Grappling Report: Ralph Gracie sentenced to prison for assault
A rundown of the biggest headlines and news from the world of competitive grappling.
Fight 2 Win put on two fantastic events one after the other last week, with F2W 160 taking place on 15th January and 161 happening on the 22nd. The first event saw William Tackett remind the world exactly why he’s one of the hottest prospects right now by beating ADCC veteran John Combs by Decision with relentless leg attacks from the bottom that really put Combs’ defensive skills to the test.
F2W 161 was then headlined by Roberto ‘Cyborg’ Abreu who continued the incredible form that saw him win a slate of awards in 2020 by defeating Tim Spriggs to retain his F2W Super-Heavyweight title. The rest of the card featured a host of elite grapplers putting on great displays, like Aaron ‘Tex’ Johnson submitting Arnaldo Maidana, Rida Haisam outworking Brendan Allen, and Jason Rau defeating Gesias ‘JZ’ Cavalcante.
Who’s Number One Announces First Event of 2021
FloGrappling routinely host the most star-studded grappling events of the year and they’ve announced the first edition of Who’s Number One in 2021 will now take place on February 26th. While they have yet to announce the lineup for the event, it’s pretty much guaranteed to feature some of the biggest names in Jiu-Jitsu as they routinely pull out all of the stops in matchmaking.
Previous Who’s Number One events have had incredible headliners like Gordon Ryan taking on fellow 2019 ADCC World Champion Matheus Diniz, or Rodolfo Vieira taking a break from his burgeoning UFC career to take on Kaynan Duarte. They also tend to stack the rest of the card with unique fights like Nicky Ryan taking on NCAA Champion Tony Ramos, or teenage prodigy Grace Gundrum facing IBJJF World Champion Mayssa Bastos.
Miha Perhavec Becomes First Black Belt Under Keenan Cornelius
It’s been a little over a year since Keenan Cornelius opened the doors on his own gym, the Legion American Jiu-Jitsu Headquarters in San Diego, and he’s already awarded the first black belt of his coaching career. The honor was given to Slovenian Judo black belt and experienced Polaris competitor with a 3-1 promotional record, Miha Perhavec, who has been with Cornelius since the very beginning of opening the academy.
Perhavec has a wealth of experience both in and out of the gi as he’s traveled all around the world to learn from the very best Jiu-Jitsu minds available. All of this was to build on a standing grappling game that would already have given many BJJ competitors fits to begin with. With a strong stable of brown belt competitors underneath him, this is likely the first of many black belts that Cornelius will be proud to award in the coming years.
Ralph Gracie Sentenced to 6 Months in Prison Assault of Flavio Almeida
The incident in question sent shockwaves throughout the BJJ community back in 2018, when Flavio Almeida was the victim of a vicious assault in front of everyone at the IBJJF no gi World Championships. It’s been a long road from there for the Gracie Barra representative and after a lengthy legal process, justice has now been served with the assailant, Ralph Gracie, facing jail time and a fine.
He was sentenced to six months in prison, a course of anger management classes, and ordered to pay a $50,000 fine earlier this week. It wasn’t long after the news broke before Ralph Gracie released his official statement on the sentencing and appeared to express regret over the decisions that led to the assault being committed, and thanked those that had supported him throughout the process.
Quick Hits
- ADCC veterans Lachlan and Livia Giles have just announced that they’re expecting a baby boy, so congratulations are in order for the happy couple!
- Umar Nurmagomedov started replicating his famous cousin by choking out his Sergey Morozov in his UFC debut, taking his professional record to an impressive 13-0.
- Both TJ Dillashaw and Juan Archuleta were recently both promoted to purple belt by Philipe Della Monica at Gracie Barra Headquarters.
- Incredibly popular Masters 7 competitor Sandi Duquette sadly passed away earlier this week after a battle with liver cancer.