Last month I posted a, much discussed, breakdown of what I thought were the top 10 MMA gyms, consistently producing the best fighters.
Some of the biggest disagreements in that list centered on the absence of newcomer the Blackzilians, a camp which has now surely hit the pinnacles of the sport, with the likes of Vitor Belfort, Alistair Overeem and Rashad Evans as regulars.
Then there was the placing of other camps in the list, such as team Black House, home of arguably the greatest fighter of all time, Anderson Silva, which I had down at number three.
To complicate things further, as much as these gyms like to think of themselves as “families”—they are anything but—fighters change camp routinely and will often straddle multiple camps at the same time.
George St. Pierre, for example, calls both Jackson’s camp, in New Mexico, and Tristar, in Montreal, as home. Many of the Team Quest guys, now a diminished outfit, are often to be found training at Xtreme Couture in Vegas.
So, for arguments sake, I’m going to stick to my previous list and divide the fighters up among the gyms they spend most of their times, or have trained out of most recently.
Here’s a pick of the best fighters from each camp.