Helena Crevar

Helena Crevar is an American submission grappler and Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt under John Danaher, widely regarded as the most precocious talent in modern women’s no-gi. Born in January 2007 in Las Vegas, Nevada, to Serbian immigrant parents, she was homeschooled as an only child and immersed in martial arts from age three through Kajukenbo—a Hawaiian hybrid of striking and grappling. By eight she had earned a junior black belt in Kajukenbo, tried ballroom dance, ballet, basketball, and swimming, and then discovered Brazilian jiu-jitsu at a local strength-and-conditioning gym. Within months she was competing, drawn to the mental problem-solving of the “gentle art” more than striking sports she briefly sampled.

Her formative BJJ years in Las Vegas included work under Hector Vasquez at Cobrinha Las Vegas, where she built a competitive base while studying Gordon Ryan matches and John Danaher instructionals on her own. In late 2022, at just 15, she and her family relocated to the Austin, Texas area so she could train full-time with Danaher’s squad—then branded New Wave Jiu-Jitsu, later reopened publicly as Kingsway Jiu-Jitsu. Training daily among world champions such as Gordon Ryan, Garry Tonon, and Giancarlo Bodoni, Crevar’s game advanced at an extraordinary rate. Danaher promoted her purple in September 2024, brown in December 2024 (still 17), and black in June 2025 after she won the adult brown-belt IBJJF World Championship—making her the first woman ever awarded a black belt by Danaher, roughly a decade after she first stepped on a jiu-jitsu mat.

Crevar’s international breakout came on the ADCC circuit. After early Trials experience as a teenager, she won the 2024 ADCC West Coast Trials at −65 kg—among the youngest Trials champions in event history—then reached the 2024 ADCC World Championship final in Las Vegas. En route she submitted Aurélie Le Vern with an outside heel hook, the first finish by heel hook in ADCC women’s history, and defeated Brianna Ste-Marie in the semifinals before taking silver against Ana Vieira. At 17 she became the youngest ADCC World Championship podium finisher ever recorded. Parallel pro-circuit success included the Polaris women’s lightweight (70 kg) title in 2024 with subsequent defenses, a UFC Fight Pass Invitational win over Le Vern, and a growing reputation for submission hunting against full black-belt fields while still a colored belt.

In 2025 she consolidated the top of the women’s rankings. At WNO 27 she submitted Elisabeth Clay by rear naked choke to become the youngest Who’s Number One champion. She signed with ONE Championship in July 2025, won the women’s $100,000 bracket at Craig Jones Invitational 2 (including an Aoki-lock finish of Sarah Galvão), claimed FloGrappling Female Grappler of the Year, and rose to #1 pound-for-pound on FloGrappling’s women’s no-gi rankings (also topping 145 lb and 155 lb). In her black-belt IBJJF No-Gi Worlds debut that December she submitted every opponent en route to medium-heavyweight gold. Into 2026 she has continued across ONE, Polaris, WNO, and IBJJF, with an invitation to the stacked +65 kg division at the 2026 ADCC World Championships in Kraków—already one of the defining figures of her generation’s women’s grappling.