Issue 051
July 2009
There is an affliction in mixed martial arts, a malady of sorts. It’s not an illness, a disease or an infection. It is a psychological condition, and is known by many as ‘Vitor Belfort Syndrome’.
There are some very clear and recognizable symptoms to this condition, and they are:
- Starting off your career with a bang
- Believing your own hype
- Surrounding yourself with yes men
- Behaving like a diva.
Once the symptoms have manifested, they are usually followed by a swift and painful loss.
To explain, Vitor Belfort (now a capable and mature 31-year-old middleweight) began his MMA career at the tender age of 19. He was a prodigious talent, a phenomenally fast boxer and handy grappler, trained by the legendary Carlson Gracie. Belfort won his first four fights in a combined time of just over three minutes. He was tipped as the next big thing, the new face of the sport, an athlete for the future.
There was just one problem. Belfort was being pushed too hard, too soon, and would unwittingly become the poster-boy for mismanaged young MMA fighters everywhere. In 1997, for his fifth MMA fight, the 20-year-old Belfort was put in against the 36-year-old Randy Couture. To be fair to Belfort’s handlers (who obviously thought he could cope with the veteran wrestler), Couture had only two fights under his belt at the time and didn’t seem too much of a threat (on paper at least) to the dangerous youngster.
Couture’s handling of Belfort is one of the great classic fights, not just of that era, but in all MMA. He showed Belfort that prodigious talent just wasn’t enough. Couture had spent many years wrestling at the highest levels. He understood what it was to feel tired and out-muscled in a fight, but he also knew that if you dug deep enough you could overcome those factors and be in with a chance at winning.
Belfort didn’t have the benefit of this knowledge, as he was plucked from the mats at the Carlson Gracie gym and thrust under the spotlight before he had chance to discover it for himself. While he should have been slowly working his way up the ladder as a promising young future star, he was instead fighting at a level he was simply not equipped to function at.
It would be nice to think that this mistake, made in the sport’s infancy, would serve as a warning to young fighters of today. Surely the message is clear enough, but it pains me to see so many young men go down the same path.
It’s an often-repeated joke that everyone nowadays is a cage fighter, but it is true enough that there is a growing number of young men entering the cage. Some of these young men are extremely talented individuals with masses of potential. They’ve grown up watching evolved athletes instead of those coming from single-art backgrounds, and are more technical and better overall fighters than many of the sport’s initial competitors could ever have hoped to become.
The problem lies in that many of these youngsters are jumping straight in at a professional level, bypassing altogether the amateur scene. The motivations for doing so aren’t just financial. Some consider the amateur path a waste of time, something that only gets in the way of their career. This isn’t just a misguided point of view; it’s an ignorant and short-sighted failure to plan for the future.
Fighters who jump straight in at the professional level are missing out in a big way. They’re neglecting the chance to earn valuable experience in an arena where a loss does not harm your overall career prospects. Nobody ever got rich and famous as an amateur sportsman, but many of the top professional athletes in the world came from a lengthy amateur background.
While it is true that your amateur record won’t matter as much when you’re a pro, it’s the opportunity to develop yourself as a fighter that counts. Aside from the chance to road test all those gym-honed techniques, fighting as an amateur is all about getting used to competing and about building mental strength – learning how to keep going, overcome adversity, and deal with the demons that tell you to quit.
Let’s take the career of a hypothetical young fighter. He’s in his early 20s, a frightening prospect and athletic specimen who eats, sleeps and breathes MMA. Fast-forward through his first few fights (one-sided affairs in which he easily beats his over-matched opponents), until he’s stuck in with a noted fighter. This fighter may not even seem that good – his record is patchy and he’s not a player on the big scene. Our fighter goes up against this veteran and, shock horror, after a gritty and hard-fought encounter, loses!
The lesson here is that you can be fit, strong, technical and skilled, but what if your opponent wants to win more than you do? What if they know how to call upon the reserves, which you simply don’t possess, to get them through the tough times? You’ll be faced with a challenge you might not be able to overcome.
This is why there should be no rush for aspiring fighters to jump in at the deep end. I’ve seen promising athletes bite off more than they could chew more times than I can remember. Hopefully this will serve a reminder and warn off people from trying for too much, too soon.
