By Cain Velasquez
By the time I step inside the Octagon at UFC 146 on Saturday it will have been over six months since I last fought. It’s taken time to get back, as I wanted to rest my body, heal up from injuries and ensure I returned 100 per cent fit and ready to go.
I didn’t just want to rush back for the sake of it. Saying that, though, it has been frustrating sitting out and watching everybody else go about their business. I love the gym, the routine and it was very hard to take it easy for so long. It’s never good to have time off following a defeat, as you’re always keen to get back in there and set the record straight and that’s what I wanted to do after I lost the title to Junior dos Santos in November.
Also, layoffs do affect you and they do take some working around. I noticed it during camp. Not only does your body change during time away from the gym, but you also lose a bit of snap and technique in your work. If you’re not practicing your art on a daily basis, or even just going through the motions now and again, you’d be surprised how quickly your skills can deteriorate. Thankfully, this training camp has undoubtedly brought me back to where I was.
It’s also made me realize I need to rematch Junior dos Santos at some point in the future. I’d find it difficult to end my career knowing I never had the chance to get my revenge and reverse that loss.
I know deep down that wasn’t me in there against dos Santos first time round, but I have to beat him in a return in order to prove it to the wider world. Don’t get me wrong, he won our first fight fair and square and I take my hat off to him — he’s a great champion and fighter — but I feel I owe it to myself and to the fans to go out there and fight him again.
Not only that, I won’t rest until I’ve beaten him. Some people say I am quiet but they also know I am very competitive.
Defeats are never nice, and it obviously sucks to lose, but I wasn’t too downhearted after that dos Santos defeat. All I could do was accept the result and learn from it.
Also, because the fight was so short, it wasn’t like I could go back, analyse the tape and pinpoint all the things I did wrong. Yes, there were things that went wrong, of course, but the fight wasn’t long enough to be all that revealing. Dos Santos went out there, swung some big punches and he caught me.
That was that.
If we were to fight again, I’d obviously do many things differently and I wouldn’t put myself in a position to get caught with something silly, but that’s the way fights go sometimes. We’ve seen many fighters over the years get caught early.
Losing was a new experience for me, and it isn’t something I want to become all that familiar with. It’s not nice walking around without the UFC world heavyweight title and it’s not nice wanting to get revenge over somebody who has beaten you. Believe me, I’d rather not be chasing dos Santos right now, but that’s the way things are and I’ve learnt to accept that.
Junior is the champion of the world and, unless Frank Mir dethrones him on May 26, things will stay that way for the foreseeable future. All I can do is keep pushing my case for a rematch, starting with a big victory against Antonio (Bigfoot) Silva on May 26.
Given everything Silva achieved in the recent Strikeforce heavyweight tournament, this is a good fight for me to take. He is respected in the heavyweight division and is probably a top 10 guy at this moment in time. That should mean victory over him gets me back — there or thereabouts — to where I was 12 months ago. I’d much rather fight a tough and dangerous guy like Silva on May 26 than somebody lined up for me to roll over in a round or two. I know this is a genuine test, and I know it’s one that will lead me a step closer to Dos Santos and that UFC championship…
Former UFC world heavyweight champion Cain Velasquez battles Brazil’s Antonio “Bigfoot” Silva at the first-ever all-heavyweight UFC main card at UFC 146 on May 26, live on pay-per-view.
Follow @cainmma on Twitter for all the latest news ahead of his bout at UFC 146.
