Élisa Julien always arrives early for her twice-weekly MMA training at the El Baja Boxing Academy, in the Fontaines district of Tours (Indre-et-Loire). This combat sport, which the 21-year-old discovered two years ago after practicing boxing and krav maga when she was a teenager, contributes to her balance.
«If I don’t come to train, I feel a lack, she confides. MMA allows me to let off steam,to externalize things that I cannot expel elsewhere. I also have more confidence in myself.When I walk down the street late at night, I have no apprehension. If something happened to me, I would know how to defend myself, although I would always say that it is better to run.” laughs this fighter nicknamed “Smiley”.
His smile never leaves his face, “except in a ring, until she has won by knockout”, testifies Ulrich Vitry, his trainer, who praises his rage to win and his investment. In the confined space of the octagon, the fear of taking hits is completely foreign to him: “I feel an intense sensation, a unique pressure that I experienced, to a lesser extent, when I was doing crossfit (a very powerful physical conditioning method, used in particular by the military, Editor’s note). My head is completely empty. It’s time. No choice, you have to go,” describes Élisa, holder of the green grade (the fourth out of the eight existing grades), which opened the door to her first fights.
All her qualities could even, in the eyes of her coach, propel her towards a professional destiny like Manon Fiorot, the current world number two, who won her amateur world champion title at the age of 27. “Among women and among heavyweights in the men’s categories, there is room. If Élisa decides, she has all the cards in hand,” he assures.
At a time when so many others dream of a career crowned with glory and money, the young woman has no plans to leave the amateur world: «I’m still young, I want to travel and I don’t know what I’ll do next year. For the moment, I live this passion to the fullest. »
A sulphurous reputation
Faced with the craze for this discipline, very popular among young people, Nedjid El Baja, the founder of this Touraine combat sports institution, very renowned for its expertise in boxing, has limited the number of registrations.
“We stopped at 43 licensees and we limited access to those over 16 years old. But we could have had many more, especially children. I welcome 7 year old kids who want to become MMA stars,” observe the one that everyone in the neighborhood calls “the boss”. Suspicious, he did not immediately open his club to this practice: “ At first, I didn’t believe it was going to be this big. And I wanted to find the right coach to convey the image, the values of the club and maintain control. »
Since the first publicized UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) fight in 1993 (read the benchmarks), this emerging discipline, a contemporary heritage of pankration associated with a mixture of martial arts and combat sports, has spread like wildfire, arousing confusion and distrust among public authorities.
For their part, the major federations of Olympic disciplines took a dim view of the emergence of this controversial competitor. The brutality of these spectacular duels, compared by its detractors to the lions’ den and circus games, slowed down the legalization of official competitions. Until January 2020, when the then Minister of Sports, Roxana Maracineanu, finally decided to authorize its practice in France.
“MMA has developed against the tide,” specifies sociologist Yann Ramirez, author of the essay In the MMA cage, sociology of a 21st century sportcentury (Ed. Atlande). “France had until now developed a great sporting culture of amateurism and olympism. Leisure sport had always preceded the appearance of professional and publicized competitions. The opposite happened for MMA. »
Appearing in the event field, in the wake of major wrestling shows, these competitions are in full democratization. “This is what I called in my thesis “reverse sportivization”. But it is still today in France the most popular discipline with the fewest number of licensees. underlines the researcher.
Break preconceived ideas
Since 2020, MMA has entered the fold of the French Boxing Federation (FFB) as an associated discipline. Lionel Brézéphin, national technical manager of the FFB, referent of the MMA project, was entrusted with the mission of supervising his practice: “I started from a blank page to propose a regulatory framework and structure the training component,” explains the manager, who was inspired for this purpose by the experiences of major pioneering countries (United States, Japan) and the expertise of the world of boxing in the protection of athletes. For his part, veteran Johnny Frachey deployed a system of technical ranks, based on «the codification of the 680 techniques known to date, so that they can be taught in clubs.”
Of interest to the mainstream media, the journey of the French stars (Cyril Gane, Francis Ngannou, Karl Amoussou, Cédric Doumbè, etc.) has contributed to breaking preconceived ideas about this sport, which “will always raise questions in France”, admits John Ramirez. “In our Western societies, sensitive to hygiene, we have difficulty understanding how an athlete can reach such a pain tolerance threshold. »
Conversely, in the Caucasus, in Brazil or in Asia, where violence eats away at the daily life of the population, its practice, firmly anchored, stems from the instinct of survival: “I come from a country in which you are obliged to know how to defend yourself to save your skin,” recognizes Ruslan, the second MMA coach of the El Baja Boxing Academy and former member of the national wrestling team of Dagestan, a federated Russian republic.
Strategy rather than force
Based on scientific studies reporting lower trauma than in rugby, boxing or even football, Lionel Brézéphin refutes the idea that this sport is more violent than another: “In MMA, there are indeed wounds, sometimes very impressive as we saw in the recent fight of Benoît Saint-Denis at the UMC (Ultimate Martial Championship), but above all it is an activity with a very strong physical commitment, pitting two consenting protagonists against each other, who engage in a game of chess. The goal is to be able to use a technique to dominate the opponent. pleads this great promoter of what he calls “Combat IQ”. Only the fine strategists and the most creative stand out from the crowd: “Someone who only thinks about violence or force will never be a good fighter,” he says.
Although attracted by the adrenaline of fights, the vast majority of MMA fighters would not, according to Élisa Julien, “the first to look for fights in everyday life, if only because we know better than anyone what we are capable of”. In his club, licensees also undertake to adopt irreproachable behavior outside the ring. Ulrich Vitry assures us: “Those who fight outside know that they will never be able to set foot in the room again. »
The French MMA Federation plans, for its part, to distribute to all practitioners a “code of honor”, written, initially, for the members of the French team, responsible for setting an example .
—–
100,000 practitioners in France
France has 270 clubs wrote MMA.
100,000 people practice this sport. Among them, 10,000 licensees are registered in a competition course.
Created on January 31, 2020, the FMMAF (“French MMA Federation”) has already trained 1,500 coaches, including 980 during the health crisis.
Since the legalization of competitions in Francein January 2020, this internal body of the French Boxing Federation organizes events such as the MMA League, an amateur fighting circuit.
L’Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC)created in the United States in November 1993, is considered the most important league in the world.
Amateur fights stretch over three three-minute rounds. In the championship, they take place in five rounds of five minutes.
To find out more:
– A book : In the MMA cage, sociology of a 21st century sport by Yann Ramirez (Éd. Atlande), 276 p., €19.
– A series : The Cage by Franck Gastambide, available on Netflix.
