Shane Carwin’s return to the Octagon to face Ultimate Fighter coach Junior Dos Santos for No. 1 heavyweight title contendership at UFC 131 this Saturday is almost one year after his last appearance in what was a tough loss to former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar.
Carwin’s matchup with Dos Santos was a question of being in the right place at the right time. Lesnar coached opposite Dos Santos in the 13th installment of the The Ultimate Fighter, and he was scheduled to fight the Brazilian at UFC 131 in Vancouver.
Unfortunately for Lesnar and to the benefit of Carwin, the diverticulitis that kept Lesnar out for close to a year spanning 2009 and 2010 came back, and the former champ was forced to pull-out of his fight with Dos Santos and undergo surgery to correct the problem.
Carwin, already in training camp to fight UFC newcomer Jon-Olav Einemo at UFC 131, was the only credible candidate available to step in for Lesnar on short notice.
Carwin couldn’t have asked for a better scenario, and at 36 years of age, he needs a little bit of luck to help get him back to a title fight as soon as possible, seeing as how time is not on his side.
Talking about father time, one of the things that tends to happen as an athlete ages is their physical skills and abilities begin to erode until there comes a point that they can’t compete anymore.
Having rarely gone out of the first round or the first minute in a fight for that matter, Carwin’s body still has plenty of athleticism to compete with the best. However, in his loss to Lesnar last summer, Carwin looked a little too hard to finish in the first round, and the behemoth of a man seemed to have punched himself out.
At the end of Round 1, Lesnar got back up from a beating that lasted for close to four minutes of a five minute round and controlled the action until the close. At the start of Round 2, Carwin looked exhausted and it didn’t take long for Lesnar to put him on his back and work towards an arm triangle submission victory and second straight title defense.
Fans and media felt the reason Carwin lost was due to his apparent lack of cardiovascular fitness and that he would always be a fighter that has to look to finish early to win.
Carwin went through some surgery of his own this winter for severely pinched nerves in his neck and had some time to reinvent himself as well.
In episode four of Here We Go: Camp Carwin, Shane explains how he has changed his diet, lost 30 pounds, all the while maintaining his explosiveness and athleticism. The episode also claims that the camp has focused on improving his endurance in the Octagon.
Of course, cutting down on body fat percentage and eating a healthy diet is going to help one’s level of physical fitness; there is no disputing that fact.
However, something that seems to have been lost in the shuffle is that what happened to Carwin in the Lesnar fight wasn’t necessarily as much a question about Carwin’s cardiovascular fitness, but rather the expression of an underlying medical condition.
Carwin took to his twitter account after the Lesnar fight and explained that what he had was not a problem with his cardiovascular fitness per se, but actually the expression of a medical condition called lactic acidosis.
“What happened to me July 3rd is called ‘Lactic Acidosis’. It was brought on by a few things and mainly not breathing while exerting energy. I was all cramped up, nausea and major head ache.” Carwin tweeted shortly after the fight with Lesnar.
I am no medical expert and won’t go into the details, more information on the condition can be found at Medline Plus.
Interestingly, in the description of the condition one of the most common causes of onset is intense physical exercise, something a professional fighter is doing every time they compete.
Carwin did say that it was brought on mainly because he didn’t breath, and that may very well be the case, and improvements in his breathing rhythms along with his new diet and weight may be the key to success.
That being said, if lactic acidosis is something that has happened to Carwin in the past, it may happen again. One has to imagine that the longer a fight goes on at an intense pace the chances Carwin experiences the symptoms he experienced in the Lesnar fight probably increases drastically.
There is not doubting Dos Santos’ abilities, he is a great boxer and doesn’t give his opponents a chance to catch their breath (just ask Roy Nelson), so Carwin will probably be pushing the limits once again and it will be interesting to see whether his body locks up on him or not.
The fact that Carwin has only left Round 1 on one occasion over 13 fights, along with his tremendous knockout power, might mean the big man probably doesn’t have to worry too much.
Furthermore, if his cardio is as good as he says it is, then making sure he breaths properly and is patient with his punches might be enough to keep him from locking up against Dos Santos this Saturday Night.
Leon Horne has been contributing to Bleacher Report for three years now. He focuses mainly on mixed martial arts, but he has also written about tennis, football and hockey. Just send him a message if you want to talk sports or discuss any opportunities. You can follow him on Twitter for updates: 
Read more MMA news on BleacherReport.com