Kalebe Pereira has been making waves in the sport recently and the 16 year-old prodigy has just submitted a black belt in the main event of Amazon Abu Dhabi Jiu-Jitsu 14 on November 14th, 2024. He’s the latest young talent that Melqui Galvao has been able to develop and he’s following in the footsteps of a number of his older teammates. Galvao has managed to produce a team of elite young competitors over the last few years like his son, Mica Galvao, and the two-time ADCC world champion Diogo Reis. He’s become known for his strong group of child and juvenile competitors, and Pereira is the latest example of one of them hitting the highest level of the sport.
Pereira first came to the attention of most people in the sport at the first edition of the ADCC South American Trials earlier this year. He was just 15 years old at the time and he still managed to beat several elite adult competitors, finishing fourth in the under 66kg division. It was an incredible performance and it proved that he will definitely be a force to be reckoned with in the coming years. Although he couldn’t win an invite to ADCC 2024, he did impress the organizers enough to earn an invite to the very first edition of the ADCC Youth Championship.
Although he was back to competing alongside his peers, every single teenage grappler at that tournament could beat the average black belt. He won the under 74kg bracket for under 17 year olds regardless, emerging as one of the inaugural champions of the event. Obviously Pereira will continue competing in his age bracket but these performances have earned him the ability to book matches against more adult competitors as well. That’s exactly what happened at Amazon Abu Dhabi 14, as Kalebe Pereira was booked against ADCC Trials winner Luiz Paulo until he withdrew and was replaced by fellow black belt Willian Ragnarok instead.
It was a pretty flawless performance from Pereira all in all, as he pulled guard and swept Ragnarok early on in the match. He passed Ragnarok’s guard and stepped into mount, forcing him to turtle in the process. From there Pereira immediately started working to take Ragnarok’s back, making a few adjustments in order to secure the position. Pereira was able to lock up a bow and arrow choke in order to secure the win, being presented with his trophy by his teammate Diogo Reis. The footage of Kalebe Pereira submitting Willian Ragnarok in the main event of Amazon Abu Dhabi Jiu-Jitsu 14 was uploaded to the official Instagram account of MXMediaBJJ:
