Den före detta mellanviktsmästaren Michael Bisping har varit i UFC sedan 2006 och inte helt oväntat så har han mängder av historier att dela med sig utav. I veckans avsnitt från hans podcast ‘Believe You Me’ så berättade ”The Count” Bisping om den gången i 2008 då han blev inbjuden från UFC att besöka soldater i Afghanistan tillsammans med Carlos Condit, Urijah Faber och B.J. Penn.
Carlos Condit osäker över framtiden: ”Älskar fortfarande sporten”
Soldaten slog Condit först
Enligt Bisping så besökte de en militärbas i det krigsdrabbade landet och det tog inte lång tid innan de började sparra med några av de stationerade soldaterna.
Bisping körde först och i vanlig ordning tog han det lugnt med sin sparringpartner:
“We did some very cool stuff and one of the things we did was go to an outbase where there was a very small camp set up, very little people and it was where some special forces, badasses basically, a small group of hardcore special forces guys and they had a tiny little gym set up.”
“In that gym was a boxing ring and we went in there and we were meeting these guys and just shooting the shit talking to them and then one of them says ‘would you like to spar?’
“I was like ‘alright cool. I’ll spar with you.’ So we put the gloves on and I’m just messing with the guy throwing out a couple of light jabs.” berättade Bisping
Efteråt så blev även Condit tillfrågad om han ville sparras:
”To be fair, the guy was cool. We had a nice friendly spar and I threw a few jabs and I took it easy and that was that, we finished.”
“One guy then says to Carlos Condit, another one of the special forces guys, ‘do you want to spar’ and Carlos Condit says ‘yeah, sure, no problem.’
“Oh, and by the way, they call him the Natural Born Killer, that guy is cool as fuck. He never raises his voice and he’s super mellow.”
Condit blir tillfrågad om hur hårt han vill sparras och ”The Natural Born Killer” svarar på sitt sedvanliga sätt:
“They put the gloves on and the special forces guy says ‘how hard do you want to spar?’
“Carlos replies ‘I’ll hit you, as hard as you hit me,’ which is a fair answer, but it was a very cool answer because he was [saying] ‘if you want to go hard motherfucker, we will go hard, but if you want to keep it light and friendly then we can go light and friendly, the ball is in your court.’
“So the guy says ‘cool’ but then all of a sudden, right then and there the special forces guy BANG … he sucker punches him as hard as he can and I mean a fucking hard shot and Carlos goes down to the floor.”
Nu när Condit förstår situationen så anpassar han sig snabbt:
“It was a big heavy shot, but Carlos gets up, shakes his head, get’s his shit together, and then just goes at the guy.”
“Jab, right hand, left head kick, BOOM, knocks the special forces guy straight through the ropes onto the floor, unconscious, out cold.
“Everyone in the room was looking around like holy shit.
“I was like ‘oh Carlos, I’m not sure that was the best thing to do,’ but fair play, ever since I saw that I was like he’s a bad motherfucker man. He’s a great guy.”
Lyckligtvis finns det videomaterial från tiden då UFC-gänget besökte Afghanistan. Här kan du se delar av den historien som Bisping berättar:
https://youtu.be/myxhzSqbvxA
