In South Africa, if you mess up in training you get tased. That’s how it works according to CIT head coach Morne Visser, who is preparing Du Plessis for UFC 305.
What is going on at the CIT Performance Institute in Pretoria, South Africa?
Dricus Du Plessis has made a big deal of being the first ‘real’ African champion — the only one who was born and raised in Africa, who still trains and lives in Africa. He trains at CIT under head coach Morne Visser, and Visser certainly has a unique way of keeping his fighters on their toes.
In the latest UFC 305 Countdown show, we can see Visser ‘correcting’ his students using a lightweight version of a taser.
“This is my assistant coach,” Visser says, holding up a stun baton with electricity crackling from the tip. “He f—ed up. So I helped him fix the problem. This is fixing the problem. He’s not on his toes. Not keeping up his hands. Not kicking when he needs to. So I’ll fix him.”
From the UFC 305 Countdown: Head coach Morne Visser uses a taser against his students to prevent bad habits. pic.twitter.com/K57ZYrgUqu
— Alexander Volkara France (@VolkaraFrance) August 10, 2024
Footage shows Visser going down a line of students giving them shocks on the bottom of their feet.
“It’s much better [than a] mental note,” Du Plessis said of the technique. “Much better than a sticky note.”
“He doesn’t f— up very much any more, that much,” Visser said of Du Plessis.
A full power taser can paralyze a person and potentially put them into cardiac arrest. Stun batons are nowhere near as strong, but Visser is still a maniac for using it to ‘train’ his fighter.
These days, though, its worth questioning everything — even what you see with your own eyes. Just a few weeks ago Tom Aspinall revealed he’d trolled everyone with claims he was soaking his fists in gasoline. Could Visser and Du Plessis be doing the same while the Countdown team was in town filming?
Dricus Du Plessis: ‘Izzy, Izzy, who the f*ck is Izzy?’ pic.twitter.com/DHLea49EnJ
— Best MMA Moments (@XcellentMMA) August 11, 2024
Du Plessis certainly doesn’t fight like a man who has been shocked every time his form is slightly incorrect. But South Africa can be a strange place, so we’re left having to wonder if this particular training practice is indeed deployed in the gym on a regular basis and not just for UFC cameras.
Du Plessis will defend his middleweight tile against Israel Adesanya at UFC 305 on August 17th in Perth, Australia. Can he shock the world like his coach shocks his students?