On October 23, 1951, about 20,000 people came to the Maracanã in Rio to watch Masahiko Kimura fight Hélio Gracie. Brazil's president, Getúlio Vargas, was reportedly among them. Seventy-five years later, people in almost every BJJ gym on earth say Kimura's name a few times a week.
How they got there
Kimura was a many-time All-Japan judo champion, touring Brazil with a small troupe. Hélio had built his family's jiu-jitsu around leverage for a smaller man, and he wanted the troupe's best. First he had to get past Yukio Kato, who was close to his size. Their first match was a draw. In the rematch in São Paulo, Hélio choked Kato unconscious, and that earned him Kimura.
The fight
Nobody weighed in. Estimates of the gap run from about 10 kg to more than 30, depending on who tells it, but everyone agrees Kimura was bigger.
He threw Hélio again and again in the first round, and the soft mat saved Hélio each time. In the second round Kimura pinned him from the top and caught his arm in ude-garami, the reverse shoulder lock. Hélio would not tap. Kimura wrote that the arm broke and that he cranked it again. Hélio's brother Carlos stepped in and stopped it.
What people still argue about
Plenty. The famous line that Kimura would call it a loss if Hélio lasted three minutes has no record on the Japanese side. The weight gap, the broken arm and the crowd size all shift with the storyteller. Two things hold in every version: Kimura won, and Hélio never tapped.
How the lock got the name
Brazilian sportswriters started calling it the "Kimuriana" when Kimura came back to Brazil in 1959, and it shortened to kimura. A style built by the Gracies named one of its best-known submissions after the man who beat a Gracie with it. Kimura, for his part, praised Hélio's fighting spirit.
Your part
Lock in a few kimuras this week: from side control, from guard, off a sloppy underhook. After class, say which ones landed and which got away, into TOMO or a notebook. By next week you will know where your kimura lives.
Sources
"Masahiko Kimura vs. Hélio Gracie," Wikipedia, checked 2026-10-23. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masahiko_Kimura_vs._Hélio_Gracie
"A thorough look at the most important fight in BJJ history," Gracie Magazine. graciemag.com
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