What We Learned from the 2023 IBJJF Nogi Championship

The 2023 IBJJF Nogi world championship has ended and we now a number of new athletes have entered their names into the record book. We got a lot of new champions and many people who have been looking to get to the top for years, finally got their gold. I'll go over the blackbelt adult results and stats here, but because of the size of the event I couldn't cover everything. The stats in this article only come from the finals of the adult black belt division due to the sheer number of matches. Anyway, lets get into it.  


Results



Men's



Rooster Everton Teixeiria def  Riki Yoshinaga via points


Light Feather Edwin "Junny" Ocasio def  Zach Kaina via dec


Feather Deigo "Pato" Oliveria def  Gianni Grippo via points


Light Lucas Vallente def  Deandre Corbre via points


Middle Tommy Langaker def  Mike Perez via points


Medium Heavy Ronaldo Junior def  David Garmo via points


 Heavy Elder Cruz def  Adam Wardszinski via points


Super Heavy Javier Zaruski def  Vinicius Ferreira via Triangle choke


Ultra Heavy Roosevelt Sousa def  Heikki Jussila via RNC


Absolute Roberto Jimenez def  Roosevelt Sousa via RNC




Women's




Rooster Mayssa Bastos def Ariana Cabral via Junny Lock(inside heelhook) 


Light Feather Tammi Musumeci def Jessa Khan via points


Feather Alex Enriquez def Adele Fiorino via points


Light Ffion Davies def Amanda Bruse via points


Middle Gabi MCComb def Thamara Silva via points


Medium Heavy Elizabeth Mitrovic def  Salla Simola via points


Heavy Andressa Cintra def  Raphaela Guedes via armbar


Super Heavy Kendall Reusing def  Mikaela Barros via armbar


Absolute Ffion Davies def  Gabbi McComb via RNC




How People Won



Most of the wins were on points, which is somewhat expected for finals matches. Often times the earlier rounds of tournaments have more submissions and from the matches I've seen from this event, that holds true as well. Anyway, as you can see above, neck submissions were the most common, followed by arm subs and finally leg subs. For the most part people were trying to submit each other, but often just couldn't get it done. There were a few times people seemed to be playing for points, but it was much less common than it has been in previous years. The addition of heelhooks in the last few years and the proliferation of pro shows has helped make this event more interesting. You see more people attacking submissions, wrestling, etc than before. Overall I think this was an entertaining event. 



Stats

As I said before, these stats are only for the finals of the adult black belt division.


Here we can see the RNC came out on top again. This is almost always the number 1 submission and is the only submission I'd recommend everyone to learn, no matter what your goals. Next was the armbar, which was hit twice. There was also a triangle choke. Here I listed it as an inside heelhook, but it was actually a Junny lock. The Junny lock is a variation on the inside heelhook that can be used in certain situations. It was actually attempted several times at this event and surprisingly by people other than Junny Ocasio. For those that are unfamiliar, you can check it out here.



The sub sweep came out on top here. As I've said before, the sub sweep, is when someone goes for a submission and turns it into a sweep. Here it mostly came from leglock attempts. The next most common sweep was a tie between the berimbolo, arm drag, SLX and the single leg. The single leg wrestle up is a common sweep we usually see as it can be chained with almost any other sweep or used on its own. The berimbolo is a bit more rare these days, but we saw it being used to good effect at these world championships. The arm drag is also a solid sweep that can be hit from almost anywhere and of course we know the SLX is a powerful sweeping position. We saw 1 50/50 sweep as well and a few rare sweeps such as the matrix and tornado sweep. The tornado sweep was spectacular and I'm sure it will be used in some highlights. 




The bodylock and kneeslice came out on top here. This was followed by the hip switch pass. There were a lot of hlafguard passes attempted, but nobody could get one to work. The same goes for the double underpass, however some seemed to use that to expose the back, which they were able to accomplish.  




Since there were few rules against guard pulling, there weren't a ton of takedowns at this event. Of the ones we did see, the kneetap came in #1. I believe both were from Kendall Reusing. We also saw a kosotogari(or perhaps gake) and a mat return. There were a number of doubles and singles attempted, but none of them were close to scoring.



 




The back came in number one here. 4 of the subs came from that position and with a 4 out of 12 completion rate, I'd say it where these athletes wanted to be during these matches. None of the other potions had any finishes although in some cases there were many attempts. As seem here the high point value given to the back is for good reason. It really is a very dominant position.






Overall

This was a good event worth watching and you should watch all the finals, except for a few. The ones I'd recommend skipping are Ronaldo Junior vs David Garmo, Elder Cruz vs Adam Wardszinski, Gabi MCComb vs Thamara Silva. The others range from decent to really good. Roberto Jimenez was especially exciting. This event showed the IBJJF nogi events can be exciting and action packed. I hope in the future all IBJJF events rise to this level. I was also happy to see a number of big names at this event as sometimes people skip it. There were a number of ADCC vets and high level competitors here. 

Of course it is always possible to complain, but I didn't see too many bad calls, there was a good amount of action and there were big names competing. You can't ask for much more out of an even. I think if things continue in this way the prestige of this event might rise into the realm of ADCC(although that might take a while). I'm hoping the IBJJF looks at this and does a Nogi GP just like they've done with the gi. 



Here are the some of the semi-final matches for those that haven't seen them.




Year to Date

The fightpass invitational 5 and the AIGA championship are later this week, so I will add those to the year to date stats later. I'll publish the final results in the year end wrap up, so be on the look out for that.

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