Issue 042

October 2008

Paul Kelly is the latest Wolfslair product to make it to the UFC.

He followed his teammate Mike Bisping into the big leagues when he debuted at UFC 80 in January in an explosive battle with Paul Taylor, which had the arena crowd on their feet and the viewers at home sitting up to take notice.

He made such an impression that, for his next fight, UFC matchmakers have seen fit to pair him with someone higher up the ladder. So, in October, Paul Kelly will be looking across the Octagon at formidable knockout artist Marcus Davis.

Davis has fought three British opponents and stopped them all, so the Liverpudlian is keen to redress the balance. “I want to do it for the UK – to show the Americans that we can fight over here,” he says. Anyone expecting Kelly to quake at the prospect of facing a former professional boxer with an impressive number of knockouts and submissions on his sheet obviously doesn’t know him too well. “I’ve got no fear in me,” he states flatly. “I don’t get nervous before I fight. People tell me that maybe I should, but it’s not my style.”  

Perhaps this can be attributed to his background. Kelly grew up around Croxteth and West Derby, suburbs of Liverpool that are home to some of the meanest streets in Britain. Croxteth is particularly notorious. Last summer, it made the headlines when 11-year-old Rhys Jones was shot dead in an incident between local gang members not much older than he was. “It’s not a rich area, no one has got a bean,” says Kelly. “If you drive round, all the houses are boarded up and there is lads on every street corner. Liverpool is a poor city compared to most and people get by however they can.” 

Drugs and robbery, which in turn produce gun crime, are “part of the culture” he says. There are constant reminders, even when he is in his own home. “If the back door is open, you always hear the kids letting shots off on the park.” Having lived around the area his entire life, he knows no different, but he acknowledges that it is shocking for outsiders to hear about. He relates an anecdote that illustrates the point perfectly.

“Friends of mine came to pick me up and I told them to meet me at the shops round the corner. There was a big crew of lads there and when the car pulled up, they didn’t recognise them so they got moody,” he says. “Next thing one of them runs round the corner, comes back with a gun and starts letting shots off at the car. If your face don’t fit and they don’t know you, they don’t hang about.”

Kelly knows it is a life he could have fallen into easily. His early years were turbulent and school was not a success story for him. He freely admits that if he wasn’t fighting professionally he would be doing “whatever I could do to make a buck”.

“I was a little bastard in school,” he laughs. “I wouldn’t listen to anyone. I used to be always getting into trouble and fighting. It was fighting that I always used to get expelled for. My last school, I was only there for three months and I wasn’t allowed in the classroom, I had to do my work in the dinner hall on my own. The days that I skipped school, the teachers were made up.”

He isn’t one to feel sorry for himself and nor does he offer excuses, but he does reveal something that is typical of many disruptive pupils. He suspects that he suffers from dyslexia, which stems from differences in how the brain processes written and spoken language.  

Dyslexia has nothing to do with intelligence or intellectual capacity – as Richard Branson, Noel Gallagher and Tom Cruise can testify – but Kelly feels his teachers didn’t see it that way. “They just thought I was stupid or just being lazy,” he says. After they gave up on him, he lashed out. When he first started fighting, “My whole family was made up with it,” he recalls. “It’s done me the world of good.”  

Being in the UFC means the world to Kelly and he is training his heart out to be the best athlete he can be. He swims 40 lengths every morning, trains for three hours, then lifts weights of a night. The punishing schedule is combined with a precise nutrition regimen that sees him eating 11 times a day.

On his UFC debut, it was announced that he used to work in a cake shop. I asked him if he will have trouble avoiding his doughy treats in the run-up to the fight, but he burst out laughing. “I never worked in a cake shop! I get asked this in every interview. Anthony McGann (Wolfslair boss) made that up and put it in my bio that he gave the UFC, then Joe Rogan mentioned it before my fight,” he grins.

He takes it in good humour, but when talk turns to Marcus Davis, he gets serious. News that Davis was calling out Chris Lytle on a recent radio show doesn’t sit well with him. “He’s a fool if he’s looking past me,” he snaps. “I’ll give anyone a fight, I’m going to go full-on like I always do. We’ll see what happens.”

That is as much as Kelly will say though. He doesn’t like to make predictions and he says he doesn’t like trash talk at all. His final word on the matter reveals a lot about him. “I’m just here to fight a good fight. I’ve got the same mindset as Forrest Griffin,” he laughs. “I like to know that I’ve been in a fight, I like to hit and get hit. Even in sparring, I like coming away with a black eye or a bloody nose.”

Paul Kelly’s 

Top Treats

Paul never worked in a cake shop, but if he did, here’s what he would be stealing.

Strawberry Mess

My Sunday treat from a place round the corner. I look forward to them all week. Last weekend they had run out. I was close to tears.

Vanilla Slice

All the custard comes out the side when you bite one of these. It’s good for my footwork because I have to keep moving to avoid getting it all over me.

Scones

After a hard session with the fight team, there is nothing nicer than afternoon tea with cucumber sandwiches and a few buttered scones.