The next six months, win, lose, or draw at any stage of the tournament,  determine my next five to ten years – Brent Weedman

Brent_Weedman

Brent Weedman

Brent Weedman finishes fights, period. All of his career wins have come via stoppage and he does not plan on that changing as he heads into the Bellator Season Four Welterweight Tournament.  The Louisville, Kentucky, native drew Dan Hornbuckle as his first-round opponent in the Bellator opener on March 5 in Lemoore, California, at the Tachi Palace Hotel and Casino.  Brent is thrilled at the chance to avenge his  2006 loss to Hornbuckle, and CageCraze.com was thrilled to get a chance to visit with Brent at his training camp at Real Fighters Gym in Louisville with Team Haycraft. There is no better candidate for our first Featured Fighter from Kentucky, and Brent had a ton of things on his mind.

We spoke with Brent after a grueling Team Haycraft sparring session, and his fight against Hornbuckle had just been publicly confirmed. We thought at first that “Weedman vs Hornbuckle II” was a fight that was worthy of being a semi-final or final fight of the tournament but Brent looked at it differently, and spoke highly of the matchmaking at Bellator. “The thing I love about fighting for Bellator is that their fights are the main focus. They always put the best possible fights together and they did a great job. I can guarantee that something exciting is going to happen, someone is getting finished…I like that because win, lose, or draw, we both come out of it with higher earning potentials and higher visibility.”

The chatter leading into the Bellator tournament has been mostly concentrated on other fighters, which is the way that Brent likes it. “I’m fine being overlooked, I love playing the underdog. It is a little bit of a spoiler though, because in every interview that Dan [Hornbuckle] has done he talks about how it was one of the toughest fights of his career. So, it does kind of suck that my first opponent won’t sleep on me. Everybody else does, but you’ll never hear Dan say ‘Who is this guy? I am going to run right through him.’ ”

Brent_Weedman_Eric_Haycraft

Weedman takes direction from Eric Haycraft

Brent went on to discuss how far he has grown since the first fight against Dan Hornbuckle, and why this fight will be different. “Instead of stepping back and pushing him over with one finger like I should have [after hurting Hornbuckle with a body shot],  I freaked out. I picked him all the way up to the ceiling and then drove him all the way to the mat.” Dan Hornbuckle then submitted Weedman with a triangle choke. “The thing I like to point to in this fight …my first real Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu lesson ever was with Helio Soneca after the Hornbuckle fight, on how to escape the triangle. Fast forward to now, and I am a three-stripe purple belt under a 5th-degree black belt [Soneca] from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, that is a legend in the sport.”

Looking at the rest of the field, Brent’s journey towards a matchup against Ben Askren will not get easier if he gets past Hornbuckle. “Everybody in this tournament can win. On any given night, anyone in this tournament can win. That is the kind of professional sport that I want to be a part of.” When asked if he thought everyone in the field could beat Askren, Weedman hesitated, but went on to say, “That’s a good question, a really good question. I am going to say ‘yeah’ just for the simple fact that Ben is so good at wrestling, that we have not seen much else from him and we haven’t needed to. That is not necessarily a slight against him. Ben Askren is a fantastic athlete which means he is going to pick up the rest of the game rapidly…that being said, he is still young in his submissions game, he is still young in his kickboxing game.”

Brent_Weedman2

Weedman working drills at Real Fighters Gym

Brent likens Askren’s wrestling prowess to the BJJ game of Jake Shields. Brent spent some time out in California training with Shields, along with Nick and Nate Diaz. Brent says that his training with them “completely revolutionized” his game. Brent is kind of a big fish in a small pond in Louisville, but in California he said he was “fodder, just another body for them.” Brent is back in Louisville now and along with his trainer, Eric Haycraft, has begun to plug in the new training methodologies he picked up from his trip to the West Coast.

Brent is now just weeks away from the biggest fight of his career, and this is make-or-break time for him. “The next six months, win, lose, or draw at any stage of the tournament,  determine my next five to ten years. Ten years from now, I can look back and say that for six months I did it full bore, I did it the way you are supposed to, I put everything else on hold, and I did what I wanted to do.  Fighting is not important. Do you think that any of the protestors in Cairo care about Brent Weedman vs Dan Hornbuckle? No. They’ve got important things to care about. But fighting is in me, it is my passion, and you have to do what you love in life. We all only get to live one time…and then it is over.”

CageCraze.com would like to wish Brent the best of luck heading into the Bellator Season Four Welterweight Tournament. You can watch the opening round of the tournament on March 5 on MTV2. Please visit Bellator.com for more info on Brent Weedman, Dan Hornbuckle, and all of the other competitors. We would also like to say thank you to Eric Haycraft for allowing us to come into Real Fighters Gym and observe the Team Haycraft workouts. Brent would like to thank his management team at SuckerPunch Entertainment. Please check out their website and contact them if you are interested in becoming a sponsor for Brent’s tournament run.

CageCraze.com is your MMA Social Network dedicated to connecting, promoting, covering and improving local MMA everywhere. Create your free profile today, and stay connected with local MMA Everywhere! Brent Weedman has his own CageCraze.com profile, create yours and connect with Brent!