Luta Livre

Luta livre is basically a mixed martial art with a lot of sumission wrestling which is what we at shootfighters do and what has been spoken of by many and few.

The words Luta and Livre literally translate as Fight and Free. Yet a better definition of the term is Freestyle Fighting.

With the introduction of the Ultimate Fighting championship, many English language martial arts publications rushed to find and translate older Brazilian articles regarding the history of Gracie Jiu-Jitsu. It was common knowledge that the practice of no-rules freestyle fighting was common in Brazil, so when those translating the articles saw many references to competitions between Gracie-trained fighters and Luta Livre practitioners, it was mistakenly assumed that Luta Livre referred to a specific Brazilian freestyle system.

However, Brazil is home to a system of wrestling which incorporates both submissions and strikes which is most properly referred to as Luta Livre Esportiva and probably what most have in mind when making the aforementioned mistake in semantics. It is striking not only for the efficacy of many of its practitioners in real-world combat but also for its similarity to catch wrestling and shoot wrestling, in spite of being developed almost wholly independently of either.