Helena Crevar has just been promoted to black belt in BJJ by John Danaher and in doing so, she’s become the first woman to receive the rank from him. The 18 year-old has already earned her place as one of the best no gi grapplers in the world by winning a silver medal at ADCC 2024, and now she will have the opportunity to do the same in the gi. She’ll have to wait a little while to do so though, as the IBJJF gi major season has only just come to an end and won’t be starting again for another 6 months.
Although she’s already beaten multiple top black belt competitors over the last few years, the IBJJF time restrictions for belt promotion have meant that she was ineligible for a black belt until now. Her run from the end of blue belt to black belt has been incredibly quick in fact, as she was still a blue belt at the time of winning her ADCC silver medal. She has received her purple, brown, and black belts all within the space of 9 months and this has only been made possible by changes to IBJJF rules that allow for world champion competitors to ignore any minimum time requirements for belt promotion.
Crevar was awarded her purple belt just a few days after ADCC in September 2024 and this was the first time that she had received a belt promotion from Danaher, as she joined the team as a blue belt. She then received her brown belt just 3 months later after competing at that level very briefly, because she became the purple belt double champion at the IBJJF No Gi World Championship 2024. After focusing on no gi competition for a few years, she decided to return to the gi this year and was able to win another gold medal at the IBJJF World Championship 2025 just a few days ago.
It’s been an incredible rise to the top of the sport and Crevar has been almost universally dominant at the lower belt levels. As with many teenage prodigies, it’s always tough to get matches against elite opponents and the belt system keeps them separate at major events too. Obviously Crevar has been getting some great matches since winning a silver medal at ADCC and she’s won titles at major promotions like Who’s Number One and Polaris. Being promoted to black belt unlocks a whole new level of regular competition for Helena Crevar though, as she’ll now be able to face top competitors at IBJJF majors all year round and she’s already confirmed that she plans to do no gi worlds later this year too.
Helena Crevar announced the news that she was promoted to BJJ black belt by John Danaher in a recent post to her official Instagram account:
