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There be more attachs of this article though, but ill post the rest of pics later
Championship Roots
Rolls’ father, Carlos, died in 1994 at the age of 92. Throughout his life, Carlos was convinced that sex had only one purpose: procreation. In 1950, he was angered by his second wife, Geny, who refused to have another child. Stubborn as he was, Carlos looked for another woman to bear his 15th descendent. He eventually met Claudia, who bore him Rolls. When Geny declared that the innocent child was not welcome in her home. Helio immediately stepped in and graciously took custody of Rolls when he was only four months old. Half-a-year later, Helio’s wife gave birth to his first son, Rorion. Relson came soon after and, a few years later, Rickson. The four were raised together. According to Helio, Rolls was a very hyper child but had a great heart. He never stopped for a minute and was always involved in some kind of activity. At the age of 11, Rolls used to go to the Gracie Gym everyday after school to help. He was still living with his uncle Helio, but had frequent contact with his father, Carlos. Besides the weekends spent in Teresopolis, the family home, Carlos also saw his son two or three times a week when he came to the city to bring the practice kimonos to the gym from the laundry business he ran out of his home. “Rolls was very funny kid,” remembers Pimpo, a grade school friend. “A diplomat used to live in his building and his driver use to wait for him every day in a big white car. Rolls would wait for the car to be freshly washed and then throw papaya on it all the way from the 7th floor, making the vehicle totally dirty. It was funny to us but I don’t think the driver or the diplomat much liked it.” Even as a child, Rolls was very strict about following the Gracie diet. “I don’t recall ever seeing Rolls miss even one meal,” says Pimpo. “The quantity of papaya he would eat for a meal was very impressive - while we would only have it for dessert. I guess that’s where he got so much ammunition to hit the diplomat’s car.” At the age of 12, Rolls started to travel extensively - a rare occurrence in those days. His mother, Claudia, who worked for Lufthansa airlines and lived on Manhattan Island in New York, got him free airline tickets to visit her. “After a few trips to the United States, Rolls was speaking better English then me,” explains Claudia. “Because he learned English very young, he didn’t have any accent. From here, he traveled all over the U.S.” Before he turned 18, Rolls took an extended trip to Europe, where he visited the best museums, learned Italian, and gained an appreciation of history and the fine arts. Rolls was already developing the open-minded attitude that would lead him to revolutionize jiu-jitsu and become its greatest champion.
The Golden Era
But it was a defeat that would convince Rolls to take his training more seriously and take him to the next level. One day, a strong man named Cicero, who trained at a competing gym, showed up at the Gracie Gym and challenged Rolls. Everyone there thought that Rolls was the absolute best, but Cicero did surprisingly well. Pushing Rolls to the absolute limit, Cicero, with his superior strength, was able to stalemate him. “Neither of them was able to gain a superior position, but Rolls didn’t win like expected,” Reyson recalls. Brother Carlson agrees. “If there were points given in the match, instead of just submission only, Rolls would have lost.” When Reyson suggested that Rolls needed to train his body, the open-minded Rolls agreed. He also started visiting different schools to better improve his technique. “I took him to practice with Osvaldo Alves,” Reyson says, “a Shunji Hinata student. Osvaldo had a very good technique and lived a few years in Japan. Rolls was obsessed and immediately started to improve. Within a year or two, he was beating everybody with no effort at all.” Rolls was soon to test himself again, in the flame of competition. In the beginning of the 1970s, Sergio Iris, Carlson’s top student, known as Serginho de Niteroi, was a phenomenon who had beaten Carley Gracie. Rolls decided that he would challenge this unbeatable fighter. “It was at that time that Rolls really started pushing his practice,” remembers Osvaldo Gracie. “He worked out everyday. He would run for miles, then do wind sprints. He also lifted weights, jogged on the sand and up hills, did gymnastics, and had a long training sequence of push-ups and sit-ups. When the day came for them to meet and practice together, Rolls was in unbelievable shape. On that Saturday, at Carlson’s gym, Rolls triumphed over Serginho. He was the absolute family champion.” Always wanting to challenge himself, Rolls went to different gyms to practice. Carlson’s gym was his favorite, though, in part because of the deep admiration Rolls had for Carlson, and partly because Carlson always had something new or improved to teach him. “He was very picky about not wanting to fall behind in the newest techniques,” says Carlson. “So when I would teach him something he didn’t know, he would repeat it until he learned it completely.” Wanting to popularize jiu-jitsu among the general public, Rolls started to promote sport competitions, which at the time happened only in every two or three years. At the age of 22, practicing what he preached, Rolls won the first Guanabara State Championship. “I was stronger but he won anyway”, remembers Mauricio Robbe, a Pedro Hemeterio black belt. “His technique and quickness were unstoppable. I moved from Sao Paulo to Rio de Janeiro to practice with him.”
On His Own
In 1974, in a testament to the high esteem Rolls held his older brother Carlson, he stopped teaching at the Cidade Gym with Helio, and started dividing space with Carlson, in Copacabana. This marked the beginning of an era and was where Rolls put together his first competition team. It consisted of Fabio Macieira, Paulo Conde, Talarico, Nissinho Azulay, Carlinhos(Gracie Jr.), Ricardo Azoury, Marcio Macarrao, Mauricao Motta, and Romero Jacare (now teaching in Atlanta). Eventually Crolin and Rilion Gracie would join the team as would Alvaro Romano, Fabio Santos (now teaching in San Diego), Rodrigo Mazor, Carlinhos Soneca, and Renan Pitangui. “He was the perfect teacher,” recalls Rilion. “He always said the right words at the right time. One time at a competition, I had already won six juvenile matches and wanted to enter the adult tournament but I was very tired. So I sat in the corner and complained, ‘I’m dead! I want to go on but I’m too tired.’ Rolls came up and placed his arm around my shoulders and said, ‘Victory without sacrifice has no meaning.’ That woke me up and I entered and ended up winning all my fights.” Rolls was continually bringing new innovations and training methods to Brazil. He brought the first video cameras to Brazil and recorded all his practices and used the tapes to make corrections to his technique. He also invented the now-common interval practice, where two lines of students face each other and switch places from time to time. The method came about because of the necessity of making the Saturday practices shorter, so everyone could go out at night. An example of his lasting influence is that two of the major jiu-jitsu organizations today are headed by former members of his first competition team - the Alliance, for by Romero Jacare, and The Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Federation, formed by Carlos Gracie Jr. “It was Rolls’ example that motivated me to found the federation,” Carlos Jr. says. “When Rolls died, I stopped competing for a long time. Now, I try to motivate my students to compete as much as they can - just like Rolls did.”
The Driving Force
Competition was the driving force behind Rolls life. “I was just a boy when somebody showed up at the school saying that there was a karate competition that weekend,” remembers Rolls cousin, Royler. “And Rolls instantly answered: ‘Put our names in it.’ I didn’t understand a thing that was going on, but that’s how Rolls was, he would compete in anything.” After his fight with Cicero, Rolls won every fight, be it in practice or in tournaments. Nobody remembers seeing him tired or with his guard down. He was always looking for sponsors and never let a long period of time go by without winning a championship. He loved to fight and competed in free-fighting, Greco-Roman wrestling, and sambo. In 1976, Rorion and his Helio, went on a TV show to demonstrate the art of jiu-jitsu. A few days later a karate teacher also went on. When the host of the show asked how karate would do against jiu-jitsu, the karate master said that they could beat jiu-jitsu fighters very easily. A challenge was made when Rolls heard of this and, when it happened, every jiu-jitsu fighter won. In the final fight between the two masters, shown on the tape Gracie Jiu-Jitsu in Action, Rolls won easily. As Rolls fame grew, no opponents would come to jiu-jitsu competitions to fight him. When Rolls was entered, one or two men would show up to give it a try. Rolls eventually started visiting the United States in search of matches. In one of his trips to the USA, a friend from New York introduced him to Bob Anderson, a five-time national wrestling champion who weighted 220 pounds. Anderson and Rolls became friends and Anderson went to Brazil for two months to train and teach wrestling classes at Rolls’ academy, while staying at Rolls’ house.