Grandmaster Carlson Gracie left us on February 1, 2006.
We celebrate his memory and his legacy 10 years after his passing and remember one of the greatest moments of his career.
The man responsible for training some of the most accomplished MMA and Jiu-Jitsu fighters of all times was a beast himself.
He retired still undefeated in a time where vale-tudo fights were not much different from street fights.
His most famous performances were against Valdemar Santana, a former pupil of his uncle Helio.
There were four of them, in 1955 (video above), 1956, 1957 and 1959.
The first one under Jiu-Jitsu rules ended in a draw, but Carlson won in ’56 and then again in ’57.
The fight in 1959, the third under vale-tudo (MMA) rules, was the closest of the four and also ended in a draw.
About all those matches, Carlson had a timeless quote: “If I had lost to Valdemar, the Gracie family would have ended right there.”
But he didn’t lose and his triumphs added to the family legend and helped build the stepping stone from which Jiu-Jitsu took over the world.
