Erin Herle

Erin Herle grew up in the San Fernando Valley, California, and found Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in 2009, starting her path under Rômulo Barral at Gracie Barra before settling into the Alliance system under Rubens "Cobrinha" Charles. Over the next several years she moved between Cobrinha's Los Angeles academy and Marcelo Garcia's New York school, absorbing a technical, scramble-heavy approach to the sport that would define her competitive identity as she rose through the colored belts.

Herle's climb through the ranks was gradual and hard-earned. As a blue belt she reached the final of the 2012 IBJJF World Championship, and by purple belt she was a fixture on the podium at Worlds and the European Open. Her brown belt years were her breakout stretch, capped by a No-Gi World Championship title in 2015, a European Open title in 2016, and a São Paulo Open title in 2017 — results that made her one of the more dangerous names in the women's lightweight pool heading into black belt.

Cobrinha promoted Herle to black belt on November 4, 2017, and she wasted little time adjusting to the deepest division in women's competition. She won the IBJJF South American Championship that same year and added a silver medal at the 2018 IBJJF European Open, competing against a lightweight bracket that regularly included multiple former and future world champions.

Herle's game has always been built around timing and positional control rather than physicality, a necessity in a lightweight division that has produced some of the most technical grapplers in the sport. Her knee-slide pass and calm, patient top game reflected years spent training with elite partners rather than relying on raw athleticism.

In the years since her most active competitive stretch, Herle has shifted her focus toward the mental side of performance. She completed a master's degree in Sport and Performance Psychology, became a Certified Mental Performance Consultant (CMPC) in 2024, and founded Train Ya Mind LLC, where she now works with athletes navigating the same pressures she faced across a decade of high-level competition. She has spoken candidly about her own struggles with injury, competitive anxiety, and the difficulty of stepping away from the mats, work that has made her a respected voice on athlete mental health within the jiu-jitsu community.

A technical lightweight known for her scrambling guard game and a sharp knee-slide pass, Herle built her career on precise fundamentals rather than brute streng