Ricardo Almeida

Ricardo Almeida is a professional Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) fighter. Ricardo Almeida is a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-jitsu under Renzo Gracie. He's currently residing in Hamilton, New Jersey. He's an experienced fighter of the Ultimate Fighting Championships (UFC), PRIDE Fighting Championships and a former Middleweight champion in Pancrase. Ricardo Almeida started his training in Jiu-Jitsu at the Gracie Barra Academy in Rio de Janeiro when he was 15.Ricardo Almeida started teaching Jiu-Jitsu part time when he was just 17 in Brazil. He moved to the US after that and taught Jiu-Jitsu at the Renzo Gracie Academy. Now he owns his own Jiu-Jitsu school, with over four hundred active dedicated students in Hamilton, New Jersey. He has fought only one Amateur MMA Match, which is now on the special features of the HBO documentary about Mark Kerr titled 'Smashing Machine".

Before starting his professional career Ricardo Almeida used to teach jiu-jitsu. He made his debut at Pride 12- in cold fury against Akira shoji from Japan. He fought it hard and won it comprehensively. He lost his second professional fight against Matt Lindand at UFC 31 but won his next fight against Eugene Jackson at UFC 33.He couldn't continue his winning streak and  lost his next game against Andrei Semenov by a technical knock out at UFC 35.That was the last of his lost two games. He won all his matches in Pancrase championship. Ricardo Almeida won his last game against Rob Yundt at UFC 81.He has faced 11 opponents out of which he has defeated 9 and lost to two. In his career he has won the Middleweight King of Pancrase Title, defeating Nathan Marquardt in the first round. Some of his major titles are 4x Brazilian National Champion, 1999 Pan American Champion and 2x Silver Medalist at the ADCC Submission Wrestling World Championships.

Opponents faced by Ricardo Almeida are:-

• Rob Yundt
• Ryo Chonan
• Nathan Marquardt
• Kazuo Misaki
• Yuki Sasaki
• Ikuhisa Minowa
• Osami Shibuya
• Andrei Semenov
• Eugene Jackson2008-06-04
• Matt Lindland
• Akira Shoji

When Ricardo Almeida left this sport it wasn't an easy task for him. There were some other major responsibilities that he had to look into. He was a father to a two years son and his wife was pregnant again. And on top of this he ran an active 400 students Jiu Jitsu school. For the sake of all this he left his home "The Octagon" for 3 years even after having won a six-fight win. The champion Ricardo Almeida now returns after having signed a six-year contract with the UFC and coming back in the middleweight MMA scene

Ricardo Almeida is a Black Belt in BJJ under the guidance of Renzo Gracia. He is one of the jewels in the "The Ultimate Fighting Championship"," Pride Fighting Championship" and a former middleweight King of Pancrase.