Wallid Farid Ismail[2] (Arabic: وليد فريد إسماعيل, born February 23, 1968) is a Brazilian mixed martial artist and promoter.
Ismail is considered one of the first professional fighters in BJJ because of his specially dedicated training, as he had many sponsors and did not have to teach or have another job, unlike most of the other competitors in the country at the time.
[3] In mixed martial arts, Ismail is also considered a pioneer, having his first official fight in the Vale Tudo event Desafio - Jiu Jitsu vs. Luta Livre in 1991, also having competed for the UFC, and PRIDE, most of his wins in MMA came by way of submission.
[5] Of Palestinian Brazilian heritage, Ismail started training in Brazilian jiu-jitsu in 1980 in his home state of Amazonas in Brazil under Ary Almeida, and then, in 1984, he moved to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and started training under his master, the late Carlson Gracie, who described Ismail as a "hairy and chubby guy," but had a desire to succeed, as he would be known for later in his career[6] and stayed by the side of his master until the day Carlson died in 2006.
In 1996, Wallid was involved in a violent incident with Edson Carvalho, a judo black belt and fellow Carlson Gracie trainee.
Seeing the situation, Mehdi opted for calling the police, but it arrived too late and didn't compromise to break up the violence, and meanwhile Wallid was brutally beaten down and left unconscious and profusely bleeding.
After the incident was finally over, Ismail had to be attended by Mehdi himself and spent a week in an ICU, with 20 stitches in his head, both orbital bones broken and many other facial injuries.
Mestre da Morte, declared himself prideful of his trainee's act and actually paraded through the city with the bloody gi jacket of Ismail.
[2] Carlson Gracie, who was teaching in United States at the time, returned to Brazil and attacked Lacerda in a public meeting, challenging him to a fight, but nothing came from it.
Ismail claims that Edson's brother Ricardo Carvalho intervened actively in the brawl and that it became a 2-on-1,[14] but Mehdi himself dismissed this version and assured that the fight was fair.
In response, a few days later a group of Luta Livre invaded the Copa Nastra jiu-jitsu tournament, which Ismail was competing, in order to fight him.
The match saw both fighters extensively exchanging strikes, Ismail used his aggressive jiu-jitsu to takedown Tadeu and apply an early form of Ground-and-Pound, punishing him with headbutts and by throwing him outside the ring multiple times.
He first fought Australian Dennis Kefalinos, winning in short time, and went to face Japanese professional wrestler Katsumi Usuda, hailing from Pro Wrestling Fujiwara Gumi.
The fight would become infamous for its irregularities and disregard for the rules, as Takahashi seemed to be uninformed of the event's ruleset, continuously grabbing the fence in response to takedown attempts, while Ismail intentionally ignored them later on.
Shortly after, Wallid went on to score multiple successful takedown attempts, though Kazuo went on to knock Wallid down with a right hand, which at first seemed to end the fight, but the Japanese wrestler stood waiting, believing his opponent would receive a 10 count like it was done in Pancrase; when he learned that the match would continue, he tried to kick Ismail, but it happened to be an illegal attack because he was wearing wrestling shoes.
Recovering the pace, Ismail eye-gouged Kazuo, which was also legal, after which the Japanese wrestler asked for time to check it out, which was refused, as the UFC didn't include it in their rules unlike Pancrase.
Siding with Antonio Inoki and his faction of fighters opposed to NJPW, he was expected to debut as an active wrestler in August, teaming up with Kazuyuki Fujita and his allies.