Frank Mir is one of the most talented, quick, intelligent athletes in the heavyweight division. His potential is astounding, and he has a former UFC heavyweight title reign to show what he can attain when it's harnessed optimally.
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| Mir believes Nogueira has the edge in BJJ. (UFC) |
Known for being able to analyze fights extremely well with his commentary for the WEC, the articulate Mir gives his honest breakdown of how he stacks up to legendary heavyweight Nogueira in this Q&A.
Q: Your fighting someone you've looked up to in Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira. How does that impact your thoughts going into this fight?
A: I think because I approach martial arts differently than some other individuals, I don't see it as a way of going in there and trying to kill somebody. Obviously I'm trying to win to the best of my ability but it's not a personal thing. Before fights there's a lot of aggression and animosity because you're building up to punch someone in the face (laughs). But after the fight there's very few instances where I don't see fighters respect each other. Just like when you spar with your friends, you try and go as hard as you can. I always tell people a linebacker and a quarterback can be buddies but in practice if I get a beat on you I'm going to try to take you out. I look up to Nogueira. I think he's a phenomenal fighter, somebody who is an inspiration to a lot of people. He shows a lot of heart in all his wars he's been in. Fighting him is not going to take anything away from him. If anything, if I go in there in the best shape I've ever been in I can push him to his limits, win or lose it'll show he's a great fighter and I just want to be in that same arena.
Q: Have you changed anything up training for a five-round fight?
A: No. The things I changed a year and a half ago right before the Antoni Hardonk fight are the same things now. I realized getting in shape for a fight is not an eight-week thing. In the past I tried doing that, I tried to mimic boxing, you can be out of shape and jump in the ring and get in shape in eight weeks. Some guys can do that, all the power to them. I can't. I have to train year-round. I can constantly improve on my conditioning if I do that. And that's what I've done. It's been a progression. After I beat Lesnar I was back in the gym Monday. It doesn't mean I don't take a day off here and there to go spend time with the family, but two days never go by where I'm not in the gym, even when I don't have a fight coming up. And 10 weeks out I'm in the gym every day, twice a day. So even in the Brock Lesnar fight, even though he came at me with such a hard pace I didn't panic like I would have panicked in the past because I knew, "OK, this is no problem. I can get the s--- beat out of me for 15 minutes and not get tired. This is way easier than training." But in the past I had to fly after people and take a lot of attempts, because you'd see me panic in fights. It wasn't about pain, it wasn't my chin, it was the fact I knew I had a very limited gas tank. The minute you step in the ring you have a pretty good judge of where you're at. I knew where I was, I had no cardio in my early career in the UFC. That was due to my training. Cardio is not genetic. People can be a little bit better than others naturally, but you've got to work at it.
Q: You mentioned finishing fights fast. 50 percent (seven out of 14) of your fights have ended in one and a half minutes or less.
A: Motivated by fear (laughs).
Q: Do you see this being a quick fight or a long one?
A: I don't see it being quick at all. I can't imagine that in over 35 fights Nogueira has had -- and no one has finished him -- that I'm going to be the one to do it. If it happens, great. It's like showing up the day of the race and the guy forfeits and I get a free win. I'll take it, I guess, but I'm not going to train for that anticipation. If I catch Nogueira and he falls down and for some reason I knock him out or I catch him in a kneebar or some kind of choke and I happen to finish him, I'm going to go for it, but I haven't trained expecting it. I've really expected that this fight is going to be a 25-minute fight. If anything my strategy has been more geared towards making sure I win convincingly on the judges' score cards. Looking at how judges score fights, what counts for points, what do they look for? I've geared my training that way because trying to finish Nogueira is not easy. You see the size of Heath Herring's leg -- he took that upside his head, it dropped him, but he was still in the fight. He was able to recover and he made it back and won the fight.
Q: Where are you training these days and who are your main training partners?
A: I train at Striking Unlimited. My coach is Ken Hahn. I've been there since the Hardonk fight. I love training there. Robert Drysdale is my jiu-jitsu coach, he comes in and I bring partners in like Vinny Magalhaes. Vinny comes over and helps me roll. I have a lot of guys in that area that are more well-known. Steve Cantwell will come over and spar with me to help me. I even spar with guys who weigh 155 pounds sometimes. Heavyweights often fight flatfooted and are heavy, so the only way for heavyweights such as myself to overcome that is to fight with smaller guys. I have 20-ounce gloves that I got from Hawaiian Fight Gear so I don't actually hurt anybody and I just try to be faster than the guys. Cantwell is a pretty quick athlete and he's a good kickboxer so I'll spar with him. Obviously I outweigh him by 40 pounds, if I just hug him and lay on him I'm not going to get much out of training. But to try and go speed for speed, that's pretty much how I train now.
Q: And do you think that is going to be one of your advantages in this fight?
A: I think so. He has a pace. I think Nogueira's a better athlete than sometimes he lets himself on to be. A lot of guys, we go for home runs in fights, and that can be a problem. And I learned this because my leg has healed to such a point where I can run again. One thing I've noticed, if you told me to run 800 meters, "OK I can run it in 2 minutes 20 seconds." That's a pretty good pace, I'm cooking for my size. But if I run the first lap in 65 seconds, I'm OK I'm going to finish the second lap and make it in 2:20. But if you tell me you want me to finish the first lap in 58 seconds, I might finish the race in 3 minutes now because I'm going to completely hit the wall and crash. And that's how Nogueira is. Obviously I'm obsessed with studying fights and I've studied him. He doesn't kill himself trying to get anything, he just sets a pace and keeps that same pace. He's like a marathon runner. He knows how fast he can run a mile and he can push a certain pace but if he goes faster he'll get tired, and if he goes any slower he lets the pressure of the guy.
Q: You're both great on the ground with BJJ. How do you envision the ground battle going in this fight?
A: I think going jiu-jitsu for jiu-jitsu is going to be quite difficult for me. He's been doing jiu-jitsu longer than I have, and if anybody asked me I would say he's a better jiu-jitsu guy than I am. He's been a black belt longer than I have. For me to say I have an edge there, I don't see where. But that's why I'm not trying to make it a strictly confirmed jiu-jitsu match, I'm going to use elbows and strikes and mix it up and go for more unorthodox submissions -- more footlocks and kneebars and whatnot.
Q: What about wrestling and boxing? How do you compare yourself to him in those areas?
A: For what I've done in the ring, I think he's better. I see what I've done in the gym, but I really don't want to say too much about that because I hate when other guys do that, "Hey, I'm this", I'm like, "Hey, you did it in the gym but you haven't done it when the lights were on." So I need to do it. Striking, I think I have the potential to be the better striker, but as far as actually applying it in the ring that's a different story. That's really going to be my goal now -- I've seen what I've done in practice and I need to transfer that to life.
Q: You are quite honest in noting that he's better than you in all categories based on past in ring performances. But saying that, where do you get your confidence from?
A: Just through my training, I know where I am. I've come to the point now where winning and losing fights, that's great, but it's about performance. That's really what everybody cares about. I've seen warriors go out there and give one hell of a performance and get caught or something happens and they lose the fight, but you still respect the guy at the end of the day. So that's within my control, Nogueira can't stop me from fighting my hardest. I can stop me.
Jatinder Dhoot is a Canadian journalist who runs theMMAdigest.com.