On the eve of his co-main event matchup against Mauricio Ruffy at UFC Paris this weekend, Benoit Saint-Denis spoke with Fighters Only’s Paul Browne about handling setbacks and making a fresh start in the UFC lightweight division.
A Fighter Rebuilding After Setbacks
The ability to overcome adversity is a prerequisite for any combat sports athlete who wants to achieve greatness. Many who have reached the top of the mountain have had to drag themselves back from the brink of despair along the way. For Benoit Saint-Denis, that climb begins this Saturday at the Accor Arena in Paris.
Saint-Denis (14-3 MMA, 6-3 UFC) takes on rising Brazilian star Mauricio Ruffy (12-1 MMA, 3-0 UFC) in the co-main event at UFC Paris, eyeing a fresh start in the lightweight division after a dramatic fall from grace in 2024.
“God of War” racked up five consecutive stoppage wins from 2022 to 2023, breaking into the rankings at 155 pounds and earning a high-profile matchup against Dustin Poirier. After a bright opening round, the French standout’s world came crashing down when he walked into a thunderous right hook from “The Diamond” and found himself staring up at the lights inside Miami’s Kaseya Center.
Another crushing defeat in his next outing, against Renato Moicano, halted all the momentum Saint-Denis had built. Although he returned to the win column with a submission victory over late-notice UFC newcomer Kyle Prepolec in May, the former French Army Special Forces soldier now views this Saturday’s bout with Ruffy as the springboard to another run at the division’s elite.
Finding a New Home in Training
Having teamed up with fellow French fighter Nassourdine Imavov—who faces Ruffy’s teammate Caio Borralho in Saturday’s main event—Saint-Denis says he has found a home under the watchful eye of Coach Nicolas Ott and believes the changes in his camp will fuel his comeback.
“It was a very tough year due to the pressure I had been putting on myself,” Saint-Denis says, reflecting on his two defeats in 2024. “A lot of stuff I didn't manage well with the rise (up the division). I had too much pressure on my shoulders, and I couldn't take it. I have learned a lot from it.
“Now I have a staff and head coach very competitive that are bringing me back to do what I love about this sport. It's training to be a better man and a better fighter, which is helping me come back a lot stronger. I really enjoy the process right now, and I don't put myself under that kind of pressure anymore.”
Lessons From UFC 315
Saint-Denis had originally been scheduled to face Joel Alvarez at UFC 315 in May. Like Ruffy, Alvarez has built a reputation at 155 pounds and flirted with a breakthrough into the top 15.
His eventual win over Kyle Prepolec—who stepped in as a late replacement for the injured Spaniard—felt like a sideways move compared to what a victory over an established name like Alvarez might have meant. Still, Saint-Denis is choosing to focus on the positives from what he admits was a difficult situation.
“I think in the life of a fighter, you want to fight as much as possible and to win as much as possible,” he says. “Yeah, of course, we had a lot of deception when we took the flight (to UFC 315 in Montreal), and we arrived and we learned that Alvarez couldn't make it, but we were able to fight and to use our training camp for the very first time with my (new) head coach, and it was a way to (adapt to) each other. Prepolec is a tough guy, so we still had a good fight, and yeah, it's life; nothing is always perfect in MMA, but at least we got a fight (against) a tough guy, and we earned a bigger fight this weekend.”
A Massive Co-Main Event
While the Prepolec fight may have felt like a formality for Saint-Denis, he faces a very different challenge this weekend in Mauricio Ruffy. “One Shot” has made a sensational start to his UFC career and delivered one of the most memorable finishes in promotional history in his most recent outing against King Green this past March.
Two pairs of teammates going head-to-head in the co-main and main events, France vs. Brazil in front of a raucous Parisian crowd, and Saint-Denis’s credibility as a legitimate lightweight contender all hang in the balance. The stakes couldn’t be higher for “God of War,” but he insists he’s ready for whatever Saturday brings.
“I love to say that every fight is the most important fight of your life because if you lose a fight, you have to climb back a lot of steps to go back to where you were at,” he says. “So I take every fight very seriously, and of course winning this fight will be huge for me, and I'm ready for battle.”
