Injury Problems Behind Him, Bruno Pucci is Ready to Fight Again

A young career riddled with injuries didn’t keep Evolve MMA featherweight Bruno Pucci down for too long. The Brazilian jiu jitsu black belt and no-gi world champion has battled past a bad back and surgeries to eventually make his way back inside the ONE Championship cage, and now he’s ready to show the world what it has been missing.

“It’s no secret. I had a really bad lower back even before I moved to Singapore,” said Pucci. This came from way back. I really don’t know how I got it, but it was really bothering me, so I had to kind of stop to get it fixed. That’s why I had such a long break.

“It was just something that wasn’t in my control. If I could have chosen, I would have liked to stay more active as a fighter. But I had to work through the adversity.”

Pucci lost to the United States’ Major Overall in 2014 by devastating knockout, and had to spend over a year away from competition to deal with his lingering back issues before returning with a scintillating victory against Indonesia’s Anthony Engelen a few months ago.

“I’m a hundred per cent now. I got surgery to get the back fixed. I fought last December in Manila right after the surgery and right after the recovery period, and I felt great. Now I can give a hundred per cent in training. There’s nothing stopping me anymore,” said a relieved Pucci.

After defeating Engelen, Pucci slumped to the canvas overcome with emotion, and literally showered the cage with tears of joy and relief. Suddenly, he was back where he wanted to be, doing what he loved to do. It just goes to show that a true fighter can’t be contained within limitations.

Pucci recalls how tough recovery from the injury was, and elaborated on why he was so emotional to find himself back in the cage after a long absence.

“It’s easy to say that I’m all better now because I got my back fixed, but my family and close friends know exactly what I went through. It’s not easy to recover. There were complications here and there. My right leg wasn’t moving very well, so the doctors had to make some adjustments and I couldn’t see the end of it all,” said Pucci, remembering the ordeal.

“I didn’t know when I would be able to come back, but it took a lot of hard work and intense post-therapy to recover from my injuries. Now I’m back to training and back at the level that I was before. That’s what made it really emotional for me. Coming from a loss and then going one and a half years without fighting and then winning – that was really emotional.”

Pucci says he’s learned a lot over the past few years, during rehabilitation and even in the loss to Overall. The loss was a learning experience for the 26-year-old from Brazil who is now based in Singapore.

“Some people like to see the negative side of the loss. Most of us just see people win or lose. At the time, of course I didn’t want to lose, but now after a while I see that it was good for me,” said Pucci.

“I saw so many mistakes that I made in that fight and it kind of opened my eyes to a lot of things that I have to work on. I think I have been putting the work inside the gym to fix all those mistakes. So I think that loss was good for me. I feel much better now.”

Despite his immense talent, Pucci feels he’s not in the position to hurry things along. Right now, he just wants to see what he can against the man in front of him. Bonuses will come later he says, after the hard work has been put in.

“My goal now is just to take things fight by fight. I don’t want to rush things. I don’t want to rush into anything that I’m not ready for yet,” said Pucci.

“But of course my next goal is to be a more active fighter. If I can fight more times a year I can show my skills better inside the cage, and of course get better as an athlete. I’ll also get more experience, so that’s my goal. The more I fight, the more I win. I will get closer to the main goal of every fighter, which of course is a title.”