BJJ Worlds' History - 1999

Still the underdog
Comprido surprises Roleta and Zé Mario and takes the title


Comprido twists Roleta’s foot in a move not often seen in 1999.

Roberto Roleta is the favorite against the recently-promoted to highest-rank, Rodrigo Comprido. That Sunday evening, July 23rd, nearly Monday, it was up to the two finalists to decide the black-belt open class division, as well as the single most important title of the competition for their teams.  For the second year in a row, after almost eight-hundred fights, the last one would determine the team rankings for the World Championship.

As in the previous year, Gracie Barra and Alliance fought for first place, and depended only on the victory of their athletes in the final fight. In 1998, Rolles Gracie was disqualified in the open class purple-belt division and saw Fernando Tererê’s Alliance become champion. Now, there was no punishment, but the result is still surprising. With a standing americana, a rare move for 1999, Comprido made Roleta tap quickly and went over to the endearment of the few teammates that had stuck around till the end of the evening at the Tijuca Tênis Clube to celebrate Alliance’s second win, who didn't hesitate to toss the man responsible for their success into the air.


Royler with his mouth hanging open against Leo Santos, in his last World Championship.

Comprido had just come off a loss to Paulão Filho in the heavyweight category, and needed to convince the Alliance instructors if he wanted to participate in the open class category. He managed to convince them, and, before facing Roleta, showed his prowess by defeating the previous year's open class champion, Zé Mario Sperry, by one advantage. At the other side of the bracket, Roleta has a hard fought fight with a fighter from Bahia who the black-belts are quite unfamiliar with: Rodrigo Minotauro, who was competing in his only championship having been promoted to the highest level, and moved to the world of MMA. The engineer’s victory came in the form of a judge’s decision, after a tie of 4 to 4 in points.

With his elbow twisted, the two-time open class champion of 1996/97, Amaury Bitetti, didn't even go to the stadium in 1998, frustrated with not being able to try for the triple. In 1999, when he finally appeared, the pecking order had changed. He did not fight in the open class division. And, in his weight category, outdone by Roleta, who managed to do, with surprising ease, what no one ever had: sweep one of the athletes with the best base competition Jiu-Jitsu has ever seen. Meanwhile, besides the unexpected defeat in the open class final, Roleta would suffer another setback that day, hours before. He lost to Saulo Ribeiro by two advantages in the middleweight category final. It was a fight Saulo had run through over and over in his head before taking it to the mat, where the whole building watched the project unfold standing. He pulled guard along with Roleta and got on top. Advantage. He feigned a foot lock, got another advantage, and pulled guard again. From then on, he controlled the scorecards and outdid his rival  for the first time (the only time in the Worlds).


Murilo works on passing Gurgel’s guard.

Saulo’s teacher, Royler Gracie, consecrated himself as five-time lightweight champion. On the way there adversaries fell in hotly disputed fights: Soneca, Leonardo Santos, Leonardo Vieira. The fight with Nova União's Leo was a series of sweeps from both parties, with shouts from the outside and disputes in some positions in the balanced confrontation. But with Vieira, in the decisive fight, Royler was tactical and cold. Instead of trying to stand in the closed guard that had beaten Feitosa in the previous fight, Gracie didn’t get up, and tried to open it by putting pressure on the knee. Nothing happened. He didn’t free himself from the legs, nor did  Leo come close to throwing him off balance, and what could have been a great fight was overshadowed by what occurred thereafter: the title and, we would find out later, the appearance in World Championships for the one elected by athletes to be the best in Jiu-Jitse in the 1990s.

And if Vieira, this time at a lower weight, would not face his greatest rivals, Vitor Shaolin and Márcio Feitosa, it is fitting that these two should meet in the deciding lightweight fight. One take down for Feitosa, one sweep for Shaolin. The score is tied, one advantage would decide the victory for the Nova União athlete, the first time they met in the Worlds, and the fourth in their careers, at that point.


Paiva hugs Atalla’s shoulders and assures he wins the middleweight gold.

In the middleweight category, Alexandre Paiva would come out on top. In the very last fight of the category that had Jean Jacques Machado, Ricardo Cachorrão, Eduardo Jamelão, Haroldo Cabelinho and Rafael Gordinho, Paiva applied a takedown on Roberto Atalla and scored two points to win a title he had been chasing for years. Chasing the gold also sums up Murilo Bustamante's victory, in the heavyweight division. In previous years, he comes up against Saulo, Roleta and Gurgel. And it was against the later one, by advantage, that he won his last fight, the semifinal. On the other side, he opened the way for Paulão Filho, who, as mentioned, would beat Comprido.


Roleta and the first time Bitetti is thrown off balance in competitions.

A lot is said about the fight between Roleta and Minotauro in the open class division that year, but the fact is that Roberto Traven also beat the man from Bahia, and closed the division with Leonardo Castello Branco. Traven remembers how he made such na effort, but so much effort, that the moment the fight was standing again, he saw two adversaries.


Leo Leite annuls one of Sperry’s reversal attempts.

Sperry, as with Roleta, would lose a second time in 1999, before the semi-final against Comprido. It was in the fight for the super-heavyweight gold, against Leonardo Leite, that he managed to avoid the grips of Carlson’s athlete and imposed his game on top; Sperry barely managed to adjust his guard and was always in an uncomfortable position on the bottom. Six years later, he pointed out a technical error in his presentation. It was too late. Tactics was the greatest weapon this new crop of athletes had, as Comprido showed at the very end of that Sunday night. And it proved to be again the following yeat.