Granddaughter of Robson Gracie[ martial arts legend] and niece to Ralph, Ryan, and Renzo Gracie, Kyra Gracie grew up in Rio De Janeiro, where martial arts was a male-dominated area, but she didn’t let this stop her. The fighter won three ADCC gold medals and five IBJJF World Championship titles between 2004 and 2011, but her perseverance and victories were inspired by a long list of uncles and cousins who tried to stop her from going down this path. Gracie spoke about her family dynamic during a talk with Websummit in Rio De Janeiro.
“The best spot on the couch back home was for the champion. Who chose the food? The champion. If there was any debate in the family about anything, the champion had the final word. I said, ‘Well, I guess I’ll have to become a champion to have a voice here too. I’ll follow these footsteps.”
Despite warnings from her uncles, Gracie started training at the age of 11. She began at an amateur level and soon rose to the top.
“Winning made me really happy. I was a very shy girl, and that was when this feeling flourished inside of me. ‘I can do it too,’ you know? I discovered myself as the woman I am today, evolving in areas I needed to evolve, my weaknesses.”
Gracie’s predecessors founded Brazilian Jiu-jitsu and made the martial arts a global business. They traveled around the world with their 30 children, winning challenges before assisting in creating the UFC, but women were never allowed any role. Even her mother stopped doing BJJ:
“She got to blue belt and then had to stop. She was prohibited from training by my uncles because that wasn’t the ideal path for a woman. And when I saw my mom quitting, I thought : “Damn, do I have to stop too? But I like it so much. What do I do now? But I was young, 12,13 years of age, and they thought U would eventually quit along the way. “
“Women weren’t valued within the family. She said. “First, they are prohibited[from training], and then if you win, it’s like: “Cool.” But if a man wins: “Wow, that’s awesome, he should represent the family. The great champion.” There wasn’t much incentive. And then you got to competitions while men made $50,000 as champions. Back then, women made $2000. They didn’t even pay for my supplements.”
The trials and challenges she faced in male-dominated sports motivated her to keep training.
“I had to fight to be able to fight, because when I decided to become a fighter, my family said , ‘ Kyra, forget about it, women aren’t supposed to do this, go do something else. We’ll protect you,” She said, “It was always like that. ‘You have many uncles and cousins, we’ll protect you.’ When you live in a place where they repeat that over and over again, you end up believing in it. I was that person that believed that only men could go somewhere in fighting.”
She never quit and went on to claim gold medals. She became the first female BJJ black belt in the Gracie family and the first female to be inducted into the ADCC Hall of Fame. She currently runs her gym and BJJ school in Brazil.
“I’m the only woman to run a jiu-jitsu school in Brazil. I’m glad I continued, because when you have a woman in a place of power, regardless of the area, you inspire other women. I see many women train jiu-jitsu now, I see their daughters train jiu-jitsu. Girls that are self-confident, that look you in the eye and know how to speak. That’s more important than jiu-jitsu, because that gives you self-confidence.”
