Top grappler Ethan Crelinsten might just be making the transition to MMA some time soon, as he recently took part in a training session with his teammate Damien Anderson. This is actually far from the first time that Crelinsten has worked on his striking in addition to his grappling, and in fact he actually practiced MMA before Jiu-Jitsu. He started training MMA originally and it wasn’t until he moved to the most popular academy in Canada, Tristar MMA, that he changed the course of his combat sports career. Falling in love with submission grappling over MMA, that was when he decided to dedicate himself to Jiu-Jitsu instead.
That connection to Tristar MMA and their head coach Firas Zahabi is what led to him eventually training under John Danaher in the legendary blue basement of Renzo Gracie New York. Crelinsten continued learning from both Zahabi and Danaher for a very long time and quickly made a name for himself in the sport, winning two editions of ADCC Trials before eventually being promoted to black belt by Danaher. He has been a constant presence at the very highest levels of the sport in the years since then and has become one of the biggest Canadian no gi grapplers.
He eventually became one of the four founders of B-Team Jiu-Jitsu during that time and since then, Ethan Crelinsten has recently watched one of his teammates embark upon a very successful MMA career. Damien Anderson has only been a professional fighter for less than a year and he’s already racked up an impressive 3-0 record with three finishes, attracting a lot of attention in the process. If Crelinsten does choose to make the transition to MMA in the future then he’ll have an excellent sparring partner at his disposal, along with all of the other elite grapplers who train at B-Team Jiu-Jitsu.
Damien Anderson shared the images of Ethan Crelinsten coming out of an MMA training session with him in a recent post to his official Instagram account:
