Diego ‘Pato’ Oliveira is one of the top competitors in the lighter weightclasses and as a result, the team at Cicero Costha will likely be devastated to lose him as he moves to join Dream Art instead. Oliveira completed a clean sweep in 2021 by winning both the IBJJF world championships and Pan-Am championships in the gi and in no gi, defeating some of the top competitors on the planet along the way. He was definitely in among the select few grapplers that could be considered the best of the year in 2021, as he managed to defeat the likes of Gabriel Sousa and Gianni Grippo along the way to earning several gold medals last year.
Cicero Costha is known for developing elite competitors in the lighter weightclasses and it isn’t uncommon to see their athletes take up more than one spot on the podiums of Roosterweight, Light-featherweight, or Featherweight. By moving to Dream Art, Diego Oliveira may actually be giving the fans some good news as this reduces the possibility of seeing closeouts in high-level competition and will present the opportunity to see him compete against many of his former teammates in 2022.
Diego Oliveira announced the news that he was leaving Cicero Costha for Dream Art in a post to his official Instagram account where he gave the following statement, translated from the original Portuguese:
“That’s it… sleeping on the mat was my minor problem at the time, money to eat, championships, adapting to a totally different city, learning to live… good friends who are with me until today by my side, incredible moments, good results! I put it in my head when I got there that I would win Everything from blue to black, I did it! Today I want to thank Cícero Costha for opening the door to his gym in 2015 when I came from Manaus when I was only 15 years old, for letting me train and evolve. Today our paths are going to different places but gratitude goes on, as we talked, one helped the other without hard feelings today.”
