Grand Master Osvaldo Alves: BJJ Red Belt

Master Osvaldo Alves was the 9th degree red belt in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. He has given Brazilain Jiu Jitsu his whole life, working for its promotion and development throughout the world. He introduced many new techniques and concepts in the game which are still followed by the youngsters in the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. All these new concepts and techniques took BJJ to new heights and made BJJ a better sport. He has left behind his legacy. Many of his students won championships in the Brazilain Jiu Jitsu tournaments and now are teaching other BJJ students. He also worked in the International Brazilain Jiu Jitsu federation (IBJJF) as the technical director. He was considered the most senior instructor in the history of Brazilan Jiu Jitsu. Japan recognized his efforts for the game various times. Osvaldo passed away at the age of 83 but his Brazilian Jiu Jitsu legacy will remain forever.

Osvaldo Alves was born in 1939 in the Brazilian state of Acre within the Amazon rainforest. A few months after his birth, Alves’s family moved to Rio de Janeiro. Osvaldo enjoyed reading American comic books about some fictional characters or superheroes such as Captain Marvel. His childhood interest in reading superhero comic books led him to learn and train in martial arts. Osvaldo started his martial arts career by training in Judo. 

At that age, he opted for Judo just because the sport was easily accessible to him. When he started training Judo, he was just four years old. He joined the academy of the former Japanese Judo champion Fujimata.

Osvaldo, in his childhood, often used to pass by one of the greatest BJJ academies in the world, Gracie Academy. At first, he took no interest in joining the academy. His first interaction with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu was because of Reyson Gracie. Osvaldo, while passing by the academy, used to interact with the kids who were training in the academy. Afterward, Reyson told Osvaldo about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and urged him to train with him. Listening to the sport, Osvaldo became interested and accepted the invitation of Reyson Gracie. With time, both became close friends spending with each other’s family.

After meeting with Reyson Gracie, Osvaldo had his interest in two games: Judo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. But after starting training BJJ with Reyson, Osvaldo did not stop training for Judo. he continued training in both martial arts. It was due to his lot of hard work and training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu that made him win the Pan American championships two times in two different cities. He got gold medals in both tournaments. He started to be recognized as one of the best young judo talents. His efforts and skills were appreciated globally, and due to all his great success, he was invited by the Japanese university Gama Filho University to train in Judo. This university is considered amongst the best universities in the world for Judo training. Osvaldo was awarded a scholarship for training at that university.

• After training in Judo, one of the best training schools in Japan, Osvaldo came back to Brazil. He was a different person altogether after coming back, as he introduced the techniques in BJJ that even the Gracies were not aware of. One example of such technique is the side control position. Gracies did not focus on the side control position. They had more focus on the groundwork and top control position in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Osvaldo familiarized Gracies with the deep and in-depth concepts of side control position, how to get it from various positions, escapes, and many other things associated with side control. This was just an example of the one innovation which Osvaldo brought to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

• Other innovations include sweeps. According to Osvaldo himself, he said that when he started in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, there were only five to six sweeps. After many years of training in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, he introduced many sweeps in the game, and now there are more than 50 sweeps in BJJ. He also introduced many other things in the game, including tricks to be dominant over your opponent and traps to trap your opponent in some submissive position. One such trick or trap is a wristlock. Climbing armbar is also a technique that was introduced by the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu master. Osvaldo used to say that the things that made him flattered and appreciated were when he used to see people doing what he invented in the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu game.

• As Osvaldo had trained both Judo and BJJ, he was certainly better than the person who was just training Judo or BJJ. At the time, when Osvaldo was doing BJJ for some time, Gracies had very little knowledge of the takedowns and how to defend against the takedowns. But Osvaldo, having the edge of training both Judo and BJJ, had the knowledge of the takedowns. He was very good at taking down the opponent and defending against the takedowns. He introduced the concept that if you train Judo and learn some techniques from Judo and incorporate them into Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, you will become a much better BJJ athlete than others, and you will find yourself at the edge and advantage over the others.

• At first, no one was ready to accept and adopt this new concept in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Reyson Gracie was the first person who adopted this new concept, obviously after Osvaldo Alves. Later on, Rolls Gracie also adopted this concept. In this way, many Gracie family members, one after the other, started to adopt this new concept. They started doing cross-training with Osvaldo Alves. They started training both Judo and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu.

Osvaldo, after excelling in his career and winning many championships, decided to teach BJJ students. 

He used his own home for the academy. He taught BJJ techniques and skills in his small room. He used a mat, and the space was such that it could not add more than four people. But Osvaldo was a very passionate BJJ athlete. He made sure that his academy was a success. His small academy produced many great BJJ students. In that same small academy, he invented many new BJJ techniques, such as the wrist lock, climbing arm bar, and high guard, which became very famous.

• Osvaldo also had something which was never done before in the history of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Even after Osvaldo, no one did that. The move Osvaldo made was promoting two of his students who were purple belt straight to the black belt. They were not given the brown belt and were awarded the black belt. Osvaldo had the reason for that, and the reason was that his two students were very skillful, and they deserved to be awarded the black belts. The move at first was not widely appreciated. Many criticized him.

• There were others who understood the reason for the promotion of the students from the purple belt straight to the black belt without passing through the brown belt. They appreciated Osvaldo for thinking logically and doing the thing that no one thought. But later on, both of his students played as a Brazilian Jiu Jitsu black belt and took part in competitions. One of his students gave a very tough time to the BJJ great Rickson Gracie, and other students won all the matches as black belt Brazilian Jiu Jitsu athletes. Both proved Osvaldo right. After that, everyone appreciated the move done by Osvaldo for such a rare promotion in the Brazilian Jiu Jitsu belt rank system.

• Master Osvaldo Alves, with his childhood friend Reyson Gracie, had his first interaction with Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, and with yet another guy, Artur Netto, all three went back to Osvaldo Alves's hometown, Amazon. Traveling for some time, they all finally settled in Manaus. After some time in Manaus, they realized that the city was very backward in the development of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. There were no BJJ academies in the city at that time.

• Also, some people asked the Master and Reyson if they could train some kids in the city for Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. These all things urged the Master to open and start his own BJJ academy in the Manaus city of Brazil. The academy's name was Osvaldo Alves Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Academy.

Master Osvaldo Alves passed away at the age of 83 leaving behind many great students of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. He died due to cancer. His academy produced many notable personalities of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. He was recognized for his skills and expertise in the game around the game. The same Japan that invited Osvaldo for training in one of their best Judo training schools in Japan was also invited for the seminar in Kodokan. Kodokan is the headquarters of the Judo community around the world which is located in Tokyo. Osvaldo was the only one in the history of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu who was given the opportunity to speak in the world's largest Judo community center.

Osvaldo Alves Documentary

Osvaldo Alves Interview

Osvaldo Alves BJJ Training