Olivier Gruner
| Olivier Gruner | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
August 2, 1960 Paris, France |
| Allegiance |
 France
|
| Service/branch |
 French Navy
|
| Website | www.thepros.tv |
Olivier Gruner (born 2 August 1960 in Paris, France) is a French World Kickboxing Champion and former Commando Marine. Following his retirement from kickboxing, he became an actor and later a director specializing in action movies.
Gruner was born into a family where both his father and brother became noted surgeons and his younger brother became an engineer.
After seeing a Bruce Lee movie at age 11, Gruner became captivated with martial arts and began studying Shotokan Karate, and then boxing and Kickboxing.
At age 18, rather than pursuing the academic life many expected of him, he joined the Marine Nationale, volunteering for their Commando Marine unit. As a part of his military training he learned to scuba dive, sky dive and climb.
In 1981 Gruner left the French military to train full-time to compete professionally as a kickboxer.
He traveled to the French Alps and began training to fight professionally. In order to pay for his training expenses, he had to hold down four jobs, as a bouncer, a ski patrol member, a trainer and a ski lift operator. In 1984, he began fighting professionally as a kickboxer in France. After 10 professional fights, he became the French middleweight champion.
By 1985, his successes in the ring allowed him to train and fight full-time and, in 1986, he became World Middleweight Kickboxing Champion. Having achieved his dream of becoming World Champion, in 1987, he retired to pursue a career as an actor and model.
Discovered at the 1987 Cannes Film Festival, he began a film career. Gruner joined Imperial Entertainment and began acting in action movie in 1990 with the urban action movie Angel Town and Albert Pyun’s cyberpunk 1992 science fiction thriller Nemesis.
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Wikipedia