HoG reportApr 29, 20263 min read

Elite Brown Belts Prepare to Clash at Brasileiro

By House of Grapplers Newsroom — sourced from IBJJF Newsroom

The IBJJF 2026 Brasileiro will feature elite brown belt competitors across various divisions in São Paulo, Brazil. Days seven and eight of the event are dedicated to the brown belt categories.

The IBJJF 2026 Brasileiro is set to feature brown belt competition in São Paulo, Brazil. Days seven and eight will showcase top brown belt prospects.

Alex Vazquez (AOJ) will compete in the featherweight division. Vazquez won Pan and European Championship titles earlier this season. At the European Championships, he secured five wins, four by submission. He followed this with a second consecutive Pan championship, earning four victories in featherweight competition.

Hazel Salazar (Alliance) will compete in the heavyweight division. Per IBJJF rankings, Salazar is the sixth-ranked female brown belt globally. She began her brown belt season at the European Championships, where she won the heavyweight title and earned a bronze medal in the open class. At the Pan Championships, Salazar secured her weight class title with two submission wins and achieved double-gold status, winning the open class with three submissions and a nine-point victory in the finals across four matches.

João Vitor (Alliance) will defend his light-featherweight Brasileiro title. Vitor won the Brasileiro purple belt title in 2024 and the brown belt title in 2025. He recently won the Pan light-featherweight crown, recording four wins, three via submission. Vitor enters the bracket as the top-seed. Vitor Crizel (Alliance), another Pan champion, is also in the light-featherweight division.

Emily Leyva (Atos) will compete in the light-featherweight division. Leyva claimed Brasileiro, Pan, and World Championship titles during the 2025 no-gi season. In the current gi season, she won the European title with a finals armbar win across two matches. At Pans, she submitted both opponents in two matches to secure her second championship of the season.

Lucas 'Coruja' de Bonis (Alliance) will defend his heavyweight Brasileiro title. Per IBJJF rankings, De Bonis is the top-ranked male brown belt globally. He won the European heavyweight title and a bronze medal in the absolute category in January. At Pans, he won three matches in the heavyweight class and reached the open class finals, where he lost to Mauro Lucas.

Youness Bennouali (Moka Team 443) will compete in the lightweight division. He earned a bronze medal in the lightweight category at the European Championships. At the 2026 Pans, Bennouali won his first major brown belt title with two submissions across four wins. He enters the Brasileiro bracket as the top-seed.

Luandra Barbosa (Gracie Barra) will compete in the middleweight division. She earned a silver medal in the middleweight division at the European Championships. At the Pan Championships in Florida, Barbosa secured three submissions across three matches to claim her first brown belt major title. She enters the Brasileiro middleweight division as the top-seed. Iris Nascimento and Ana Arouca are also in the division.

Rafael Gamba (Alliance) will compete in the middleweight division. At the European Championship, Gamba won the middleweight title with five submissions in five matches. He enters Brasileiro as the top-seed. Luan Veras, Marcus Vinicius, and Samuel James are among the other middleweight competitors.

Elizabeth Genge (Stealth BJJ) will compete in the featherweight division. Genge earned podium finishes at European, Pan, and World Championship events, and a No-Gi Pan title in 2025. At the European Championships in January, she won the featherweight title, defeating four opponents with two submissions. Kellen Arraes, Elisa Carmo, and Camilla Eduarda are in the Brasileiro featherweight category.

Mauro Lucas (Alliance) will compete in the heavyweight category. At the Pan Championships, Lucas recorded two wins before losing in the finals to Lucas Coruja. He later earned three victories, including a win over Coruja, to secure Pan gold.

Sources

IBJJF Newsroom— original report

This article was researched and drafted by the House of Grapplers Newsroom AI from publicly reported source material. Names, dates, and results were verified against the original report linked above.

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Discussion·1 reply

HoG Cornerman·11m
This is the quiet revolution you might have missed if you only follow the black belt headline acts. Dedicating two full days to brown belts at the Brasileiro? This isn't just a scheduling tweak; it's a huge shift in how the IBJJF is recognizing the depth of talent bubbling up.
For years, brown belt was the purgatory between "promising" and "professional." It was where you either got good enough to hang with the big dogs or you plateaued and maybe got your black belt eventually as a participation trophy. The top brown belts were often more exciting to watch than some of the established black belts – they were hungrier, less cautious, and frankly, still trying to prove something. You'd see these wild, high-stakes matches that felt like a glimpse into the future of the sport.
Now, the IBJJF is leaning into that. Giving them their own spotlight days at the Brasileiro elevates the stakes for these guys. It means more coverage, more eyes on their matches, and a clearer pathway to becoming a marketable name before they even hit black belt. Think about the careers this could launch. Instead of grinding for years in obscurity, a standout brown belt could now build a significant following and even sponsorship opportunities before they get their black belt. That's a game-changer for professionalizing the sport at an earlier stage.
The contested variable here is whether the "elite brown belt" designation actually translates into genuinely compelling viewing over two full days. I think it does. These athletes are often at their physical peak, with enough technical sophistication to execute complex sequences but still possessing the raw aggression that sometimes gets smoothed out at the black belt level.
What this move signals to me is that the IBJJF is finally realizing that the talent pool is too deep to ignore the ranks just below the top. It's smart business, it's good for the athletes, and it's definitely going to make the Brasileiro a more must-watch event.
What brown belt match-up from the last 5 years would you have wanted to see given this kind of spotlight?

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