MMA exclusive: Raised like a Spartan, Aaron Pico becomes most touted debutant in history at Bellator showpiece

Aaron Pico belongs to a bygone age: of the Spartans. The 20-year-old Californian has become the most touted mixed-martial arts debutant in the sport's history and must show what the ancient civilization once called its 'agoge', an upbringing in a warrior code.

Pico, who has studied fighting forms from the age of seven, like most children study academia, breaks out his martial arts moves on the biggest stage on Saturday night at the hallowed fight Mecca, Madison Square Garden, the first contest on a pay-per-view card underwritten by millions of dollars as Bellator MMA, owned by media giants Viacom, drive their flag firmly into the heart of Manhattan. It's an arrival moment. For the fight league, but for Pico, too. 

Part wrestler, part boxer, part wunderkind. Ambitions to be a world champion in MMA and boxing. A genuine champion in both would be a modern first. These things have an awful habit of going wrong, yet having spent some time around Pico, the detail is there, as are the sojourns to wrestle in Dagestan (at a time where it was classified as amongst the most dangerous places on the planet), study the Noble Art of boxing in the Hollywood Wild Card Boxing Gym under esteemed trainer Freddie Roach, travel to Thailand, Ukraine, and all the time guided by the watchful, masterful eye of 'Crazy' Bob Cook, whose scouting missions in MMA are simply legendary.

Look back over Cook's resume, and 'Crazy' is a misnomer. Crazy good, more like. Ronda Rousey, Daniel Cormier, Cain Velasquez... to name but a few. No, Cook may have unearthed a gem here.             

Back to Ancient Sparta, again, for a moment, and Pico. The Spartans took their boys aged seven to become fighters, under 'agoge' or fighting pedagogy, an education instilled in many noblemen's children too, the rigorous regime compulsory for all males.  

The acquisition of stealth, loyalty to the city of Sparta, the ability to withstand pain, and the skills of hunting and fighting were legendary. The aim of the system, created by the semi-mythical Spartan law-giver Lycurgus, was to produce strong and capable warriors to serve in the Spartan army. And now we have Pico, grown in the same mould in modern MMA.

"I'm Mexican-American. Seventh generation here in California. My great-great-great grandfather was the past Mexican governor of California. I take it one day at a time but I've got big goals for the future," Pico tells The Daily Telegraph in an exclusive interview before his big night, facing a taller, older fighter in Zach Freeman, who has a record of eight wins, two losses (and works, as the six-footer pointed out this week, for a company which sells and installs industrial plate glass windows) and is largely the fall guy in this fight.

Pico is back on his focused theme. "I've got a great team, especially with Bob Cook and our management team. I've got a great boxing coach, striking coach, wrestling, I've got everything. I'm very professional with my job. I want to be the best. Obviously I've got a great talent but that only gets you so far. I think what's special about me is I love to work. That's the biggest thing for me. I've known what I've wanted to do from an early age."

That meant doing 'kids MMA', he explained, when it was illegal. "Oh yes, I was doing kids MMA back when it was illegal. A lot of people don't know where I've come from. I've done numerous amounts of pancration fights, I've gone overseas and fought... I started off wrestling and at the time there was a cage there and if we did good in wrestling our treat was to go and fight in the cage. I was eight or nine years old. I wasn't very good at boxing so I told my dad I wanted to learn to box. I was eager. My next door neighbour was a boxing coach. I went with him and I just fell in love with striking and boxing. That's all I did every single day. Then I went back to wrestling and took a different path. But I knew from an early age I wanted to become a fighter. MMA was illegal for kids, but we would meet up at gyms."

There were the early heroes, now cranky, faded fighters whom we all loved back in the day. "At that time I loved Chuck, GSP, but I was watching a lot of boxing. Everything was mostly boxing. Floyd Mayweather, Oscar De La Hoya, Manny Pacquiao, those guys," he explained. "I look at that as a blessing. There are a lot of people who'd want to be in my shoes but if you dedicate yourself and focus on what you want to do, at the end of the day what solves pressure is having a clear mind because you've done everything you can to be the best.

"I would beg my dad to let me go fight. My parents would be working, my mum was going to nursing school at the time, and I found my way to the gym. I'd call my dad's friend or my grandma, or someone else, anyone I could. I can honestly say I was addicted to boxing and fighting and would do anything I could. I found the European Championships for kids in pancration and I was like 'dad, we have to go'. That was in Ukraine. I had five or six fights there and had five knockouts. The final was tough but I beat my opponent. I actually won the jiu jitsu European over there, too."

Pico's parents have been key in this. And his father has been ubiquitous in New York this week. "My parents have always backed me up. If my dad had it his way he'd want me to race motorcycles. That was his thing. He sat me down but I told my mum, 'I don't want to ride motorcycles. I want to fight, wrestle, this is what I want to do'. I was pretty good. It's really fun.

"But I knew I'd have more fun fighting. He rode back in the day as a kid but he played baseball and stuff like that. We kind of fell into wrestling. Our family loves motorcross now. I think motorcross is crazier than fighting. My mum is an RN, a nurse, and my dad sells medical product. I come from a normal home. I have an older brother who is 24 and going to nursing school."

Life is laid out for him. Clean, defined. "Everybody goes to college to become a doctor, lawyer or whatever, but from an early age I knew what I wanted to do and that was to be a fighter. Why not study and learn how to be a fighter? This is my job."

But more ambition burns. "I'd love to be boxing world champ. I believe I can be one of those guys who can be a boxing world champion and an MMA world champion, legitimate. I believe that wholeheartedly. That's a goal of mine and I think I can do it. I try to spar with the best boxers in the world. I go to Wild Card Gym and spar there. I just love fighting. I've been to Dagestan. I've been to Russia, Ukraine, Italy, Bulgaria, Croatia, Israel, Japan. Those people in Dagestan are so nice. I felt totally at home. They take great care of you, great hospitality. I definitely want to go back."

Cook believes Pico is special. "He's the new generation of MMA fighter that has grown up doing it. A lot of us saw it later on in life and thought 'oh, that looks like fun, we need to start training it'. This is the new generation that has been doing it since a very young age. He's already an elite striker and grappler/wrestler. He was wrestling at the highest level. He was the olympic alternate. Then he got injured. He's extremely accomplished in that. He had an amateur boxing background as a youth as well.

"MMA is kind of like the pros for wrestling. We see a lot of the wrestlers transition into MMA and do very well. I think when you look at the history of who has been the UFC champions over the years and other organisations one thing you'll see in terms of a prominent background is wrestling. You've got the new generation of guys like Aaron but there's ebb and flow. Sometimes things will swing more towards the strikers, and sometimes it will swing towards the grapplers."

The key, moreover, is that his team keep his progress moving in camps and training as his elevation to elite fights may be accelerated. That means ultimate preparation, ergo, travelling to train with the best, wherever that may be. "He's at a level where he can't just be in one place to get everything because the level is not high enough," Cook told The Daily Telegraph. 

"He has to go and travel for individual areas. Like for wrestling he travelled all over Europe to get the highest level and different flavours. And with boxing he'll work down at the Wild Card, and works with other coaches at home. When we go to kickboxing we'll go to Thailand and other places. That's the kind of athlete he is. He needs to be challenged at the highest level. Mediocre is not good enough."

It certainly isn't. "I'm on the road all the time," Pico tells me, solemn and focused and just belying his two decades of life. "I want to learn from everywhere. I want to be the best, and to be the best you have to go everywhere. And I'll do whatever it takes. That's my life." Some kid we have here in Aaron Pico. And this is going to be some journey...