After 15 months of not fighting in mixed martial arts competition, Randy "The
Natural" Couture has decided to step back into the octagon and do what he
loves best.
He inked a new deal with the UFC in hopes of some day fighting the #1 heavyweight in the world– Fedor "The Last Emperor" Emelianenko. However, it won’t be an easy path as he must first defend his UFC heavyweight title against the very powerful Brock Lesnar.
Despite the long absence, Randy says that ring rust is not a
factor due to his consistent training. Randy feels more than ready for this upcoming bout and nothing is going to stop him now.
Here’s a snip from The Natural as he explains how well prepared he feels for this fight on Saturday at UFC 91:
"Everybody asks about ring rust and all that stuff…I don’t think it’s
the same for a mixed martial artist as it is for boxing. Sparring in the gym,
the training we do, it’s just about as real as the fights. So I’m not worried
about that at all…I’ve got a great camp…I’ve been very active with all the
guys, Forrest (Griffin) and a number of the other athletes that train at Xtreme
Couture. I’ve never been one to sit around. I like to train. I like to be in
the gym. They’re kind of my family…I fought every week that I was out. I may
not have had a fight in a cage, but I’ve got a cage right here in my gym…Obviously with a guy Brock’s size and with his athletic ability and
mobility, those are things you certainly consider when training and
formulating a gameplan to face that opponent…I don’t believe I’ve fought anybody Brock’s size other than Tim (Sylvia). (Gabriel) Gonzaga is a little bit smaller…I fought a couple of big guys back in the day, but I don’t think any of
them were as big as Brock either. (But) both of my recent fights have
been against guys that were pretty large. I think he’s going to
outweigh me by about 35 pounds, so those are things that I’ve trained
and prepared to deal with…There are similarities in that it’s hard to find guys that are going to simulate Brock or a guy like Tim…They’re very unique in their skill sets and their physicality. And so
there’s been some déjà vu during this 10-week camp with some of the
things that I had to go through week in and week out…But that’s good. The outcome of the Sylvia fight was good. That paid off. Hopefully it’s going to pay off again in this fight…I’m not worried about Fedor…I’m not worried about any of that. I don’t even want to hear any of those questions, because at this point none of that matters…I started out taking this one fight at a time, and I’m going to continue to do that…It seems to be working for me."
