This weekend, Ana Laura Cordeiro completed an epic career-comeback story by winning gold in the over 60kg female division at ADCC 2015. Cordeiro’s story is one of great success, heartache, victory, and pain. Cordeiro exploded on to the scene in the 2000’s with an impressive, aggressive grappling game, which helped her amass an unbeaten competitive jiu-jitsu record before injury almost forced her into retirement. A nasty back injury forced Cordeiro to stop competing for over 4 years. At times it looked like Cordeiro would never make it back on to the mats, but this weekend, Cordeiro overcame the odds to take home gold.
With Ana Laura Cordeiro’s victory and with Gabi Garcia suffering defeat, the women’s ADCC over 60kg division provided a lot of talking points.
ADCC Women’s +60kg
Official results:
1st place: Ana Laura Cordeiro
2nd place: Jessica Oliveira
3rd place: Gabi Garcia
What was the high point of the tournament?
As amazing as Cordeiro’s overall performance was, there was one moment that truly shocked the world in this division. Jessica Oliveira, a brown belt, defeated Gabi Garcia, who is perhaps the most dominant female grappler of the last decade, in a massive upset. Oliveira’s upset will go down as a legendary moment in ADCC folklore and in my eyes is the tournament’s second greatest upset, only being bettered by Eddie Bravo’s victory over Royler Gracie in 2003.
Where do the finalists go from here?
Ana Laura Cordeiro will be hoping that she can stay fit. A healthy Cordeiro is truly unstoppable and with all things going well, we could see Cordeiro have success at the Pan American games and the World Jiu-Jitsu championships over the next year. The future is very bright for Cordeiro.
Jessica Oliveira has impressed a lot of people with her performances at ADCC this year and by no means should she feel any shame in losing to Ana Laura Cordeiro. Oliveira will come back stronger and under the tutelage of Henrique Machado, she will undoubtedly come back even better.
Watch now, later, or never?
While this bracket had some decent moments, it isn’t worth watching right away.