William Abreu
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Miami, Florida, USA
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About Us
William Abreu was born on March 1, 1983, in Miami, Florida, USA, moving to New Orleans, Louisiana, at the age of 4.
Competitive sports became a part of William’s life during middle-school, a time when he started playing basketball. It was only later in life, during his mid-teens, after returning to his native Miami, that Abreu first joined a wrestling mat.
William’s path in wrestling was an unconventional one. He started at the age of 15 at the Miami Beach Senior High, but 1.5 years into the program he grew disenchanted with the coaching and decided to leave. Still very interested in the sport Abreu decided to continue on his own, skipping school or leaving early to attend practice at other schools. In an interview with BJJ Heroes from August 2020, Abreu said of those days: “I gathered money however I could to compete, and traveled by bus or hitchhiked, but never enough for a hotel, so I slept outside. During the 2001 national qualifier, a coach noticed I was alone and not eating much. At the end of the event, he also noticed me grabbing my belongings from behind the bushes. Realizing I was sleeping outside he offered me to stay with him and his team. That’s when everything changed for the better, I trained with him during the summertime. By the end of my junior year, I was doing well enough to be picked to represent Florida on the national level.”
That coach was Nestor Varona, a man who was just starting his own club with local kids. By the time college came, William was picked up by the Upper Iowa University (UIU).
Taking a break from college during the Summer of 2007, William started teaching wrestling to a group of friends who practiced jiu-jitsu. It was during that time that he was first introduced to submissions by rolling around with his friends.
This period was followed by a motorcycle accident on August 7, that year, which kept Abreu from returning to school. The Florida native had fractured his lower back and earned a herniated a disc, while also needing abdominal surgery.
After an extensive recovery procedure of nearly two years, William started coaching kids wrestling, locally. It was through this program he came across Roberto “Cyborg” Abreu. “I started the first kids wrestling club for Miami Beach. One day a student mentioned he also did jiu-jitsu and thought I was related to his coach. I asked why and he said we had the same last name and both wrestled“. That student’s BJJ coach was Cyborg Abreu, who was invited to watch practice, with William and Roberto eventually wrestling in class, “after the sparring he [Cyborg] invited me to train with him. 6 months later I became the wrestling instructor for him and the team.” the Floridian explained of the 2009 event.
