Naively, I thought a British guy who had kids with Australian passports and had a long-time partner who was an Aussie would be welcomed in Sydney as an adoptive son. I also thought the English vs Aussie sporting rivalry was just a bit of fun, and mainly confined to cricket.
Nope. The Aussies booed the hell out of me at the Acer Arena. Yeah, I was fighting a living legend in Wanderlei Silva, but the abuse they yelled made me wonder if Mad Max 3 was a documentary.
‘I HOPE HE FUCKING KILLS YOU!’ screamed one bloke, his upper body locked rigid in fury.
‘FUCK YOU, YOU POM!’ another managed to say despite the white foam in his mouth.
‘GIVE US BACK KYLIE, YOU ENGLISH PIG-DOG!’ howled another.
(Alright, I may have made that last one up.)
As much as they booed me, they cheered for Wanderlei even more. They roared like mad when he landed anything on me – and sometimes even when he didn’t – while my best work was met with glum indifference. That may have affected the judges’ decision, who knows, because other than two big moments when he got me in a deep guillotine choke and a brief knockdown in the last few seconds of the fight, I felt like I controlled the action.
I’d been knocked back down the rankings with another decision loss. It was disappointing – losses always are – but it wasn’t massively discouraging. I truly felt I’d won the fight and asked the UFC for another match-up soon.
The UFC came back with an assignment and a date – Dan Miller in Las Vegas, UFC 114, 29 May 2010 – faster than I expected. One the one hand, Rampage was fighting on the card (vs Rashad Evans in a much-anticipated grudge match) so I’d have him to train with in Liverpool, but on the other, my third child was due in the middle of May.
There was no way I was going to leave Rebecca and miss the birth of our child, so Rampage and the rest of the team departed for the US two weeks before the fight without me. Days went by with no sign of a contraction. When we got to within a week of when I would be fighting Miller, I turned to Rebecca and cheerfully said, ‘No pressure or anything, but you’ve got to have this baby today.’
We googled a million old wives’ tales as to how to trigger labour and our house smelled like an Indian restaurant with all the spicy food Rebecca ate. Then, on the Monday of fight week, the little guy who’d go on to troll his old man to the amusement of an international audience, finally signalled he was ready to make an appearance.
Rebecca took no pain medication and gave birth like it was something she did most Monday evenings. Our baby boy – who we’d eventually name Lucas – was super-healthy and we took him home early Tuesday morning. I woke up after a few hours’ rest to the sizzle and smell of chicken sausages and eggs. Upon staggering downstairs, I found a steaming pot of coffee freshly brewed. Rebecca had gotten up with the baby and had made me breakfast.
‘Your flight’s in five hours,’ she said as she sat down at the kitchen table with our newborn in her arms. As blown away by this woman as I routinely am, this was one of the occasions where I just looked at her in awe. I just shook my head.
‘What’s the matter?’ she asked.
‘Nothing,’ I smiled. ‘I’m just thinking it might be better for me to stay here and you go fight Miller on Saturday.’
On the night, I managed to get the job done. Miller was every bit as tough as his reputation and had a great engine, but I won a unanimous decision. That set up a fight with contender Yoshihiro Akiyama in a main event in the autumn.
UFC 120, 16 October 2010, was UK MMA’s coming-out party. The UFC put on a two-day Expo at Earl’s Court; over 30 UFC fighters and personalities did Q&As, seminars and autograph sessions for over 20,000 fans. The UFC 120 card itself at the O2 Arena was stacked with British talent and set a European attendance record of 17,133. Me and Dan Hardy, who was the co-main event attraction, did more media than either of us had ever done in the UK. The whole country, it seemed, was buzzing about its emergence as an MMA power.
Then the fights started.
The fight card was a disaster from a British standpoint. One by one the UK fighters were defeated. London heavyweight James McSweeney was knocked out in the opening fight and Curt Warburton from the gym I trained at lost his UFC debut. Then TUF 9 champ James Wilks was defeated.
There were three fights to go before I made my walk to the Octagon. My phone rang. The display read ‘HOME’ and I answered.
‘Hi, I’m sorry, can you talk?’ Rebecca’s mum, Kate, asked.
‘Yeah, of course. I’m not on for another three fights.’
‘I know – we’re watching the fights in the front room,’ she said. ‘Callum’s really upset and worried. Can you have a word with him?’
‘Yeah, put him on.’
The potential consequences of what Dad did for work had become more rooted in reality for Callum over the previous 12 months. He’d watch the fights but if I got hit or taken down, he’d bolt out of the room upset. When I fought in the US, he’d be unable to sleep until he was told – around 5am – that Dad was okay. And obviously, hiding the fact I was fighting on a particular date was impossible.
‘Hello, Callum,’ I said in my Dad voice, ‘you alright? You’re not nervous, are you?’
‘Maybe a little bit,’ he said quietly.
‘Aww, there’s no need to be. I’m not going to get hurt, am I? What do I always say, it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, as long as you go out there and try your best. Isn’t that right, Cal?’
‘Yeah …’
‘Listen, I can’t promise you that I’ll win, Cal. I can’t do that for you, mate, I’m sorry. But I can promise that I’m going to try my very best. Is that okay?’
‘Yeah.’
‘You go back and sit with Grandma and Gramps. I’m going to try my best, okay? Promise. And no matter if I win or lose, I’ll give you a call right after the fight, okay?’
‘Yeah! You home tomorrow?’
‘Yeah, me and Mum will be home tomorrow afternoon.’
‘Okay. Love you, Dad.’
‘Love you too, Cal.’
Back in the Octagon, the night was going from bad to worse from a British perspective. Previously unbeaten wonderkid John Hathaway, coming off an impressive win over Diego Sanchez, was routed by Las Vegas welterweight Mike Pyle. Then came the co-main event, when the 17,133 fans, who’d been chanting ‘Hardy! Hardy! Hardy!’ so loudly I could hear it through the walls, were silenced when Dan was knocked cold in the first round by Carlos Condit.
Dan and I were sharing the same dressing room. We’d warmed up together on the thick red training mats. We’d tapped gloves just before he made his ring walk and I’d joined everyone else in clapping him out of the room. ‘Let’s go, Dan!’ I shouted. He returned 20 minutes later with the same evacuated look in his eyes that, I knew, I’d had at UFC 100. My heart broke for him.
‘I’ve been there, mate, it fucking sucks,’ I said, trying to say something. ‘I’m sorry, mate. You’ll be back. Just listen to the people around you and go get yourself checked out.’
Dan nodded affirmatively but, given how I’d been after the Henderson KO, I wasn’t at all sure he knew what was happening. Between the phone call with Cal and seeing Dan like that, I could have used a few minutes to gather my thoughts.
But Burt Watson was at the door:
‘LET’S ROLL, BISPING! LET’S ROLL! WE ROOOOOLLING! YEAH!’
The noise was as overwhelming as ever from the UK fans, but this time felt a little different. This time, they needed something from me. After watching half the British roster getting beaten one after the other, they needed me to win.
Akiyama was coming off two Fight of the Night performances and hadn’t come to London to mess about. Barely 11 seconds into the fight, he landed a thunderbolt of a right cross to my temple. There was a flash behind my eyes and a ringing inside my ears. It was the same shot he’d used to KO Denis Kang with. I retreated for a couple of seconds, checked my equilibrium was good, and then set about winning the fight.
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�d landed some meaty punches and a hurtful kick to his ribs when an errant fingernail raked my right eyeball. So much wet gushed out I kept patting away at it with my glove to check it wasn’t bleeding. While I waited for the eye to clear up, I made adjustments in my stance and footwork to use the peripheral vision of my other eye.
We had a great striking battle. This was high-level MMA. Language barriers vanished in the Octagon. The way we exchanged nods of appreciation when the other executed a great combination, smiled at each other when a huge kick or spinning back fist missed by less than an inch and nodded apologies after inadvertent fouls told us all we needed to know about the other’s character.
Akiyama surged forward at the end of the first round, I countered with a left that was blocked, and a right that I knew he would slip – directly into a left shin to the face. I needed to think two and even three steps ahead with Akiyama.
The man known to Japanese women as ‘Sexyama’ threw a left hook at the beginning of the second, but I knew he was really looking for that right again. I was landing more and more combinations, hitting the shorter man with uppercuts and setting the pace I wanted to keep the fight at. We continued to exchange punches and kicks. I don’t know what the yen was worth against the British pound but on that night I gave Akiyama 2.25 strikes for every one he gave me.
The fight stats show that I threw 268 strikes – and all but one of them were power punches or kicks. I came close to finishing the show in the third, but I mistimed a leg kick and caught Akiyama in his cup. He rightly took time to recover from the low blow – but he also recovered some of his strength and my chance for a stoppage had come and gone.
After 15 minutes, the judges confirmed I’d won all three rounds. The British fans went home happy.
Akiyama-san came to my dressing room after the fight with his cornermen and his translator, a tiny Japanese man in his mid-seventies who could have been the inspiration for the Mr Miyagi character in The Karate Kid. Through his translator, Akiyama told me it had been an honour and pleasure fighting another martial artist.
‘It was a pleasure,’ I said, and I bowed.
Then I called Cal up. He already knew I’d won and, bless him, asked if Akiyama was okay.
At the post-fight press conference, I said I wanted to fight again quickly.
‘I think I’m one or two more fights away from a title shot,’ I told the press. ‘I’m getting better and better each fight. I’m putting it together now I have this experience. Mr Akiyama gave me a great fight and I’d like a top-five opponent next.’
Three weeks after UFC 120, I was sitting on my couch at home watching TV when my manager called my mobile.
‘Alright, Mike, the UFC have got ya an opponent for UFC 127 in Australia like ya wanted,’ he said.
I muted the TV and sat up. I was excited. Despite the boos, I’d loved fighting in Sydney at UFC 110. Rebecca and me were seriously thinking of relocating our family there. So when we’d heard the Octagon would be going back to the same Acer Arena in February 2011, I let the UFC know I wanted to be part of it.
‘That’s great,’ I said. ‘So, am I the main event for this one?’
‘Co-main,’ he said. ‘I think they’ve got B.J. Penn to headline.’
Fair enough. My mate ‘Baby Jay’ was only two fights removed from his legendary run as UFC lightweight champion and the Hawaiian ‘Prodigy’ was a massive draw worldwide.
‘Let’s have it, then,’ I said. ‘Who am I fighting?’
My manager paused before answering, ‘The UFC have got ya Jorge Rivera.’
‘Got me? Jorge Rivera? As what? A sparring partner?’
‘I know, Mike,’ my manager continued. ‘But that’s all who’s available. The guys above you in the rankings who aren’t out injured are already booked for other shows. If you want to fight in Sydney – or any time before the spring – all the UFC have for you is Rivera.’
I sighed out a swear word. The New Jersey-based Puerto Rican was a 39-year-old undercard lifer winding up a 19–7 career. He was a good puncher with his right – he’d knocked out Kendall Grove with it recently – but he just wasn’t the kind of name I was expecting for my 14th UFC opponent.
Even his name – pronounced ‘Horr-Hey Rivera’ – made me roll my eyes. It sounded like some sort of floating brothel.
‘Alright, fuck it,’ I said at last. ‘Let’s just get the win. I’ll put on a great performance and make everyone take notice despite the opposition.’
I parked my car in the tiny, broken tarmacked car park across the road from the Liverpool gym just before 10am on 3 January 2011. The car boot opened and I grabbed the large blue bag which contained all my training gear. I slammed the boot shut. UFC 127 was now eight weeks away.
It was bitter cold out. Not as cold as the record-breaking, ball-numbing December had been but frigid enough to make the grass between the car park and gym white and crunchy underfoot. Training bag swung over my shoulder, I hurried to the gym door which – as usual – was locked from the inside. All I could do was bang away at it with my fist, praying someone would answer before my ears froze off.
Eventually, Paul Kelly opened the door. As I stepped inside, I realised it was actually colder in the gym than it was outside with the frozen white grass. Paul saw the look on my face. ‘Wait till you get on the fuckin’ mats,’ he said. ‘It’s like March of the fuckin’ Penguins in ’ere.’
I’d recently begun training Muay Thai with a new coach – a master of the eight-limbed art named Daz Morris – several times a week and how I missed his centrally-heated Salford gym that morning.
Training at the Liverpool gym during the winter was like swimming in a freezing pool – you just had to commit to jumping in and getting your body temperature up. I pulled a T-shirt over my rash guard and joined my teammates doing shuttle runs from one side of the gym to the other. The whole squad bounced from wall to wall and you could see breath swirling out of our mouths and shooting out of our nostrils. In a few minutes, those of us working the hardest had sweat literally steaming off our skulls and necks.
With hindsight, I could have been a little burned out. I’d fought 4 times in 11 months already. Put another way: I’d spent 29 of the previous 48 weeks of my life doing exactly what I was about to do for the next 8 weeks.
But Rivera himself was about to provide all the motivation I needed.
A month out from UFC 127, Rivera’s camp began putting out a series of YouTube videos designed to hype up the fight and annoy me. It was bizarre stuff; him and his team working their way through every British stereotype and jerking themselves through rehearsed dance routines and yelling penis jokes cribbed from South Park. The videos kept coming and continued to get more personal until there was a reference to my family. The following Monday, Callum, aged nine at the time, came home from school upset. The kids at school had been playing Rivera’s videos.
Now I couldn’t wait to fight him.
I made my way through Australian immigration on Sunday, 13 February. The fight was scheduled for the morning of Sunday 27th. We’d again arranged to acclimatise for a week at Tama Te Huna’s Elite Fighter gym in the suburb of Penrith. For the second year in a row, the difference between spiky British winter and Sydney’s summer climate took me by surprise.
Like at UFC 110 the previous year, Tama’s younger brother James was in action at the UFC event. Two other fighters from the Liverpool gym were also fighting at UFC 127, along with Ross Pearson from TUF 9. My mate Jacko was with me again, doing video blogs for my website and keeping my mood light. All in all, we had a huge English posse with us and Tama Te Huna graciously put us all up.
In the evenings, Dean Amasinger – a TUF 9 alumnus who was now branching out into personal training and nutrition – would barbecue our meals as we all sat around a giant circular table under a low sun. Yep, I could really see myself living and training here.
When we all moved to the host hotel on the Sunday, the mood changed. At UFC 110 we’d stayed at a Hilton in Darling
Harbour, where the famous white opera house sits next to the water. This time we were closer to the middle of town at the Star City Resort, a modern hotel/casino doing a decent impersonation of mid-sized Las Vegas property.
I’d barely made it to the hotel lobby when several reporters ran up to me. They excitedly repeated quotes they’d gotten earlier from Rivera where he said if I were ‘really a man’ I would come find him there and then and not wait until we were in the Octagon.
That nonsense set the tone for Rivera’s conduct all week. Every time we were within 100 metres of each other, Rivera or his tough-guy sidekick (a boxing coach turned wannabe UFC fighter) would sneer and shout at me like we were in rival street gangs. The wannabe was especially pathetic – the way he acted in public embarrassed everyone. I couldn’t wait to put this fight behind me.
The only time I responded verbally was at the press conference, which took place at 2pm local time on Friday, 25 February, in a mini theatre area to the side of the casino floor.
Despite under-21s not being allowed in, there was still a fairly big crowd of fans present. UFC 127, after all, had sold out all 18,186 tickets ($3.5million worth) in just 22 minutes. And, bless ’em, several US- and UK-based journalists had once again persuaded their bean counters that a week in the Sydney sun was an absolute editorial necessity.
No doubt because of me and Rivera, the UFC kept opponents far apart. Red corner fighters – B.J. Penn and myself – were held in a dressing room behind stage left while Rivera and B.J.’s opponent Jon Fitch waited in a room behind stage right. Also joining us on the stage would be two Aussie fighters – Kyle Noke and George Sotiropoulos – who were fighting Dennis Siver and Chris Camozzi, respectively, on the 12-fight card.
While we were waiting, B.J. showed me an enormous swelling on the back of his head. He’d been bitten by some sort of spider on his first day in Australia and had a throbbing pink L-shaped pus-pocket to show for it. The doctors had told him it was fine and not to touch it, but he joked he was planning on bursting it with a knife before the weigh-in. ‘This shit all squirts out? I’ll make 170lb easy.’
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