Vitor Belfort: MMA should not become like Formula 1 racing
Vitor Belfort’s UFC debut was in 1997; he was 19 years old. He swept the four-man tournament in 130 seconds. The…
Vitor Belfort’s UFC debut was in 1997; he was 19 years old. He swept the four-man tournament in 130 seconds.
The sport has changed since then, and in his opinion, it is not all for the good. However, in era when fighters go through long camps designed to defeat a single opponent, Belfort jumped at the chance to fight UFC light heavyweight champion Jon Jones in October, although he had been in training to fight at Middleweight.
It was right away when I received the invitation, Belfort told MMAWeekly.com when asked how fast he accepted the fight with Jones. I just saw it as great opportunity for my career. I said to Lorenzo and Dana that I was ready if they needed me, and then they requested me.
I believe the fight world became a little complicated and fighters today have this mentality that things run on their time. Can you imagine in my era, they just throw you a pair of gloves and put you in an open weight tournament. Today you need a strategy, a camp, based on the opponent that you fight, and this way they are never ready for short notice fights.”
I’m not denying that the level and the techniques have improved, but we have to be careful to not become like a Formula 1.”
In the beginning, it was the driver that was important. Today is the car and technology that wins the race. The driver is secondary in the process. Fighters have to be ready to fight any time. Of course the ones who are in a recovery process from an injury are an exception, and this is acceptable.
You cannot take away the business part because we make our living off of the fight but we need to have our roots in what we are: fighters!
