Claudio Calasans and Fernando Tererê on the middleweight podium at the 2013 European Open (photo by Kinya Hashimoto)
A favorite to take gold no matter what tournament he’s in, Atos middleweight Claudio Calasans Jr. returns home from Lisbon with another two medals to hang up on the wall of his bedroom. The first is a bronze for the absolute. The second, a golden one, is special like few in his career. After finishing off two opponents, Calasans took on the illustrious Fernando Tererê, who ended up getting disqualified for crossing a leg over the knee while playing guard. Even so, the match carries special import for Calasans, who is now a two-time champion of Europe.
“I could tell that he [Tererê] had been training hard and had come back to fight with the best in the division. I’m rooting for him to continue pursuing his objectives in Jiu-Jitsu. To me it was a dream to fight him. If training with him is already a dream, imagine competing against him! I never imagined it would be possible, since when I was a blue belt the guy was a black-belt champion,” says Calasans, before explaining the events surrounding the disqualification.
“In the end he was disqualified for crossing his leg inwards over my knee when playing guard. I was winning the match by two points and an advantage point. It happened about six minutes into the match. Neither Tererê nor the ref noticed the mistake, as we went for two minutes in the irregular position.”
Calasans feels his outing in the absolute on Saturday left a bit to be desired.
“Man, I don’t mean to take credit from the guys I face but I had three matches in the absolute and don’t know what happened—I didn’t do well. I trained a lot to win, but I fought a lot different in my weight class. I think it just wasn’t my day. I messed up a lot, even in the matches that I won, and you can’t let that happen at black belt. Now I’m going to make myself stronger because of it, since I’ve got the most important part: a major love for Jiu-Jitsu,” he said in finishing.
