James Brydon

The upcoming TFC 10 show features two fighters from Edmonton in matchups originally scheduled for December.

The Fight Club's Friday night show in Edmonton is titled "High Octane", but it could easily be dubbed "Take Two."

The main and co-main event of TFC 10, which takes place at the Shaw Conference Centre and will be the first time the promotion's show will air live on pay-per-view, are fights that were originally meant to take place back in December.

(Or so some thought.)

Local favourite Ryan "The Real Deal" Ford (11-2, 3-0 in TFC) headlines his fourth straight, and finally gets his shot at former UFC fighter Tommy "Farm Boy" Speer. The matchup had been tapped for TFC 9: Total Chaos, but it never materialized. The reason it didn't depends on who you ask.

Ford, the welterweight champion who will defend his belt for the second time, said organizers claimed Speer agreed to the fight but then pulled out. Speer (13-4) says it didn't go down like that.

"The fight was offered to me but I working on the (family) farm," said the 25-year-old from Elgin, Minn. "It was just a miscommunication where I never accepted the fight, and everyone just assumed I backed out two weeks before. I had never even accepted the fight."

That didn't stop his opponent from taking a few jabs at the American, who after a loss in late 2008 said he was unable to juggle both his rural life and fighting career and called an end to the latter.

"Ford says I'm a farmer and not a fighter," Speer said. "On Friday night, I'll prove he's half right."

Speer, who trains at Matt Hughes' HIT Squad, said his past "retirement" announcement was more of an emotional response to a frustrating split-decision loss to a less-experienced Beau Baker in a lower-tier promotion.

The November 2008 defeat was a low point in a fighting career for Speer that just a year earlier was highlighted by a successful run on The Ultimate Fighter 6 as part of Team Hughes. That included unofficial wins over current UFC contenders Ben Saunders and George Sotiropoulos (who now fights at 155) on his way to the final

The December 2007 TUF title bout ended in disappointing fashion as Speer was choked out by Mac Danzig early in the opening frame. Four months later, he lost his second straight in the Octagon -- he was knocked out within a minute by Anthony Johnson -- and was subsequently released by the UFC.

Up to that point, Speer had only lost once professionally, and his record included a win in the WEC. But since he has only fought four times, and only once since his 2008 loss to Baker.

Speer isn't concerned about any "ring rust" however.

"I'm an active guy. I'm always doing something everyday, if it's not training for a fight it's something physical on the farm."

Speer, who had never been outside the U.S. before this week, said he likes Edmonton and considers it no different than any big city in the States. But he's aware the crowd will definitely be on the side of the local hero.

"I'll have two people cheering for me: My two cornermen."

For the 28-year-old Ford, whose exploits are fairly well known to Edmonton fight fans, in preparing for his last MMA bout he had three different changes of opponents. So he's just happy to be able to spend his entire fight camp focused on one guy.

Well, that's only half true. The first half -- roughly 4 1/2 weeks -- of his fight camp was pure striking as he prepared for his pro boxing debut on Feb. 13 at the Shaw Conference Centre. There he beat former Canadian cruiserweight champion and WBO world title challenger Willard Lewis by majority decision.

He certainly had to work harder to get his hand raised there than for his previous MMA win -- at TFC 9, he knocked out late replacement John Walsh in 13 seconds.

(Go to 4:15 mark).

Does the Canadian expect the same kind of thing against Speer?

"You never know," Ford said. "We always come in with a game plan, but as soon as the fight starts, you never know what's going to happen. There's no surprise in his game plan. He's obviously going to throw a couple punches and then try to take me down. I know he's not going to want to trade with me."

Ford said in the last four weeks he worked a lot on his wrestling with his coach Adam Zugec in Victoria. But his preference is to always come out guns blazin' -- a point not lost on Speer.

"I know his pace is fast," Speer said. "I'm not going to sit back and let him control the fight, so that means I've got to pick the pace up. I like a slower pace fighting and mix up my combinations but I have a feeling it's just going to be two guys throwing punches and fighting fast-paced."

(Wouldn't organizers love that for their first chance to showcase their product on PPV?)

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The co-main event is the one that is truly a re-do.

Victor "The Matrix" Valimaki, another hometown hero, was set to defend his light-heavyweight belt against Victoriaville, Que.'s Martin "The Stress" Desilets (9-2) on the December card before he had to pull out the day of the weigh-ins because of illness.

He separated his shoulder in his previous fight -- a September win over Lew Polley at TFC 8 -- and a number of other small injuries made him unable to do as much cardio that he normally does, which made him a bit heavier than he should have been. And then he had some food poisoning for a couple days before he was set to cut weight.

"I was already pretty sick and throwing up and pretty dehydrated," Valimaki said. "I had that for about two days before I started my cut, and then the sauna just pushed me over the edge."

Like Ford, Desilets' camp naturally went into trash-talking mode regarding him not being able to make weight.

"I honestly don't blame him," Valimaki said. "I've had a guy drop out the day of the fight before and it sucks. You put so much preparation in and just mental strain leading up (to the) fight and you find out a couple of hours before you're not fighting.

"So I don't mind (them trash talking). I just feed off of that and use it to train harder."

Valimaki (16-5, 3-0 in TFC) admits the problems he had made it a learning experience.

"(It) was an eye opener for me that I can't do big cuts like that anymore. I used to routinely do 25-30 pound water cuts over a couple of days and I'm just getting to that point where your body shouldn't take that."

So Valimaki, 28, made a lot of changes to his regimens. He hired a nutritionist and said he's been a lot tighter with his diet. He still works with the same coaches and partners, but he's doing more cardio, mixing up a lot of intervals, and he switched up his strength training programs.

And on Tuesday when I spoke to him, he had just returned from purchasing a portable sauna, which he was planning to use for the first half of his weight cut.

"It's a seated one, it's basically like a tent, where you're head sticks out. … This makes it a lot easier because I can be at home, I can watch a movie or something while I'm cutting."

The weigh-ins are Thursday at 6 p.m. MT in Edmonton. Valimaki doesn't expect the "second take" to result in anyone yelling "cut!"(No pun intended.)

"It won't be because of me this time if the fight doesn't happen!"