“She always managed to beat me at home” - ‘Buchecha’ recalls training with his sister while starting BJJ

17-time Brazilian jiu-jitsu world champion Marcus ‘Buchecha’ Almeida will return to the circle at ONE Championship’s biggest event in promotional history. In front of a potential 200 million Amazon Prime Video subscribers, Almeida will try to make it four in a row when he meets former interim world title challenger Kirill Grishenko.

‘Buchecha’ has looked practically unstoppable in his first three appearances against Anderson ‘Braddock’ Silva, Kang Ji Won, and Simon Carson. Almeida dispatched all three opponents in the first round with an average fight time of just over two minutes. It has been an impressive run and a win over Grishenko would likely launch ‘Buchecha’ into talks for a world championship opportunity.

Before getting to his eagerly-anticipated return to the circle, Almeida sat down with ONE Championship to talk about his early years as a kid, during which he learned about the world of submission grappling.

During the conversation, Almeida revealed that when he was just starting out, he was regularly beaten up by a fellow gym member who just happened to be his sister.

“My father didn’t like the idea at first, but in order not to forbid my sister from training, he started training, too. At the gym, there was only my sister and one more girl... Then the two convinced me to go train too. And as I got beat up a lot by her, I started to go. That was my first contact with jiu-jitsu.”

With a head start on her brother, Almeida revealed that his sister would regularly mop the floor with him at home, but in the process, he learned a valuable lesson.

“She was already learning a few things and she always managed to beat me at home, and that drove me crazy. I saw how difficult it was to face someone who knew how to fight.”

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‘Buchecha’ believes now is the right time to face Kirill Grishenko

By all accounts, Marcus Almeida is facing a significant step up in competition when he meets Belarusian Kirill Grishenko at ONE on Prime Video 1 on August 26.

Coming off an interim heavyweight world title loss to Anatoly Malykhin, Grishenko aims to get back into the win column while simultaneously stopping the ‘Buchecha’ hype train.

Following the announcement of the bout, Almeida recognized that it was a step up in competition, but also pointed out that Grishenko and himself are very similar on paper.

“Yeah, it’s a huge step up. But I don’t like to think like that. When I made my debut in ONE, Kirill was doing his debut at the same time, so we had the same amount of time in the house, right? He has three fights in ONE. I got three, going for my fourth one. Before that, he didn’t have much experience in MMA, so I think it’s fair.”

The stakes are high for both fighters. While Grishenko looks to stay relevant in the world title picture, Almeida is tasked with keeping his undefeated streak alive on his way up the ladder to world title contention.