Judo takes Léo Leite out of the BJJ Worlds

By Erik Engelhart

Photo Eduardo Ferreira

 

Three days before the dispute for the Brazilian championship, Léo Leite (Alliance) broke the ligaments of a finger in his hand and broke a toe, all in the same training, which almost took Léo out of the competition. "I was training in São Paulo and, at the week of the Brazilian, I broke the ligament of my hand finger and broke the toe. I thought about not disputing, but, as I was already there, I decided that I would participate to see how it would be", commented the fighter, who couldn’t have done better choice, since he submitted all his opponents until the semifinal. In the title fight, the black belt gave a show against Bruno Mathias (Checkmate), submitting again and guaranteeing another gold for his career.

 

"Actually, my injury just really disturbed me against Charles Cachoeira (semifinal) because he was very strong. It still hurts a lot, I'm putting ice all the time and treating with anti-inflammatory. I didn’t stop the trainings, I’m training normally... I always remember a phrase from Oscar that inspires me a lot: 'the pain is part of the athlete's uniform’, if the athlete doesn’t feel pain, I think that he isn’t training enough", said Leo, who won’t dispute the World championship, therefore he’ll follow the Brazilian Judo team in a marathon of competitions.

 

"I won’t fight the World championship because I’ll be serving the Judo team and, at that time, I’ll be in Romania, and then I’ll go to a camp inPortugal, then I’ll go to France, where will present all the selections ofFrance, Japan, Korea, Russia and Georgia. In the first weekend of July I will be back to compete in a Grand Slam, at the Maracanãzinho, and, a week later, I close my journey with the selection of Judo at the World Cup that will be disputed in Belo Horizonte", finished the Brazilian.