Learn the unbearable mount of Rickson Gracie

Once, a curious fellow asked the now-coral-belt coach Joe Moreira, a UFC veteran and trainer to stars like Kimo Leopoldo and Marco Ruas, what had been the most memorable and instructive fight in his long trajectory, which includes matches in Brazil, the U.S. and Japan, where he competed in judo.

Moreira, a skilled black-belt since 1984, didn't have to think: "That tournament where I fought Rickson in two finals, in my weight class and the absolute, was certainly one of the most memorable ones to me." And what could Joe have learned in that tournament in Rio, at Fluminense Club, on November 23, 1987?

"What I can't forget to this day was his mount. Because I had a trait: I loved it when my opponent would come full of pressure, trying to crush me. That was when I felt at home, certain of what to do and how to use my opponent's force and weight against himself, even if I was under the mount. But with Rickson nothing worked."

Joe Moreira then concluded: "When he mounted me, he appeared to weigh as much as a feather, but with such stability and total control that I couldn’t avoid it. Something unbelievable, that I never saw before. Or after, really."

Rickson, in the occasion, took the gold medal in the medium heavy and absolute, and was interviewed by the newspaper O Globo about the submission he used on Joe Moreira:

"The fight was not easy, and just the fact that he didn't run from it already proves his qualities as a black-belt. I follow a tradition of more than 60 years in my family, and jiujitsu is my very life. I don't go in to lose."

Learn a little bit about Rickson's unbearable lightness when mounting, with this valuable lesson.