BJJ in Petrópolis

Pedro Sauer Team Brasil

Pedro Sauer was born and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where from an early age he began training in the martial arts. At age five he began boxing and later took up judo and taekwondo. At age fifteen his friend, Rickson Gracie, invited him to train jiu-jitsu with his younger brother, Royler. That experience changed his direction entirely, and he began training jiu-jitsu the very next day. Pedro worked toward degrees in Economics and Business Administration, completed postgraduate study at Fundação Getúlio Vargas, and spent eleven years as a stockbroker in Brazil before moving to the United States in 1990 to teach jiu-jitsu full time. After training in California with the Gracie family and other influential instructors, he moved to Utah later that year and helped pioneer Brazilian jiu-jitsu in the American Southwest. In 2005 he relocated to Northern Virginia and opened One Spirit Martial Arts in 2006, which remains the headquarters of the Pedro Sauer Association.