Gordon Ryan

Ryan began training in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu at the age of 15 under Miguel Benitez before switching to train under John Danaher, Tom DeBlass and Garry Tonon. He began competing and won the IBJJF World No-Gi Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championship as a brown belt.

After a stellar 6-month brown belt run, where Ryan won important tournaments such as the Newaza Challenge and the World Championship, Ryan was awarded his black belt by Garry Tonon on February 2016 in a ceremony supported by the presence of Tom deBlass, Ricardo Almeida and John Danaher – who shared the responsibility of the new belt rank.

On April 24, 2016, Ryan won the Eddie Bravo Invitational Championship, defeating world champion Yuri Simões and noted grappler Rustam Chsiev on the way. Ryan next faced top USA grappler Keenan Cornelius in a no time limit, submission only match where Ryan was able to upset Cornelius and submit him with a heel hook.

In September 2017 Ryan competed at the prestigious ADCC World Championship. He took gold in the -88 kg weight category, defeating Dillon Danis, Romulo Barral, Xande Ribeiro and Keenan Cornelius. He also took 2nd place in the absolute division, submitting all his opponents on his way to losing to Felipe Pena in the final.

He would go on to win another EBI title and defeat Yuri Simões in a superfight at Kasai Pro to wrap up 2017.

In September 2018, Ryan competed at the IBJJF Pan No-gi, winning both his weight class and the absolute division all by submission. Ryan led Team Alpha Male's victory in Quintet's 2018 Tournament, Quintet 3. Ryan’s submission victories against Josh Barnett and Marcos Souza saw Team Alpha Male advance to the Finals. His submission victories against Craig Jones and Vítor Ribeiro earned his team's ultimate victory in the tournament. He also competed at the IBJJF Nogi Worlds in California, again taking gold in both his weight class and the absolute division.

In 2019 Gordon Ryan competed in a superfight against Joao Gabriel Rocha at KASAI Super Series in Dallas, Texas.[4] Gordon ultimately won the match, but during an exchange there was an entanglement where Gordon was attempting an entry for a heel hook and his knee popped multiple times and tore his LCL. This injury was expected to keep him out of competition for about 6 months.[5]

In September of 2019 it was reported that Gordon injured his hand in a freak accident with one of his motorized bikes. The tire became flat and he decided to carry the bike on his shoulders. When he went to hoist the bike on his shoulders the throttle stuck and sucked his hand in between the tire and fender leaving him competing at ADCC with one hand heavily bandaged and injured. Despite the injury he went on to win the -99kg division. He beat Ben Hodgkinson, Tim Spriggs, Lucas Barbosa and Vinicius Ferreira. He would then move on the absolute division where he would claim gold following victories over Pedro Marinho, Garry Tonon, Lachlan Giles and Marcus Buchecha Almeida.[6]

Ryan was forced to withdraw from a superfight set for July 31st, 2020 after contracting COVID-19.[7] On October 2nd, 2020, Ryan faced fellow ADCC 2019 World Champion Matheus Diniz and defeated him via Heelhook approximately halfway through a thirty-minute submission-only match.[8]

Throughout his career, Ryan has courted controversy on several occasions, almost exclusively for his behavior on social media as opposed to his conduct in competition. He has been accused of racist and xenophobic comments on several occasions over the years[14] and came under fire in February 2019 for his comments on a story about the number of homeless people freezing to death in Chicago, claiming that it was "nothing to do with luck".[15]

Ryan has also engaged in numerous public spats with other competitive grapplers, including an incident on October 13th, 2020 when he revealed private conversations between himself and Felipe Pena regarding a potential fourth match between the pair.[16] Shortly after this, on November 29th, 2020 he also accused fellow ADCC 2019 medalist Lachlan Giles of using PEDs after the latter shared his opinion that those who have won medals while using PEDs should relinquish those titles.[17] In January, 2021, Ryan also clashed with several key members of ATOS on social media, including founder and head coach Andre Galvao, ahead of their potential match at ADCC 2022.[18]

• Gordon Ryan BJJ Heroes Profile
• Gordon Ryan Homepage
• Gordon Ryan FloGrappling Profile