- The final moments a fighter waits for his fight to start is where the mental game really comes into play. Before a fight, a fighter is left with a lot of time to prepare and it’s up to them to find a way to get in the right mindset and come up with a plan. Some fighters let superstition guide there mindset going in. Others mean to calm there nerves to deal with there own thoughts. Then there are those who simply have a different way of doing things. The odd part is as abstract as some of these rituals are, they actually may change the outcome of who’s hand gets raised at the end of a bout.
Alot of fighters do completely different things to prepare for a fight. Some fighters do things that have absolutely nothing to do with fighting that they think is necessary. Some may simply see having a good time as an “essential part of preparation”. The ufc fighter Danny Castillo believes going to strip clubs every night in the last week leading up to the fight was an important part of his eight straight victories. Most people would think partying is the opposite of preparing for a fight but if someone keeps winning fights, they are obviously well prepared. Jon Jones is another example of someone who claims his victories have something to do with how he prepares. Which is getting absolutely innebriated for a week straight until the fight. Jon Jones is one of the most accomplished fighters so it is hard to believe partying is apart of his regiment. Another example of unorthodox preparation for a fight is not taking a shower for a straight week so when the time of the fight came, The other fighter couldn’t bare to even get close to his grimy body. This was the tactic of a well renowned UFC fighter named Matt Lindland. This tactic may be the last thing you would want to do just to win a competition but it is an effective means to make wrestling with Matt a misery.
Some of the superstitions that guide fighters are bizzare and make little sense but they would have you know that’s why they win. Fighters such as George St Pierre believe there is some deep meaning to rubbing your nipples before a fight and that it brings luck. He heard this from an ancient fighting myth and took it to heart. Muy thai fighters are filled with superstition that controls the way they train. Many techniques are used to ward off supposed evil spirits inside of the ring such as rubbing oils and potions over your body before a fight. Or getting a tattoo inscribed on the skin by a witch doctor was another common practice. Speaking of which doctors, In 1987 Julio Caesar Chavez was ready to square off with Edwin Rosario. In an attempt to curse Caesar into being weakened by cold, Edwin’s mom or a whitch doctor placed a picture of caesar in an ice bucket. To counteract this, ceasar’s corner decided to put a red headband on him. Whether it worked or not, Ceasar won the fight with ease so he wore it in all his fights.
Often times a fighter has a certain ritual to help get them in the right mindset for battle and settle nerves. Some fighters take a more spiritual approach. A combination of a quiet locker room and meditation to change one’s energy is how a lot of successful fighters trained including ronda rousy. She went as far as wearing a pair of boots that was supposed to improve blood flow. Other fighters will do some bouts of hard sparring in the coming weeks of the fight to get prepared mentally for war. Hard sparring is really close to a real fight and sometimes fighters get hurt worse in this type of sparring than the actual match they are preparing for. Often times you see fighters come to fight day and they already look beat up from sparring. This is a risky method as any time a fighter does hard sparring, they are risking injury but when the fight comes they are not as nervous to fight. There are also fighters who take an unorthodox approach to calming pre fight nerves. The UFC fighter Clay Guida is a prime example of this because every time he gets ready to step in the cage he has his brother slap him like his life depended on it to mentally put Clay in fight mode. Being slapped repetitvely is something that gives clay a huge boost of confidence. “Qoute by clay”. Many fighters are hit with an emotional rollercoaster and how they deal with that decides what fighter you are going to see in the ring.
From the audience’s perspective they see two warriors ready for battle but what they don’t see is the mental struggle within each fighter. Fear of failure can be debilitating and the fighters are battling before they even start hitting each other. The first fight is with the mind. Fighters have found a lot of different phycological tricks for there brain to be successful. Perhaps the skill of a fighter is secondary to how prepared they are mentally in getting there hand raised. A fighters skill is more acessible when they overcome the battle of nerves and let themselves off the leash. Often times its apparent a fighters downfall starts before they even lose. How many of the greatest fighters of all time have gone suddenly from the top to not even being able to win a single fight? Sometimes this can be attributed to age but other times it’s obvious they just lost the magic mentality that made them great. Tony Ferguson was one of the top fighters in his division of all time but his downfall was equivalent to a car dropping off the grand canyon. It was so sudden at a time when he was at the top of his game with an impressive record of 23-3 at 35 years old. Six losses later it is safe to say he lost that spark. Every time a fighter steps into a cage, they are tested mentally. The mind is a persons greatest tool and the art of fighting reflects that.
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