Ophélie Artaud / Photo credit: Patrick Batard / Hans Lucas / Hans Lucas via AFP
Football, table tennis, and above all… boxing. Far from his costume of former Prime Minister, mayor of Le Havre or president of the Horizon party, Édouard Philippe is a great sports fan. Admiring the great American boxer Mohamed Ali, of whom he keeps several photos in his city councilor’s office, Édouard Philippe himself decided to put on the gloves and get into the ring a few years ago. A passion that now follows him and helps him in his political career, as he explains at the microphone of How about we talk sports? even if he regrets not having started sooner.
“I like the atmosphere and the requirement that boxing imposes”
“I discovered boxing quite late. When I was a teenager or young adult, I thought it was good. I liked the atmosphere, but the sport itself, I was scared to go there” , he recognizes at the microphone of Jacques Vendroux. “I was 44 when I started, and it was love at first sight. I am an amateur who regrets having started boxing at 44, who is 52 today, and who is capable of do two or three rounds in a row, and two or three training sessions a week. But physically, it’s very hard.”
A difficult and demanding sport, which the former Prime Minister can no longer do without. “I like the atmosphere and the requirement that it imposes and it does me good, physically and morally”, details Édouard Philippe. Skills that are very useful in political life: “it allows me to remain calm in almost all circumstances. All combat sports allow you to have much more self-confidence and at the same time to be much more respectful, much more humble vis-à-vis others,” he adds, dismissing the idea that it could be a violent sport.
A useful practice in politics
“It’s a sport of mastery. And when you know how to fight, when you know how to fight, when you start to know how to give blows, have a technique, agility, precision in your blows, an ability to link up.. . we have a lot more self-confidence and we are at the same time much more respectful of others because we see all the way that remains to be done to become better”, explains the mayor of Le Havre.
As in politics, this combat sport is “a demanding practice and it’s difficult to be totally casual when you do boxing”, assures Édouard Philippe at the microphone of How about we talk sports?.