Watch Gabriel Almeida's next match with Nicky Ryan to see who's Number One On May 28

Episode Transcript
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Jose Flores (00:00):
In a podcast where I get the privilege to talk to

(00:02):
the warriors and legends of themartial art world, today I am
being joined by ibjjf Americannational champion in gi and
nogi. Mr. Gabriel, Amina, Sir,how are you?

Gabriel Almeida (00:13):
I'm good. How are you?

I'm doing well, sir. Again, thank you so much
for your time. I appreciate thisis my pleasure to be here. Yeah.
So, um, to get you started youwere born in Brazil, and I don't
want to butcher the name butNiteroi Niteroi? Yeah. So tell
me more about the ROI ratio. Howwas that? Like?

It was cool.
Like it means this smaller citythan Rio is like, right next to
Rio. Right. So like, we got thebay and we were across the bay
where it Niteroi and also it'slike kinda kind of smaller part.
But it's a really cool town now.
That's not small. Also, it'spretty big, and as big as Rio,

(00:51):
but I used to go a lot to Riotwo, so it's really nice growing
up there. You know, like a lotof people live there and work in
Rio. So it's more like aresidential area. And that's
where I started training.

Okay, and how was life growing up there? Was it
easy? Was it challenging?

It was it wasn't normal. If you know if,
like I said, like, it's a it'slike, me, like, not a super big,
but like, kind of a big citytoo. You know, so it's like,
everything you get in a bigcity. So it wasn't like I moved
a lot also like but in the inthe city. You know. I love it

(01:38):
there. I miss it. It's abeautiful place. You know,
there's beaches and everything.
It's, it's awesome.

So as I talk to more people that are from
Brazil, a lot of them are theylove surfing. Do you love
surfing as well?

I do actually.
It's one of the reasons why Ilike California too, because I
get to surf you to

any any beach here that you like to go surf.

I like going to Huntington Beach. You know, it's
like the closest one that that Igo. Mostly. Yeah, but I try to
go all over the course. It'spretty cool here. Nice ways.
Yeah.

I mean, I myself, I've been living in Long Beach
my whole my whole years. Butyeah, I've actually never surfed
and I hear it's fun, but I youknow,

so much to do here too. Yeah, they just really
just going to the,

to the beach. So you didn't start jujitsu when
you were young. You started inyour teens, if I'm not mistaken.

I was like 17 to 18 or so was like almost
turning 1809

Yeah. You started under adorable flexor right.
Yeah,

that's that was my professor. He has a Jamie, my
hometown. Okay, any dairy. Sothat's where I started. And so
he's been what like now? I'm 28.
So 10, almost 11 years that Istarted.

Wow. So how did you find his place? How you came
about that place?

Actually, I so my mom used to do Taekwondo when
she was young. And she stoppedfor some reasons like for life.
And there was a point that shewanted to get back to it. Right.
So we looked for good Taekwondoschool. And that's actually
where Fletcher teachers like myprofessor. So I started

(03:25):
training, Taekwondo and that gymwith Professor Ricardo and that
jujitsu class was right after.
So it was one of those gyms likewhere you get like you find all
martial arts. So they had likeTaekwondo, they had jujitsu,
boxing, Muay Thai, you know? So,like, the Taekwondo class was
like at 7pm and 8pm. We had ajujitsu class. And sometimes I

(03:45):
would just stay and watch alittle bit. So and then like,
me, so it was me, my mom, mycousin, my brother, my other
cousin. So we all startedtechnical together. And we also
started jujitsu together likeafter a year training,
Taekwondo. We were like, let'stry to do this. I didn't

(04:07):
understand much. Becausesometimes when you look when you
don't understand what'shappening, you're like, you
know, but I, my my brotheractually gave me the idea. Hey,
let's try. Whatever. Let's goand join more than Taekwondo.
And I stopped doing Taekwondobecause of jujitsu because I
wanted to train more Jiu Jitsu.

So you only did a year of Taekwondo.

Roughly. No, actually, I did like, two, two
and a half. So I tremble, likeat the same time, so I dream one
year Taekwondo and they want tostudy jujitsu. I capture it for
a little bit because I wascompeting to a lot and travel
all over in Brazil, SouthAmerica to compete. And I kept
with Taekwondo until I decidedokay, I want to get more serious

(04:49):
in jujitsu and I'm gonna justchange you to, you know,

how was Mr. Dorado or what you said it wasn't I'm
sorry. Let me backtrack a bit.
It wasn't a bit. It wasn't thesame instructor right for tech
one. No,

no. He was like, Yeah.

Tell me more about your Taekwondo instructor How
was he was?

Yeah, so like the reason we started training
with him. So Ricardo was he wasa coach. He was one of the
coaches for the BrazilianTaekwondo national team, you
know, and his wife actually wasone of the athletes she was in
the national international team.
No way she wouldn't train withus but she was in the national
team and and that was like, oneof the main reasons that why we

(05:30):
want to get there because we sawlike, all these guys really
good. He's a good coach, becauselike, he has like national team
athletes with him. And that'swhy we wanted to start with him
like he was I mean, he was veryserious very respectful. You
know, like a lot of us you likeget a some of the things I
learned from Taekwondo inrespecting everything. I keep

(05:51):
putting my life into now. Youknow, and he didn't like very
much any move to jujitsu becauseit stopped doing any Taekwondo,
but that's life, you know, like,we move on.

Alright. Yeah, no, we don't want and just keep
training one step at a time.
Yeah. And so you met a doctor,Mr. professor, Dr. flexor. So
you started writing jujitsuright away? How was he like Mr.
Jordan? flexa.

Yeah. So like he's, and he's a really nice
guy. He's super tough in JiuJitsu. He has like, he's one of
the toughest black belts I trainin. Oh, yeah. He's super good,
especially one of those that arenot competitors. Because he was.
He was one who competed into hisBrown, he was a brown belt.

(06:38):
And he never competed in theblack belt. He competed, like
years later. But in thebeginning, he he wasn't
competing anymore. Like JC gotthe black belt into like 10
years of black belts. He nevercompeted. So but he was super
tough. Like, I got crushed byhim in training every day. And
even after I moved in, I startedtraining, more competition. Why

(07:02):
because the gym, a Niteroi,like, most of the people there,
they weren't focused oncompetition, you know, like
those guys work. And to get tothe gym at night, they just want
to do it for the hobby, youknow, and I was like, I had
another mindset, I wanted tocompete, I wanted to go hard.
And sometimes you need to trainwith people also that that had

(07:27):
that mindset. So you know, buteven after that, when I moved,
and I started training somewhereelse, whenever I would go back
and train with with Eduardo, hewould still kill me in training.
And also, he's like, one of thetoughest guys to train with
this, my friends until today,you know, we never had anything
I just moved to the other gym,just to focus on my on my dream

(07:52):
and moving here, too, you know,so his typical guy helped a lot
helped me a lot, mainly due to,you know,

yeah, no, and what you seem to have a very driven
mind. Like, your, your goal isthere you charge at it, when
what brings that to you, what,what drives you? It's really
like,

I mean, that's my life, right? So I feel like,
I got to do my best every dayand try to improve. It's not
like I'm trying to comparemyself with anyone else. Like,
that's one thing that I keep inmy mind, I don't want to be
better than anyone else, I'd beonly to be better than myself
yesterday, you know, and likethat, that constant thought of

(08:35):
improving everyday improving,getting always like 1% better.
It's it's one thing that helpsme keep going when I see like
when you see it withdevelopment, sometimes like when
you when you don't see yougrowing, you get like, pushed
back a little bit. But when yousee you're growing and growing,
you're growing. It keep kind ofmotivate motivates you to keep

(08:58):
going and keep the resilience,you know, keep working. The
consistency in training, andjujitsu, something I love to do.
And since the first day, Ienjoyed it. And as I got better,
I got better. I love competingtoo. It took me a while to
compete. My professor didn't letme compete. He was like,

(09:20):
training for eight months andpeople trained for a month and
they go compete. My professorwouldn't let me into his like,
he knew I was good to compete,you know? So, I mean, I my first
one, actually, I lost in thefinal, but I was so pumped up I
really loved it. All of the guyswho fought that went with me for
my gym. I think like I gotsecond. There's another guy who

(09:45):
got second. And yeah, but like Iwas I was so excited for like
modeling my first tournament Iwas super happy and I want to I
want to do this again. I want todo this again. So like I mean,
when you do something Love thatlike pushes you to work harder
to get better, you know, becauseyou're blessed to do what? what

(10:07):
you love to do like some people,a lot of people, they have to do
stuff they don't really like.
They work on something theydon't really like. But when you
enjoy when you enjoy what you'redoing makes it easier to
motivate. And to keep the focusand to keep pushing. Yeah,

yeah, that's, you know, that's very important,
especially after coming. Youknow, you said you play second.
A lot of people even though theyplay second, they feel like they
lost everything. So some of themthey they just up and quit or
they give up and they don't wantto try not you, you You said you
you were excited.

My first time like us, I had three fights, I
cut a lot of weight to make tomake me lightweight. He was the
only only time in my life I madetwo lightweight. Because my
cousin for two and he waslightweight. He wanted to do
featherweight, and I'm like, Oh,he's gonna be the featherweight.
I'm gonna do like but and I wasa middleweight. So I cut like 15

(11:01):
pounds in a week. Oh, I lost myfight. But I was I was doing
better than the other guy, youknow. But I got cramps because I
cut too much weight that Ishould. And I lost I ended up
like laying the guy past mygarden in the NFL was like three
to two and took him down. And westood up I think I bought and he
passed my guard again. So therewas like three to two, you know?

(11:24):
But anyway, I was like, just sohappy to be there super excited.
You know? And I just wanted todo this again.

I mean, is there any time in your in your coming
up the ranks that you felteverything just clicking
clicking? in like, okay, that'swhat this work. This is how this
works. Because normally whenpeople start off, you know,
things are just, I say like,like a Lego set. All the pieces
are scattered, scatteredeverywhere. But slowly but

(11:53):
surely you start connecting thepieces. Is there any time during
your ranks that that came about?

I think I started like, understanding more
a lot about Jiu Jitsu wasactually when I was least
focused on the competition,which was my purple belt. So I I
started as a white belt, right.
And I was doing good in thecompetitions. And then I got my
blue belt. I was a worldchampion blue belt. So I was

(12:20):
like, pushing pushing him as Imoved to my purple belt. So I
won the world championship inblue belt. I got my purple belt
and I my life focus shifted alittle bit like towards college
working, you know, and I was notfocusing so much on jujitsu. And
then I came like, I wasn't I wasin college, and I I stopped

(12:45):
college for a little bit and itcame to the US to spend like a
year here training with a friendin in South Carolina. Oh, and
they're like we study the lot.
So I at least studied jujitsu.
So I learned a lot. Especially Iwas always like, I was super
flexible. I would play guardwell, but I wasn't like very

(13:06):
aggressive. And sometimes I willlose fight because of that.
Because I would just dress on myflexibility people trying to
smash smash me, but theywouldn't pass my guard because I
was just flexible. But I didn'thave like, too much technical
knowledge, like to play guardand be offensive and also to
pass guard. So like, I think inthat time in the purple belt, it

(13:30):
was actually the time I won. Ididn't win as much I didn't win
many titles and purple belt. ButI learned a lot I learned a lot.
You know, like it was like my Ideveloped my top game I
developed my bottom game and Istarted getting more aggressive
like changing my way to behaveand also learning more about

(13:50):
like focusing, you know more.
You know, I was like they're mymy friend that I was in South
Carolina. His name is ThiagoSouza. Now he's living in Dubai,
he's running this huge teamthere called the Tino gear,
Dubai. So he was one guy whoteach me He taught me a lot on

(14:11):
how to be focused what you haveto do. How to improve your game,
how improving every aspect?
Yeah.

Wow. So I mean, from my understanding from what
what I when I did a little bitof my research, I thought you
came to California first. Butyou went to South Carolina? No,
actually,

you should come here. So I moved to check mine
in 2013. I was I was blue beltfor about a year. Okay. And I
moved to check my name Rio. So,like I said, there was a point I
was training with my partners heNiteroi and my professor flesher
he saw that like a lot ofprofessors don't see that but he

(14:53):
saw that I was like that I was Iwanted to go harder and harder
and I needed to perform, youknow, so then he told me like,
Man, you got to go trainsomewhere else where the focus
is competition with othercompetitors, you know. And then
he talked to Rico here, which isLaos brought in Rio, he messaged

(15:19):
him and said, Hey, I got astudent here. He's a great
competitor. He needs to improve,can you? Can you take him like,
and then I started going to Rioevery day. Even though we're
living in ether, right? Istarted going by bus real every
day. And training in Rio in themorning, and I will get back at
night. Trinitarian ultra in theflesh anyway, so I'll train

(15:41):
competition training in themorning at checkmat and train
like with the students at nightin a Niteroi, you know, so I
kept doing that, that for alittle while and moving to jack
ma gave me the opportunity tocome here to California, every
time there's a camp. So like,there's words the Spanish people
come from all over the worldhere, actually, to this location

(16:04):
to, to this gym. And they, theytrain together for those big
tournaments. And that's whathappened to me. So like when I
was a blue belt, my first yearof blue belt, I didn't do that.
But the second one 2014. Thatwas when I won the world
championship. I came to find thePan Am's in March, and I spent

(16:25):
three months here training forthe World Championships, right?
I got a supermodel at Debenhams.
I got the word got the goldmedal in Abu Dhabi, we're pro
and I got the gold medal in theworld championship, like just by
training here with the guys herein California, you know, and
then I got my purple belt. Thenext year I that's when I went

(16:46):
to spend a little time inCharleston, South Carolina with
my friend, you know, but that'slike how, like the progression
of how it happened. I was cominghere to California lodge
training. I already met Leo, youknow, and, and that's kind of
like how he started.

Oh, man. So explain to me a little bit about the
atmosphere. How's it like,knowing the panelists is coming?
And you have an asset? Because Ihear this a lot. How's it like
coming into a room full of thisnoise? Because a lot of people
would say this. killers. Yeah.
How's it like coming here? How'sthe atmosphere? How's the
training? How is that? I mean,that must be something once in a

(17:25):
lifetime, like, must be great.

Well, yeah.
But like, like I said, like,when I moved to check my name,
Rio, I already had thatatmosphere in my gym, you know,
so we got a lot of competitorsin. Like, most of them would
come here. And people from like,Europe would come here, people
from all over the US would comehere and do it get together, he

(17:49):
would just be like the sameroom, but on a bigger scale. So
I like I had my same room there.
A lot of people trying to killthemselves. But as we would get
here, just like we concentratetalent from all over, you know,
then I would get here with trainwith British with train with
ponza I would train with all theguys where we need everything.
And I would get smashed byeveryone just I mean, I was a

(18:12):
blue belt and to get here andtraining with all those guys
that I see them fighting andthen we need everything. Yeah,
like well, you know,and you get used to it. I mean,
like the same get used to gethis mass but you like as you get
used to it you improve to, youknow, the more you get Lisi like
iron sharpens iron, right, themore you'll get smashed, the

(18:34):
more you're like either going tobreak or you're going to get
better get tough. Yeah, tougher,like, like a diamond, right this
year about the diamond like thediamond only. You have to put a
lot of pressure on you to tocome out. So like I said, Be if
you can't hear like, if youdon't break, you're going to get

(18:57):
tough eventually, you know?
Yeah.

And I mean, of course, when you're competing
and you're in a competitionatmosphere, of course, your
skill set is just going toimprove better than I mean, just
faster, as you say than theperson who comes in here. Just
it's a hobby, and whatnot. So, Imean, you've been competing
basically all your jujitsu life.
No. What do you guys usually go100% at when you're in the

(19:27):
competition level? You guys go100% wrong. 100% Of course, you
guys are cautious, buteverything because I mean, I
don't know if you know, palagiEbell. But he says, Every time
it looks like people are likefighting

and dying in the gym. I have a dream.

Yeah. Because I mean, I've heard that it looks
like people are Well, I mean,you that you're rolling with
some and you guys are going 100%Yeah, to the outside eyes. It
looks like you guys are tryingto kill each other but you guys
are going just it's just fun foryou guys. I mean on that No fun,
but you guys are training. Yeah,

no, I mean, the the training. Like there's
always like stages of training,right. So like, you as you, you
you're doing the campi trainingin the camp like you're going
hard right? You're pushingbecause you got to push
otherwise like if you go to thecompetition and you were
training like soft you're notgoing to go hard into
competition when you train softhere. So but of course like the

(20:25):
week of the competition youstart like slowing down a little
bit, try to reduce the injuriesrecover the body, you know, but
we always like trying to go likedo our best you know, like when
you're when you're trainingthere's a lot like you never
want to lose a lot of ego likeyeah, I mean good ego, you know,
that makes you grow. And soyeah, we go we go hard on each

(20:45):
other, like, like, we're tryingto kill each other, bro. We are
friends. We shake hands, andit's all good. We'll have lunch
together.

At the end of the day. Yeah, you lose you paying
for my meal. So um, your, youryour first match as a black
belt? Do you recall that?

Yeah, my first match. So I went to this
tournament is if a divisioncalled sgg i f if he was there,
there were championship fromthat Federation. It also like
got bunch of Federation's, like,each one has their own world
championship have the main ones,which is the ibjjf. But like
that Felicia has their award, orchampionship and I went there

(21:27):
especially they had they hadlike prize money if you want Oh,
and I went there to fight Iactually like my first match. I
did actually pretty good. Iscored a few points, I'd like to
push the guy to pull the guardto guard strap him, I finished
him from the front of mine withit with cross choke, you know, I
thought I was like superconfident, you know, because

(21:50):
like I said, when you changewhen you train with the guys
here, you already training withthe black belts, you know, so,
like, I moved up, you know, inbelts, but of course, even the
level in the competition isgoing to go up too. But the
level of my training was, wasalready there. It was still like

(22:12):
the same. So then I knew I wasgonna do good. And now like I
lost in the final that firsttournament to a guy who was like
world ranked Monroe he Bomar.
And I lost to him like it waslike, one guard pass, he passed
my guard. And that was it. Youknow, but it was in the final I
won two matches and lost him inthe final. And I was like,
pretty happy with my, my firstperformance, you know, I knew I

(22:34):
could improve because sometimes,like when you find small
tournament, you can find peoplewho are not on the top level.
But if all one of the guys thatwere like, over there, like he
was winning Pan Am's he waswinning, like the biggest
tournament and I was like, Okay,this guy's the real deal. So I'm
gonna go and see how it goeswith him. That's, that's what

(22:55):
happens a lot when you find thebig names. You know, some people
get scared, they're like, Oh, myGod, I'm fighting this guy. He's
the legend, or he's, like, 10time world champion or whatever.
But you forget, like, you havenothing to lose, you just go
there like to ask yourself, ifif you're like, like I say, you
might have like, 1% of chance toor winning, but it's still 1%

(23:19):
you still got that chance, youknow. So even if you're going to
lose, make sure you sell it likefor a lot, like make, make sure
they pay a lot for that for thatloss, you know, so
after you find someone likethat, and then you feel like,
okay, it's not that big of adeal. I mean, on the super good,

(23:42):
but it's not like, I'm not somuch under the level, you know,
or I'm not even like below them,I'm just like, there. And then
you start building up confidencefor the next one, and the next
one and the next one, and you'lldo better and better and better.
You know, I fought him like acouple months ago, and I beat
him, you know, so it's like,you, you grow as you fight, you

(24:06):
know, so like, I'm sure we'regoing to fight again. And I
don't know how outcomes gonna bebut I'm always gonna do my best
to, to win the next one, youknow,

so we ready? Yeah.
Yeah, it's like a third one whenyou're on the top. A lot of
people get comfortable onceyou're on the top. So some
people they don't train as hardas they used to. In the people
coming up that mountain. They'retraining their butts off.
They're waking up extra early,or they're doing something
extra.

But yeah, you forget that like when you're on
top, like the eyes are new, youknow, people are aiming on you
and like when sometimes youdon't look down and see who's
coming. Yeah, that's true. Solike people are studying you
there. They see what you'redoing like everyday all the
time. And if you don't becareful, like they will take

(24:57):
your spot.

Yeah, and I like that mindset. I like what you
said about that, when you'refinding someone that world
champion and when not thatpeople are like, Oh my goodness,
this person is x this x that. SoI don't know if it's fear, or
it's more the respect towardsthat person. But once you're in

(25:18):
the match, I could tell that yougot all that out the window and
you and I were going to go at itright now. And I'm going to test
myself like you said,

yeah, it's really I know, like before, this
so this is what something thatchanged after I became a black
belt. Because before my blackbelt, I used to feel a lot like
that whenever I would fightsomeone that okay, this guy's
really good. And I that wouldscare me, I'll be like, Yeah, I
don't know if I can do this. Iwould like doubt myself. You

(25:48):
know, like, after after got myblack belt, I just felt like,
Man, I'm on the highest level,you know, if I don't win, so
what you know, so let's just goat it, you know, and they
suddenly that changed in mymind, like, that I started like,
focusing more on like, how, howfortunate and blessed I was for

(26:12):
being there, you know, incompeting against those guys,
rather than being scared offighting them and losing to
them, you know? So that's whatpushes me and drives me like,
I've been doing a lot of superfights against the best guys in
the world. And I never say no,like, I know, I don't want to
fight this guy. I'm always like,let's go, let's do it. Let's do

(26:33):
it doesn't matter who it is.
I'll do it. You know? Because,like I said, like, I'm just
like, I'm doing what I love. Sowhy not? You know?

Yeah, and I mean, if, if you lose things don't go
your way. You get experience outof it. Yeah, get get some get
back to

work. You can see what you what you what you
missed on Did you were youmissing like in your
conditioning, or you weremissing your technique? And your
strategy, like something, youalways gotta improve something,
there's always stuff that you'regoing to see, okay, I, I made a
mistake right here, why I gottired, or I got like, then you
can fix whatever there is tofix. You can just like get it.

(27:13):
Okay. I'm gonna work on thisnow. And then the next time is
not gonna happening. But you'regonna find another mistake, and
then you'll fix it. Yeah, yeah,that's how you build. That's how
you grow.

So is it safe to say that you look at your
matches when whether you win,lose or draw just to see where
you could, you know, improve?

Yeah, of course. Because, I mean,
whenever, whenever I win,whenever I lose, there's always
stuff to improve. So there'salways room so it's good to
watch your match. See, like,Okay, this is not that good.
Even even if I want unless Iwant my match, but I didn't
finish. And I want what wasmissing. So I could finish that

(27:51):
match. What can I do better thanbefore? You know? And then, I
mean, we keep improving, keepworking to fix those mistakes,
to improve your technique toimprove your strength to improve
your, your cardio, you know? Sothat's how you build up. Oh,
man.

Is there any tournament throughout your
career that sticks to you tillthis day that you go, I wish I
could have done better or I'mglad I did that, because that
saved me. Save my butt.

I mean, like, there's a lot of tournament's in
my life that I I'm like, I thatI remember that stick stick to
me. I mean, there's the wordchampionship that I want.
There's like, there's sometournaments where I lost by a
little bit then dad, like, kindalike us some sometimes, like I

(28:44):
remember, like, I should havedone something different, you
know? What I mean? I wouldn'thave done something different
because I already did it. So Ican only look forward, you know,
but like, after your sir, afteryou after it's passed, like, I
mean, it's like I said, he'spassed, if like, you fix those

(29:04):
mistakes, you'll learn with itand you'll move on. Even like
you can see it in your titlesbecause like you said, like when
you're in the top, people arelooking at you, they're going
hungry, so we got to lookforward. Gotta look towards the
next one, and the next one, thenext one. But I have like,
there's a bunch of tournament'sthat I, I have in my life that I

(29:24):
mean, I really like toparticipate. DCC You know, it
wasn't the best performance. Butyou were something like I was
super glad to participate. Iwant to do the next one too. So
I'm like, trying to build up theranking so I can get invited
next time. And I the trials thatI want to participate in all

(29:45):
those World Championships that Ifought, like, every every time I
learn something and also like,at every tournament, there's
like, a lesson or like whenyou're losing, there's always a
lesson something you can improveAnd that's what I try to
remember. Like, what? What can Itake in this tournament as a

(30:09):
lesson for the next one? Youknow, so I don't he doesn't
happen. Yeah.

All right. And you obviously trained in gi and
nogi. So you started off withgeek correct? Yeah, I started
with the GI. Did you find thetransition to be easy with nogi?

No. Like, he was like, Martin. In the
beginning, I used to train thathappens a lot in Brazil here in
the US people have the wrestlingculture. So people already have
a lot of understanding about thenogi right. So when he was a
little bit different, because Ihad no previous previous

(30:47):
grappling experience, so Ididn't know much and whenever I
would change from ghee to nogimy game would translate because
I would trust a lot of my gripsin the game, you can get grips
you know, gay, so all that wouldbe kind of loss and I wouldn't
play guard very well. I didn'thave like, the knowledge I
needed to, to. To fight well, weknow gi right. Any results like

(31:12):
that a lot of people they trainall year with the ghee. And we
have like the biggest tournamentyou have in Brazil right now. No
geats the Brazilian nationals,alright. And people would train
like, a nogi for a month, justfor the month before the
tournament. And once thetournament is gone, they stop
training nogi so that's what Iwould do to you know, so it's in

(31:33):
October, like end of October, sobeginning of October with start
training, okay, between therefor a month, and go compete.
That happened a lot. And I cameto the US and started wrestling.
And I started learning more.
Mike gnocci Gaming proved a lotand every time I fought the
Brazilian nationals after, afterthat, after I came here, I won.

(31:54):
So I won in purple belt. Oncethough, sorry, I won twice in
the purple belt, and one in thebrown belt. You know, so I won
three times the Braziliannational, like, so it was like,
every time I fight, I wonbecause like, I knew my level
like win so much higher thanbefore. And that that I mean, I
was doing super good, you know,and that I did really good in

(32:18):
those tournament. But like,after I flew out there, got my
black belt. I decided like Iwant to participate in the adcc
so then I charted focus a lotmore into nogi I did my first
nogi words, I was so wellprepared. He was I was supposed
to fight him to brown belt Leocame to me, Hey, I'm giving you
the black coat and like, Whatwhat? And then like, Yeah, he

(32:40):
just he just told me that I'mgoing to give you the back but
like, you know, week or so like,and you're gonna fight no yours
in the Blackboard. And I'm like,Okay, let's do it away. And I
won my first match. I lost thesecond one, made some mistakes.
And was like learning, you know.

(33:02):
And then after this, I startedlike training a lot more, a lot
more, and I won the atcc trials.
You know, I focused like Ithought like, my year net 2019
was when the ADC happened, thiswas this is going to be my adcc
year. So I'm going to train fora DCC. So I trained for the
trials, I want the trials,submitted four out of six
fights. And then I kept trainingnogi I went to the adcc they're

(33:28):
good, I kept training, then Iwant you to know your world
championship and as a black beltI got in the final one, the last
two. But like, Yeah, I got asilver medal in the world
championship. There's a like Isaid, there's a lot of mistakes
from that match that I know Icould have. I could I already
improved a lot of what I missedon that match. You know, but

(33:52):
like I said, My nogi gameimproved a lot after I got my
black belt like actually after Istarted coming to the US and
spending time here and training.
More like wrestlingunderstanding more about how it
works in nogi Yeah,

wow. So now that you know I mean, I take it you
go to Brazil and and train overthere from time to time. Do you
give those guys a littletraining or the help them out a
little bit? Because obviously,you know, like you said, it's
just different atmosphere herewith the wrestling and
everything.

Oh, yeah, no, of course, like a lot to help.
So whenever like people ask mestuff, whenever I go there,
they're like people have thethey usually prefer to train the
ghee. You know, they don't trainthe nogi as much. But whenever
we do train nogi I try to givegood tips try to help them out.
You know, boy, if any of theyear anything I learned here I

(34:44):
like to share with my friendsthere. And also with the
students, sometimes I have toteach a class I get to teach a
class in in jack Missouri or Iget to teach a class in my in my
hometown. So

that's amazing. And now that you Taste to both both
gi and no gi. Do you have anypreference? Or do you like them
both equally?

I do enjoy both. I'm enjoying a lot more no
gays. And so my because of myfights coming up and also
because like here, we've beengetting a lot more attention
with the nogi you know? But I doenjoy both. But right now in
this moment, I'm more like kenanogi mood.

And that's right, because you have a fight coming
up. That's correct.

Yeah, actually, next week. I'll be going to
Austin next week. I'm fightingNiki Ryan, who's number one, so
it's gonna be pretty cool,

Nick, you're right.
That sounds familiar. It's

got Gordon and Ryan's brother.

Oh, okay.

Unknown (35:43):
Yeah.

Wow. That's so how how long do you prepare take for
yourself along detail. Okay, I'mgonna have X time to prepare
half like how much time do youtake to prepare I should say

I wouldn't say like I prepare only to this
fight. I mean, we do add somestrategy and I always of course
like watch my opponents fightingso I know what to do so I can
know what to expect it's easieron the super fights to do that
rather than just a tournamentwhere there's like 100 people in

(36:21):
and you can like just watcheveryone so but I don't I'm
always like different from likeMMA and other sports like MMA is
the guys who they fight likeonce or twice a year sometimes.
So then you get like a threemonth gap and you rest and

(36:44):
they're like you get like onethree months three four months
camp and it see here you know,in jujitsu, like we tend to stay
always ready to like to have tostay always right of course,
like sometimes we take a littletime off just to recover the
injuries but you have to planyourself like okay, this is
gonna be my little time off liketwo weeks maybe not off off

(37:08):
because I live from it, youknow, so but I train like less
harder you focus more on justlike the techniques you know, so
you can like like a vacation orsomething but we can't just stay
always ready you know that thecalendar not never stops is
always tournament's whenever youthink like, okay, all the storm,
it's going to pass, I'm going torest and then like someone calls

(37:29):
you, hey, there's a super fightcoming for you. And I'm like,
Okay, let's do it. I'm ready.
Training, you know, so we keeptraining every day. We train
like Monday through Saturdayhere every day, like every week,
and we can't like we don'treally slow down, like, unless
there's no fights, which is notnormal. You know, like, I've
been fighting like pretty muchlike every month, once or twice

(37:49):
a month, you know? So I've beengetting just, I'm always ready.
I'm just like getting betterevery time that's the thing.

That is so then in there, I mean, obviously 2020
threw a big wrench into yourplans. However now I see the
tournament's are coming back up.
I see everything's coming backto someone normalcy. So Texas is
your next big one. Do you knowthe date for them? And do you
know how people could watch it?

Yeah, so it's gonna be on May 28 in Austin,
Texas. It's going to be streamedso if people are not in Texas
they can't watch it. There'sgoing to be streamed live on
flow grappling so they can signup for flow grappling. And yeah,
but if they want to go there,they can buy tickets to go watch

(38:41):
it too. They're selling onEventbrite can check their
website there the the name ofthe event is always number one.
We've got a bunch of bunch ofpeople here from the you
actually got three athletes fromthe gym here. Fighting spatty
fontas me and Luis bonza there'salso another gift from checkmate
and geotarget fighting. But he'she's in Austin, he lives there.

(39:03):
So the team is going like strongfor this tournament, you know,
for this event. And I mean,we're excited to go Oh,

that sounds exactly Well, Mr. I made it any I'll
before we leave any words youwould like to say, too, I mean,
I know you said you had somesponsors and whatnot. Oh yeah. I

just want to thank my sponsors. You know,
like I got Keiko sports whosupports me with my GIS in my my
gear for competition you know, Iam sponsored by just roll to
give me like the gear to likethe clothes and like nogi stuff
to fair sports. For the TAFEwhenever my fingers are hurt

(39:44):
they helped me out I also likemuscle hammer. It's like one of
those massage guns recovery. Oh,super good. Yeah, it was it all
the time whenever I I finishedtraining or like just don't want
to loosen up my body helps me alot too. I got my condition and
training when you shouldn'ttrainer either if you are doing

(40:05):
my nutrition is out of you knockyou. And yeah, those are the
guys who actually helped me andalso the gym like a check my
team who always was always thereto help me get prepared my coach
love your everyone.

Yeah. Thank you so much. I mean, even for myself
you have, to me at least youhave a very driven mindset. And
I like how you come across, evenat a last year, still excited
that you went to the tournamentand you see it as an experience
that that's me today. Tell me alot. I mean, because, as I said,

(40:41):
a lot of people take a lossreally hard and they sometimes
they just go down.

You never want to lose the conference. Like
whenever I lose, I get mad I Iwant to cry I go to I don't want
to talk to anyone, you know, I'mlike, I try to stay in my spot.
But also, like, there's a momentwhere you get sad because of the
loss. And there's the momentafter that, where you focus

(41:05):
Okay, what what can I get fromit? Okay, what can I improve
from that, you know, to makesure it isn't happening. So it's
there's always a learn with lossof hoarsely disbarred. It's part
of the suffering, I hate losing,you know, I don't want to lose,
I don't want to lose, no, youknow, but, like, it's important
to not just like, try to push itaway and let it go, but try to

(41:28):
get it and focus in, okay, whatcan I get from that? Oh, how am
I gonna improve there? You know,otherwise, you just keep making
the same mistakes, you're gonnalose again, because of the same
reason and the same reason thatfrustrates you. Because you're
not, you're not fixing thatmistake, and you keep doing it.
Like when you do it once, okay,when are they twice? Yeah. You
see, like, three, four times thesame mistake. You're not doing

(41:51):
something to get better, youknow, so there's always ways to
get better. So it's important tolook back what we did before
and, and grow from it. Okay,

well, let's try that. Again. Thank you so much.
I love doing this. I appreciateit. So much, ramita. Everyone
out there. Thank you for tuningin. We'll catch you next time.
Bye bye.

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Gabriel Almeida | jiu-jitsu black belt | IBJJF Champ & top competitor of his generation

Watch Gabriel Almeida's next match with Nicky Ryan to see who's Number One On May 28

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