One of MMA’s biggest superstars, Ronda Rousey, boasts top-level judo as one of her strongest core skills. Yet in France, one of Europe’s lone holdouts standing against MMA, it’s judo helping to block the UFC from coming into the country. “When you have the president of the judo federation (Federation Francaise de Judo) saying that MMA is not a good sport – and this federation has 600,000 people participating in judo, which is huge for France – you listen to them,” International Mixed Martial Arts Federation President Bertrand Amoussou told MMAjunkie. “So we come in after that and say, ‘No, it’s not a bad sport.’ We need to show them that we are making an effort and are constantly working on regulations and safety and things like that.” If there’s a more perfect man to lead the charge to bring MMA to France than Amoussou, it’s certainly hard to imagine. The 48-year-old is a lifelong practitioner of martial arts who was born in Senegal but moved to France at just 4 years old and started training in judo. He represented France in the 1990 European Judo Championships and took home a bronze medal
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IMMAF head optimistic judo’s grip loosening, hopeful to finally bring MMA to France – MMA Junkie