Ethan Crelinsten remembers the cold.
Growing up in Montreal, getting to the gym meant taking a bus and the metro, then dealing with a wind that made the trip feel longer than it was. The city gave him plenty to appreciate, from its food and culture to the people who helped him find his way into combat sports. Getting through those winters was part of the experience, too.
“It makes you tough,” Crelinsten told Dan Kuhl of Combat Press. “The wind kind of, like, peels your face off.”
These days, he is happy in Austin, Texas. The weather agrees with him, the training room is deep, and he has found a competitive outlet away from the mats in pickleball. Before he can put more time into improving that game, however, there is a championship to pursue.
On Thursday, Oct. 8, Crelinsten will face Renato Canuto for the vacant lightweight title at UFC BJJ 12, live from the Meta Apex in Las Vegas. For a grappler who once called out the promotion while holding a Polaris belt, the opportunity is exactly what he wanted.
Finding His Passion in Montreal
Crelinsten did not grow up committed to a particular sport. Before finding MMA and jiu-jitsu, he was going to school and spending time with friends, occasionally trying different activities without taking any of them seriously.
Once he found grappling, that changed quickly.
“I just found MMA and I found jiu-jitsu and I loved it right away,” Crelinsten said. “So I just sort of stopped everything else and went full-blown into that because I found my passion.”
Montreal offered more than a place to begin training. Crelinsten pointed to the connections between Tristar, Firas Zahabi, Georges St-Pierre and the athletes at Renzo Gracie Academy as helping pave the way for his own progression.
He remembers the city fondly, even if he has little desire to trade Austin’s weather for another winter commute.
“It was a great place for me to start,” he said.
A Familiar Training Room With a New Name
Crelinsten’s path eventually took him to Puerto Rico before he settled in Texas. He enjoyed the island and the people who welcomed the team. Leaving, he explained, was a matter of internal changes rather than dissatisfaction with life there.
Austin had already been a destination the athletes wanted to pursue. When they went their separate ways, it became the place to build their next training environments.
More recently, another change brought a new identity to Crelinsten’s gym. Simple Man occupies the same facility that housed B-Team, and much of the membership remains familiar.
“We’re in the same exact spot,” Crelinsten said. “We have most of the same members, too.”
He acknowledged that seeing Craig Jones leave was difficult, while also recognizing that people’s ambitions do not always keep them moving in the same direction.
“Anytime there’s a split or people sort of grow in different directions, they go off in their direction,” Crelinsten said.
For the athletes still training in Austin, he sees plenty of reasons to be encouraged. New faces have joined the room, established members are continuing to compete, and upcoming events have given the group a shared sense of purpose.
“There’s a super deep room now,” he said.
The name has changed, but the atmosphere he values remains: competitive training alongside a positive, familiar community.
Calling His Shot With UFC BJJ
Crelinsten appreciated his time with Polaris. He held its 155-pound championship and spoke warmly about the promotion and how it treated him.
He also wanted to test himself on a larger platform.
“I wanted to hold both belts,” Crelinsten said. “I wanted to do, you know, hold the belt in UFC and the belt in Polaris. But unfortunately, that’s not really possible.”
After defending his Polaris title, he used his time on the microphone to make his intentions clear. He wanted the UFC BJJ belt in the same weight class.
According to Crelinsten, conversations began later that day, and his first match with the promotion followed a few months later. A quick victory gave him another opportunity to ask for the championship match.
Now, he has it.
Canuto presents the kind of opponent who makes that opportunity especially appealing. Crelinsten expects movement, a strong gas tank and a scrappy match against someone who will be difficult to hold in place.
“I don’t think Renato has been in one boring match his whole life,” Crelinsten said.
He respects Canuto’s upper-body judo and well-rounded game. He also understands that tough opponents come with competing at this level.
“Everyone’s tough at the top,” he said. “And I can find my way to get my game going.”
Why the UFC BJJ Bowl Suits Him
Crelinsten likes the UFC BJJ competition surface, particularly what its curved boundary does to keep athletes engaged.
His earlier experience competing with a slanted boundary came at Karate Combat. That helped him appreciate a format that limits interruptions and makes it more difficult to use the edge of the competition area as an escape.
“It keeps the match from going out of bounds,” Crelinsten said. “It keeps everyone engaged because there’s never any breaks in the action.”
He prefers the bowl’s gradual incline to a sharper slope. Rather than immediately turning an exchange into a pushing contest, he feels it gives athletes a chance to recognize their position and respond.
The boundary still demands adjustments.
“You have to hold your ground a bit more,” he said. “You can’t just, like, you know, play backing up.”
That matters against an opponent who can keep moving and threaten takedowns. Crelinsten expects the surface to make engagement necessary, something he welcomes in a matchup he already believes will deliver action.
Pickleball Can Wait Until After the Title Match
Outside training, lifting and cardio, Crelinsten keeps himself busy with cooking, television and trying to play guitar. Lately, pickleball and ping-pong have taken up more of his attention.
There is a ping-pong table at the gym, and he plays pickleball with training partners as well as at a busy spot near his home.
Asked who leads the gym’s pickleball competition, he put Damian and Sal at the top. He is working on closing the gap.
“I’m getting there,” Crelinsten said. “I’m catching up.”
Once Canuto is behind him, he joked, he can get back to the “real training.”
First, though, he wants to leave Las Vegas with the lightweight belt. He already has a specific callout in mind for what could follow, but he is keeping that name to himself until the championship match is finished.
There is no mystery about what he expects from Oct. 8.
“Me versus Canuto is guaranteed fireworks,” Crelinsten said. “Neither one of us stalls to, you know, edge out wins.”
He expects the kind of match that makes both athletes work for every position.
“I think it’s going to be a grueling, gritty match.”
UFC BJJ 12 airs live on UFC Fight Pass beginning at 8 p.m. ET.