Devhonte Johnson securing a choke. Photo: Erin Herle
The 2014 IBJJF Boston Summer at UMass Athletics was a day for the absolutes. Since the black belts had a good mix of matches in the open due to lack of opponents in their weight divisions, so too did the blue belt and purple belt opens.
A good day for Devhonte
Blue belt Devhonte Johnson of Carvalho BJJ Academy traveled up from New Jersey to compete in the heavyweight division. On his way to the gold he had three matches. His first match was won by submission, his second match was won by points, and in his final, although he was tested, he was able to submit for the gold.
He says, “My toughest match without a doubt was in the finals of my weight class. My opponent was very strong and did a really good job of off-setting my balance in very unorthodox ways and managed to sweep me three times. But I was pretty confident in my game and just weathered the storm. Fortunately I was able to sweep him twice, take him down once and pass his guard and with about 30 seconds left I was able to secure a wrist lock to get the submission.”
For the open weight, he had a total of four matches. And in each one, he never allowed his opponents to secure a point or advantage against him. Three of the matches were won by submission while the final was a score of 10-0 points. “It was a good day,” he says.
Another double-gold for Devon
Devon Delbrugge with a mounted triangle. Photo: Erin Herle
Purple belt Devon Delbrugge of Crazy 88/Team Lloyd Irvin of Baltimore, MD is no stranger to the podium at the IBJJF city opens. In Boston he was able to secure another double-gold with almost all submissions. In his middleweight division there were three matches. His first opponent was finished with a wrist lock from mount. In his second match he submitted with an ankle lock from 50/50 position. The final was finished with a triangle from mount.
In the open weight category, Devon had three matches. His first was a cross choke from mount, his second match went the distance with a score of 12-0 and the final match was completed with a reverse triangle, “Braulio Estima style”.
He explains one of his toughest matches: “So this tournament I felt that I gave up a lot less mistakes than I usually do, so I was able to get to a dominant spot pretty quick. But in my first match of the open, my opponent kept rolling out of bounds with a footlock which got him two points twice in the match. That was probably the toughest because I had to play catch up from a 0-4 start.”
But competing under pressure has never been a problem. “I’ve noticed that I perform way better at bigger tournaments compared to the smaller ones or even how I roll in practice.”
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See the full results here: http://static.ibjjfdb.com/Campeonato/000295/en-US/Results.pdf
