GONG (Gi Or No Gi)

At a glance

• Channel produced and hosted by Fred Rousseau, a journalist and filmmaker covering combat sports for more than twenty years.
• Over 600 podcasts, features and documentaries, from MMA to savate, sambo and buhurt.
• Flagship shows: LFE (La Fine Équipe) with Cyrille Diabaté and Daniel Woirin, and the GONGcast.

Overview

GONG (Gi Or No Gi) is the channel of Fred Rousseau, a French journalist and filmmaker who has covered combat sports for more than twenty years. He started in print, produced segments for the Arte show Tracks, and GONG began as a weekly TV program before becoming a YouTube channel.

Rousseau covered and called some of the first UFC events held in Europe. He followed the first French fighters around the world and interviewed Georges St-Pierre, Lyoto Machida, Royce Gracie and Dan Henderson. The project is partly funded by viewer donations on Tipeee.

What you'll find

The channel lists more than 600 podcasts, features and documentaries covering MMA, boxing, kickboxing, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, sanda, karate, wrestling, buhurt, sambo and savate. Its archive includes interviews with Georges St-Pierre, Maurício Rua and Francis Ngannou.

LFE (La Fine Équipe) brings together Rousseau, Cyrille "Snake" Diabaté and Daniel Woirin to talk through the news, often with a guest, such as Manuel Ferrara for the UFC Paris recap in LFE #73. The GONGcast covers interviews and debates, and the Scramble and GONG Declassified series round out the lineup.

Why follow

GONG puts you in the room with people who lived MMA from the inside: Cyrille Diabaté fought at the top level, and Daniel Woirin coached Anderson Silva and Benoît Saint-Denis. Episodes often run past two hours and go deep, mixing fight analysis, stories from gyms in Brazil and the United States, and debates about how the sport is run in France.

The channel tracks the French scene closely, from UFC Paris to Hexagone MMA and ARES, with segments on Matthieu Letho-Duclos, Salahdine Parnasse and Axel Sola.

MMA Official's take

GONG is for French speakers who want long conversations, an unfiltered tone and a deep archive across every combat discipline. The humor is constant and the language is casual, so it helps to be comfortable with spoken French slang.

Start with a recent LFE episode after a big card, such as LFE #73 on UFC Paris. If coaching is your interest, the videos built around Daniel Woirin are a good entry point. After that, dig into the documentaries and GONGcast episodes on fighters you follow.