Lucas Figueiredo On The Growth Of Alliance Jiu-Jitsu In Russia

Nov 13, 2013BJJEEFeatured, Interview

Lucas Figueiredo is a BJJ brown belt from Alliance Rio De Janeiro who is spending time in Russia to develop Alliance Russia. He is the nephew/ son of BJJ legend Alexandre Paiva. In this interview with BJJ Eastern Europe, Lucas talks about his Jiu-Jitsu story, his famous family and his work in Russia:

Hi Lucas, can you please introduce yourself to the BJJ Community of Eastern Europe?

Hi, my name is Lucas Figueiredo, 22 years old, I’m a brown belt under Alexandre Paiva, I’m from Rio de janeiro. I don’t have any big big tittle, on blue belt I was novice Brazilian champion, on Adult I was national Team champion, just did 2 fights and won, and my friends did the rest , and 3rd place on Europeans when i lost by referee decision in semi final , on purple and brown was a hard time to me , because it was when my wife was pregnant and i was needing to work a lot, so, i just collected some gold medals on state championships and small competitions.

Alliance Rio De Janeiro with Alexandre Paiva (bottom center)

Please tell us about your Jiu-Jitsu story. About your relationship with Alexandre Paiva and your brother Victor Genovesi and about Alliance Rio de Janeiro where you train.

I started jiu-jitsu at 3 years old together with my cousin Victor, i have memories to see the balcony of the house full of gis, being at dojo watching my uncle and my aunt training, so i think that it became pretty natural.
My uncle and my aunt are like a father and mother to me. I even spent more time with them than with my parents, and Victor is my cousin/brother , we grew up together , studied and trained together. They are like a mirror on my life, not just because they are world champions but because they are very good people. They have character and honesty and all .

Alliance RJ is a very nice place to be, first because it is Rio de Janeiro, you know ( hehehe), second because we have my uncle Alexandre Paiva there teaching us and Alexandre Puga too (he is his pupil and head coach too , and looks like a jiu-jitsu encyclopedia) and third because we have a really good training there, and all good guys. I’m sure everybody who visits us will feel good at being part of this Alliance family.

Please tell us about your time spent in Russia at Alliance Russia. What are the plans of Alliance in Russia?

I’ve spent a good time here in Moscow. I was living with my friend Ayub Magomadov and his family. We did the physical workout in the morning, on the middle of the day we drilled and did a couple of specific rolls and at night we were teaching and rolling . I don’t have plans of Alliance in Russia, this is just happening and growing naturally, we started from zero and with a month and a half we are already with 38 students in one class, that is looking really promising!

Lucas with his Russian students in Moscow

How do you see BJJ progressing in Russia?

People here like to train, like martial arts, they are naturally fighters. I have 2 talented fighters running with me, Ayub and Khasan. Both are really good guys and good fighters. They are both black belt in judo, and Ayub is blue belt 3 degrees and Khasan is a purple belt , and of course there are other teams in Russia with good fighters too.

What do think of Russian culture, people, life in Russia etc?

How I said I’m enjoying my time here in Moscow, the culture is really different than in Brazil, but everybody is being good with me. I made good friends and I hope to keep these friendships for all my life. My life here in Moscow is not so different than in Brasil. I wake up every morning ready to train hard like I do in Brazil .