SEPTEMBER 24, 2019, and yet another big, last-minute, change to the line-up of the sport’s biggest tournament taking place in 4 days time, the ADCC World Championship. After more changes than we care to count, last week we had 2015 open weight champ pull out of the -99 kilogram division and be replaced by Vinicius ‘Trator’ Ferreira of Alliance and Francielle Nascimento – Brazilian trials champ, be replaced by Catherine Perret of Alliance.
Today we are sad to inform our readers that João Gabriel Rocha has also dropped out. It seems as though Rocha has suffered a bad injury and has been replaced by Hudson Taylor, who placed 2nd at the East Coast ADCC Trials in 2018, beating Nicky Rodriguez in the semi-finals by 5×0, going on to lose to Aaron Johnson in the final.
This is a major blow to the +99 kg division as João was widely regarded as one of the favorites. Although not widely known by the submission-grappling community, Hudson is a former NCAA champion and a BJJ purple belt. He is also well recognized for his involvement in sports equality, being the founder of Athlete Ally – a nonprofit LGBTQ athletic advocacy group based in the United States, who focusses on making athletic communities more inclusive and less discriminatory and helping athletes to advocate for LGBTQ equality.
