IMMAF head optimistic judo's grip loosening, hopeful to finally bring MMA to France

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.

Amoussou, the older brother of onetime Bellator title challenger Karl Amoussou, eventually turned his attention to MMA and in 2004 picked up a knockout win under the PRIDE banner. He was named IMMAF president in August 2013.

Until now, France has declined to support MMA, not directly banning the sport but instead outlawing organized competitions. Amoussou believes the judo federation he once represented is a key reason the government remains opposed to the sport.

“The judo federation is very strong in France,” Amoussou said. “They are just afraid the MMA will become bigger than judo, so they are pushing for us not be recognized.

“We’ve been going through this process for 10 years now explaining and educating, and fortunately there have also been a lot of changes in the media. Three or four years ago, it was written in the media that MMA is a very brutal sport and things like that, but today they’re learning more about MMA and they are saying, ‘Come on, it’s not as brutal as we thought. We should recognize the sport. There are good people running the sport.

“Every time they change the government in France, they keep on saying the same thing, that things are changing, so now they need to make the move.”

Amoussou was in Las Vegas to oversee the IMMAF’s first-ever amateur world championships, which took place as part of the UFC’s International Fight Week activities. He’s since returned to France, where he lives, and is scheduled to meet with the government next week.

Amoussou is hopeful French officials will listen to the changing sentiment of the public and open the nation to hosting MMA events, which could eventually include a visit from the UFC.

“Obviously France is a little bit conservative, and we can understand that,” Amoussou said. “They’re concerned that they’ll put their son into MMA, and he’ll be hurt. I think they understand the professional part of sport, But they also need to understand that that will be just 1 percent of the people who practice the sport. We have to work for the other 99 percent, too.

“We need to talk to the government. I’m talking to them this month, July 18, and we need to see what comes out of it. Everything is ready. All the questions that they will ask me, I have a response for that, so I’m quite confident we can start to host events very soon. If you ask me when I think we can have a UFC in France, if I’m remaining very very positive like I am, I would say in one year – maybe one to two years.”

France isn’t heavily represented at the top level of the sport. Francis Carmont and Nordine Taleb were both born in France but currently live and train in Canada. Still, Amoussou said there are approximately 15,000 people training MMA in the country.

The political roadblocks sound eerily similar to the situation in New York, the lone U.S. state that still doesn’t sanction the sport, where logic doesn’t necessarily dictate policy.

Amoussou hopes now is the time for that all to change.

“People in France are finally hearing the truth about MMA,” Amoussou said. “Five years ago, they might say it was a brutal sport and ask, ‘Why do you have this octagon? Why do you put those people in that type of situation and allow punches on the ground?’ But we have statistics and studies we can share with them to show all that we do in the sport for fighter safety. Once they really study it, it’s obvious they need to make the move.”