SEEF DISTRICT—Belarus has bred some of the most exciting and fearless athletes in mixed martial arts history at the height of the country’s emergence in the all-encompassing sport during the early 2000s.
With BRAVE Combat Federation hosting its first live event in the Belarusian capital of Minsk this Friday, June 4th, it brings back fond memories of the nation’s MMA peak as the card will feature six of its homegrown talents in a 12-bout lineup.
One of them is Vadim Kutsyi, a blue-chip super welterweight recruit who holds a remarkable 15-1 professional record with seven victories by way of submission and four via knockout.
Kutsyi hasn’t tasted defeat in five years, riding high on an eight-bout winning streak—with six of those triumphs ending by finish.
The 29-year-old Minsk native is set to make his maiden promotional appearance at BRAVE CF 51: THE FUTURE IS HERE—which takes place at the 4,000-seater Falcon Club Arena—against fellow debutant Daniyar “Doni” Abdibaev in a three-round encounter.
Kutsyi would like to honor his compatriots who came before him such as Andrei “The Pitbull” Arlovski, Alexei “Brick” Kudin, Dmitry Voitov and Igor Litoshik by doing his part in restoring Belarus’ old glory in MMA on BRAVE CF’s upcoming show in his home country, which has started to generate buzz according to him.
“This upcoming BRAVE CF event has caused a huge response in Belarus. There are a lot of posters around the city, people constantly send my photos from the poster, even those whom I don’t know and who were not interested in MMA before,” he said.
“This is an indicator that BRAVE CF is doing great work to develop and promote not only their organization, but also their fighters,” the Academy MMA member added.
BRAVE CF has developed from being an upstart MMA organization in 2016 to a combat sports powerhouse, staging 50 shows in 21 different countries—six of which are European nations such as Northern Ireland, England, Sweden and Russia.
In line with its strategy of building talents from the grassroots level, the Bahrain-based outfit took advantage of venturing into untapped European markets like Slovenia and Romania.
The organization will be breaking new ground on Friday, adding Belarus to the long list of countries that BRAVE CF has visited through the years.
“Different organizations used to hold tournaments and events in Belarus, but they haven’t had such a scale as BRAVE CF,” Kutsyi stated. “Holding an important event like this one in Belarus is a very big step towards the development of Belarusian MMA.”
Now that the company has established a major foothold in Europe, Kutsyi believes that it will be difficult for its competitors to knock BRAVE CF off the pedestal that it is currently occupying as the MMA frontrunner in the continent.
“For BRAVE CF, this is another step towards expanding their borders and capturing Europe,” he shared. “BRAVE CF held a lot of events in Europe, even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. I believe the best is yet to come for them.”