Johny Hendricks
With virtually all of the focus on the main event of this weekends UFC 154 event, it’s easy to overlook the story behind co-main event welterweights Johny ‘Bigg Rigg’ Hendricks (13-1) and Martin ‘Hitman’ Kampmann (20-5).
Both fighters were teammates at one time training together at the Xtreme Couture gym in Las Vegas from 2007 until 2008. Hendricks changed gyms for the Striking Unlimited camp after getting to the point where it appeared as if his teammates had learned all they had wanted from him and “didn’t give back like I thought they would.”
Hendricks is a former Oklahoma State University wrestling All American and was certainly providing his former teammates with some excellent wrestling instruction, in exchange for their striking knowledge.
As ‘Bigg Rigg’ tells it after having trained with Kampmann, he feels the ‘Hitman’ peaked awhile ago while he has continually improved as a mixed martial artist and is looking forward to showing his former teammate what he can do on Nov. 17th.
“I trained with him for about a year and a half,” Hendricks told ESPN.com. “The thing is that about the last half of the year he didn’t want to train with me anymore. That’s why I transferred over to Striking Unlimited.
“Once I got to a point where I could somewhat compete with these guys, they didn’t want to train with me anymore. They wanted to learn from me, learn my wrestling, but once I got to where I could learn from them, to strike with them, they didn’t give back like I thought they would….
“Kampmann’s at his peak,” Hendricks said. “When we trained together, he already knew everything about striking; he was already in the UFC fighting at 185. He’s added a few things, but not much. Once you hit your peak, it’s hard to add new stuff. But he is durable and he is tough.
“I was there with him when he started cutting down to 170; I’ve known this guy for a while. For him to sit there and say that I haven’t developed is just nonsense. I’m not the fighter I was two years ago or a year ago; I’m so much more advanced.”
UFC 154: St-Pierre vs. Condit is scheduled to take place this Saturday (Nov. 17, 2012) at the Bell Centre in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The two fighters co-headline the pay-per-view event.