Rodolfo Vieira is an ADCC world champion and a five-time IBJJF world champion so his grappling has never been in doubt during his relatively young MMA career, but now he’s brought Lyoto Machida’s Karate coach, Mano Santana, on board in order to improve his striking to the same level. Vieira is set to face off against fellow Brazilian Wellington Turman at UFC 270 for what will be his second fight after becoming Santana’s student. For a long time, Vieira actually had no striking coach whatsoever and it had showed in some of the earlier fights of his career as he was often beaten on the feet by his opponents.
Regardless, Vieira is one of the most skilled grapplers on the planet and he was always able to win the fight on the ground until he came up against Anthony Hernandez at UFC 258. Although he lost the fight by submission, he still wasn’t outgrappled as such. He was caught in guillotine after his cardio failed him in spectacular fashion halfway through the fight. The submission was actually awarded the Jitsmagazine Award for MMA Submission of the Year for 2021, owing in part to who it was performed against. After suffering his first professional loss, Vieira set about fixing his cardio issues immediately and was eager to show improvements in his next fight.
He bounced back in phenomenal fashion at UFC Vegas 31 as he managed to display his elite grappling and his improved cardio by submitting Dustin Stoltzfus in the third round to take his professional record to 8-1. Speaking to Sherdog.com, Rodolfo Vieira explained the impact that his new striking coach Santana has had on his development into a well-rounded MMA fighter in a relatively short space of time:
“I fought most of my previous fights without a striking coach,” Vieira said. “The move of Mano Santana to Florida was a turning point in my career. In my last fight, he just trained me via video Zoom and WhatsApp, and I had an amazing performance. Last five months we have been training personally almost every day, and karate timing has been excellent to improve not only my striking but also my takedown timing.”
“[St-Pierre’s] movement was all based on karate. Besides excellent striking, GSP had the best takedown rating of UFC history, and his karate movement played an important role on that.”
