Author: By Philip Ferraro

There was a time when Michael Bisping – who fights Vitor Belfort on January 19th in the main event of UFC on FX 7 in Sao Paulo, Brazil – didn’t know what to do with his life.   He’d dropped out of an electrical engineering course and worked a series of blue-collar jobs. But when he committed to MMA in 2003, the working-class kid from Manchester, England found some much needed direction.  In 2006 he reflected on his humble beginnings, saying, “You always think you’re going to be great and you’re going to do things, but then I got in my early 20s and I was quite disappointed. And if I was being realistic, my life was going nowhere really. And it was going nowhere fast and I wasn’t getting any younger.”

See Bisping’s fights

After going 2-0 as a pro, Bisping fought Mark “The Beast” Epstein, a standout UK fighter.  Just 24 years old and unpolished, “The Count” received a baptism by fire after he was dropped by a punch in the first round.  But the resilient Bisping rallied back to win by second round TKO.  Bisping then went on a tear on the UK scene, going 10-0.

The UFC beckoned.

In 2006, Bisping earned a spot as a light heavyweight on The Ultimate Fighter 3.  Part of Team Ortiz, he gave fans a glimpse of two of his defining qualities: his work ethic and occasionally sharp tongue.  Bisping had an opinion or two about some of his fellow contestants, but he was never distracted from the task at hand.  His efforts were rewarded as he finished both his opponents to enter the finale, where he TKOed Josh Haynes in the second round for a UFC contract. Watch fight
 
After a first round TKO victory over Eric Schafer (watch fight), Bisping was matched against Australia’s Elvis Sinosic in 2007 (watch fight). Against Sinosic, Bisping encountered his first moment of real adversity in the UFC’s Octagon. The Brit was dropped by a knee in the second round, and soon after Sinosic nearly secured a kimura.  But Bisping’s determination and superb conditioning make him a hard man to finish.  He quickly roared back to TKO the Aussie at 1:40 of round 2. Bisping was challenged once more in his next fight against fellow TUF 3 contestant Matt Hamill.  While elite wrestler Hamill had been a novice to MMA on the Ultimate Fighter, he showed new striking skills and scored on the feet against “The Count” in a close three round fight.  The judges awarded Bisping the decision, causing a sizeable outcry from the fans.  But he remained undefeated.

At UFC 78, Bisping faced his toughest test yet in the undefeated Rashad Evans.  Anticipation grew as the two engaging characters traded verbal barbs in the weeks before their fight.  But Evans prevailed, scoring takedowns on the Brit repeatedly for a split decision victory. Bisping had his first loss.

The loss sparked a move down to middleweight for Bisping, who wanted to avoid being outsized.  His 185-pound debut against Charles McCarthy was preceded by another entertaining war of words, but “The Count” scored a first round TKO victory.  After a win over Jason Day (watch fight), he took on exceptionally tough brawler Chris Leben.  In a disciplined performance, Bisping demonstrated the cerebral side of his game. He refused to be drawn into a slugfest with Leben, choosing instead to stick and move en-route to a unanimous decision victory.
Watch fight

In 2009, his successful run at middleweight earned him a spot coaching The Ultimate Fighter 9 against legend Dan Henderson, and a fight against the former two-division PRIDE FC champion. (Watch TUF season)  Not surprisingly, squaring off as opposing coaches bred plenty of hostility between the two.  In the second round of their bout, Bisping walked into a massive Henderson right hand that sent him crashing to the canvas.  Henderson followed up with another right for good measure, but Bisping was already out cold in one of the most brutal KOs in UFC history.   Bisping’s title aspirations lost steam, and fans wondered whether he could recover from the loss. Watch fight

Bisping’s chance to prove he could bounce back came in the form of a 2009 match against Denis Kang, a long time top international fighter.  Kang caught “The Count” with some heavy shots early, but Bisping weathered the storm.  In the Fight of the Night winner, he came back harder in the second round to finish Kang with strikes, putting an exclamation point on his return. Watch fight

Bisping was then matched against another legendary fighter like Henderson in the form of Wanderlei Silva.  It was another tight bout, but the Brazilian narrowly scored the decision win.  Bisping’s title run was stopped in its tracks.

But once again, Bisping came back better. The Brit won a decision over tough Dan Miller (watch fight) and the highly touted Yoshihiro Akiyama (Watch fight) in another bout that won Fight of the Night honors. At UFC 127 in February of 2011, he took on fellow contender Jorge Rivera, and before their fight, Rivera released a series of videos poking fun at “The Count.”  Bisping, a fighter who wears his heart on his sleeve, soon fired back with harsh words of his own. It was the most bitter in the long line of Bisping’s feuds, and he addressed his colorful pre-fight history, saying, “I’ve got a rep for talking smack, and I’m not saying I don’t talk crap here and there, but I’ve never started anything first. Look at my career and you’ll see guys like Dan Miller, (Yoshihiro) Akiyama, nothing but respect all the way.”

Bisping’s emotions were obvious in the fight, which turned controversial after he stunned a downed Rivera with an illegal knee.  Bisping went on to overwhelm Rivera in the second for a TKO victory.

Bisping reprised his coaching role on The Ultimate Fighter 14 opposite Jason “Mayhem” Miller.  There were plenty of heated verbal skirmishes.  But Bisping is a man who fights best when angry, saying in 2011, “In my opinion, I think I fight better when I’m – for want of a better word – pissed off. So for me, that does help. I’m emotional in and out of the ring, and before and after a fight I’m emotional, but generally when I’m fighting, I’m very, very focused and I’m focusing on what needs to be done as opposed to doing anything silly because of letting my emotions get the better of me.”

Miller had a solid first round but soon tired out.  Bisping poured on the pressure as he battered “Mayhem” for a round three stoppage.

Bisping again found himself close to a title shot when he fought Chael Sonnen in January 2012.  In another agonizingly close fight, Sonnen’s takedowns and control were enough to give him the win in the eye of the judges.

Bisping was forced to rebound from another frustrating defeat, and face a dangerous opponent in knockout artist Brian Stann on September 22, 2012.  Bisping, once little more than a striker, showed off the skills he’s picked up in close to 10 years in the game.  He repeatedly scored takedowns on Stann to earn a unanimous decision victory.

Bisping has had several near misses, but never quite strung together enough wins for a title shot.  But he’s stayed determined and continuously improved. In 2011, Bisping reflected on his time in the UFC saying, “I’ve been in the UFC for five years now. A lot of good fighters don’t last that long. And I’ve had to go from pretty much a UK-level striker to a well-rounded fighter while competing in the UFC. A lot of TUF winners have struggled in the UFC. Compare their records to mine and you’ll see while I’ve not achieved all I want to in my career, I’m not doing badly overall.”

In Vitor Belfort, he fights an extremely dangerous contender.  Belfort is an experienced knockout artist with fast hands and excellent grappling. It’s hard to predict the outcome of the fight, but it’s easy to predict how Bisping will show up.  He’s always in shape and he’s always game.  Now a father, Bisping once worked menial jobs for little pay.  A 2011 quote from “The Count” makes it clear why he works so hard.

“It’s been the best ride of my life. I remember (UFC President) Dana White saying some things when we came off The Ultimate Fighter and it’s fully lived up to everything he’s said and far exceeded it. Being part of the UFC family, I’m so proud and so happy with my life. I’m a lucky man. I get paid well, but I truly love my job. I love being a part of the UFC, I love being a professional fighter, and I love the rewards that it gives to me and my family. So it’s unbelievable.”
 

It’s February 7, 1997, a little over three years since the first UFC.   It’s before the current regulations, and competitors are still permitted to fight more than once a night.  

A 19-year-old Brazilian demolishes both of his opponents in short order with a barrage of punches to win the UFC 12 tournament.  He’s a handsome, heavily muscled physical specimen with the quickest hands yet seen in MMA.  A few months later, he uses that dizzying hand speed to finish feared brawler Tank Abbott in under a minute.  While he hasn’t gone to the ground, as a black belt under legend Carlson Gracie it’s assumed his grappling is just as good. In Vitor Belfort, the fledgling sport of MMA had a young talent that seemed destined for greatness.  Belfort, who fights Michael Bisping January 19 in the main event of UFC on FX 7 in Sao Paulo, Brazil, was dubbed “The Phenom”.

Belfort then fought Randy Couture in a heavyweight title eliminator.  Overwhelmingly, the Brazilian was expected to blitz the unassuming 34-year-old.  It was a career defining fight for both men: the start of Couture’s M.O. as the master of the upset, and the first time Belfort fell short of expectations.  Couture controlled Belfort, even beating him up on the feet, before finishing the Brazilian in eight minutes and 16 seconds.  Belfort would later admit he was under-prepared for the bout, saying, “I wasn’t training, I was thinking I was the greatest and that nobody could beat me.”

After finishing Wanderlei Silva with punches in just 44 seconds, Belfort left the UFC to fight in Japan’s PRIDE FC.  There, he earned a 4-1 record with his only loss coming to Kazushi Sakuraba.  In 2002, he returned to the UFC, losing a unanimous decision to Chuck Liddell.  Respectable results, sure, but not what had been expected out of “The Phenom”.  Yet in 2003, after a brutal first round TKO over Marvin Eastman, he earned a UFC light heavyweight title shot against Randy Couture.  

That year, 2004, the professional and personal life of Belfort was forever altered when his family was struck by catastrophe.  On January 9th, his sister Priscila Belfort was kidnapped.  She was never found.
 
In the wake of this tragedy he somehow mustered the strength to fight Couture.  Then recently married, he said, “The only reason I’m here is because God wants me here. He’s given me the strength. If not for that I wouldn’t be here; I’d be very depressed. I’m praying for God to continue to give me the strength until the day of the fight. Then I can go back and hopefully I can have good news of my sister. I’m supposed to go to a honeymoon, but my honeymoon is not going to happen.”

Belfort won, but unconvincingly, after a grazing left opened a cut on the eyelid of Couture that forced the bout to be stopped early in the first round.  Their rematch left no questions, however, as the Brazilian was overwhelmed by Couture, who won the fight by a third round stoppage.

Belfort then narrowly lost a decision to Tito Ortiz before a stint outside the UFC that saw him beat some lesser known opposition but drop fights to top light heavyweights Alistair Overeem and Dan Henderson.  Fighting in three different organizations with mixed results, Belfort seemed to lack focus and consistency.

Belfort became understood as two different fighters.  There was the “old” Belfort, and sometimes he’d return: the man who hurt Tito Ortiz in the first round offered a glimpse of the “old” Belfort.  Then, there was the “new” Belfort, the fighter who showed up in the second Couture bout.  And there was the school of thought that the “old” Belfort had never disappeared, but was simply facing better opposition.  It was a harsh way of looking at a career that included wins and tight losses against some of the best in the world despite personal tragedy.  Blame his potential and the uncompromising nature of the fans.

But following his 2006 loss to Henderson, Belfort seemed to find consistency as a fighter.  Now 30 years old and a father, he notched two victories at light heavyweight before making his 185 pound debut. Two straight knockout victories, including a 37 second KO over former middleweight contender Matt Lindland, proved that a less muscular Belfort retained his power.  It was time for his third UFC run.

Belfort’s UFC return started off with a vintage performance: a first round knockout over former middleweight champion Rich Franklin. With the KO power he’d demonstrated in the 90’s, but a hard won maturity, he earned a 2011 shot against champion Anderson Silva.

Despite a promising start, like many others, Belfort was on borrowed time against Silva.  Shortly after the three minute mark Silva placed a front kick under Belfort’s jaw that snapped his head back and buckled him to the mat.  It was the champion’s most impressive KO, a move that now lives on in every Anderson Silva highlight reel.

One might have wondered whether the KO would rob Belfort of his confidence.  But the Brazilian followed it up with two spectacular victories, a first round KO of Yoshihiro Akiyama and a first round rear naked choke victory over Anthony “Rumble” Johnson. He proved that his fighting spirit was not so easily extinguished.

In the scramble to find a suitable opponent to challenge Jon Jones for the UFC light heavyweight title at UFC 152, Belfort stepped up. Fighting in his former weight class on short notice, he gave Jones his scariest moment in the Octagon after catching the champion in an armbar in round one. But Jones held on, escaped, and proceeded to control Belfort with a varied attack before submitting him with a shoulder lock in the fourth round.   Nevertheless, the Brazilian’s decision to take the fight was a testament to his toughness.

Belfort’s victories at middleweight have earned him his January 19 fight against top contender Michael Bisping.  Should he beat the Brit, he’ll be in the mix for an eventual title shot once more. There is now less talk of the “Old” and “New” Vitor. If it was ever a reasonable way of looking at the Brazilian’s career, it no longer is.  Despite critics eager to dismiss him, after profound personal tragedy and tough losses in the cage, Belfort has persevered.  He’s spent over 16 years in the toughest sport in the world. Now 35 and a father of three, “The Phenom” remains relevant and dangerous.

Kyle Noke knew there was a problem with his knee in the lead up to his March fight against Andrew Craig, but as fighters often do with injuries, he kept it secret.   

“It was actually sore a couple of weeks leading up to the fight and I didn’t want to turn the fight down back home in Australia so I just dealt with it and pushed it to the back of my mind and I thought it’d be ok; I thought it’d be sore but nothing would happen.”    

But when the fight happened, it was clear that something went wrong.  After dominating early, the Australian appeared listless.    

“In the first round I had his back and I went for a submission – a rear naked choke – and when I put my hooks in and squeezed I felt my knee pop out of place, so I damaged it.”   

Craig came on strong in the second and third rounds to claim a unanimous decision victory. But Noke is not the type to discredit Craig’s victory or dwell on the injury. And he doesn’t regret taking the fight.    

“No, absolutely (no regrets), we’re fighters and that’s what we do; every fight we go into there’s some little injury, something niggling and during the fight once the injury happens you’re already in the fight there’s no point in quitting just because you’ve got a sore knee.”    

It was the second loss in a row for Noke, after an August 2011 loss to Ed Herman that ended a five fight win streak.  Noke is now set to fight Charlie Brenneman at UFC 152 on September 22. Brenneman, 4-3 in the UFC, poses interesting challenges for the Dubbo, Australia born fighter.    

“I’ve seen all his (Brenneman’s) fights in the UFC so far.  He’s a very tenacious fighter, I think he’s going to try and take me down and put me on my back all day long and he’s got the gas tank to do it too.  I think he’s a tremendous fighter, a tremendous wrestler and it should be a good fight.”   
Noke, 32, has factored Brenneman’s wrestling background and cardio into his preparation.   

“I’ve been working on everything. I’m picking my wrestling up, I’ve been working really hard with Izzy (Israel Martinez), our wrestling coach, but I’ve been working hard on all aspects, especially my fitness because as I said he’s got a really good gas tank and I want to be able to fight non-stop for the full 15 minutes as hard as I can.”   

This fight marks Noke’s debut in the UFC welterweight division after competing as a middleweight.  But 170 pounds is a familiar fighting weight for the Aussie.     

“I’ve been thinking about it (dropping weight classes) for a while.  I wasn’t really cutting to make 185 and the reason I went up to 185 in the first place is cause I was fighting at 170 in Australia and ran out of opponents to fight so went up to 185 and just got comfortable at this weight,” said Noke.  

“Even before the last two fights I was considering dropping down, then before this fight spoke to coach Greg Jackson about it and he was all on board.”  

After two tough losses, it would be easy to slip into defeatist thinking.  Noke, however, maintains his all-important confidence.  His team at Jackson’s MMA plays a role in keeping him upbeat.    

“It is a positive vibe (at Jackson’s MMA). I train with all these great guys in the gym and I’m able to hold my own, which gives me a lot of confidence.    I think you have to be confident in the fight game – if you get negative about stuff then it’s not good for your career.”   

There’s not much ritual when Noke returns to the Albuquerque gym after a tough loss, just a return to the grind.    

“Everything’s great (after a loss).  We don’t really say anything to each other, it’s just back to the grind, back to training. The coaches will say ‘let’s work on this where you lost this fight’ or ‘let’s work on that’ but generally as soon as you walk in the gym everyone’s like ‘you had a great fight, sorry about this or that,’ and then it’s straight back to business.”  

And taking care of business in Toronto on the 22nd is Noke’s sole focus.  He’s in a high pressure situation – three straight losses can jeopardize a fighter’s spot in the UFC.  But for Noke, those thoughts are just a distraction.    

“It doesn’t bother me. I’ve got a fight ahead of me and if I think about all the outside stuff like the pressure of winning this fight and maybe getting kicked out of the UFC if I don’t win, I’m not gonna perform to the best of my ability,” said Noke. “So to me it’s just a matter of fighting the guy that’s in front of me and doing it to the best of my ability.”

When he first made it to the UFC, James Te Huna wondered if he belonged there. Te Huna, who fights Joey Beltran at UFC on FUEL TV 4 on July 11, wasn’t sure if he deserved to compete against the best fighters in the world. That self-belief came a little while after his 2010 loss to Alexander Gustafsson, his second fight in the Octagon.

“I felt like (I belonged in the UFC) after my second fight.  I watched Gustafsson put away Matt Hamill.  He fought Matt Hamill after our fight and he just toyed with him.  Matt Hamill’s a really accomplished wrestler and he couldn’t get him down, and after I watched that fight I was like I do have the skills to stay in the UFC,” he said.  “That was the hardest thing; my first two fights in the UFC I kept on questioning myself. After I watched that fight I believed that I belong in the UFC. I started getting better and better, and started being confident and believing in myself.”

Te Huna was born in New Zealand and now lives in Sydney, Australia. It’s particularly difficult for any fighter who lives so far away from a hub of MMA like the USA or Brazil to develop that confidence.

“Yeah, it’s kind of hard being here, away from the main countries that have all the fighters and thinking “ah, I have to be over there,” and after training with some UFC fighters, we’re all on the same level; it’s just a matter of believing in yourself and staying hungry.”

Confidence has bred success for Te Huna, who has won his last two fights by first round stoppage. He has built an impressive knockout ratio, and his last seven wins have come by KO or TKO. Te Huna says he doesn’t exactly look for the knockout.

“If I see my opponent make a mistake then I’ll take advantage of it.  I don’t go out there looking for the knockout, but if I see an opening, then I’m gonna land that shot and if he starts going down I start taking advantage of that,” he said.  “So yeah, they come unexpectedly.  I do go into fights thinking I’m gonna knock the guy out (laughs), but when it actually happens I keep composed and look for weaknesses and take advantage of those.”

Te Huna, 16-5 in MMA, was originally scheduled to fight Brandon Vera before his opponent was changed. While Joey Beltran and Vera are very different fighters, it hasn’t disrupted Te Huna’s training.

“Not really (my preparation hasn’t changed); Beltran’s a brawler and Vera was more of a kicker and he’s quite crafty.  So I started working with really crafty guys and I kept them when I found out I was fighting Beltran,” he said.  “I have to evolve my game anyway, and I’ve gotta try and get better at everything, so it doesn’t really matter.  Even though Vera was a southpaw, it still didn’t really change anything.”  This fight marks Beltran’s debut in the UFC light heavyweight division after spending most of his career at heavyweight.  “The Mexicutioner,” 14-7 in MMA, thrives in brutal wars, and Te Huna is impressed by his durability.

“In his fights at heavyweight, to me, he looked kind of slow. He’s tough as nails, he can weather the storm, he can take hits, he’s got a pretty tough chin, and he can come back out on top after having pressure put on him,” he said.  “He’s kind of like the last guy I fought, Aaron Rosa. He was pretty good like that, and once guys put pressure on him he can come back and work hard and get the win.  Beltran’s the same, but just tough, and his last round’s like his first round; he’s a very hard worker.”

While he has experience preparing at elite US fight camps, Te Huna has relied on Australian talent for his last two fights.  He recruits world class kickboxers, wrestlers and jiu-jitsu fighters from around the continent.

“Same thing for this (fight) but different training partners.  Fabio Galeb has helped me out heaps, he lives on the Gold Coast and he’s the man on the ground. He’s got the whole package, so he’s been helping me evolve my game and I’ve been working with other jiu-jitsu guys and other brawlers, just trying to get better and better at all my weaknesses.”

Working with experts from different disciplines has been an eye opening experience for Te Huna.

“I used to think my boxing was very good and my kickboxing was very good and then I started working with world champions. I started working with a world champion kickboxer and Olympic boxers and an Olympic wrestler and they just opened up all these holes in my game.  I didn’t realize I had so many holes in my game and they just fixed it all up.”

What’s been most remarkable about Te Huna’s career so far is his persistence through injury.  From a chronic shoulder problem that once required his cornerman pop it back it mid-fight, to a nasty broken arm that had a doctor tell him he’d need to stop fighting after his 2010 UFC debut, to dislocating his thumb rendering his left hand useless before his fight against Ricardo Romero, Te Huna has overcome it all.  While his luck has been far better of late, and he’s been able to focus on more than just rehabilitating injuries, he didn’t get through his last camp unscathed.

“Every camp I’ve got some strange bloody injury. The last fight I got a corked leg in a sparring session and I stuck a plastic ice brick on there,” he said.  “The next morning the skin started coming off and I went to a burn specialist and it ended up being a third degree ice burn and then it started getting infected but I managed to get on top of it and it was just one of those things.”

The 30-year-old is light hearted about his record of misfortune.  While he says he’s currently injury free, he’ll be ready if one comes.

“I get the worst bloody luck before fights and during my camps it’s just a normal thing. It wouldn’t be a proper fighting camp if I didn’t have something wrong with me.”

Just over two years on from his UFC debut, Te Huna now feels he’s hit his stride. And he has more self-belief than ever before.

“I went through a period in my first year in the UFC where I was just recovering from injury and trying to get to where I was before.  But now I’m getting better, having fun, and learning from the best guys in their discipline and getting better.”

Nobody enters a fight at 100%. That’s the MMA cliché. It’s been particularly true for James Te Huna, who fights Aaron Rosa this Friday night (Saturday morning in Australia). Te Huna’s continuous triumph over injury has been made up of small miracles, like the one that took place during a 2006 fight in Sydney.

“The first minute of the fight I knew I had this guy. I thought I’m gonna stop this guy pretty soon and we were rolling around on the ground and I went to sweep him and my shoulder came out.  The ref, lucky for me, stopped it — he didn’t call the fight off. He stopped it and called the doctor in.  So I was lucky he did that.  What he should have really done is stop the fight altogether.”

But the show went on.

“The doctor came in, he couldn’t put it back in, they were about to call it off. But before they called it off my cornerman Pedro – he’s a big Samoan guy and one of my trainers from back in the day – I ran over to him, he yanked on it in the worst possible way, like a church bell, and it went back in, and I was ready to fight again.”

Te Huna went on to win that fight after his opponent threw in the towel.  In his 2010 Octagon debut (a fight he won by TKO), he suffered a nasty broken arm that was so bad he had a doctor tell him he’d never fight again. Then there’s the tale of Te Huna’s last training camp before his first round knockout win over Ricardo Romero.

“I’m kind of used to it now, when something happens.  That last fight I had, my game plan was to stay on my feet and try and strike with Ricardo, and two weeks out I dislocated a finger sparring so I couldn’t close my fist before the fight. And then we started practicing on the other hand, and after drilling for the next few weeks on the other hand I tore a ligament off the bone on my thumb and I couldn’t make a fist on that hand either (laughs)”.

The KO – done with a right uppercut – was important for Te Huna; it came after a first-round submission loss to Alexander Gustafsson, a defeat that caused Te Huna to reevaluate his training.  

“Yeah it was (good to win again), I needed that win too. Before that (win) came I changed up a few things, I changed up my boxing coach, I’ve been training with Lincoln Hudson, he works with Olympic boxers, and he’s got a whole bunch of pros that he coaches.  I used to think my hands were all right until I went to this guy.  His boxers just toweled me up and exposed all these bad flaws that I had so I went to him and just fixed them right up.”

The New Zealand born Sydneysider is quick to praise his training camp, which includes world-class training partners from every facet of MMA.

“For this fight, I’ve got a real good sponsor, so what we did was I found that I had everything here, the best of everything here – world champion kickboxers that are my weight, and I spar with these guys, an Olympic freestyle wrestler (Igor Praporschikov) – he’s my wrestling partner here, I’ve got a jiu-jitsu black belt (Fabio Galeb), a really good strength and conditioning coach (Hayden Knowles), I’ve got Brad Pitt, he’s an Olympic boxer for Australia, and represented Australia in 2008. “
 
In a 2011 interview with UFC.com before his loss to Gustafsson, Te Huna confessed to being overwhelmed by the nerves in his first UFC fight. He doesn’t expect it to affect his 2012 homecoming.

“When I fought Gustafsson we kind of got rushed out, so I didn’t really get nervous, I didn’t get a walk out or anything; they must have been running late so we just got quickly rushed out there, so that felt good, and the very last fight I had in Colorado, I felt like an unknown and pretty much no pressure at all. I felt relaxed, felt really good,” said Te Huna, 30. “This fight now, back in Australia, I’m pretty confident with the first fight out of the way that I’ll be more relaxed and focused and I’ll get to enjoy it more.”

Te Huna, who says he represents both Australia and New Zealand in the Octagon, has studied the man he will fight on March 2.  He respects his opponent’s skills, but doesn’t view Aaron Rosa, 28, as a dangerous finisher.

“A lot of people are writing him off, but after what I’ve seen in his last fight he looks pretty good. Wrestling’s okay and he stands up and gets up to his feet pretty good,” Te Huna said. “I don’t think he’s real dangerous.  He does seem like he can finish, but he doesn’t seem to. So I won’t be scared of him or afraid of his punches or afraid of his kicks, but he’s gonna be a hard worker, so it’s gonna be a tough fight for me.”

The fight will be roughly five years on from the incident that brought him closest to giving up fighting.

“He (Hector Lombard) threw me, I placed my arm out and my shoulder came out. No excuses, he gave me a hiding in that fight but after that fight I thought I’ve gotta try and do something to get better, otherwise I’m gonna have to do something else.”

Long before he made it to the UFC, he did what he’s always done: persisted.

“So I went and had surgery, waited for the six months for it to heal. Couple months later, I started training for a fight and got back into it and started getting better and better, started improving.  So it was really exciting again. I was on a bit of a win streak, so I stuck to it.”
 

These days, between signings and media obligations, you’ll find Kyle Noke at Jackson / Winkeljohn MMA in Albuquerque, New Mexico.  There, he trains with some of the best fighters in the world under the guidance of coaches Mike Winklejohn and Greg Jackson, a pair with a reputation for being among the most cerebral in the game. But there was once a simpler time in the fighting life of Noke, who takes on Andrew Craig at UFC on FX 2 this Friday night (US time).

“When I first started out it was just something I was doing, I didn’t even think about it,” said Noke. “Then a few years after I started fighting and I got the opportunity to meet Greg Jackson and started coming to the States, that’s when I realized that’s what I wanted to do, and I pursued it from there.”

The training was certainly less intense back in the pre-New Mexico days.

“I think about four weeks before I had my first fight and about two weeks after I first started training the guy asked me to have a fight and then two weeks after that I had my first fight; the whole process was about 4 weeks,” Noke said. “But when I started fighting that was the fight I was least nervous for; it was fun for me and I wasn’t nervous and I just got in there and had a go and then after each fight I got more and more nervous before the fight.”

Fighting may not be a carefree whim anymore, but Australia’s Noke, who introduced himself to UFC fans through season 11 of The Ultimate Fighter, has embraced the higher stakes and stress.

“Everyone gets nervous; if they say they’re not nervous they’re lying, but it’s not bad, you know,” said Noke, who was once Steve Irwin’s bodyguard. “I’ve learned to deal with nerves now and it’s just part of the competition. Once you’re in there, the nerves completely go anyway and once that cage door shuts there’s no issue at all.”

With Noke’s original opponent, Jared Hamman, out with an injury, the Aussie has had to make some adjustments for the fight in Sydney.

“I changed up a bit,” said Noke. “Jared Hamman was a different fighter; he was taller, he was the kind of guy that was gonna be in my face the whole time no matter what I did because he can take a big shot, so we had to change up a little bit. He (Craig) is about the same height as me, so he’s got different skill levels; I wouldn’t say he’s better or worse, but it’s just a different opponent for me and different skills, so we had to change up a little bit.”

It’s the second time in as many fights that his original opponent has been replaced, but Noke maintains that it hasn’t stopped him from being ready.

“In my last fight I was supposed to fight Tom Lawlor and then it switched around to Ed Herman, but lucky enough both times there’s been enough time to prepare for a new opponent so it’s not too bad.”

Noke enters this fight after a loss that ended an impressive five fight win streak. Submitted via heel hook by Herman, he says he knows exactly where he went wrong.

“I didn’t really think he had it on and I didn’t think it was that tight and I tried to spin the wrong way out of it,” said Noke. “Again, if I thought it was tight I would have taken it more seriously, but he had a really good hold of it and I just spun the wrong way.”

The loss serves as more than a footnote on escaping ankle locks. It’s motivation.

“I think every loss motivates you more so I take it as motivation for the next fight. I don’t wanna lose again, so it makes me train harder and try and get better for the next fight.”

A single loss seems insignificant when compared with what Noke had to overcome to make it to the Octagon in the first place. There’s no easy journey to the UFC, but the road from Dubbo was particularly long, making Noke’s desire to stay here and represent his home country well even stronger.

“That’s why I’ve gotta make sure I don’t lose this one and go out there and put on a good show,” said Noke. “Especially coming from Australia I think a lot of people don’t take us as serious. They think Brazil are big contenders for the UFC and they rank other countries over us so the guys that are in the UFC from Australia, we have to really put on a good show and fight hard to prove we’re capable of competing with everyone else.”

And this week in Sydney, Australia, he’ll be fighting in front of thousands who support that mission.

“Any opportunity to come back home and then fight in Australia for the UFC is just phenomenal; I can’t wait to get back there.”