PORTRAIT – While he will defend his title on March 30 in Los Angeles, the world champion hides, beneath an intimidating physique, a more complex personality. And touching.
If one day you come across Arsen Goulamirian, always remember that you should never trust appearances. Beneath his 185 centimeters, his 90 kg, his haughty and massive bearing or even his look as hard as determined, in fact hides « a chocolate teddy bear », to use the words of Nadia Benabdelouahed, his press secretary. « It looks tough on the outside, but it is very tender on the inside. He is very human. At the beginning, when he came to get me, I had a certain image of him and I told him that it wasn’t possible, that he was too crazy. As a fighter, he is very violent, he is a little wild. But, in life, he is very gentle, altruistic, he likes to share with young people. » Quite the opposite, therefore, of a certain “Feroz”, his nickname in the ring inherited from a training course in Cuba where he had sent a sparring partner to the mat.
« Abel (Sanchez, his mentor and trainer, Editor’s note) told me that this nickname suited me perfectly…
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