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The Gracie Family History
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Mitsuyo
"Count Koma" Maeda
Maeda was born in 1878 in a small town called
Aomori, located north to the Japanese island of
Honshu and known for its freezing winters. As
poverty assailed the region at the end of the
19th century, many inhabitants would move to
Tokyo or other cities to try and make money and
escape the cold. This was not the case for young
Maeda, who remained there till 1886, when he
finally moved to the capital. While he resided
in Aomori, he went to Hirosaki School, of the
local elite, where he was known as the
“sumo-kid,” because of his fascination for the
art his father had taught him. And, of course,
for the several fights he would win against
school mates.
As he arrived in Tokyo, Maeda started going to
one of the country’s most traditional schools
and, later, entered a high-class university,
nowadays called Waseda, and acknowledged as a
great teaching centre. There he was taught the
techniques of classical Jiu-Jitsu. Later on, he
would knock on the door of Kodokan, a famous
Judo academy that works to this day and at the
time was already deemed the best martial arts
centre in Japan. |
The eventual master and founder of the academy, Jigoro
Kano, was a studious man who gathered many styles of
ancient Jiu-Jitsu to create Judo, whose apex was reached
in 1964, when it began to appear in the Olympic Games,
in Tokyo. But that would happen long after Maeda’s day.
At that time, Kano had just modified the art and left
out the the elements and techniques and striking
inherited from the samurais, who used to learn fighting
techniques for when their swords broke in the
battlefields. An art, therefore, bereft of the rules
which characterize today’s Judo – and Jiu-Jitsu.
In that period, fights were
held every month at Kodokan. It is suspected
that Maeda practiced hard for months before
premiering in these competitions, for he didn’t
want to risk doing badly in them. On December
25, 1898, he finally made his first (and
amazing) demonstration at the academy. Wearing a
white belt, he easily beat five or six opponents
and was immediately promoted to purple-belt.
That same day, while the westerns celebrated
Christmas, Maeda would go on to defeat more and
more adversaries until, after overcoming 15
fighters in a row, he was granted the first
degree of the black belt. There began the
trajectory of an incredible competitor.
A man of average build, measuring 5’6’’ and
weighing 150lb, Maeda wasn’t quite what one
would call intimidating. He loved drinking sake,
singing, and wouldn’t back off whenever
challenged to fight on the street. He wouldn’t
take long to take or knock down the naïve
challenger. Constantly evolving, he was promoted
to the third degree in 1901 and became a Judo
instructor at the Universities of Tokyo, Waseda
and Gakushuin. |
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In 1904, Master Jigoro Kano
summoned prodigy-pupil Maeda to travel to the
United States in order to propagate Judo. Before
the “ambassador” left, he received the fourth
degree by the hands of his professor.
Mitsuyo Maeda left the Yokohama port in
November, arriving in San Francisco, California,
soon before the en of the year. At the time,
North-Americans already knew a bit about
Japanese martial arts, since president Theodore
Roosevelt, was a big fan of the Japanese people
and its culture – he even had a Jiu-Jitsu tutor
called Yamashita. In order to improve their
self-defense, some American military men were
already learning the art at their headquarters.
But to demonstrate the efficacy of the “new” art
created by Kano, Maeda and his mates were
appointed to fight the Americans and prove the
Japanese superiority. In the famous military
school of New York, Maeda faced a football
player who also practiced wrestling. After
falling inside the guard, his back to the floor,
which in wrestling rules would mean he lost,
Maeda continued the move and ended it with an
arm lock. The Americans didn’t accept the
submission and proposed a new challenge, this
time against Maeda’s mate, an experienced
student of Kano’s called Tomita. The Yankees
believed facing Tomita would be a greater honor,
because he was a more experienced fighter
(actually, Tomita was much more of a professor
than a fighter). |
Unfortunately, Tomita was embarrassingly defeated, for
his opponent managed to transpose his legs and
immobilize him. This was too much for Maeda, who decided
to separate from Tomita and establish himself in New
York, where he maintained himself by taking part in
underground challenges. In the first of these, in front
of a wrestler a foot taller and who liked to be called
“The Butcher,” Maeda knocked the adversary down several
times before finishing with an arm lock. Three fights
and three wins later, Maeda decided to challenge the
world heavyweight boxing champion, Jack Johnson,
considered by some specialists to be the best boxer of
all time. Thus the Japanese began the tradition that
would be followed by the Gracies of challenging the
boxing champion of their day (Helio challenged Joe
Louis, whereas Rickson aimed at Mike Tyson). The boxers
also created a tradition of their own: that of never
responding to such challenges
Three years later, in 1907, Maeda went to the United
Kingdom, where he won 13 more fights, then heading to
Belgium, where again he won. He went back to America,
this time to Cuba. There he reigned undisputed. He
achieved no less than 15 victories, plus four when he
passed by Mexico. And this is only the fights with
official records. If we count street challenges, in Cuba
alone we are talking something like 400 bouts.
Since he parted from Tomita, in the USA, Maeda had
become independent and, in his travels, he insisted on
calling his art Jiu-Jitsu. This choice may have come
from the fact that, before entering Kodokan, he was
already familiar with classical Jiu-Jitsu, and probably
used in his fights many of the moves Jigoro Kano had
banned in creating Judo. Naturally, Kodokan’s strict
principles wouldn’t approve of Maeda’s challenges, and
this may have been another reason for the adoption of
the name Jiu-Jitsu.
After traveling the world in
1910, Mitsuyo Maeda went to Santos, Brazil. He
stayed for little time there, establishing
himself in Belem, after traveling to the UK, New
York and Cuba, where he at times used the name
Yamoto Maeda (“Yamoto” is an ancient word for
“Japan”). But it was only in Spain that he
became known as Count Koma, name of the
Jiu-Jitsu academy he founded in Belem. In his
academy, Maeda would teach Jiu-Jitsu to
immigrants, as a form o self-defense technique.
In the early 1920s the already famous count was
involved in an attempt from the Japanese
government of founding a colony in northern
Brazil, where Koma met a man of great political
influence called Gastao Gracie, whose
forefathers had immigrated from Scotland. Their
friendship grew, until one day Gastao asked
Maeda to teach Jiu-Jitsu to his son Carlos.
Maeda died November 28th, 1941, aged 63. It is
estimated he fought from one to two thousand
combats, without losing a single one of them.
Many Japanese immigrants and Brazilian friends
attended his funeral and thanked the master.
Maeda’s body was buried at Santa Isabel
cemetery, in Belem, Brazil. Jiu-Jitsu, on it’s
hand, more alive than it has ever been. |
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CARLOS GRACIE
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The Gracie’s first arch-enemy was no Japanese, but one
tough native. In the early 1900s, little Carlos,
grandson of a Scottish immigrant who had set up his home
in Para, Belem’s capital, didn’t think twice before
challenging a wide-eyed, sharp-nailed opponent. One
would often see the kid play catch with an alligator
that lived in the river nearby. Gracie would always take
the edge: Carlos-Gracie curious and owner of a keen
sense of observation, Carlos had noticed the reptile
couldn't see under water, only swam in a straight line,
and had to stick its head out in order to make turns. By
simply getting out of the direction of the animal’s
teeth, Carlos would always win.
Born on September 14th, 1902, Carlos was the first
family member to make contact with the martial art that,
in all of the blooming century, would be bound to the
name Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, thus, was Carlos’s life (and vice
versa) ever since his father, Gastao, trying to canalize
the energy of the boy who seemed limitless, made him
learn a new fight style with a Japanese friend of his,
Mitsuyo Maeda, a.k.a. Count Koma. At 14, thus, Carlos
began a saga that, to the whole world’s
surprise, would pervade academies and rings
across the planet. |
Or could
anyone guess? “Out of all pupils Koma taught, and they
weren’t few, as he used to travel the world teaching,
only one fully understood the grandeur of that
knowledge, adopting Jiu-Jitsu as a profession. Carlos
had, since the very beginning, a good idea of the thing
he was learning.
No wonder he created a school that’s been lasting 80
years. Indeed, when Carlos became acquainted with Count
Koma’s techniques, in 1916, the young Gracie was still a
developing personality, much like Belem, which worked as
an entrance to Brazil, with influence of European and
Japanese cultures, and on the other hand was nearly
wild, with Indians, woods and rivers where the fearless
would play.
At age 22, Carlos Gracie started to make a living out of
Jiu-Jitsu. It was the time of challenges published on
newspapers (“Want a broken rib? Look for Carlos Gracie,”
one of them read). Carlos didn’t look like a fighter,
but like a chess player. He’d go to training in police
academies. As they thought nothing of him, he had to
demonstrate the efficiency of the art he believed in,
that Jiu-Jitsu could do miracles and that he himself was
a good fighter. Carlos was always against associating
Jiu-Jitsu with violence. Of course, in the beginning
Carlos would place the ads and challenge those huge
stevedores because, in the 1930s, there was the need of
establishing an identity. That was when such comments
began: ‘The Gracies are invincible.’ ‘The Gracies settle
businesses with their bare hands”.
But each historical moment is different. When, in the
seventies, Jiu-Jitsu became a sport, there was no more
need to prove anything. It’s like today, when fighting
or not fighting MMA starts being a personal choice;
there is no longer the need there was in the times of
Carlos and Helio, when they had to prove Jiu-Jitsu’s
efficiency in the ring.
One of the greatest heritages Carlos left was the power
of discipline and will . He was never seen go by a day
without exercising and meditating.
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Nothing, however, deserved the family’s gratitude more
than the nutrition method elaborated by Carlos Gracie,
for years, based on studies and thousand of experiments.
After making his children, nephews and grandchildren
listen to their bodies and eat exclusively what is
beneficial to the organism, it’s no exaggeration today
to say that the last half decade meant 50 years of
success of the Gracie Diet, whose basic principle is to
avoid the excessive acidity in the nutrition, which to
its creator was the main cause of the organism’s
deterioration and consequent malfunction of organs.
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Thus the diet endeavors to keep the meals’ PH as neutral
as possible, balancing substances by using the right
combination. Notwithstanding, reducing Carlos’ science
to this would be disregarding much of his work – He
anticipated many of the much-divulged discoveries of
today, like carotene’s beneficial role, a substance
found in the papaya and the carrot, the concept of free
radicals and orthomolecular medicine, not mentioning his
pioneering role regarding the habit of consuming acai,
watermelon juice, coconut water, vitamins. And, when
nobody spoke of nutrition, he noticed how useful it was
to cut off red meat before Helio’s fights, since meat
gives you explosion power, but not long term resistance. |
The interest for life and nutrition, like everything
else in the descendant of Scottish, was not random.
Together with growing suspicion toward traditional
medicine, the specialist of the blooming art noticed the
need to, with the diet, look after the main work tool,
the body. Carlos Gracie, indeed, made four or five
famous fights, the last of which against Rufino, in
1931, and another one – pure vale tudo (or ‘no rules,’
if you will) – in Rio de Janeiro, against capoeira
practitioner Samuel. At one point Samuel saw himself
with no choice but to grab Carlo's testicles. The most
famous one, nevertheless, was another Japan vs.. Brazil
classic, held in Sao Paulo, in 1924. Against Geo Omori,
self-proclaimed Japanese Jiu-Jitsu representative,
Carlos made his most memorable fight. Nearing the end of
the third three-minute round, Gracie gave the foe’s arm
an inexorable lock and looked at the referee, who told
him to go on. Carlos broke the opponent’s arm, but the
latter paid no heed and gave an unfocused Carlos a
takedown, before the end of the fight, which ended with
a draw and mutual respect by the contenders, in a time
when fighters only lost bouts by tapping or passing out.
Legend has it, however, that the most unforgettable
scene was played by rooters from Sao Paulo, who threw
their hats into the ring as soon as the Brazilian broke
the foe’s limb. For one thing is to apply it when the
other guy is unfocused, but Carlos would warn
beforehand, ‘I’m going to beat you by armbar,’ and the
opponent would shrink their arm. Then he developed a
technique of getting to the arm when the adversary knew
they were going to be armbarred. That was the beginning
of the perfecting of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, characterized
by leading the foe to erring, where the weaker can
defeat the stronger.
In the later years of his life, when he paid more and
more attention to meditation after living a life of
action. He was the guru but not in a restricted sense:
he symbolized the values, the philosophy, the thinking
and the greatness of the Jiu-Jitsu project.
In fact there’s a reason for the connection most people
draw between religion and Carlos Gracie. Besides being
always a highly valued subject for Master Carlos and
being one of the most evident facets of his life in the
90’s, spirituality and mysticism was responsible for
some delicious anecdotes Carlos lived.
Once he was visiting a dear friend of the family, Luzita,
who just had a handicapped baby. They were chatting and
Luzita was holding her baby when she noticed that Carlos
was carefully looking at the child. She asked what he
was thinking about and the Master said: “You can be cool
because your son is going to achieve everything he wants
in life. This handicap is not going to get in his way at
all, much to the contrary.”
Said and done: the baby was Jean Jacques Machado, future
Jiu-Jitsu phenomenon and ADCC world champion. Many
believed Carlos to be a psychic. The result of that were
not only benefits and wise advice for the whole family.
There were also warnings that were taken for granted in
the name of love.
In personal matters such as his eating habits and the
evolution of Jiu-Jitsu, the great Master really seemed
to know which way to follow and anticipated a lot of
what was to come.
Since then the Gracie family has brought up three
generations of fighters and instructors who now help
spread the family knowledge to the rest of the world.
HELIO GRACIE
“ HE BECAME A NATIONAL HERO FOR MEMORABLE FIGHTS,
AGAINST ADVERSARIES WEIGHING OVER 100 KGS, HIMSELF
WEIGHING ONLY 60 KG, AS WAS RECORDED. PEOPLE CAME FROM
JAPAN. FIGHTS WITHOUT RULES, ASTONISHING. "A TIME WHEN
THE NEWSPAPERS DID NOT HAVE MUCH TO WRITE ABOUT," THE
CHARACTER HIMSELF JUSTIFIES. THE WRITER DRAWS HIS OWN
CONCLUSIONS.”
Helio.gifIt was only one round, lasting three hours and
forty-five minutes. There has never been and will never
again be a fight like that one. Not even animals fight
for so long. I had an ear infection, 38 degree (100
degrees Fahrenheit) fever, was 42 years of age and
weighed 60kg. He was 23 and weighed 88kg. It was so bad
that, in the end, I got dizzy and passed out. Some say
he kicked me, others say it was a punch, and my corner
threw in the towel".
Over 45 years have gone by since the episode, but its
main character talks of the outcome with admirable
clarity. It was an historical battle, which marked the
end of fighting career of grand master Helio Gracie, the
man who dedicated over 70 years of his life to
Jiu-Jitsu’s development.
Spring of 1951. We are talking about a half-century ago,
when a team of Japanese fighters, sponsored by the
Jornal São Paulo Shimbum (São Paulo Shimbum Newspaper),
that included the Jiu-Jitsu champions Kato and Kimura,
went to Brazil. The latter, number one in the Land of
the Rising Sun, had gone undefeated for 13 years. The
scheduled fight was between Helio Gracie and Kato. “They
came to beat me, they were the favorites,” remembers
Helio. “They arrived with the reputation of being
champions of the world, and in such a way that I could
not even intend to beat them. I was from Brazil, and was
curious about their Jiu-Jitsu. I wanted to lose to
Kimura, not to Kato. But he said: ‘You are very light,
and what I will do to you, Kato can do.’ As I had that
conviction that there was no way the guy could get me -
I was under the impression my Jiu-Jitsu was invincible
-, and my brother Carlos argued: “Helio, fight this
Kato, because you will win and get to fight twice rather
than once” “and I ended up accepting the fight.”
The fight took place in the brand new Mario Filho
stadium, the Maracanã, the biggest stadium in the world,
built for the Soccer World Cup of the previous year. It
was the 6th of September, and the ‘O Globo’ newspaper of
the day posted Helio’s declaration on the first page:
“Today I will carry out my greatest endeavor, which is
to face an element of such tremendous prestige as Kato,
5th degree black belt of only 22 years of age.” It
happened that, one week earlier, Helio had fractured two
ribs, during a training session. But he did not want to
postpone the fight, “I’ll fight any way I can. Nobody
will say I’m running away.” Helio declared.
The fight ended in a draw, after three ten minute
rounds. Helio insisted on saying he took a beating, by
suffering more than 20 take downs. The newspapers at the
time interpreted it differently. “So we arrive at the
end of the first round, without seeing the Japanese
fulfill his promise of winning easily and Helio, cold as
ice, is already familiar with his adversary's moves. And
Kato was only not beaten by pulling his attacker out of
the ring, which provoked boos from the audience." (O
Globo September 7th, 1951).
The fact is that Kato himself was not satisfied and
proposed a revenge match, which took place in São Paulo
on the 29th of the same month. Five days earlier, Helio,
accompanied by his brother Carlos and student Pedro
Hemeterio, left for the capital of the state by car. But
not without first declaring: “I know what I will face.
I duly studied Kato’s possibilities, and I can give this
warning: victory, this time, is in my plans.” As we will
see in greater detail ahead, the result was no different
but the Brazilian’s performance was impressive, despite
Helio having been 17 years older and 15 kilos lighter.
Helio was then coming close to ending his career as a
fighter, but continued to be the answer to the test of
the fundamental enigma of martial arts: “How do you
defeat a bigger and stronger opponent?”
 The answer started to unfold in Rio de Janeiro during
the 20s, when Carlos Gracie opened his first Gracie Jiu-Jitsu
academy, in Rio de Janeiro. The family doctor had
prohibited Helio from frequenting the academy, because
of his frequent fainting spells and dizziness. “Nobody
knew what it was. If I saw blood, I fainted; if I heard
moans, I would pass out; I even fainted in a church,
when I went to pray," he tells. "I didn't like Jiu-Jitsu,
but I didn't have anything else to do except watch
Carlos' classes," relates the master who, as time went
by, was promoted by a student, to the status of
instructor. "One day, Carlos was late, and a student
arrived for his class. I was just a little bugger and
ventured an offer to teach him what was on the program
for the day. I did what Carlos did and answered as he
would have answered. I knew everything by heart, like a
parrot. Mario liked my performance and, when Carlos
arrived, asked if he could have his classes with me from
then on. My brother, who was tired, thought it was
great," he recalls.
Helio would gain, all at once, a profession and a
problem. “I started out wanting to just repeat
everything Carlos did, but I couldn't. So I did it my
way. It’s like a strong guy that can lift a car with his
hand. I would need a tire-jack. And that was how I
created the Jiu-Jitsu of today," said the teacher,
without knowing exactly how. "I don't know because I
didn't do it using intelligence, I did it by instinct.
It’s like when you are sitting and cross your legs
because you are tired of the position. You do it without
thinking. In the same manner, I perfected the technique,
without deserving any credit, as it was necessary for e.
When I discovered the trick, I practiced it," he tells.
So the older brother, to truly test Helio, set up a
fight against Antonio Portugal, a boxer.
untitled.bmpDespite not being able to hide his
excitement with making his public debut – “Carlos asked
me something and I wanted to respond but couldn’t, my
voice wouldn’t come out,” he recalls – Helio won in
seconds, with an armbar.
Next came his first Japanese opponent, Takashi Namiki, a
black belt from the famous Kodokan school, in Tokyo. The
two met in the João Caetano Theater and Helio almost
broke Namiki’s arm in the 5th round. The time for the
fight was up, and even though Helio had mounted, he had
to swallow the draw.
Then came the American giant Fred Ebert, in November of
1932. After 110 minutes of fighting, the police broke up
the battle. "Holding any kind of spectacle after 2 AM
was prohibited," recalls Helio, who had punished his
opponent. "My elbows were black like the sole of a shoe,
from elbowing him in the face so much. That was when I
got famous," states Gracie.
 In 1934, he faced the Japanese Miaki and Polish Wladek
Zbyszko. The first went to challenge the Brazilian's
powerful choke. Miaki could tie a rope around his neck
and resist strangulation from two people pulling it, as
he would demonstrate in public. Helio didn't believe it,
as he remembers: "In the beginning of the fight, I sunk
both my hands deep into his neck, the way I liked to.
The guy let me and started choking me, from within my
guard. I almost passed out and had to let the hold go.
The round was thirty minutes long and I kept an eye on
the big clock of the stadium until there was only five
minutes left. I stuck my hand in his throat again, he
wanted to get up, I stuck my foot in his belly and
mounted him. The Japanese reversed, I kept squeezing and
advised the ref: ‘He’s out'. ‘But he didn’t tap Gracie,
don’t let go,’ the ref responded. I pushed the guy aside
and he was sleeping. He defecated in the ring and almost
died.”
The fight against the wrestler Wladek was a draw, after
three ten minute rounds. “The fight was dull, because it
was a sport fight, with no kicks or punches, and since
the guy was almost 120 kg, he was in my guard the whole
time. But he got tired, enough that I asked to extend
the fight and he didn't accept,” Helio recounts.
The next year there were two important fights. The
first, in February of ’35, was against the Brazilian
Greco-Roman wrestling champion Orlando da Silva, in an
MMA fight. “Dudu”, as he was known, had challenged
George, one of Helio’s brothers, but the fight ended up
not happening because they added the rule that being
pinned would count as a submission, determining the
winner.
George left the ring. "So Carlos sent me in to accept
the terms. They set up the fight and I almost killed
that Dudu. It was my most violent fight," said the
teacher.
And he described the battle: "At a certain point, I
kicked him in the mouth and two teeth popped out. When I
faked another kick, he covered his face and I got him in
the ribs. He fell down knocked out.” It was 19 minutes
of fighting, after which, according to the newspapers,
Dudu urinated blood from his kidneys.
 Towards the end of 1953, Helio would meet the Japanese
Yassuiti Ono, in the most difficult Jiu-Jitsu battle of
his career, as the master himself evaluates it: "Even
though he wasn't the best of them all, it was with him
that I suffered the most. What happened was that nobody
knew how the guy fought, and he arrived in Brazil saying
he could fight all five Gracies the same night.
The fight started and he squashed me so badly I didn't
know where I was. When the round ended, I couldn't see,
my vision went dim and I told Carlos I was going to
faint. He took me to the edge of the ring and gave me.
something to drink. I woke up and stood up, dead tired.
In the second round, I started to figure out how he
worked, but he was still quick, he didn't stop while
between my legs. He tried everything but just couldn’t
mount me. I was dominated. At the end of the third
round, he messed up and I caught him in a choke,
squeezed, he stood up, trying to resist the hold, but I
held it. The bell rang, I let go of the hold, and he
fell down unconscious. (laughs) He was saved by the
bell! They came in the ring, woke up the Japanese, and
he skipped out on the 20 remaining minutes.”
 Adversaries had already become scarce, and in the year
1936, Helio faced two Japanese fighters, Takeo Yano and
Massagoishi. The latter had already been warned of
Gracie’s terrible choke and tapped out to an armbar. “We
got wrapped up, he messed up and I mounted. I went for
his neck, the Japanese raised his arm and I got it. He
went nuts. This was the only Japanese I beat easily",
the teacher observed.
In the beginning of the 40s, I opened my own academy and
started making money,” says Helio, who taught there for
a few years, until he opened an academy in downtown Rio
with his brother. The gym was colossal. There I had up
to 600 students a month," he brags. 1950 came around,
the year before the Japanese delegation arrived with
Kato and Kimura. Helio was retired, but as he was
looking to make his return, he warmed up with two
Brazilians that challenged him. The first one was beaten
in four minutes. Three months later, a report from a
local newspaper brought the following news: “in a quick
encounter of two minutes and ten seconds, Helio Gracie
leaving him unconscious by choke out.”
Kimura
Then came the Japanese, in ’51. Helio faced Kato, in the
Maracanã stadium, and left for São Paulo, where the
fighters met at the Pacaembu stadium. His famous choke,
that would seem simple were it not for the number of
techniques he would use to set it up, went to work, and
the Japanese fighter went to sleep.
Two days later, arriving in Rio, described the end of
the fight to the newspaper “O Globo" “(…) He didn’t
realize that my other hand was right on the hem of his
gi. We were, however, both trying for the choke, both
with the hold set up (…) I realized the Japanese let go
to defend his neck. I tightened the choke and Kato
started to pass out, loosening his grip on my wrists.
“It was the greatest feeling in my life,” he said at the
time, and confirms this today: “It is true, because I
proved my Jiu-Jitsu was better than his.”
 With the failure of his compatriot, Kimura invaded the
ring and challenged Gracie, exactly as Carlos predicted
he would. In the heat of the moment, they agreed that
the fight would start on the ground. He also said that
if Helio could resist for more than three minutes, he
would give him the title of champion. Neither thing
happened. But the fight did. And the Maracanã once again
served as the setting for the greatest Brazilian fighter
to perform, on October 23 of that year.
This time, a record gate was established: 339 thousand
cruzeiros, with the vice-president of the republic, Mr.
Café Filho, in attendance, not taking his eyes off the
fight even under the drizzle.” If the accomplishment is
today incredible, imagine in the middle of the century,
when there were different parameters. One need only see
that much more recently, in the fight where Muhammed Ali
defeated George Foreman, in 1973, Ali, in his best shape
and peak in his training, as described by Norman Mailer
in "The fight", ran three and a half kilometers during
his last training session. Today, the distance is
considered minimal.
 The newspapers say that Helio walked four kilometers, a
petty distance for a Kimura boasting the physique and
preparation of an athlete. The absolute lord of Japan.
And even so Gracie resisted the Japanese machines peak
for over 13 minutes (an Olympic judo fight is five
minutes, and wrestling is at most nine), when he was
caught by his opponent’s greatest weapon, an arm twist
that provoked Carlos to throw in the towel, as he feared
his brother could be crippled.
I knew how to defend it so well that I escaped from the
hold several times during the course of the fight." In
the final move, there was controversy. "Carlos threw in
the towel and Kimura let go of the hold, but the referee
didn't recognize it and ordered us to go on fighting. It
would have been foul play’ so I told Queiroz (Eusebio de
Queiroz, the referee of the fight) the victory was his.
I didn’t tap, but I was glad Carlos stopped the fight,
because I was very tired.”
 So Helio, as he announced he would before the event,
retired. He started his own clan, of nine children and
28 grandchildren, and went on, in another field, to do
as much work as possible for the development of Jiu-Jitsu.
Helio had announced his retirement after the big fight,
and started dedicating himself to the administration of
what was, according to him, the greatest Jiu-Jitsu
academy of all times. “There has never been and will
never be anything like it,” says the master with pride.
“Although Rorion’s gym in California is more spacious,
the Rio Branco organization was a business. It took up
the whole floor of the building, with five rings and 100
private lessons per day. We had 600 students per month
for over 20 years.
Waldemar Santana
 Among the employees, the marbler Waldemar Santana stood
out. “I remember the day he showed up at the gym.” tells
João Alberto Barreto, who the master pointed out as his
best instructor at the time. “Years later, when we were
already at Rio Branco, he left the faucets running one
Friday the water had been turned off and, on Monday, the
mats were soaked. He got told off horribly by the master
and left, then frequenting the academy only as a
sparring-partner," Barreto clarifies.
Waldemar would turn out to be a character in the story
of the longest fight Helio ever fought: a fight that
lasted 3 hours and 40 minutes and interrupted the
master’s retirement, on the 24th of May, 1955. “Waldemar
had already been with me for five years, and some months
before our fight he came to me saying he had a fight
lined up at the Palácio de Alumínio ("the Aluminum
Palace"), where worked fights would take place. “He said
he had already signed the contract and I said he should
either desist or I would be obliged to kick him out of
my house. And that is what happened,” he relates.
From then on the press took it upon itself to fuel the
discord. “A malicious journalist got a declaration from
him saying I wasn't all that. I didn't like that and
demanded he retract the statement, he didn't take it
back and I came back from retirement, from one day to
the next," tells the instructor.
“Carlson, Helio’s nephew, was the first to invade the
ring, lifting his unconscious uncle and
waldemar.bmpcarrying him, on his shoulders, to the
infirmary.” Helio’s brother Carlos did not hide his
anger in the declarations he made to “ O Globo” : “Don’t
think my explanation is whining. It is much to the
contrary, I wish to, so as to not let my declarations be
exploited, state right off the bat that Waldemar fought
well and his victory cannot be contested by any means,"
he said frankly. He added: “However, one must recognize
that Helio only entered the ring as a question of honor,
without having trained once for it. My brother
understood that he could not run away from this fight
with his ex-student.
It was not a question of winning but a question of
proving that a Gracie does not run away from any
challenge. Helio wanted to show that cowardliness has
never passed the doors of our academy. For over five
years, Helio prepared Waldemar, one of his favorite
students. He was, at that time, a model of humility and
dedication, but they filled his head with ideas of
grandeur and, when we least expected it, he repeated a
common behavior, the creature rose up against his
creator. Waldemar wanted headlines and got them by
challenging precisely the one that taught him to fight.”
 The master himself, who carried no animosity towards his
ex-disciple (“He continued treating me well,” he
remembered), analyzed the fight: “The fear and the
respect he had for me kept him from attacking, and he
ran away the whole time. I, weak, could not go after
him. So I waited for him to attack me, to get him with a
counter-attack, which was my forte. That is why it took
so long.” Helio took a surprise beating, from an ear
infection and a 102 degree fever. And even so he fought
for almost four hours. Afterwards, Carlos proposed a
revenge match against Carlson or against Helio himself,
to Waldemar. And he accepted a fight against Carlson.
Carlson Gracie avenges Helio’s defeat by punishing
Valdemar with standing punches, strikes from the guard
and elbow-blows from the mount. A massacre that lasts 39
minutes and 20 seconds, until the “Black Leopard” leaves
the ring and his second, journalist Carlos Renato,
throws in the towel.
Helio now lives in a ranch in Itaipava, Rio de Janeiro
and often travels to the USA and Japan to teach seminars
and be present with his sons when they compete.
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