Esdras Jr talks 2020 and mantaining his resolve in the face of a pandemic. Photo: IBJJF/Facebook

Esdras Jr had a good year competing in 2020, despite the whole world having to come to grips with the covid-19 pandemic. The black-belt from Ares BJJ won some big IBJJF titles and saw his jiu-jitsu evolve and his career take off as a professional of the sport.

At 30, the featherweight is taking stock of his victories and his evolution attributed to the training provided by Osvaldo Queixinho and company in Arizona.

“My evolution is due to my daily dedication, to my studying jiu-jitsu,” said Esdras, a sitting no-gi champion of the American Nationals and gi and no-gi champion of the San Jose Open. “I’ve been dedicating myself to studying jiu-jitsu more, I’ve been eating better, and I’ve been training my mind to be positive when the scenario isn’t a good one like, for example, was the year 2020.”

He added: “Learning from Queixinho makes me a more intelligent athlete and makes me progressively more prepared to fight in any competition. I’m loving this process, which generated good results in the last season.”

During said season, Esdras injured a knee, resulting in his exit from the Pan, which was held in October in Florida. Because it was the only big event held by the federation in the second half of the year, Esdras had to deal with the frustration of not fighting in order to recover faster. He said: “Injuries are part of the sport. Of course no one expects it to happen, but I think it’s during these troubled times that we have the opportunity to do some good work on our psychology.

“During this last year, especially when I was injured, I was trying to keep my mind focused on that which was within my reach and particularly on the aspects I could control, like nutrition, physiotherapy, technical training and mental training. I can say that in the past season I learned that giving it your best on the hard days makes all the difference. It makes your mind progressively more heavily armored.”

And thus he fought and won at the American Nationals. “After having injured myself right before the Pan and gone two months without training, I resumed my training with practically three weeks to go and managed to fight well,” he said. “Claiming the championship was the best feeling I had after having gone through all these obstacles. It was soul-cleansing — it was a very delicious win.”

Next up, Esdras is likely to compete at the Dallas International Open in March as he looks to climb the IBJJF rankings.

Olympic Wrestling took over the cover of GRACIEMAG in 2000

The wrestling community woke up today with some really sad news.

The Olympic Committee decided not to include the sport in the list of 25 modalities that are guaranteed to be in the 2020 Summer Olympics.

With that, wrestling will have a last chance to make the list at a presentation for the International Olympic Commitee Board, in St. Petersburg next May.

2012 Olympic gold medalist in wrestling Jordan Borroughs commented on the news.

“Needless to say I’m beyond saddened at the news of wrestling’s removal from the Olympic Games starting in 2020,” Burroughs posted on his Facebook page. “This is no time to be sad though. We need to come together as a community and realize that this is beyond gold medals. These are the dreams of millions of boys and girls across the world at stake. Don’t stop dreaming and don’t stop believing. Save Olympic Wrestling.”

His comments reverberated through social media channels and started the “Save Olympic Wrestling” campaign.

Wrestling worldwide ruling entity also released an statement on the matter. It reads:

“FILA was greatly astonished by today’s recommendation of the IOC Executive Board not to maintain wrestling among the 25 core sports for the 2020 Olympic Games. FILA will take all necessary measures to convince the IOC Executive Board and IOC members of the aberration of such decision against one of the founding sports of the ancient and modern Olympic Games. FILA has always complied with the IOC regulations and is reprensented in 180 countries, with wrestling being the national sport in a fair amount of them and the only possibility for athletes to represent their country at the Olympic Games, thus contributing to their universality. The FILA Bureau will meet in Phuket (THA) on 16-17 February and will address this issue in view of the presentation of wrestling in front of the IOC Executive Board in St-Petersburg next May.”

While we wait for further developments in the matter, GRACIEMAG brings back one of the most important moments of olympic wrestling.

The video below shows the up to 130kg division final match of the 2000 Olympics, in Sydney. Russian Alexander Karelin was after his forth gold medal and also defending the title of undefeated athlete in international matches. His adversary was American Rulon Gardner.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9yiCuX1hV8