Dan Hardy: ‘Everybody likes an underdog’
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):I’d like to talk about your underdog status, but if a different way. Your episode of “UFC Primetime”…
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):I’d like to talk about your underdog status, but if a different way. Your episode of “UFC Primetime” grabbed a record high 1 million viewers, its highest ever. By comparison, the GSP-Penn episode landed some 880,000 viewers. If you’re such an underdog, why are so many people interested in this fight?
Dan Hardy: I think it’s a combination of a couple of things to be honest.
One, everybody loves an underdog story. I think this is a typical “Rocky” movie, this. GSP’s the guy with all the fancy techniques and all the technology and the top-level training that he needs.
And then there’s me who’s got the less-than-elite team around me. I’ve got a bunch of guys that might not be well-known to the rest of the world.
It’s just a typical underdog story, and I think everybody likes those kind of stories.
And I think also that people can see a lot of potential in me in this fight. I think people know that, although in the books it’s one fight, it’s going to be very different on the night. It’s not going to be a one-sided fight at all. I think people know that.
So I think they just want to get involved, they want to see what I’m doing and see how I’m preparing just so they can involve themselves in the story a little more.
And I think the second reason is because I don’t mind speaking my mind (laughs), you know? I mean, GSP, he says the same things in every build-up to every fight: he’s in the best shape he’s ever been in, he’s prepared hard, etc.
But I don’t mind telling it how it is. I think people are interested in that and interested in what I’m saying. I think that’s why people are tuning in. Even if they don’t like me, they wanna know what I’m going to say, because I’m good at upsetting people, I guess.
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):I read that your nickname comes from the fact that Robin Hood was from Nottingham, is that true?
Dan Hardy: Well yeah, it was just … well, originally it wasn’t. Originally it was due to a disagreement within an old team I used to train with. I went to train somewhere else, and I was kind of outlawed by that team, and none of the people were allowed to train with me. It’s a long story, so …
But the main thing is that, yeah, I’m from Nottingham, and that’s kinda why I’ve kept the name.
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com): For whatever reason, the UFC airbrushed your abdominal tattoos and changed your hair color. Which pissed you off more?
Dan Hardy: Well the photograph was, let me try and think when it was … it was from just before the Marcus Davis fight, and if you see it at the weigh-in, my hair was the same as that. I had not had it colored or cut yet, so it was slightly longer on the sides, which made it darker and I didn’t have the red in it.
The airbrushing out of the tattoo was apparently because there was too much visual stimulus on the poster. If they would’ve left my tattoo in, the tattoo would have drawn people’s eyes away from the information about the show. So that was the story about the tattoo.
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):A win for Daley makes it 3 Octagon wins in a row (KO’d Kampmann then Hazelett). You two could be fighting for the same title here one day if you’re not careful. Is that a fight that you’d take?
Dan Hardy: No it’s not, no. Myself and Paul have discussed this in the past. We get asked this question a lot. I mean everybody wants to watch teammates fight. Anderson Silva/Lyoto Machida would be a great fight, and there are three guys at AKA who have never fought each other. So I don’t see why myself and Paul would ever end up having to fight each other.
After this fight, even once I win the belt, I don’t see Paul as being the next contender anyway, because there’s the Fitch/Alves fight as well. So, I don’t see that becoming a problem. And if it ever does get to that stage, myself and Paul will sit down and discuss it and we’ll decide the best way forward.
I personally see us both holding the belt at some point, obviously one of us would hold it first, then vacate it, and the other one would take it. I’m not planning on being the champion forever. I’m happy to take the belt and defend it a few times and step aside for Paul to do his business.
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):Tell me about training with Matt Serra. How did it come about, whose idea was it?
Dan Hardy: Well it’s something I’ve been considering when I first thought of the fight camp. Because obviously, Matt Serra’s got a lot of information about GSP, with him fighting him twice.
I knew he’d be a good person to talk to. And fortunately, we’re both sponsored by Xyience, so there was a common ground there, so I was able to get in touch with him and head over.
My intention was just to spend a day with him, just to spend a training session with him. Just to pick up a bit of few things and take them back and work on them with my team. But after chatting with Matt and meeting him, we got on well, and it became apparent that he was quite prepared to give me more of his time.
So I’ve started training with him four or five times a week now. He’s been bringing his guys in, all his top guys, and he’s just been putting together solid training sessions for me. Doing everything I need for the fight, basically.
I just feel so prepared now, after working with him, it’s just made a huge difference in my confidence as well as in my preparation.
Adam Wagner (MMAmania.com):What types of things did you focus most heavily on, generally speaking? Thinking back on how Serra’s fight with St. Pierre went – his second fight, of course – he was generally on his back for much of the fight. Have you been working on escaping back to your feet or takedown defense?
Dan Hardy: Yeah, everything we’ve done has been going from bad positions. Every position you can think of, from guard to half-guard, to side mount, to mount, to back defense. We’ve covered everything. We’ve worked every position, every bad position under pressure, as well.
We’re doing rounds. We’re doing five minute rounds with fresh guys every minute or two minutes in each round. Each round we do a different position, so say we do half guard for a round, then half guard from the other side, and we just go through the rounds like that.
Obviously between the rounds and during the rounds, he’s coaching me and showing me tricks and techniques that I can use in those positions. And like you said, in his last fight with GSP, he spent a lot of time on his back, so he’s very familiar with GSP’s approach to the ground control.
So basically, he’s educating me on all the stuff that he thinks I’m going to need against GSP if it hits the ground, which is fantastic. We’ve covered so much ground in the past two weeks, we’ve done some awesome training sessions.
I trained with him [last week], and both sessions were just perfect sessions. It’s been awesome. I just feel so prepared. I think GSP’s expecting that as soon as it hits the ground for him to be safe, and that’s really not the case anymore.
