Team New Wave wins three out of four judges categories at ADCC 2022: The staff at ADCC made their judgements for the four traditional “Best of” categories for the event – Best Athlete – Fastest submission – Best takedown – Best match. Gordon Ryan won Best athlete after arguably the greatest ADCC performance in history. He also won fastest submission with a devastating heel hook in the semi finals of his weight division. Nicholas Meregali won Best takedown with a truly beautiful uchi mata throw against phenom Tye Ruotolo in the open weight division. He very narrowly edged out New Wave team mate, Giancarlo Bodoni' beautiful Sasae foot sweep against defending champion Matteaus Diniz en route to his gold medal win. It was interesting that the two most highly rated takedowns of the tournament were both more Judo oriented takedowns rather than the more common wrestling based ones. Best match was won by B Team standout Izaak Michell who had an absolute barn burning back and forth war with the great Vagner Rocha in a match that could have gone either way and which no one who saw it will forget. Interestingly all three founding members of the squad, garry tonon, Eddie Cummings and Gordon Ryan have won fastest submission award and all three did it via leg lock – two outside heel hooks and one inside heel hook. This is the second time our team has won three out of four of the judges prizes (2019 was the previous time) – a tribute to the athletes ability to not only be effective, but also to embody the ideals of good jiu jitsu in an exciting fashion that helps the sport grow. There is a lesson there for all of us – your first duty as an athlete is to win, but your second duty is to train yourself to win a way that embodies an ideal that appeals to a new generation of athletes and ensures the positive growth of the sport.
