Jose Flores: 0:00

In a podcast where I get the privilege to talk to the warriors and legends of the martial art world, today I am being joined by ibjjf American national champion in gi and nogi. Mr. Gabriel, Amina, Sir, how are you?

Gabriel Almeida: 0:13

I'm good. How are you?

Jose Flores: 0:14

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

Gabriel Almeida: 0:31

It was cool. Like it means this smaller city than Rio is like, right next to Rio. Right. So like, we got the bay and we were across the bay where it Niteroi and also it's like kinda kind of smaller part. But it's a really cool town now. That's not small. Also, it's pretty big, and as big as Rio, but I used to go a lot to Rio two, so it's really nice growing up there. You know, like a lot of people live there and work in Rio. So it's more like a residential area. And that's where I started training.

Jose Flores: 1:08

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

Gabriel Almeida: 1:13

It was it wasn't normal. If you know if, like I said, like, it's a it's like, me, like, not a super big, but like, kind of a big city too. You know, so it's like, everything you get in a big city. So it wasn't like I moved a lot also like but in the in the city. You know. I love it there. I miss it. It's a beautiful place. You know, there's beaches and everything. It's, it's awesome.

Jose Flores: 1:45

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

Gabriel Almeida: 1:51

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

Jose Flores: 1:58

any any beach here that you like to go surf.

Gabriel Almeida: 2:01

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

Jose Flores: 2:12

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

Gabriel Almeida: 2:23

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

Jose Flores: 2:27

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

Gabriel Almeida: 2:34

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

Jose Flores: 2:40

Yeah. You started under adorable flexor right. Yeah,

Gabriel Almeida: 2:42

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

Jose Flores: 2:57

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

Gabriel Almeida: 3:01

Actually, I so my mom used to do Taekwondo when she was young. And she stopped for some reasons like for life. And there was a point that she wanted to get back to it. Right. So we looked for good Taekwondo school. And that's actually where Fletcher teachers like my professor. So I started training, Taekwondo and that gym with Professor Ricardo and that jujitsu class was right after. So it was one of those gyms like where you get like you find all martial arts. So they had like Taekwondo, they had jujitsu, boxing, Muay Thai, you know? So, like, the Taekwondo class was like at 7pm and 8pm. We had a jujitsu class. And sometimes I would just stay and watch a little bit. So and then like, me, so it was me, my mom, my cousin, my brother, my other cousin. So we all started technical together. And we also started jujitsu together like after a year training, Taekwondo. We were like, let's try to do this. I didn't understand much. Because sometimes when you look when you don't understand what's happening, you're like, you know, but I, my my brother actually gave me the idea. Hey, let's try. Whatever. Let's go and join more than Taekwondo. And I stopped doing Taekwondo because of jujitsu because I wanted to train more Jiu Jitsu.

Jose Flores: 4:25

So you only did a year of Taekwondo.

Gabriel Almeida: 4:28

Roughly. No, actually, I did like, two, two and a half. So I tremble, like at the same time, so I dream one year Taekwondo and they want to study jujitsu. I capture it for a little bit because I was competing to a lot and travel all over in Brazil, South America to compete. And I kept with Taekwondo until I decided okay, I want to get more serious in jujitsu and I'm gonna just change you to, you know,

Jose Flores: 4:53

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 the same instructor right for tech one. No,

Gabriel Almeida: 5:00

no. He was like, Yeah.

Jose Flores: 5:02

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

Gabriel Almeida: 5:06

Yeah, so like the reason we started training with him. So Ricardo was he was a coach. He was one of the coaches for the Brazilian Taekwondo national team, you know, and his wife actually was one of the athletes she was in the national international team. No way she wouldn't train with us but she was in the national team and and that was like, one of the main reasons that why we want to get there because we saw like, all these guys really good. He's a good coach, because like, he has like national team athletes with him. And that's why we wanted to start with him like he was I mean, he was very serious very respectful. You know, like a lot of us you like get a some of the things I learned from Taekwondo in respecting everything. I keep putting my life into now. You know, and he didn't like very much any move to jujitsu because it stopped doing any Taekwondo, but that's life, you know, like, we move on.

Jose Flores: 6:05

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 jujitsu right away? How was he like Mr. Jordan? flexa.

Gabriel Almeida: 6:18

Yeah. So like he's, and he's a really nice guy. He's super tough in Jiu Jitsu. He has like, he's one of the toughest black belts I train in. Oh, yeah. He's super good, especially one of those that are not competitors. Because he was. He was one who competed into his Brown, he was a brown belt. And he never competed in the black belt. He competed, like years later. But in the beginning, he he wasn't competing anymore. Like JC got the black belt into like 10 years of black belts. He never competed. So but he was super tough. Like, I got crushed by him in training every day. And even after I moved in, I started training, more competition. Why because the gym, a Niteroi, like, most of the people there, they weren't focused on competition, you know, like those guys work. And to get to the gym at night, they just want to do it for the hobby, you know, and I was like, I had another mindset, I wanted to compete, I wanted to go hard. And sometimes you need to train with people also that that had that mindset. So you know, but even after that, when I moved, and I started training somewhere else, whenever I would go back and train with with Eduardo, he would still kill me in training. And also, he's like, one of the toughest 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 and moving here, too, you know, so his typical guy helped a lot helped me a lot, mainly due to, you know,

Jose Flores: 8:02

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

Gabriel Almeida: 8:14

I mean, that's my life, right? So I feel like, I got to do my best every day and try to improve. It's not like I'm trying to compare myself with anyone else. Like, that's one thing that I keep in my mind, I don't want to be better than anyone else, I'd be only to be better than myself yesterday, you know, and like that, that constant thought of improving everyday improving, getting always like 1% better. It's it's one thing that helps me keep going when I see like when you see it with development, sometimes like when you when you don't see you growing, you get like, pushed back a little bit. But when you see you're growing and growing, you're growing. It keep kind of motivate motivates you to keep going and keep the resilience, you know, keep working. The consistency in training, and jujitsu, something I love to do. And since the first day, I enjoyed it. And as I got better, I got better. I love competing too. It took me a while to compete. My professor didn't let me compete. He was like, training for eight months and people trained for a month and they go compete. My professor wouldn'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 the final, but I was so pumped up I really loved it. All of the guys who fought that went with me for my gym. I think like I got second. There's another guy who got second. And yeah, but like I was I was so excited for like modeling my first tournament I was super happy and I want to I want to do this again. I want to do this again. So like I mean, when you do something Love that like pushes you to work harder to get better, you know, because you're blessed to do what? what 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 they don't really like. But when you enjoy when you enjoy what you're doing makes it easier to motivate. And to keep the focus and to keep pushing. Yeah,

Jose Flores: 10:23

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

Gabriel Almeida: 10:41

My first time like us, I had three fights, I cut a lot of weight to make to make me lightweight. He was the only only time in my life I made two lightweight. Because my cousin for two and he was lightweight. He wanted to do featherweight, and I'm like, Oh, he's gonna be the featherweight. I'm gonna do like but and I was a middleweight. So I cut like 15 pounds in a week. Oh, I lost my fight. But I was I was doing better than the other guy, you know. But I got cramps because I cut too much weight that I should. And I lost I ended up like laying the guy past my garden in the NFL was like three to two and took him down. And we stood up I think I bought and he passed my guard again. So there was like three to two, you know? But anyway, I was like, just so happy to be there super excited. You know? And I just wanted to do this again.

Jose Flores: 11:32

I mean, is there any time in your in your coming up the ranks that you felt everything just clicking clicking? in like, okay, that's what this work. This is how this works. Because normally when people start off, you know, things are just, I say like, like a Lego set. All the pieces are scattered, scattered everywhere. But slowly but surely you start connecting the pieces. Is there any time during your ranks that that came about?

Gabriel Almeida: 11:59

I think I started like, understanding more a lot about Jiu Jitsu was actually 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 the competitions. And then I got my blue belt. I was a world champion blue belt. So I was like, pushing pushing him as I moved to my purple belt. So I won the world championship in blue belt. I got my purple belt and I my life focus shifted a little bit like towards college working, you know, and I was not focusing so much on jujitsu. And then I came like, I wasn't I was in college, and I I stopped college for a little bit and it came to the US to spend like a year here training with a friend in in South Carolina. Oh, and they're like we study the lot. So I at least studied jujitsu. So I learned a lot. Especially I was always like, I was super flexible. I would play guard well, but I wasn't like very aggressive. And sometimes I will lose fight because of that. Because I would just dress on my flexibility people trying to smash smash me, but they wouldn't pass my guard because I was just flexible. But I didn't have like, too much technical knowledge, like to play guard and be offensive and also to pass guard. So like, I think in that time in the purple belt, it was actually the time I won. I didn't win as much I didn't win many titles and purple belt. But I learned a lot I learned a lot. You know, like it was like my I developed my top game I developed my bottom game and I started getting more aggressive like changing my way to behave and also learning more about like focusing, you know more. You know, I was like they're my my friend that I was in South Carolina. His name is Thiago Souza. Now he's living in Dubai, he's running this huge team there called the Tino gear, Dubai. So he was one guy who teach me He taught me a lot on how to be focused what you have to do. How to improve your game, how improving every aspect? Yeah.

Jose Flores: 14:21

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

Gabriel Almeida: 14:33

you should come here. So I moved to check mine in 2013. I was I was blue belt for 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 he Niteroi and my professor flesher he saw that like a lot of professors don't see that but he saw that I was like that I was I wanted to go harder and harder and I needed to perform, you know, so then he told me like, Man, you got to go train somewhere else where the focus is competition with other competitors, you know. And then he talked to Rico here, which is Laos brought in Rio, he messaged him and said, Hey, I got a student here. He's a great competitor. He needs to improve, can you? Can you take him like, and then I started going to Rio every day. Even though we're living in ether, right? I started going by bus real every day. And training in Rio in the morning, and I will get back at night. Trinitarian ultra in the flesh anyway, so I'll train competition training in the morning at checkmat and train like with the students at night in a Niteroi, you know, so I kept doing that, that for a little while and moving to jack ma gave me the opportunity to come here to California, every time there's a camp. So like, there's words the Spanish people come from all over the world here, actually, to this location to, to this gym. And they, they train together for those big tournaments. And that's what happened to me. So like when I was a blue belt, my first year of blue belt, I didn't do that. But the second one 2014. That was when I won the world championship. I came to find the Pan Am's in March, and I spent three months here training for the World Championships, right? I got a supermodel at Debenhams. I got the word got the gold medal in Abu Dhabi, we're pro and I got the gold medal in the world championship, like just by training here with the guys here in California, you know, and then I got my purple belt. The next year I that's when I went to spend a little time in Charleston, South Carolina with my friend, you know, but that's like how, like the progression of how it happened. I was coming here to California lodge training. I already met Leo, you know, and, and that's kind of like how he started.

Jose Flores: 17:05

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 I hear this a lot. How's it like coming into a room full of this noise? Because a lot of people would say this. killers. Yeah. How's it like coming here? How's the atmosphere? How's the training? How is that? I mean, that must be something once in a lifetime, like, must be great.

Gabriel Almeida: 17:29

Well, yeah. But like, like I said, like, when I moved to check my name, Rio, I already had that atmosphere in my gym, you know, so we got a lot of competitors in. Like, most of them would come here. And people from like, Europe would come here, people from all over the US would come here and do it get together, he would just be like the same room, but on a bigger scale. So I like I had my same room there. A lot of people trying to kill themselves. But as we would get here, just like we concentrate talent from all over, you know, then I would get here with train with British with train with ponza I would train with all the guys where we need everything. And I would get smashed by everyone just I mean, I was a blue belt and to get here and training with all those guys that I see them fighting and then we need everything. Yeah, like well, you know, and you get used to it. I mean, like the same get used to get his mass but you like as you get used to it you improve to, you know, the more you get Lisi like iron sharpens iron, right, the more you'll get smashed, the more you're like either going to break or you're going to get better get tough. Yeah, tougher, like, like a diamond, right this year about the diamond like the diamond only. You have to put a lot of pressure on you to to come out. So like I said, Be if you can't hear like, if you don't break, you're going to get tough eventually, you know? Yeah.

Jose Flores: 19:01

And I mean, of course, when you're competing and you're in a competition atmosphere, of course, your skill set is just going to improve better than I mean, just faster, as you say than the person who comes in here. Just it's a hobby, and whatnot. So, I mean, you've been competing basically all your jujitsu life. No. What do you guys usually go 100% at when you're in the competition level? You guys go 100% wrong. 100% Of course, you guys are cautious, but everything because I mean, I don't know if you know, palagi Ebell. But he says, Every time it looks like people are like fighting

Gabriel Almeida: 19:42

and dying in the gym. I have a dream.

Jose Flores: 19:45

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 trying to kill each other but you guys are going just it's just fun for you guys. I mean on that No fun, but you guys are training. Yeah,

Gabriel Almeida: 20:03

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 training in the camp like you're going hard right? You're pushing because you got to push otherwise like if you go to the competition and you were training like soft you're not going to go hard into competition when you train soft here. So but of course like the week of the competition you start like slowing down a little bit, try to reduce the injuries recover the body, you know, but we always like trying to go like do our best you know, like when you're when you're training there's a lot like you never want to lose a lot of ego like yeah, I mean good ego, you know, that makes you grow. And so yeah, we go we go hard on each other, like, like, we're trying to kill each other, bro. We are friends. We shake hands, and it's all good. We'll have lunch together.

Jose Flores: 20:53

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

Gabriel Almeida: 21:06

Yeah, my first match. So I went to this tournament is if a division called sgg i f if he was there, there were championship from that 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, or championship and I went there especially they had they had like prize money if you want Oh, and I went there to fight I actually like my first match. I did actually pretty good. I scored a few points, I'd like to push the guy to pull the guard to guard strap him, I finished him from the front of mine with it with cross choke, you know, I thought I was like super confident, you know, because like I said, when you change when you train with the guys here, you already training with the black belts, you know, so, like, I moved up, you know, in belts, but of course, even the level in the competition is going to go up too. But the level of my training was, was already there. It was still like the same. So then I knew I was gonna do good. And now like I lost in the final that first tournament to a guy who was like world ranked Monroe he Bomar. And I lost to him like it was like, one guard pass, he passed my guard. And that was it. You know, but it was in the final I won two matches and lost him in the final. And I was like, pretty happy with my, my first performance, you know, I knew I could improve because sometimes, like when you find small tournament, you can find people who are not on the top level. But if all one of the guys that were like, over there, like he was winning Pan Am's he was winning, like the biggest tournament and I was like, Okay, this guy's the real deal. So I'm gonna go and see how it goes with him. That's, that's what happens a lot when you find the big names. You know, some people get scared, they're like, Oh, my God, I'm fighting this guy. He's the legend, or he's, like, 10 time world champion or whatever. But you forget, like, you have nothing to lose, you just go there like to ask yourself, if if you're like, like I say, you might have like, 1% of chance to or winning, but it's still 1% you still got that chance, you know. So even if you're going to lose, make sure you sell it like for a lot, like make, make sure they pay a lot for that for that loss, you know, so after you find someone like that, and then you feel like, okay, it's not that big of a deal. I mean, on the super good, but it's not like, I'm not so much under the level, you know, or I'm not even like below them, I'm just like, there. And then you start building up confidence for the next one, and the next one and the next one, and you'll do better and better and better. You know, I fought him like a couple months ago, and I beat him, you know, so it's like, you, you grow as you fight, you know, so like, I'm sure we're going to fight again. And I don't know how outcomes gonna be but I'm always gonna do my best to, to win the next one, you know,

Jose Flores: 24:14

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

Gabriel Almeida: 24:35

But yeah, you forget that like when you're on top, like the eyes are new, you know, people are aiming on you and like when sometimes you don't look down and see who's coming. Yeah, that's true. So like people are studying you there. They see what you're doing like everyday all the time. And if you don't be careful, like they will take your spot.

Jose Flores: 24:57

Yeah, and I like that mindset. I like what you said about that, when you're finding someone that world champion and when not that people are like, Oh my goodness, this person is x this x that. So I don't know if it's fear, or it's more the respect towards that person. But once you're in the match, I could tell that you got all that out the window and you and I were going to go at it right now. And I'm going to test myself like you said,

Gabriel Almeida: 25:26

yeah, it's really I know, like before, this so this is what something that changed after I became a black belt. Because before my black belt, I used to feel a lot like that whenever I would fight someone that okay, this guy's really good. And I that would scare me, I'll be like, Yeah, I don't know if I can do this. I would like doubt myself. You know, like, after after got my black 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 go at it, you know, and they suddenly that changed in my mind, like, that I started like, focusing more on like, how, how fortunate and blessed I was for being there, you know, in competing against those guys, rather than being scared of fighting them and losing to them, you know? So that's what pushes me and drives me like, I've been doing a lot of super fights 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 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. So why not? You know?

Jose Flores: 26:45

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

Gabriel Almeida: 26:52

work. You can see what you what you what you missed on Did you were you missing like in your conditioning, or you were missing your technique? And your strategy, like something, you always gotta improve something, there's always stuff that you're going to see, okay, I, I made a mistake right here, why I got tired, or I got like, then you can fix whatever there is to fix. You can just like get it. Okay. I'm gonna work on this now. And then the next time is not gonna happening. But you're gonna find another mistake, and then you'll fix it. Yeah, yeah, that's how you build. That's how you grow.

Jose Flores: 27:22

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?

Gabriel Almeida: 27:29

Yeah, of course. Because, I mean, whenever, whenever I win, whenever I lose, there's always stuff to improve. So there's always room so it's good to watch your match. See, like, Okay, this is not that good. Even even if I want unless I want my match, but I didn't finish. And I want what was missing. So I could finish that match. What can I do better than before? You know? And then, I mean, we keep improving, keep working to fix those mistakes, to improve your technique to improve your strength to improve your, your cardio, you know? So that's how you build up. Oh, man.

Jose Flores: 28:08

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

Gabriel Almeida: 28:21

I mean, like, there's a lot of tournament's in my life that I I'm like, I that I remember that stick stick to me. I mean, there's the word championship that I want. There's like, there's some tournaments where I lost by a little bit then dad, like, kinda like us some sometimes, like I remember, like, I should have done something different, you know? What I mean? I wouldn't have done something different because I already did it. So I can only look forward, you know, but like, after your sir, after you after it's passed, like, I mean, it's like I said, he's passed, if like, you fix those mistakes, you'll learn with it and you'll move on. Even like you can see it in your titles because like you said, like when you're in the top, people are looking at you, they're going hungry, so we got to look forward. Gotta look towards the next one, and the next one, the next one. But I have like, there's a bunch of tournament's that I, I have in my life that I mean, I really like to participate. DCC You know, it wasn't the best performance. But you were something like I was super glad to participate. I want to do the next one too. So I'm like, trying to build up the ranking so I can get invited next time. And I the trials that I want to participate in all those World Championships that I fought, like, every every time I learn something and also like, at every tournament, there's like, a lesson or like when you're losing, there's always a lesson something you can improve And that's what I try to remember. Like, what? What can I take in this tournament as a lesson for the next one? You know, so I don't he doesn't happen. Yeah.

Jose Flores: 30:14

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

Gabriel Almeida: 30:26

No. Like, he was like, Martin. In the beginning, I used to train that happens a lot in Brazil here in the US people have the wrestling culture. So people already have a lot of understanding about the nogi right. So when he was a little bit different, because I had no previous previous grappling experience, so I didn't know much and whenever I would change from ghee to nogi my game would translate because I would trust a lot of my grips in the game, you can get grips you know, gay, so all that would be kind of loss and I wouldn't play guard very well. I didn't have like, the knowledge I needed to, to. To fight well, we know gi right. Any results like that a lot of people they train all year with the ghee. And we have like the biggest tournament you have in Brazil right now. No geats the Brazilian nationals, alright. And people would train like, a nogi for a month, just for the month before the tournament. And once the tournament is gone, they stop training nogi so that's what I would do to you know, so it's in October, like end of October, so beginning of October with start training, okay, between there for a month, and go compete. That happened a lot. And I came to the US and started wrestling. And I started learning more. Mike gnocci Gaming proved a lot and every time I fought the Brazilian nationals after, after that, after I came here, I won. So I won in purple belt. Once though, sorry, I won twice in the purple belt, and one in the brown belt. You know, so I won three times the Brazilian national, like, so it was like, every time I fight, I won because like, I knew my level like win so much higher than before. And that that I mean, I was doing super good, you know, and that I did really good in those tournament. But like, after I flew out there, got my black belt. I decided like I want to participate in the adcc so then I charted focus a lot more into nogi I did my first nogi words, I was so well prepared. He was I was supposed to fight him to brown belt Leo came to me, Hey, I'm giving you the black coat and like, What what? And then like, Yeah, he just he just told me that I'm going 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 the second one, made some mistakes. And was like learning, you know. And then after this, I started like training a lot more, a lot more, and I won the atcc trials. You know, I focused like I thought like, my year net 2019 was when the ADC happened, this was this is going to be my adcc year. So I'm going to train for a DCC. So I trained for the trials, I want the trials, submitted four out of six fights. And then I kept training nogi I went to the adcc they're good, I kept training, then I want you to know your world championship and as a black belt I got in the final one, the last two. But like, Yeah, I got a silver medal in the world championship. There's a like I said, there's a lot of mistakes from that match that I know I could have. I could I already improved a lot of what I missed on that match. You know, but like I said, My nogi game improved a lot after I got my black belt like actually after I started coming to the US and spending time here and training. More like wrestling understanding more about how it works in nogi Yeah,

Jose Flores: 34:07

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

Gabriel Almeida: 34:23

Oh, yeah, no, of course, like a lot to help. So whenever like people ask me stuff, whenever I go there, they're like people have the they usually prefer to train the ghee. You know, they don't train the nogi as much. But whenever we do train nogi I try to give good tips try to help them out. You know, boy, if any of the year anything I learned here I like to share with my friends there. And also with the students, sometimes I have to teach a class I get to teach a class in in jack Missouri or I get to teach a class in my in my hometown. So

Jose Flores: 34:58

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

Gabriel Almeida: 35:06

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

Jose Flores: 35:27

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

Gabriel Almeida: 35:30

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

Jose Flores: 35:39

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

Gabriel Almeida: 35:41

got Gordon and Ryan's brother.

Jose Flores: 35:42

Oh, okay.

Unknown: 35:43

Yeah.

Jose Flores: 35:44

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

Gabriel Almeida: 36:00

I wouldn't say like I prepare only to this fight. I mean, we do add some strategy and I always of course like watch my opponents fighting so I know what to do so I can know what to expect it's easier on the super fights to do that rather than just a tournament where there's like 100 people in and you can like just watch everyone so but I don't I'm always like different from like MMA and other sports like MMA is the guys who they fight like once or twice a year sometimes. So then you get like a three month gap and you rest and they're like you get like one three months three four months camp and it see here you know, in jujitsu, like we tend to stay always ready to like to have to stay always right of course, like sometimes we take a little time off just to recover the injuries but you have to plan yourself like okay, this is gonna be my little time off like two weeks maybe not off off because I live from it, you know, so but I train like less harder you focus more on just like the techniques you know, so you can like like a vacation or something but we can't just stay always ready you know that the calendar not never stops is always tournament's whenever you think like, okay, all the storm, it's going to pass, I'm going to rest and then like someone calls you, hey, there's a super fight coming for you. And I'm like, Okay, let's do it. I'm ready. Training, you know, so we keep training every day. We train like Monday through Saturday here every day, like every week, and we can't like we don't really slow down, like, unless there's no fights, which is not normal. You know, like, I've been fighting like pretty much like every month, once or twice a month, you know? So I've been getting just, I'm always ready. I'm just like getting better every time that's the thing.

Jose Flores: 38:01

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

Gabriel Almeida: 38:20

Yeah, so it's gonna be on May 28 in Austin, Texas. It's going to be streamed so if people are not in Texas they can't watch it. There's going to be streamed live on flow grappling so they can sign up for flow grappling. And yeah, but if they want to go there, they can buy tickets to go watch it too. They're selling on Eventbrite can check their website there the the name of the event is always number one. We've got a bunch of bunch of people here from the you actually got three athletes from the gym here. Fighting spatty fontas me and Luis bonza there's also another gift from checkmate and geotarget fighting. But he's he's in Austin, he lives there. So the team is going like strong for this tournament, you know, for this event. And I mean, we're excited to go Oh,

Jose Flores: 39:11

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

Gabriel Almeida: 39:22

just want to thank my sponsors. You know, like I got Keiko sports who supports me with my GIS in my my gear for competition you know, I am sponsored by just roll to give me like the gear to like the clothes and like nogi stuff to fair sports. For the TAFE whenever my fingers are hurt they helped me out I also like muscle hammer. It's like one of those massage guns recovery. Oh, super good. Yeah, it was it all the time whenever I I finished training or like just don't want to loosen up my body helps me a lot too. I got my condition and training when you shouldn't trainer either if you are doing my nutrition is out of you knock you. And yeah, those are the guys who actually helped me and also the gym like a check my team who always was always there to help me get prepared my coach love your everyone.

Jose Flores: 40:18

Yeah. Thank you so much. I mean, even for myself you have, to me at least you have a very driven mindset. And I like how you come across, even at a last year, still excited that you went to the tournament and you see it as an experience that that's me today. Tell me a lot. I mean, because, as I said, a lot of people take a loss really hard and they sometimes they just go down.

Gabriel Almeida: 40:45

You never want to lose the conference. Like whenever I lose, I get mad I I want to cry I go to I don't want to talk to anyone, you know, I'm like, I try to stay in my spot. But also, like, there's a moment where you get sad because of the loss. And there's the moment after that, where you focus Okay, what what can I get from it? Okay, what can I improve from that, you know, to make sure it isn't happening. So it's there's always a learn with loss of 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, you know, but, like, it's important to not just like, try to push it away and let it go, but try to get it and focus in, okay, what can I get from that? Oh, how am I gonna improve there? You know, otherwise, you just keep making the same mistakes, you're gonna lose again, because of the same reason and the same reason that frustrates you. Because you're not, you're not fixing that mistake, and you keep doing it. Like when you do it once, okay, when are they twice? Yeah. You see, like, three, four times the same mistake. You're not doing something to get better, you know, so there's always ways to get better. So it's important to look back what we did before and, and grow from it. Okay,

Jose Flores: 42:03

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