Rodolfo Vieira teamed up with mixed martial arts veteran and coach Diego Braga for the first time to train for UFC Vegas 86. While training with head coach Davi Ramos, tragedy struck.
Braga was tragically murdered in January by members of the criminal organization Commando Vermelho.
Vieira is currently focused on honoring Braga with a strong performance on Saturday.
“He was a special person, a really nice guy,” Vieira shared with MMA Fighting. “I remember when Davey emailed me with the news. I couldn’t believe it. I kept staring at my phone thinking, ‘Did Davey send the wrong name?’ But it was him.”
“We were very, very sad. We never expected that to happen and we were as close as we were at that point,” he added.
Vieira, set to face Armen Petrosyan at UFC APEX in Las Vegas, decided to relocate his camp from Orlando to Rio de Janeiro after the cancellation of his 2023 bout with Petrosyan at UFC Sao Paulo. He then enlisted UFC veteran Ramos as his head coach.
Upon Ramos’s suggestion, Vieira reached out to Braga to assist in preparation in the event of a rescheduled fight. Braga, an experienced coach who had trained notable fighters including Anderson Silva, was focused on coaching his son Gabriel Braga in the PFL.
“Davi and I talked and Davi always had a great relationship with him, so I thought I should give him a call,” Vieira said. “We weren’t that close, but we were always cool, and I always liked him. If I’m not mistaken, we had been training for three weeks already. I used to go to Davey’s gym every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday to help out, and sadly, that tragedy happened.”
Originally planning to have Braga in his corner at UFC Vegas 86, Vieira instead called upon his head coach, Orlando’s Mano Santana, to support him during fight week following the tragedy. Despite the challenges of preparing to face Petrosyan twice, Vieira expressed his excitement to finally compete against him in the Octagon after training for consecutive fights.
“We tried to replicate the same training approach in Rio, focusing on takedowns and jiu-jitsu,” Vieira explained. “I was able to practice it even more in Rio than in Orlando. I was already used to training in Orlando, but in that sense, the change was beneficial.”
Petrosyan holds an 8-2 professional MMA record, with several early career knockouts, but has secured all his wins under the UFC banner through decisions. On the other hand, Vieira, a jiu-jitsu legend, has won all four of his UFC fights by submission.
“I definitely consider myself superior to him. It would be difficult to beat me on the ground,” Vieira confidently stated. “He’s skilled on his feet and will try to keep it standing, but I will try to take him down.”
“If I manage to take him down, I think he will do everything possible to get back up,” he continued. “We’ve analyzed his fights and he always works hard to stand up. Non-grapplers struggle to avoid takedowns and lack the technique to stand up from half guard or on one leg. We’ll give our best to avoid that and keep him contained. That’s what we’ve been working on.”
