Tainan Dalpra will be making a huge move in 2023 as he has decided to make the transition to no gi competition and he’ll be making his debut later in the year. It’s big news that will almost certainly have an impact on the landscape of professional grappling, as Dalpra has been a dominant force on the gi circuit ever since he was promoted to black belt in 2020. In that time he has won every major IBJJF event and some of them even multiple times over, adding a pair of IBJJF World Championship gold medals to his resume.
Dalpra has already achieved pretty much everything that he could in his career as a gi competitor despite being just 22 years old, and he’s had an almost perfect run. He’s had 73 matches since being promoted to black belt and has never been submitted, only losing twice in all that time against Mica Galvao and Jansen Gomes. Both of those losses were by thin margins as well, as Dalpra dropped a referee decision to Galvao and lost on advantages to Gomes. If Dalpra can replicate that level of success once he makes the transition to no gi, he could be an incredible force to be reckoned with on the mats.
It’s fantastic timing for Tainan Dalpra to make his no gi debut as well, because he has just enough time left in 2023 to take a match or two before the IBJJF No Gi World Championship at the end of the year. He’ll have a little more time to take that experience and make some adjustments to his game in order to make a run at ADCC Trials if he chooses too. Even if Dalpra doesn’t attempt to win an invite at ADCC Trials, the promotion has already set the precedent of inviting competitors based on their gi performances. After the success of inviting Nicholas Meregali in 2022, Dalpra might be an ideal candidate for ADCC 2024 if he has a few good no gi performances before there.
Tainan Dalpra announced the news that he was going to make his no gi debut in 2023 in a recent post to his official Instagram account:
