My Interview With Murilo Bustamante - Part 1

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The End of the Carlson Gracie Team and a Focus on MMA

In early 2000, Carlson was living in the US full time. Many of his students, Murilo included, remained in Brazil, training, teaching, competing and maintaining Carlson’s multiple academies. This was a time where there were significant opportunities being created for Jiu-Jitsu fighters, whether it be in MMA or ADCC. Carlson, being away from his team, became concerned that his students would eventually leave him and start their own team. While this was not the case, Carlson believed it was.

In order to prevent the potential breakup of the Carlson Gracie Team, Carlson had a contract drawn up that would require CGT team members to pay a percentage of fight purses to Carlson. In exchange for the payment, Carlson would let them use the CGT name and allow them to train at his academies in Brazil. The contract, according to Murilo, did not require Carlson to coach or corner the fighters. 

Many of Carlson’s Black Belts were pressured to sign the contract and in speaking to multiple members of the team from this era, many said they were completely caught off guard by the request. They felt they had done a lot to keep CGT alive, having run Carlson’s academies and coached his students after Carlson moved to the US. In 1998, the remaining Brazilian students even created the Club Carlson Gracie to manage his affiliates in Brazil. Murilo was elected the president of that organization unanimously by the CGT students and instructors.

Many of Carlson’s students I talked to claimed to not have an issue paying a percentage of their winnings to Carlson as they had done so for years without a formal contract and without complaint. They did though attempt to negotiate with Carlson to ensure that he participated in their training camps and cornered them in their matches, but Carlson refused to make any concessions.

While he was attempting to negotiate with Carlson, Murilo received an invitation to fight at UFC 25. This would be Murilo’s first opportunity to fight in the Ultimate Fighting Championship. This event, held in April of 2000, was the third UFC event to be held in Japan and was headlined by a fight between Wanderlei Silva and Tito Ortiz. Murilo was offered the co-main event, a fight with Yoji Anjo (the same man that had shown up at Rickson’s academy to challenge him in 1994).

Murilo, wanting to maintain his relationship with Carlson, offered to pay Carlson the percentage he was requesting, even without the formal contract in place. Murilo just asked that Carlson corner him for the fight. Carlson refused and Murilo went to Tokyo without his long-time trainer and mentor. Regardless, Murilo would end up submitting Anjo with an arm triangle in the second round, elevating his professional MMA record to 6 – 0 – 1.

After the fight, Murilo was informed that he had been expelled from the Carlson Gracie Team. Murilo says he tried multiple times to reconcile with Carlson, but the relationship had degraded beyond repair. According to Murilo, Carlson would not even shake his hand when they eventually ran into each other.

The situation was very disconcerting to Murilo, as by this point, he had spent twenty-five years under Carlson’s leadership and he did not want to see the team dissolve nor lose his relationship with Carlson, who he viewed as a father figure.

Unfortunately, reconciliation was not possible. Shortly thereafter, Murilo, along with fellow Carlson Black Belts, José Mário Sperry, Ricardo Libório and Luiz “Bebeo” Duarte formed their own team, the Brazilian Top Team. 

Carlson continued to hold a grudge against his former students, telling others that they had abandoned him. I have discussed this situation with multiple BTT founders and this was not their perspective, as they say they were the ones that were told that they had been formally expelled from CGT.

At the end of 2000, Murilo would once again fight in Japan. It would be for the same Japanese fight promoters who held the UFC show, but this time it would be under the Pancrase banner. Murilo would fight Sanae Kikuta. While relatively unknown at the time, Kikuta would shoot to fame at the ADCC the following year by defeating Saulo Ribeiro to take Gold in the 88KG class. Murilo was not at 100% for this fight and spent time prior to the bout in the hospital with a bacterial infection in his leg. Despite not being in good health, Murilo was still able to claim the Unanimous Decision after 15 minutes of fighting.

In 2001, Libório would move to the US to form the offshoot American Top team. Murilo and the others would continue to run Brazilian Top Team and in 2007, Murilo would take over as the sole leader of BTT.

Also in 2001, the Fertitta brothers established Zuffa and purchased the Ultimate Fighting Championship. The two brothers were looking to put together big-name fights. The first UFC that Zuffa held was UFC 30, which occurred in February. The Fertittas would offer Murilo to fight Light Heavyweight Chuck Liddell and the two would square off at UFC33 in September of that year.

I asked Murilo if he was concerned about fighting up a weight class. He responded that he was not concerned about the weight difference and did not cut weight for the fight. At the time, Murilo did not subscribe to the philosophy that he needed to cut weight to gain an advantage in a fight. Unfortunately, Murilo would lose the three-round fight to decision against the larger Liddell. It would be the first Vale Tudo/MMA loss of Murilo’s career. While some fans were disappointed with Murilo’s loss at the time, I remember still being impressed. Regardless of who Murilo faced, no matter how big or dangerous they were, he would always endure and be almost impossible to submit or knock out. He lost the match, but the evidence of the Self-Defense aspect to his Jiu-Jitsu was undeniable.

After the Liddell fight, the UFC gave Murilo two options. He could either rematch against Chuck at Light Heavyweight or face Dave Menne at Middleweight for the title. While Murilo was agreeable to face Liddell again, the Menne fight would give Murilo an immediate title shot. He agreed to fight Menne at UFC 35 in January of 2002.

Murilo’s plan, unbeknownst to the community at the time, was to beat Menne, win the Middleweight title and then fight the reigning Light Heavyweight Champion. This would have made him the UFC’s first two weight class champion. Murilo felt that he was used to fighting bigger guys (Erikson and Liddell) and was fine fighting up the weight class.

Murilo would win the fight against Dave Menne by TKO in the second round, winning the UFC Middleweight title. This made Murilo the second ever UFC champion of that weight class and the first Brazilian to win any weight class title in the UFC.

He would defend his title for the first time four months later in May at UFC 37. While the fight is legendary, people were not aware that Murilo got a bacterial infection in his finger during his training camp. He was put on a strict regimen of antibiotics and could not train in the lead up to the fight. His grip was also seriously impacted. The infection proved to be so significant that Murilo had to have his finger cauterized after the fight to prevent the spread of the infection to the rest of his body. Regardless, Murilo persisted and in what would be a crazy bout, Murilo would actually defeat his Olympian opponent by submission two separate times. 

As Lindland was a Pan Am Champion, World Silver medalist and Olympic Silver medalist in Greco-Roman Wrestling, Murilo knew he would face a tough opponent who would not give up easily. 

In the first round, Murilo would catch Lindland in an armlock, Lindland tapped and referee Big John McCarthy would touch Murilo’s chest signaling Murilo to release the submission. Murilo did as instructed and as soon as he let go of the arm, Lindland claimed he did not tap and wanted the fight to proceed.

I asked Murilo if he popped Lindland’s arm. He said no, that he did not have time as he let go as soon as instructed by the referee. Murilo was sent to his corner for a standing restart. The normally unflappable Murilo was extremely agitated and frustrated with the situation. He said it was one of the biggest mental tests of his career to regain his focus, calm himself down and finish the job he was there to do. 

Murilo was able to accomplish this in the third round, leveling Lindland with a punch before tapping him again, this time with a guillotine. 

That fight left a bitter taste in his mouth regarding how the UFC managed the situation and he knew there were opportunities for bigger paydays at the Pride Fighting Championship.

It was 2003 and Pride was organizing its first ever Middleweight Grand Prix tournament. An eight-man bracket of elite fighters would be assembled with quarterfinal matches to be held at one Pride event and the semi-finals and finals to be held at a second event. Middleweight for Pride was not the same as the UFC. In Pride, Middleweight was defined as 205 pounds and under. This was the equivalent of Light Heavyweight in the UFC. 

The tournament was already scheduled to include the absolute best fighters in the world at that time: Chuck Liddell, Alistair Overeem, Quinton “Rampage” Jackson, Wanderlei Silva and Kazushi Sakuraba.

As always, Murilo was up for the challenge and attempted to get a slot in the tournament despite being undersized for the weight class. The Pride officials instead picked Ricardo Arona, Murilo’s younger and larger student at BTT to participate. As such, Murilo pivoted his schedule, stopping his fight training and instead focused on preparing Arona for the grueling tournament.

What was unknown to the public at the time was that Arona got injured at the end of his training camp. Arona ended up flying out to Japan on August 2, eight days before the event. By Monday the 4th, Arona was convinced he could not fight and officially withdrew from the card. At this time, Murilo was still in Brazil, planning to fly to Japan on Wednesday the 6th. 

However, Pride was desperate to fill the missing slot on short notice put a lot of pressure on Brazilian Top Team leadership to deliver a fighter. Murilo, not wanting to jeopardize BTT’s future business relationship with Pride agreed to take his student’s place on the card. As a reward for stepping in on such short notice, Murilo was given an additional two-fight contract from Pride.

Murilo arrived in Japan as planned on Wednesday with the fight occurring Sunday night. He had no time to prepare, but would not back down from a challenge nor a commitment. Murilo famously wore Arona’s shorts for the fight to symbolize that he was fighting in his student’s place. 

He would draw Rampage in the quarter finals, who at the time was 17 – 3, with wins over Igor Vovchanchyn and Kevin Randleman. Despite not training at all and fighting one weight class above his weight, Murilo performed well. After the first ten minutes of the twenty-minute match, Murilo became fatigued. Murilo heard a voice in his head say, “let’s go” and it motivated him to keep fighting. At one point, Murilo was able to secure a guillotine, but Rampage used the ropes to escape. Ultimately, Murilo would lose the match by decision, but earn respect from all for stepping in on such short notice.

To me, this match was another great example of the power of Murilo’s Jiu-Jitsu. Who else could do what he did? Not train. Not prepare. Just hop on a plane and go fight one of the top fighters of all time, in their prime at the weight class above him. This was a time when Rampage was mauling everyone. Shortly after this fight, Rampage would knockout both Chuck Liddell and Ricardo Arona. Murilo did not need to modify his style or prepare for specific opponents. Murilo’s Jiu-Jitsu was always with him and always ready to handle any situation. What more could you ask for from a Self-Defense aspect?

Murilo would continue fighting MMA in Japan for the next four years. During that time period Murilo would go 5 – 5, but the record does not tell the full story. Murilo’s five wins included three finishes. His five losses included four decisions. As I mentioned previously, Murilo was almost impossible to finish. There were times when he lost decisions, but his Jiu-Jitsu prevented him from taking significant damage.

Unfortunately, Murilo’s MMA career would not end on his own terms. He had a previously undiagnosed medical condition where a vein in his inner ear can become compressed and cause intense vertigo. It is known as Labyrinthitis. Normally, Murilo was unaffected by the anatomical anomaly, but there were times where his head took specific impacts during training and the vertigo occurred. 

It had not, however, occurred during a competition. That changed during Murilo’s 2010 fight against Jesse Taylor. The two were fighting in the Impact Fighting Championship 2 show in Australia when, during the course of the match, Murilo’s head bounced off the mat. The referee, Big John McCarthy, restarted the fighters and when Murilo attempted to stand back up, he got dizzy and fell back to the mat disoriented. McCarthy stopped the fight and it was ruled a TKO. 

Murilo continues to perform physical therapy to his neck to minimize the frequency of the bouts of Labyrinthitis, but the condition, for the most part, ended Murilo’s professional MMA career. He would only have one more fight, two years later. It was a rematch against Dave Menne and would occur at the Amazon Forest Combat 2 show in Manaus. Despite being 45 at the time of the fight, Murilo won via unanimous decision after 15 minutes.  

Murilo Today

Murilo continues to live in Rio de Janeiro, lead the Brazilian Top Team and is a seventh degree Coral Belt. His goal is to create the safest environment for people to learn Martial Arts. He wants to maintain an atmosphere that is welcoming to people and one where they can learn from good instructors. His vision is for BTT to be a place where you can bring your whole family to train. 

Murilo strongly believes that lessons of life are learned on the mat and that people can become more secure, more confident and change their lives for good with the help of a good BJJ program.

Conclusion

I have placed this article in the Globalization Era section of my website as Murilo truly embodies this theme in two important ways. As a competitor, he straddled the line, competing in both the era of a very localized and small Jiu-Jitsu community in Rio (bare knuckle Vale Tudo and pre-CBJJ Sport Jiu-Jitsu tournaments) and the world many readers are more familiar with which includes professional, global MMA leagues and IBJJF tournaments with thousands of entrants. Additionally, as a leader within CGT and later BTT he created lineages and academies across the globe, developing a generation of Jiu-Jitsu practitioners and leaving an indelible mark on the history of Jiu-Jitsu with his technique and perseverance.

Despite spending hours talking to Murilo, I feel there is so much more to cover. Perhaps one day, we can sit down and cover more. For someone who was a firsthand witness to so many important facets of our history and as someone who carved so much of that history with his own sweat and blood there is much we can all learn from him.

“I didn’t want to be like everyone else.” — Leka Vieira

As I continue building out the Globalization section of this site, I keep returning to a central question: what were the forces that truly drove the expansion of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu beyond Brazil?

Some of those catalysts are easy to identify. Brazilian fighters competing internationally in early MMA events, such as Murilo Bustamante. Early American adopters like Craig Kukuk. Institutional adoption, including the integration of BJJ into the U.S. Army Combatives program.

But another, less discussed lens is class composition, who was actually on the mats and how that changed over time.

In the earliest days of Jiu-Jitsu in Brazil, students broadly fell into three groups.

There were the dedicated practitioners, a relatively small group who embraced hard training, committed to the full curriculum, and developed their skills for competition and teaching.

There were the cultural elites, politicians, executives, and celebrities who typically trained privately, took a limited number of lessons, focused on basic self-defense, and then stopped training.

And then there were the women.

Women were always present in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Wives and daughters of the Gracie family and other practitioners were exposed to the art, often learning rudimentary elements of the self-defense curriculum. But they were rarely integrated into regular classes and almost never formally ranked. Their participation was limited, frequently informal, and often confined to private settings, family gatherings, or choreographed demonstrations designed to showcase the effectiveness of the techniques.

Fast forward a century, and the landscape looks entirely different. Walk into almost any academy in the world today, and you will find women training alongside men in group classes, progressing through the full curriculum, earning rank, and competing at the highest levels of the sport.

That transformation, from peripheral presence to full participation, is one of the most significant cultural shifts in the history of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. It did not happen by accident, and it did not happen overnight.

This article examines that transformation through the lens of class composition, who trained, how they trained, and how that changed over time, with Leka Vieira’s story sitting at the center of that shift.

To be clear, Leka was not the first woman to train, nor the first female Black Belt (that distinction is generally attributed to Yvonne Duarte who earned it in 1990), nor the first woman to compete. But she was at the forefront of a fundamental cultural change in Jiu-Jitsu, and her story intersects with many of the key inflection points that drove that evolution.

Over the course of several hours of interviews, I sat down with Leka to explore her journey, the challenges, the breakthroughs, and the moments that helped redefine what was possible for women in the art.

Throughout this article, interwoven with her biography, I will provide additional context on the environment at the time and how specific events contributed to broader changes within the Jiu-Jitsu community.

Note: When Leka Vieira’s name is discussed, she is often credited as the first woman in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu to achieve various milestones. Wherever possible, this article aims to present the most complete and accurate historical record. In some cases, these attributions are well-documented and will be stated as such. In others, additional context is required. And in certain instances, where definitive verification is not possible, Leka will be described more precisely as one of the earliest pioneers in that space.

Women Can’t Train

Alessandra Vieira was born on March 14, 1976, in the small town of São Pedro dos Ferros in the state of Minas Gerais. Her father was a farmer, and she lived there with her parents and two older brothers until she was five years old.

She grew up in a traditional family, in a country and at a time when gender roles were strictly enforced. As a child, she spent much of her time playing with her brothers, roughhousing, wrestling, and playing soccer. Through those experiences, she developed an early interest in activities that were typically considered masculine.

That inclination put her at odds with her father. His expectations for her were clear, and they did not include “men’s” sports or behaviors. Her mother held similarly traditional views, though she was less rigid in enforcing them. This tension between expectation and independence would become a defining force throughout Leka’s life.

When she was five years old, her family abruptly relocated 250 miles south to the Copacabana neighborhood of Rio de Janeiro. The move followed a home invasion during which armed men entered their house. While her mother and the children hid in a closet, her father confronted the intruders and was shot in the hand. For safety, the family left their town and moved to Rio, where they had relatives.

As she grew older, her interest in sports continued. Despite her passion, she received little support from her father, who insisted she focus on household responsibilities and activities he considered appropriate for women.

In third grade, she became interested in handball, one of the few sports available to girls at her school. She would have preferred soccer, but there was no girls’ program.

It was during this time that she acquired the nickname “Leka.” In handball, quick communication was essential, and “Alessandra” was too long to call out during play. In Brazilian culture, nicknames are often assigned by others and can be harsh, critical, or tied to inside jokes. Wanting to avoid that, she chose her own, a short, neutral name that was easy to shout across the court.

In eighth grade, while playing handball, she partially tore her ACL. At the time, surgical repair was not an option unless the ligament fully ruptured.

This injury forced a decision. She could no longer compete in handball at the level she wanted, and with reduced activity, she began to gain weight. She knew she needed a new outlet.

Her background, growing up roughhousing with her brothers, had already given her an interest in combat sports. One of her brothers had begun training in Tae Kwon Do, and she considered following that path. At the same time, a female friend of hers had started Jiu-Jitsu and was already a yellow belt.

Despite that connection, Jiu-Jitsu initially made little sense to her. The idea of grappling, grabbing, and being grabbed, felt strange and unappealing. This was 1992, one year before the first UFC and long before it was common for women to train.

Her friend persisted. Eventually, Leka agreed to try a single class.

That class took place at an academy called Dojo, run by Aloisio Silva, a black belt under Robson Gracie. The session focused on gi takedowns. She trained with multiple male partners and was immediately struck by the effectiveness of the techniques and how they worked against larger opponents.

By the end of that class, she was fully committed.

This single experience would shape the rest of her life. Over the course of our interview sessions, she returned to it repeatedly. The way she described that moment, the clarity and certainty, was like a switch being flipped. It was as if everything began there.

Sixteen-year-old Leka left school and began training two hours a day, five days a week. Knowing her father would not approve, she hid her training from him for nearly two years.

I pressed Leka on this point because it seemed almost impossible to believe that a teenager could simply abandon school and live a secret second life centered around Jiu-Jitsu.

Leka confirmed that the story was exactly as she remembered it. One day, during her lunch period, she walked out of school and never returned. For approximately a week, she concealed the decision from her parents before finally telling them that she was not going back.

To a modern reader, the idea seems almost unthinkable. Yet it was entirely consistent with the stubborn determination that would define much of Leka's life. Once she had decided on a course of action, outside pressure or “conventional wisdom” would not change her mind.

At the time, Leka's parents had no idea that she had immersed herself in Jiu-Jitsu or that the sport had become the central focus of her life. They assumed she was spending her days at the beach, socializing with friends, and enjoying the freedom that often accompanies adolescence.

In reality, Leka was devoting herself almost entirely to training. While her parents believed she was simply passing the time, she was quietly building the foundation for what would become one of the most influential careers in women's Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

Remarkably, Leka maintained this double life for nearly two years.

Her friends thought she was irrational. They questioned how she could possibly know, at such a young age, what she wanted to do with her life. More than that, they challenged the premise itself. This was not something women did.

At that point, she was not thinking about a career or financial future in Jiu-Jitsu. She simply knew this was what she wanted. That certainty, and the resistance she faced, began to form a chip on her shoulder. She wanted to prove them wrong.

Failure was not an option.

Despite her commitment, her early experiences at the academy were difficult. Male training partners often spoke to her condescendingly. Some would insist she start from dominant positions, on their back or from mount, because they did not consider her a legitimate opponent. Others told her directly that she did not belong and that Jiu-Jitsu was solely for men.

At times, they would even commandeer the women’s bathroom, making it difficult for her to change before and after training.

It is important to add context here.

Leka was not the first woman to train in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, nor even the first woman at Dojo. A small number of women were already training there when she arrived in 1992.

At the time, she was living in Copacabana, an area with no shortage of academies. However, while Dojo was relatively tolerant of women training, that was not the norm. Many academies either discouraged women joining or refused to allow them to train at all.

Leka and I also spent time discussing what training was like in the mid-1990s. Even though I was in Philadelphia and she was in Rio, the environments were strikingly similar, something many younger practitioners today do not fully understand.

When you joined an academy, that was it.

That decision defined your Jiu-Jitsu journey and shaped much of your life outside the gym. You did not cross-train. If you had friends at other academies, those relationships often ended. If you left or were expelled, finding another place to train was extremely difficult.

As Leka put it, “You had to either get your black belt there or you had to quit. Those were your only options.”

In that context, ending up at an academy that would allow her to continue and eventually complete that journey was not just fortunate. It was pivotal.

Training itself reflected the priorities of the era. There was little distinction between sport-focused and self-defense-focused Jiu-Jitsu. You simply trained to fight. Competition existed, but it was seen primarily as a way to test techniques in a controlled environment.

Classes were typically held in the gi. On particularly hot days, or occasionally at the end of the week, training would shift to no-gi, usually T-shirts and gi pants. Rashguards and board shorts had not yet become standard.

Women can train, but they cannot compete

Six months later, Leka was still training two hours a day, five days a week. She was improving, but still a white belt. One day, a local promoter came to Dojo looking for a female blue belt to participate in a women’s gi match on an upcoming card.

Aloisio Silva, the chief instructor and owner of Dojo, promoted Leka to blue belt specifically so she could compete.

The event was held on a mat laid out in the parking lot of a shopping mall in the Botafogo neighborhood. Under the Rio sun, the mat baked, burning the competitors’ feet. Leka was sixteen years old with just six months of training. Her opponent was an adult blue belt from the Carlson Gracie team, with four years of experience, a judo black belt, and a thirty-pound weight advantage.

For the first time, and not the last, Leka was jeered by the crowd. They shouted that they wanted to see her get beaten and that her opponent should break her arm.

She lost the match on points.

The loss became another turning point.

No longer content with a single daily session, she began training three times a day, every day. She added weightlifting and running to her routine. The criticism intensified. People told her this kind of training was not for women. That she was wasting her time. That lifting weights would not work. Some even accused her of cheating by training that way.

The constant criticism took a toll. It fed her insecurities. She wanted approval but could not find it.

Still, she continued.

She would later describe this loss as one of the most important catalysts in shaping who she became.

Her partially torn ACL remained a constant problem. During training, her knee would often buckle, creating hesitation whenever she tried to push herself to her limits. As she did not have health insurance, a full tear could have ended her career before it truly began.

That tension, between pushing forward and risking everything, followed her daily for years and contributed to ongoing doubts about her performance.

During our discussion of this period in 1993, I briefly shifted the conversation. UFC 1 would take place later that year, and I was curious how the academy culture changed following Royce Gracie’s public success.

Her answer mirrored my own experience training in Philadelphia. There was an explosion in enrollment, a new sense of energy in the academy, and a steady stream of people walking in off the street to issue challenges.

It is difficult for people today to fully understand that environment.

In the mid-1990s, it was completely normal for someone to walk into an academy, issue a challenge, and be met immediately by a student pulled from class.

This was not a sport match. Not submission grappling. This was a fight. Vale tudo. In front of the whole class.

At the time, we believed we were defending the honor of Jiu-Jitsu. These challengers did not believe in it, did not respect it, and it was our responsibility to prove them wrong.

What Leka told me next was something I had never heard before.

“I did the challenges too.”

It stopped me.

After more than thirty years in Jiu-Jitsu, I thought I understood that era. I had never heard of a woman participating in challenge matches.

To be clear, these were not matches against other women. These were fights against men.

Seventeen-year-old blue belt Leka, facing grown men. Men with fighting experience. Men who did not want to lose to a woman in front of a room full of men.

She told me she would take punches here and there. But she always finished the fight.

She also mentioned something that immediately brought me back to my own early training days. She would avoid eating before class, knowing she might be called into a fight at any moment and did not want to risk vomiting during the match.

I had done the same. We were just white belts, but that is how it was then.

It was striking how similar our experiences were, even separated by thousands of miles.

As 1993 turned into 1994, formal competitions remained rare, especially for women. Still, Leka competed in two major events that year: the Rio de Janeiro State Championships and the Brazilian National Championships.

Today, most practitioners are familiar with the International Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation (IBJJF). At the time, it operated as the Confederação Brasileira de Jiu-Jitsu (CBJJ). The CBJJ held its first official Brazilian National Championship in 1994. However, another organization, the Federação de Jiu-Jitsu do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FJJRIO), had already held national-level events in 1993 and 1994. This overlap creates confusion when discussing results from that era, as there were effectively two “national” championships.

Leka competed first at the FJJRIO Rio State Championships and then at the CBJJ inaugural nationals, both in the female blue belt featherweight division. In each event, she won her first three matches before losing in the finals.

At this point, Leka was still concealing her training and competition career from her father. Following her success at the Brazilian Nationals, she was informed that footage of the event, including highlights of her matches, would be shown on television.

Realizing the broadcast could expose the secret she had worked so hard to maintain, Leka rushed home and unplugged the television before the program aired. It was a simple but effective solution to a problem that, in her mind, threatened to reveal her entire hidden life.

The story is almost humorous in retrospect. While Leka was already becoming one of the top female competitors in the country, she was simultaneously trying to prevent her father from discovering that she competed at all.

When I asked her about Jiu-Jitsu influences during this period, she pointed to the limitations of the time. There was no internet, no instructional videos, no easy way to study matches. When she had the opportunity to watch the black belt men compete, she would try to memorize everything she saw.

Back at the academy, she would attempt to recreate those techniques on her own.

It was inefficient, but it forced her to develop a broad and adaptable style. Rather than following a single system, she pulled from multiple sources. Pressure passing from the Carlson Gracie team. Guard work from Nova União. She built her game piece by piece.

Despite her progress, the underlying struggles remained.

Her knee continued to interfere with training and competition. The lack of emotional support weighed on her. She was still a teenager navigating an unusually difficult path. She had no encouragement from her family, limited acceptance from training partners, and remained an outsider within the broader Jiu-Jitsu community.

I asked whether having Aloisio as an instructor provided any sense of support. Whether he served, in some way, as a surrogate father figure.

She paused, then shrugged.

“As long as I was winning.”

It was a stark answer.

Even in the places closest to her, her value was tied to performance.

After two years at blue belt, Leka spent one year at purple and two years at brown.

In 1995, at nineteen years old, she began teaching a women’s-only class at Dojo. It was the first of its kind at the academy. Leka does not recall whether she was a purple or brown belt at the time.

She admitted that she did not enjoy teaching at that stage in her life. In her view, it took time away from what mattered most to her: training and preparing to compete.

That perspective is not unusual.

In speaking with high-level competitors over the years, I have heard similar sentiments expressed privately. The pursuit of excellence at the highest levels often demands a singular focus. Time spent away from training, even on something as valuable as teaching, can feel like a compromise.

For Leka, the priority was clear. She was still building herself as a competitor, and anything that interfered with that process was difficult to accept.

Leka was nervous about being promoted to purple belt. She would be the first female purple belt at Dojo, and she understood that the expectations would be higher. She felt she needed to prove herself against stronger and more experienced opponents.

In addition to training Jiu-Jitsu three times a day, she maintained daily strength and conditioning work and began training Judo to improve her stand-up.

Her perspective on teaching also began to shift. While she had initially viewed the women’s class as a distraction, she started to recognize its value. Teaching forced her to think more deeply about technique and strategy, and in the process, she became a more complete practitioner.

At the same time, the training environment grew more intense. Her sparring partners pushed harder, testing her in ways they had not before.

As she began to find success at purple belt, she also gained visibility. Her name started to appear in the early Jiu-Jitsu media, and other female competitors took notice.

It raised a question.

Was she finally going to find a community that supported her?

No.

Women began showing up at Dojo to challenge her.

Some would return to their home academies and claim they had defeated her, regardless of what had actually happened on the mat. Reputation mattered, and beating Leka, even claiming to beat Leka, carried weight.

Still, not every encounter followed that pattern. In some cases, those initial challenges led to something different. Leka would occasionally form friendships with the very women who had come to test her.

Leka remained at purple belt for about a year, competing in the limited tournaments available at the time.

She would befriend another up-and-coming female competitor. Someone who would also be one of the other early women to train professionally and who would go onto become an icon in her own right, Leticia Ribeiro. While Leka was usually a belt ahead of Leticia and Leticia trained at the rival Gracie Tijuca/Gracie Humaitá academy, the two would often train together and over time become good friends.

By the time she reached brown belt, Leka entered the 1998 World Championships. This was only the third year of the event and just the first year in which women were allowed to compete. The field was so small that female competitors from blue belt through black belt were grouped together.

Leka advanced to the semifinals but was ultimately disqualified following an argument with her opponent, who accused her of biting.

It was also during her time at brown belt that she received a rare opportunity.

In December 1998, a major Jiu-Jitsu showcase was organized in Rio de Janeiro. The Oscar de Jiu-Jitsu II Copacabana Challenge featured some of the biggest names of the era, including Fabio Gurgel, Saulo Ribeiro, Marcio Feitosa, and Vitor “Shaolin” Ribeiro. The main event was a no time limit match between Royce Gracie and Wallid Ismail.

There was only one women’s match on the card.

Leka was selected to compete against Daniela Figueiredo Paiva.

The event received significant media attention across Brazil. Leka won her match.

A few days later, she was promoted to black belt.

Women can Compete, but They Can’t Be Black Belts

It was something she had never focused on. She later said that she did not care about promotions or the timing of them. Her attention had always been on training and competing.

At that point, it would have been reasonable to assume she had finally reached a level of acceptance within the Jiu-Jitsu community.

She had not.

Despite her competition record and growing visibility, there were still those who claimed that a woman could not be a legitimate black belt. That her rank was not real.

In 1999, Leka competed at the World Championships for the first time as a black belt. She would have three matches that day, two against fellow black belts and one against a brown belt competitor. In the finals, Leka once again defeated Daniela Figueiredo Paiva, becoming the first female black belt to win a World Championship title.

This is where some historical nuance and semantics come into play. It is correct to say that Leka was the first woman to win a World Championship as a black belt. However, she was not the first woman to win a women’s division that permitted black belt competitors. The year prior, in 1998, the first year women’s divisions were officially offered at the Mundials, the divisions combined athletes from blue belt through black belt due to the small number of female competitors. That year, purple belt Tais Ramos won the lightweight blue-to-black division, while Rosangela Conceição won the heavyweight division.

Following her historic 1999 victory, Leka began receiving significant attention from the two major Brazilian grappling publications of the era: Gracie Magazine and Tatame.

It was also in 1999 that Leka traveled to the United States for the first time and she was likely the first female black belt to do so. Arriving in California, she connected with Rigan Machado. At the time, Rigan had approximately ten women training at his academy, something that stood out to Leka given the comparatively small number of women training in Brazil. She later recalled feeling immediately welcomed by both Rigan and the academy’s students. While she could not really communicate in English, Leka really enjoyed the experience. She stayed in the US for around eight months and taught herself English by watching American TV and movies. She got an opportunity to teach the American female students and even got to teach a private lesson to Bruce Lee’s famous student and eventual Machado black belt, Dan Inosanto.

Leka would soon return to Brazil, but the trip to the United States had fundamentally changed her perspective. She realized that her future opportunities in Brazil were extremely limited. Sponsorships were rare, teaching opportunities for women were almost nonexistent, and there was little financial future for a female competitor, even at the highest levels of the sport. She became determined to return to the United States permanently and help establish women’s Jiu-Jitsu there.

As had happened many times before in her life, people thought Leka was crazy. They told her she would fail and insisted that American women would never want to train Jiu-Jitsu.

At the 2000 World Championships, Leka once again advanced to the finals, where she lost to her friend Leticia Ribeiro.

Shortly after the tournament, Leka left Dojô to join Gracie Humaitá and begin training more formally alongside Leticia. Some additional context is important here. Many people are familiar with the name Gracie Humaitá as the flagship Helio Gracie-aligned academy led by Royler and Rolker Gracie. During this era, the team fielded many elite competitors. However, while athletes competed under the Gracie Humaitá banner, many of the team’s top competitors trained daily at the subordinate Gracie Tijuca academy.

Gracie Tijuca had developed a reputation for producing exceptional technical talent, including Leticia Ribeiro and several high-level male competitors. The academy was led by Vinicius “Vini” Aieta, Saulo Ribeiro, and Marcelo Machado.

As mentioned previously, switching academies during this period was often viewed negatively within Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu culture. Loyalty to one’s team was taken extremely seriously, and changing affiliations could create significant tension. However, by this point Leka was no longer an unknown prospect. She was an established black belt world champion with growing recognition in the sport. Exceptions could be made for someone of her stature, and Gracie Humaitá welcomed the opportunity to add a reigning world champion to its competitive roster.

In late 2000, Leka returned once again to California, this time with the goal of training at Rickson Gracie’s academy. When she contacted the school, however, she was bluntly told: “We don’t take women. Women can’t train here.”

This was despite the fact that Leka was already a world champion black belt and currently aligned to Rickson’s brothers. For her, however, it was simply another rejection. By that point in her life, she was used to hearing no.

Leka would return to Rigan’s academy and teach the women’s class three times a week as well as private lessons. For the first three months, as she had no money, she lived inside the academy. Literally. It was a source of embarrassment for Leka, as she did not want her students to view her as unprofessional. Students would often offer to give Leka a ride home after the academy closed and she had to come up with excuses for why she would decline. She did not like this as she felt she was lying to her friends. Eventually, Leka would confide in one of her students who offered to take Leka in as a roommate in exchange for free private lessons. She would stay in this situation for the first three years of her time in the US and this was instrumental in her getting on her feet.

It was during this time that Leka furthered her legacy. Teaching the women’s class, Leka would come in contact with Cindy Omatsu. Cindy was a long time Rigan student and Cindy would become Leka’s star pupil. In 2002, Rigan and Leka would jointly promote Cindy to black belt. It was the first time Leka had promoted someone to black belt. Cindy’s promotion made her the first non-Brazilian woman to hold that rank and it is believed that this may be the first case of a female black belt in BJJ promoting another woman to black belt.

Leka stayed at Rigan’s academy for five years and would often compete in the US-based Pan American Championships, but not the Rio-based World Championships. I asked why and was quite impressed with her response. 

Leka was in the US legally and working her way through the naturalization process. If she left frequently to go compete in Brazil, she felt it could jeopardize her status in the US. She did not want to disrespect the laws of her newfound home. It is one of the great what ifs of the story. While Leka won the Pan Ams in 2001, 2002, and 2003, she only ventured to Brazil once during that time, winning Worlds in 2002. If Leka could have travelled freely to Brazil during those years, would she have added more world titles to her resume?

She would once again return to Brazil in 2005, winning worlds one more time and making her a three-time World Champion and one-time runner-up in the gi.

It was also during her time at Rigan Machado’s academy that Leka competed in her first no-gi tournament. At the time, no-gi specific training and competition were still relatively uncommon. The ADCC had only begun in 1998, and women’s divisions would not officially be introduced until 2005.

The event was the Jean Jacques Machado Grappling Games, and Leka entered almost entirely on impulse. Up to that point, she had never specifically trained for no-gi competition and did not even own appropriate no-gi gear.

Leka left the venue before the event began, walked to a nearby tourist souvenir shop, and purchased a cheap rashguard and a pair of board shorts. She then returned to the competition, competed in that improvised gear, and won her match.

Women Can Be Black Belts, but They Can’t Have Academies 

In 2005 she would leave Rigan’s academy to start her own. It was located in Torrance and would be called Leka Vieira BJJ. The academy was exclusively geared towards female students as Leka felt at the time that no men would want to train under her.

It was during this period that Leka competed in the ADCC Submission Fighting World Championship. As mentioned earlier, while this was the sixth edition of the prestigious no-gi tournament, it marked the first time women were allowed to compete. It was also the first time the event was held in the United States, and with the tournament taking place in California, the opportunity was impossible for Leka to ignore.

The best female submission grapplers in the world would be there.

Of course, Leka wanted in.

Leka prepared for ADCC with the traditional mindset of the era. Most elite Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competitors still focused primarily on gi training, operating under the belief that high-level BJJ practitioners could transition seamlessly into no-gi competition without specialized preparation. Looking back, Leka now admits that approach was a mistake. In her view, success at the highest levels of no-gi competition requires focused, specialized training.

The women’s tournament featured two weight divisions along with an absolute division. Leka entered the under 60 kg bracket, which included many of the biggest names of the era, including Leticia Ribeiro, Gazzy Parman, Roxanne Modafferi, Erica Montoya, and Kyra Gracie. Leka won her first two matches before advancing to the finals, where she lost to Kyra Gracie. She also entered the absolute division, winning her first match before losing in the second round.

Even in the rapidly evolving world of international submission grappling, Leka had once again proven she belonged among the elite.

She continued to run her academy for the next couple years, while continuing to train at Rigan and Jean Jacques’ academies. It was during this time that Leka would meet her future husband, who was a blue belt under Rickson. They would marry in 2007 and have a son in 2009.

This period of Leka’s life was particularly challenging as she attempted to balance elite training, teaching, running an academy, marriage, and motherhood all at the same time. Despite the demands of daily life, she deeply missed competition and, after the birth of her first child, committed herself to returning to elite-level competition.

Unfortunately, her comeback was cut short when she severely injured her already chronically damaged knee, rupturing her ACL and MCL while also tearing her meniscus. Leka underwent reconstructive surgery and eventually returned to competition training, determined to resume her career.

However, after the birth of her second son, she suffered another meniscus tear. The combination of repeated knee injuries, surgeries, recovery periods, and the responsibilities of family life made it increasingly difficult for Leka to train consistently at the highest level and ultimately prevented her from returning to sustained elite competition.

It was during these repeated comeback attempts that people increasingly encouraged Leka to open another academy. What surprised her most was that it was no longer only women approaching her about training. Men were now seeking her out as well.

In 2015, Leka and her husband committed to opening a new academy, ultimately deciding to establish a Checkmat affiliate in Valencia. At first, the decision struck me as somewhat unexpected. Checkmat was unquestionably one of the most respected teams in the sport, and Leo Vieira was widely admired as both a competitor and instructor, but Leka had no previous affiliation with the organization. In my view, she had already accomplished more than enough to operate entirely under her own banner. She had successfully run an independent academy before and possessed the credibility, accomplishments, and reputation to stand on her own name alone.

When I later asked Leka about the decision, however, her answer felt completely consistent with the person she had always been. She explained that she had long admired Leo Vieira and his Jiu-Jitsu. More importantly, with Checkmat headquarters nearby, she would once again have daily access to elite-level training and high-level competitors.

Even after everything she had already accomplished, Leka still wanted to train hard. She still wanted to surround herself with elite athletes. She still wanted to test herself and compete at the highest levels of the sport.

To this day, Leka continues to run and teach daily at Checkmat Valencia. In addition to Cindy, she has now promoted five more practitioners to black belt, both men and women.

In 2018, wanting to give back and further support the growth of women’s Jiu-Jitsu, Leka launched the Wonder Women program. By that point, the landscape had changed dramatically from the one she entered in 1992. Women were no longer rare on the mats, but many of the same challenges still remained, particularly the difficulty of finding quality training partners and experienced, high-level female coaches.

Through Wonder Women, Leka sought to continue the work she had been doing for decades, not simply developing female competitors, but helping build a stronger and more connected community for women within the sport. She hosted open mats and group training sessions at her academy, with attendees traveling from across the country for the opportunity to train with Leka and other like-minded women. The sessions, typically held four or five times a year, would often draw between seventy and eighty participants. While the events themselves were free, each gathering was built around a charitable theme, with attendees encouraged to donate to causes such as food banks, veterans organizations, and local hospitals.

In many ways, the program reflected the same role she had occupied throughout her career: not just participating in the evolution of women’s Jiu-Jitsu, but actively helping shape it.

In 2019, Leka Vieira was 43 years old. Her body had endured years of wear, multiple knee surgeries, and the physical cost of a lifetime spent competing. She was now a wife, a mother, an instructor, and an academy owner. She still trained as hard and frequently as her body allowed. 

But she was still a competitor. She was still Leka Vieira.

That year, she entered the Pan Ams in the Master 3 Black Belt division.

She did what Leka always did.

She won.

Conclusion

Today, it is normal to see women training in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu.

They teach classes. They compete professionally. They earn black belts, develop champions, and build careers within the art. In many academies around the world, women training alongside men is no longer viewed as unusual at all.

It is easy to forget how recent that change really is.

When Leka Vieira first stepped onto the mats in 1992, women were still widely viewed as outsiders in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Many academies discouraged them from training or refused to accept them entirely. Even after becoming a world champion black belt, Leka still encountered people who insisted women could not be legitimate black belts, instructors, or academy owners.

What makes Leka’s story significant is not simply a list of titles or historical firsts. It is that she remained there through every stage of that transition. She experienced the era when women were not accepted. She helped push the door open as a competitor and instructor. And she lived long enough to watch a new generation enter a very different version of the art.

That version of Jiu-Jitsu did not appear on its own.

People like Leka built it.

And perhaps the most fitting part of her story is that, after everything, she never really changed. Through the injuries, the criticism, the setbacks, the teaching, the motherhood, and the passing decades, the core of who she was remained remarkably consistent.

She still wanted to train.

She still wanted to improve.

She still wanted to compete.

She was still Leka Vieira.