A white belt competitor’s unlikely podium finish at the ADCC Atlanta Open turned into a much larger story after it came to light that the man who defeated him in the semifinals had competed against Olympic gold medalist Jordan Burroughs just four years prior.
The story began when Boston-based BJJ black belt John Connors took to X to share details about one of his athletes, Jalen Martinez, who entered the Beginner/White Belt division.
Martinez, in only his third competition ever and with no prior wrestling or grappling background, earned third place. He lost in the semifinals to a competitor who, it later emerged, carried eight years of wrestling experience and had faced Burroughs at the collegiate level.
ADCC moved swiftly once the discrepancy surfaced, disqualifying the opponent for sandbagging. Connors praised the organization’s response: “I commend ADCC for quickly DQ’ing him as soon as they discovered the sandbagging.”
Online sleuthing eventually identified the disqualified competitor as Temuulen Mendbileg, a 24-year-old from Mongolia.
According to sources, Mendbileg has a college wrestling record of 10-2 and a 2024-25 record of 14-5. He is also 2-0 in amateur MMA. Following the public exposure, his competition results were removed from his Smoothcomp profile.
The grappling community reacted quickly. One commenter wrote: “White belt division should be meaningless to anyone with 8 years of wrestling… It isn’t dominating your division, it is being a bully and his coach should be ashamed.”
Not everyone believed the beginner divisions warranted that level of protection. Commenter @jackietheheel argued: “The problem is competitions being held at white belt and even blue belt. We all know socially it doesn’t matter if you place gold in these divisions so why bother competing in the first place? I’d argue black is the only division where gold matters.”
Connors disagreed: “Nonsense. Competing is a valuable part of skill development. Experience levels, as well as weight classes help create an imperfect environment of relative fairness that allows competitors to have a productive experience to help their development.”
Connors also addressed why beginner-level results carry genuine meaning: “What’s gained at white belt is experience in competing and valuable information to inform an athlete’s training.”
