Brice Picaud, 32, did not wait for 2020 and the formalization of Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) in France to enter the arena. “I started in 2014 in Reims, at the Lion Fight Gym. At the time, we were fighting in Switzerland, Italy, Germany… Since then, I have remained faithful to the city which saw me become a professional, even if sometimes you have to leave to be recognized at home,” he explains. -he from Dijon, where he set up his club. “Before 2014, I was doing Thai boxing and kick-boxing, with feet and fists. But there was always something missing to reach the full potential. I added legs, wrestling… MMA combines everything, that’s where the best are. »
A versatility that does not prevent the competitor, less than 66 kilos and a regular at the René Tys complex in Reims, from saying he is “rather calm and shy. When I was young, I learned everything regarding karate: the values of the tatami, respect, progression in ranks as in life…” In MMA, however, there are few limits: all blows are allowed up to KO, elsewhere rarer than one imagines. “Often a fight ends in submission, with a key. »
What does he answer, then, to those who qualify his sport as extreme? “I answer that you get hurt a lot less in MMA than in judo or dance! There is no lasting trauma, shock, no dislocated shoulder… Only stained eyes and sometimes a little blood, but it passes in five days”, comments the sportsman, who affirms “to have horror of blows. My approach is rather playful, even educational. In MMA, we find all the profiles, from the aggressive to the quietest”.
It is therefore the “show of a tough sport” that Brice Picaud prefers. “The proof: we are paid according to our ranking, but also for our ability to impress the public. When I enter the cage, I change character, it’s Lion Kid who does the show and kicks. The athlete mentions an income of around 10,000 euros per year, only earned during the fights. “Saturday, if there is only one to see, it will be mine. »
In the new Reims Arena, inaugurated for the occasion, Brice Picaud will therefore face the Parisian Sofian Bougamoun. “A fight is three rounds of five minutes. But I will win from the first, “he provokes, hoping for a theatrical revenge once morest the one who beat him in 2019. “The main thing is to make the discipline known. Two other Rémois will perform on Saturday evening in their city (Sofiane Aïssaoui and Alexis Fontes). After two first editions in Paris, Hexagone MMA 4 should be held in Nice next April.
