How a fighter responds to the crowd is important. You want the benefit of their support, without getting distracted.  There’s a fine line between the two.
    
    When I’m in the locker room, waiting to make my appearance, I’m very sensitive to the noise generated by the fans. Even when shut inside a room of stainless steel lockers and thick wooden doors, the explosive energy of the crowd impacts me. This is multiplied many times over when I enter the arena, feeling like a Roman gladiator, and make my way to the octagon. The crowd’s energy surrounds and lifts me. It’s a powerful force.
    
    Then the door to the octagon slams, and everything fades to black. I have trained my mind to only hear the voices of my cornermen – my survival depends on it. At times I pay attention to the advice that is being given to my opponent, in an attempt to nullify the shouted tactics.

    I’ve been training for many years to move my body in order to deflect much of the power of my opponent’s landing punches. If I were in a street fight, I’d know how to move so that punches likely wouldn’t land at all on me.

    When I fought Matt Hamill, he did a good job of confusing me at first. He’d switch to a southpaw position and I’d start wondering if someone spiked my water in the locker room. I never had seen Matt doing this in his fight footage, and so I was not mentally programmed. While I was trying to figure all this out, he worked some blasts in.

    Some fighters are able to switch back and forth in their stances. One moment they’re leading with their right, and next they’re coming at you with their left. Anderson Silva is switching constantly - he’s mastered the art.
    
    I had studied many tapes of Silva’s fights in my preparation for him. I figured that whichever stance he assumed, I’d be able to read his patterns. Most fighters offer unintentional signals to alert you to their next maneuver.
 
    Silva’s alternating stances, however, ultimately confused me. I felt almost as though I were in the octagon with two different fighters. That’s a place you don’t want to be.

    Fighters are trained to see a blow coming and they know how to move their head an inch this way or that. Those tiny differences help to deflect much of the power of blows. But if you punch them off guard, the damage is equal to that being received by someone who’s never even been in a fight.

    If my wife sucker punched me, it’d hurt. The same blow coming in the octagon wouldn’t faze me, because of my posture and my high level of adrenaline.  This is how stunt experts can do amazing things and not get hurt. They rotate this way and that – and they come out unharmed.

    Go on YouTube to the pre-fight staredown between Heath Herringand Yoshihiro Nakao. Nakao leaned into Herring and delivered a kiss on his lips. Heath didn’t appreciate this loving display, and immediately sent a moderate punch to Nakao’s jaw – knocking him flat-out! If they had been fighting, Nakao would have barely felt that strike. 

    An important item that experienced fighters know: a half-hearted punch delivered at a surprise is far more powerful than a forceful punch delivered to someone who sees it coming. This is why in street fights, he who hits first usually wins.

    With sucker punches, all people are equal.

    All UFC fighters share a common love of the sport they dedicate their lives to, but we are also vastly different in how we think and behave in our day-to-day lives. One big, common denominator regarding most professional fighters is that they will try to avoid a street fight. 

    When some people know what you do for a living, they enjoy baiting you into a fight. For me to get involved in a battle outside the octagon, it would have to be a matter of fearing for my personal safety or that of a family member. All my years of fighting are no match against a bullet or blade.

    Getting into a fight, because of a stream of insults and obscenities directed at me, would be significantly stupid on my part. No matter what explanation I later offered to the police, I’d be on the hook.

    I always tell my friends that if were forced into a fight, I’d probably just hold the guy down and give him a few noogies.

    Many fans would like to know if there are any emerging trends in the art and science of mma. They’ve heard that a certain fighting style is best – only to later to be replaced with another combat system that is touted as superior. No wonder there’s confusion.

    The day of mma trends is over. The future of this sport is now with the true mixed martial artists, those who blend styles so seamlessly that it is often difficult to pigeonhole them as being expert in one or two areas.

    There are 3 aspects to fighting – striking, takedowns and groundwork. Fans love to argue which is the best fight style, but what is all comes down to is simply this: effectiveness in the octagon. It doesn’t matter what style of takedown you use – judo, Greco-Roman wrestling, freestyle or whatever. The same view holds for groundwork.

    Legs play a bigger part in athletics than is sometimes supposed.Muhammad Ali stated that he often boxed with his legs as much as with his hands. He was speaking of the footwork he used against his opponents, and his ability to keep his body in strategic rhythm. 

    All sports are based on footwork. The last time I was training inSeattle, we played soccer for conditioning one day. Having never played before, I figured it would be easy to keep up, based on my athletic ability and conditioning. What I learned quickly is that I was running twice as much as the experienced players. 

    The reason for their smart economy of motion was their sophisticated footwork.