Circus pro wrestling roots and MMA debut at 14: The story of DWCS's Rickson Zenidim
10/10/2023 17:00
Rickson Zenidim fights fellow Brazilian flyweight Andre Lima in the co-main event of Dana White's Contender Series in Las Vegas on Tuesday with a UFC contract on the line. It's the culmination of a longtime dream for a clan that has had combat running through its veins for nearly a century.
In the early 1900s, Americo Zainedim fled Turkey to escape from war and set foot in Brazil with his family to start a new life. He and his wife Alavina made a living selling cheap jewelry in Irati, a small town in Parana, but Americo decided to continue the tradition of competing in pro wrestling matches in the circus to earn extra money. They had 12 children, who years later gave them more than a dozen grandchildren. Decades have passed, and some still keep that fighting tradition alive.
"My father's uncles took him to the circus to watch them compete in pro wrestling when he was a kid," Zenidim said on MMA Fighting's Trocação Franca podcast. "It was pro wrestling, but things always got heated and ended up in real brawls. My father grew up in that environment and started training Muay Thai, kickboxing and taekwondo. It was vale tudo for real, no rules."
Rickson's father Paulo Bueno moved to Ponta Grossa, 50 miles distant from Irati, to continue his career in circus pro wrestling, but added real vale tudo fights to it. In total, spanning from 1999 to 2022, "Paulao" competed in 36 sanctioned MMA fights, compiling a record of 25-10-1. Rickson said his father's loss to Marcelo Santos at Meca World Vale Tudo 6, via decision, changed the way Paulo was seen in the fight sphere.
"That's how he created the Zenidim style," Rickson said. "You can't see too much of this style but it uses a ton of counter attacks. His fight with 'Marcelao', from Chute Boxe, for example, you have the opponent charging forward the entire time and you start to defend, block and counter. [Santos'] face was completely deformed but people didn't see [Bueno's attacks] because the opponent was rushing forward. There's video of his post-fight interview on YouTube, and the guy with a deformed face won against my father. My father came up with this style and everything we do is focused on MMA. My father had this vision and its been essential to what we're doing in MMA."
Rickson, now 24 years old and 14-1 in MMA, has been doing exhibition matches since age 3, and jokes he's been a fighter "from my mom's womb." His professional MMA career officially started in 2013, competing on his father's promotion Paulao Fight in Ponta Grossa at 14. He signed a contract to fight at Shooto Brazil a year later, but the promotion cancelled the match after public backlash for signing a 15-year-old. Rickson said similar thing happened with Jungle Fight, leaving him no option but to compete in the regional circuit.
"They said the event was going to air live on TV and the network wouldn't allow a teenager fighting," Zenidim said. "They held my career back a little bit, but it was good in a sense that it gave me time to earn experience in the regional scene. Different times. It would be impossible to do that today, to fight professional at 14. Many people criticized us for starting too early, but I was way ahead of everybody else because I was fighting older opponents and there was no one left for me to fight here."
Zenidim scored a dozen finishes as a professional fighter with 10 first-round submissions to his credit, and expects no easy match when he faces unbeaten Andre Lima (6-0) at the UFC APEX.
"I don't like to go the distance," Zenidim said. "I'm coming to fight on the feet or on the ground. My opponent comes from a boxing background and he's very good, I've watched some of his fights, but he's only made his professional MMA debut last year and has six fights. I trust my training with my family. Our style will be recognized worldwide on Oct. 10. I'm going after the finish no matter where, and I'm coming out with the contract."
