Barão ready for his WEC debut. Photo: Carlos Ozório
The headlining matchup of this Sunday’s WEC 49 show in Canada features former lightweight champion Jamie Varner against Kamal Shalorus, but the very first preliminary bout on the card offers a WEC first-timer who could provide much to talk about: Nova União’s Renan Barão will make his WEC debut against Anthony Leone at a catch weight between the feather and bantamweight divisions.
Barão is the current Shooto South America featherweight champion and has a record on 22 wins and 1 loss. He is the son of the kickboxing coach at team Kimura / Nova União camp in the northeast-Brazilian city of Natal, but spends much of his time training at the Rio de Janeiro headquarters of Nova União with standouts like WEC featherweight champion José Aldo, soon-to-debut-in-the-UFC Amilcar Alves, Ronys Torres, and the rest of the Nova União camp.