User:Birabrasil/sandbox

Bira Brasil (born September 2, 1977) is a Brazilian-American sports commentator, and Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt. He began his career as a soccer/football color commentator with Sport Promotion in 2001, for the English transmissions of Brazilian soccer/football, that was run by TV Globo (in 2005 he became a full time color and play by play commentator at TV Globo). In 2019 he joined Conmebol for their international project of the Copa Libertadores and Copa Sudamericana, doing games in both English and Portuguese. His love for Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu and MMA has also helped him become the main play-by-play commentator for Shooto Brasil's transmission for the UFC Fightpass in English.

Early Life

Bira was born, Ubirajara Brasil de Lima Júnior, in the city of Sorocaba, São Paulo, Brasil. His mother, Ruth Grava, is from Portuguese and Italian ancestry, worked in politics and is an accomplished artist. While his father, Ubirajara Brasil de Lima, was a criminal defense lawyer, and is also of Italian and Portuguese ancestry. His parents were only together for the first three years of his life, and in 1985 he moved with his mother to Las Vegas, Nevada. In Vegas the young Bira quickly adapted and in less than one year was speaking perfect English, becoming a regular all American kid.

Education

After 4 years at Clark High School, Bira got his Associates degree at the College of Southern Nevada (formerly known as Community College of Southern Nevada), and went on to get a business and international business degree in 2001 at the University of Nevada Las Vegas, UNLV.

Career

Sport Promotion / TV Globo

From 2001 till 2005 Bira was the color commentator, in English, for the main soccer/football competitions in Brasil. After graduating from UNLV and moving to Brasil, Bira passed many on screen tests and began his work as a sports journalist along side of Jonathan Cotterill. At Sport Promotion they were responsible for covering the Campeonato Paulista, Copa do Brasil, and Campeonato Brasileiro, as well as other competitions around the country. The project was a partnership between Sport Promotion and the country's largest tv station TV Globo.

TV Globo

In 2006 TV Globo decided to be completely in charge of the Brazilian transmissions to the international market and brought on Bira and Jon as full time employees to transmit the country's largest and most important competitions for the foreign market. The duo did all of the games year round, as well as host a weekly magazine show called FootBrazil. In 2018 the television channel was going through many changes and decided that it would be their final year with the international project.

At TV Globo, Bira was also involved with every single UFC event the television station ever covered. He worked along side of play-by-play legend Galvão Bueno, as well as Cléber Machado, Luis Roberto, and Sérgio Mauricio. Others that were in these transmission were Junior dos Santos, Vitor Belfort, José Aldo, Demian Maia, Rodrigo Minotauro, and Rogerio Minotouro.

Conmebol, FC Diez, MediaPro

One month after leaving TV Globo, the South American Confederation (Conmebol) came calling. They were beginning an international project for transmissions of the Copa Libertadores and Copa SudAmericana, the two largest continental competitions in South American, equivalent to the champions league. Bira began this project doing the games in English, but after two months he was asked to be the main play-by-play for the international transmissions in Portuguese. The reason for the change was that the companies had Argentine commentator doing the game in Portuguese, but after viewer complaints, they decided they needed some one with perfect Portuguese to cover the matches. Today he does transmission in both English and Portuguese.

Shooto Brasil

In 2022 long time friends Andre Pederneiras and Gustavo Dantas, from the Nova União Jiu-Jitsu team, came calling and Bira accepted their invitation to be the main play-by-play commentator of Shooto Brasil, for the english coverage in UFC's Fightpass. There he works alongside of former UFC athlete, Thales Leites. The duo also covers the Shooto Boxe, a boxing event which began when Jose Aldo kicked off his boxing career.

Jiu-Jitsu

Bira is a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu blackbelt. Although he had previously trained in many martial arts such as: Judo, Karate, Kung Fu, Muay Thai, and Akido... Bira found his true love in 1995, a year after watching Royce Gracie change the martial arts world at UFC 1. He initially began training with Reylson and son Rodrigo Gracie in Las Vegas, but after the later moved to New York to train with Renzo Gracie, Bira joined the Nova União Jiu-JItsu team at J-sect Jiu-Jitsu in Vegas. There he learned from some of the best, John Lewis, Steve da Silva (Sugapop), Toni Pontes, Renato "Charuto" Verissimo, Gustavo Dantas, amongst many others. There he also trainined with, and became friends, with future legends BJ Penn, as well as Robert Drysdale.

After moving back to Brasil in 2001, Bira trained with Eduardo Telles and Fernando Terere's team, until picking up an injury and putting a hold on his training for many years, and focusing on his commentator career. He would later on join Clube Pitbull de Jiu-Jitsu in São Paulo under Robson "Pit" Medeiros.

Events Covered

Soccer / Football

Campeonato Paulista (02 - 18)

Campeonato Brasileiro (02 - till today)

Copa do Brasil

Campeonato Carioca (03)

Copa dos Campeões (Brasil 2002)

Copa Libertadores (19 - till today)

Copa Sud-Americana (19 - till today)

Sul-Americano U 17 (2023)

Beach Soccer

FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup (2005, 06, 07)

FIFA Mundialito Clubs (2011) (Guarapiranga)

Copa America Beach Soccer (2023) (Rosario)

MMA

K1 MMA 2003 (Curitiba)

K1 Brasil 2004 (Goiania)

Shooto Brasil and Shooto Boxe (UFC Fightpass) (all events from 2022 till today)

Fistball

Fistball World Cup in Porto Alegre (2003)