There are competitions you enter for experience.
There are competitions where you find out where you stand.
And then there are competitions where you arrive with a title to defend.
Monét David is going to Lisbon as a European champion.
In 2025, the young Northampton Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu competitor travelled to Dublin for the IBJJF European Kids No-Gi Championship and came home a European champion.
On 10–11 October 2026, she goes again. This year’s European Kids IBJJF Jiu-Jitsu No-Gi Championship takes place at the Complexo Municipal Esportivo do Casal Vistoso in Lisbon, Portugal.
Different city. Different year. Same objective.
Win Europe. Again.
From Dublin to Lisbon
Last year, Monét was not travelling to Dublin as the defending champion. She was going there to try to become one.
She did.
That distinction matters because defending a championship brings a different kind of pressure. The first time you are chasing the title. The second time, you know what it takes to win it — and everyone starts again.
Monét heads to Lisbon representing ZR Team Northampton / Onyx Combat Academy, within the wider ZR Team network, attempting to defend her IBJJF European crown and become a two-time European champion.
Monét is listed in the official IBJJF athlete list under ZR Team Association.
This is not one result
It is easy to look at a young athlete, see a European gold medal and allow that one result to tell the whole story.
But that is not Monét’s story.
Alongside becoming an IBJJF European champion, she has won the British Open twice and Elite BJJ National Championship, while consistently testing herself on the competitive circuit.
That consistency previously carried her as high as No. 9 in the IBJJF world rankings in her Grey Belt / Teen 1 / Female Medium-Heavy division.
A strong competition record takes more than one successful weekend. It requires turning up again and again.
Win. Learn. Train. Travel. Compete.
Then do it all again.
Gi, no-gi and MMA: a wider combat-sports ambition
Monét competes in both gi and no-gi Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. She is also an avid MMA competitor, taking her interest in combat sports beyond the grappling mats.
For her, these competitions are part of a longer journey. She would like to pursue a career in combat sports someday. It is an ambition she is working towards through training, learning and continuing to test herself in competition.
Gi and no-gi each bring their own challenges. MMA adds another setting in which to develop and apply her skills. That wider interest helps explain why she keeps returning to train and compete: there is more she wants to learn and more she hopes to achieve.
Explore our MMA programme and Submission Grappling training to see the different routes available at Onyx.
The champion returns to the challenge
There is something fascinating about returning to a championship you have already won.
You know you can do it. But the previous result does not decide the next match.
When the referee brings the athletes together in the middle of the mat, the score starts at zero. Last year’s medal is not worth an advantage point.
You have to earn the result again.
That is the challenge waiting in Lisbon. Monét is going back to test herself, with everything she has learned since Dublin.
Northampton is building competitors
There is another story developing alongside Monét’s individual journey. It is what is happening back home.
Onyx Combat Academy and ZR Team Northampton are developing a genuine competition culture in Northampton.
That does not mean everyone who walks through the door needs to become a competitor. Far from it.
Many people start Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu because they want to learn, become fitter, challenge themselves and enjoy training. Our Submission Grappling programme welcomes that approach alongside the competition pathway.
But there is a difference between training somewhere that allows competition and training somewhere that understands it.
For athletes who want that pathway, the room matters. The coaching matters. Your teammates matter. The rounds matter. And the standard you become accustomed to every week matters.
Competition pedigree runs through the room
That competitive mentality is not limited to one successful junior.
The adult room at Onyx / ZR Team Northampton is being developed with the same philosophy. Competitors train alongside recreational members. Coaches bring their own competitive experience into the room. Athletes test themselves outside the academy, and those experiences come back onto the Northampton mats.
Our coaching team brings experience across striking and grappling. Tom Mearns’ continuing competition journey is another example of that approach in practice.
The wider ZR Team UK network adds another dimension. Northampton sits within an affiliation containing experienced coaches, active competitors and other serious training rooms.
We want to build on those connections: more shared competition rounds, more inter-club training and more exposure to unfamiliar styles and difficult opponents.
Because better competitors need better problems to solve.
That is how standards rise.
Serious competitors. Open doors.
There is a balance we are determined to maintain.
We want someone who has never put on a pair of gloves or a gi to be able to walk into Onyx and feel comfortable starting.
We also want an ambitious competitor to walk into the same building, look around the room and think:
This is somewhere I can get good.
Those things are part of the same culture. Good coaching should not be reserved for elite athletes.
The beginner learning their first escape deserves technical detail. The child entering their first competition deserves proper preparation. And the athlete attempting to win a European championship deserves a room capable of helping them progress.
The destination changes. The standard should not.
One medal does not make the journey
Whatever happens in Lisbon, Monét has already experienced standing on top of an IBJJF European podium, reaching the world’s top ten in her division and becoming a two-time British Open champion alongside her other domestic championship successes.
But competitive sport keeps asking a simple question:
What are you going to do next?
For Monét David, we now know the answer.
She is going back. Back onto the IBJJF mats. Back into European competition. Back to defend the championship she won in Dublin.
This time, the road leads from Northampton to Lisbon.
Two championships. Two cities.
Dublin made the champion.
Lisbon gives her the chance to do it again.
Find your own training pathway at Onyx.
Whether you want to begin, train recreationally or develop towards competition, explore the programme and talk to our team about the right next step.
Event information and further reading
- IBJJF — official Lisbon championship information
- IBJJF — registered athletes by academy
- Monét David — athlete profile
Update, 11 October 2026: Read the Lisbon results and how Monét and Naimah returned with two gold medals.