Ronnie Britt Week 3 Blog

Pictured (left to right) Dan Anderson, Chris Bott, Mike Van Meer (w/ Michigan hat), myself, Dillon, and Chris Mickle

It is a little more than four weeks out from fight night, training is going well. So far no major injuries and my stamina and weight are coming along great. I am beginning to pick up my intensity in both sparring and conditioning. This is where I start to visualize how I expect the fight to go and I develop my strategy and then implement that into my training. I would like to think I am well rounded and capable of fighting both stand up and on the ground, but a majority of my wins have been by submissions. However, I prepare for anything because anything can happen in a fight, and it most often times does.

I was asked by you gentle readers, what fight was my toughest.  That would be the Bryce Teager fight at MCC 12 in 2008. We went at it like two cats in a bag. I dropped down to 155 lbs to fight him for the number one contender status, I usually fight at 170, so I thought I could do it.  At the day of the weigh-ins I was at 161 after coming down from 194 over the course of 5 weeks.  I hadn’t been under 160 pounds in 20 years, but I felt great!  I got into the sauna for 30 minutes with a sauna suit and slathered abolene (opens the pores) all over my body.  When I got out, I was 152, it seemed easy!  However, on the way to the Twisted Parrot to weigh in, I swear I saw a polar bear climbing a fence in West Des Moines along the interstate. I tried to reason with myself, it was March, cold, and it had been a really rough winter after all. lol.  My eyes seemed to have suddenly developed the ability to look in different directions at any given time, I was told this was normal after a dramatic weight cut. I ate and drank to my stomach’s content after getting on the scale. To this day I still think Twisted Parrots pizzas are a godsend! Anyway, onto the fight… I was wanting this fight so bad. I was focused, intense and as confident as I have ever been. I was sure I was going to win. I looked across the cage at Bryce and wondered how in the hell he got to 155? Man, he looked huge. I looked like I could double for Patrick Swayze, after chemo for pancreatic cancer, lol.  The first round went somewhat well for me, I landed an uppercut that dropped him and I almost submitted him as well. I put everything I could into finishing him, but he was so tough! . After the round ended, I went back to my corner completely drained, I don’t know how I made it through the next two rounds. We punched and kicked the crap out of each other for three rounds, after the fight I could barely walk. My face looked like it went through a windshield. I lost a decision….but I was happy.. well, as happy as you can be after losing i guess. But that was the first fight I had ever gone past the first round, I was exhausted, battered and in pain but I didn’t quit. I found out a lot about myself. They say you learn more from a loss than you do a win, and that’s true. The most disappointing thing about that night was after dieting so strictly for a month or so, I didn’t really get to enjoy a well deserved pizza after the fight because my jaw was dislocated.  : /

I was asked which fight was my favorite. That would have to be the fight against Jesse Sanders. The reason for that was because it was the only fight I took that I thought I was going to lose. Jesse was a professional boxer known as Iron Jaw and had quite a following. I had seen him box many times and I knew he was a hard hitting, tough boxer. At the time of our fight, he was 4-0 in mma and I was 8-0. He was to be the main event at the Warparty fights in Marshaltown that night but his opponent dropped out, I was also on the same card and my opponent had dropped out as well.  It was only fitting that we fight each other, but he was at 185 and i was at 170.  Not only was I concerned about the weight difference, but I knew Jesse had also wrestled in high school…how was I going to take this boxer down to submit him? I figured he would be stronger than me, in better shape, younger (that’s a given!) and much better stand up. Well, I wasn’t goin to back down, even if i thought I was going to be eating my teeth somewhere in the first round. I just figured I would give it my best shot and have fun with it while I was awake.  My plan was to really come at him like I wanted to strike and kick, and then go for a take down.  I didn’t want him to get a rhythm going or work his combos. I faked a shot low to his legs, like i was going for a take down, then I came over the top with the hardest punch I have ever thrown. I hit him right in the eyebrow, busted him open.  And he just kinda smirked at me. Part of me about had a coronary, but another part said, ‘lets give him some more’. I started to back into him like I was going to go for a rolling leg lock, he nailed me with a left hook that felt like a ball peen hammer to the forehead, and then followed that with a right uppercut that just narrowly missed. I tried backing in again, Jesse thought I was going to try a spinning kick and he picked me up and slammed me to the mat. After the fight he told me that he was swearing at himself for taking me down as he was slamming me.  Once we hit the mat, I worked my hips out, caught his arm and tapped him with a slipout armbar. I won in 53 seconds, you can imagine my elation, after all, I kept my teeth!

Ok maybe time for a funny story or two.  One time I was cornering some of our guys up north somewhere, Danny Anderson was fighting Manny Quiros I think.  Danny fought a good fight and won somewhat easily. In celebration, as he was leaving the ring, he went to jump over the top rope and miscalculated…or perhaps he just wasn’t as athletic as he thought he was.  In any case, he didn’t make it. He landed on the top rope and proceeded to fall back into the ring ass over tea kettle. It looked like a backward somersault with a landing on his head, but he rolled through it and swaggered out of the ring as if he meant to do it. He even raised his hands triumphantly and acknowledged the laughing crowd as if they admired his acrobatics.  At another one of Danny’s fights he faced a well known tomato can of less than stellar abilities. Early in the first round, Danny had taken the guy down and had him in our corner so he could hear our instructions better.  As Danny was on top in half guard, he went to hammer fist the guy and the guy made a loud whimpering noise. Danny looked up at me in disbelief, I looked back at him and shrugged. Danny then started to rain down hammer fists at various speeds as if the guy was an instrument, however the noises that guy made were not exactly music to the ears, it was hilarious anyway.  Danny mercifully finished the guy with a gut kick, intending to win money from Travis Fulton as Travis didn’t think Danny could knock the guy out. It was ruled a TKO as the guy laid there and moaned and wouldn’t get up, so Travis didn’t have to pay up.

Not really a training story, but I used to host many UFC parties at my house. My basement not only had a cage, but it also had a fireplace and a wetbar (I think every training establishment should look into this!). Mikey Van Meer showed up for one such event wearing a flat billed Michigan hat sideways. I did not care for this as I was a Nebraska fan and they both were vying for a claim to the national championship that year. Plus a respectful person should at least curve the bill of his hat and wear it straight!  He was doing this to basically antagonize me.  The goof took off the hat and set it next to the fireplace for me to adore and went upstairs to use the restroom.  I found a hat of similar likeness and threw that into the fire and hid his ugly hat. When he came down stairs and asked where we put his hat, I pointed at the fire and laughed. He started hopping around like curly of the three stooges, he even tried to save his hat by reaching in to the fire to grab it. He stammered and looked at me like he didn’t know whether he should punch me or find some water to put out the fire. We were all laughing so hard at the way he was panicking and cursing us as he found a poker to get the charred remains out of the fire. I thought that he was in such a state of disbelief that he might actually try the remains of the hat on to see if it was salvageable. At this point it was a black tarry gooey thing that barely even looked like a hat. All I can say is he must really like Michigan.  lol.  We eventually came clean after a few fights had passed, as Mikey was starting to get emotional.  Man was he happy to see that hat had been unharmed.

Ok. I have received more questions about my mindset for fights, how I will feel about not fighting anymore and my thoughts on other subjects. I will go over some of these next week.  I may also include more stories if time allows. A few people have also asked where they could get Warfrog T-shirts, just click this link!  http://www.knockoutsquad.com/Home_Page.php

If you have any other questions, feel free to email me too at Ronnie.britt@gmail.com

Till then, don’t croak.
Warfrog