eMarkLee

For 4 years, I trained in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu(BJJ) with Roy Harris is San Diego. I was fascinated with BJJ because of two factors. The first was that it was an art you can apply directly to street fights. At the time, right after the first UFC came out, I felt that this was the best way to prepare me for general fighting situations and to be able to make my college roommates tap out if they did not clear the sink of filth. I didn’t even mention rowdy cousins acting up in their or my parents’ house. It was also a way to practice at 100%, going for submissions at every training session. It was also a martial art that did not involve getting punched in the head. For some reason, I don’t enjoy repeated blows to my head.

Fast forward to today, where UFC is a big popular mainstream sport more popular than boxing. Watching all of the fight shows makes me wonder if I can compete with these guys in the Lightweight division (155lbs). There was a time when there were no weight divisions and everybody just fought, which meant the little guys like yours truly would not stand a chance. Weight classes show how much better the fighters have become.

So how well would I do in the UFC? I just found out because last night I saw myself fighting in the UFC.

Fellow Taiwanese Fighter

If you follow the UFC Ultimate Fighter on Spike, you know there’s a fighter named Andy Wang on the show. Andy’s a Taiwanese who came to America at a young age. Andy is a technical fighter, a black belt in BJJ, who fights with determination. He’s mainly a ground fighter with very limited stand up skills. He practiced tai chi with his grandfather just like I did when I was young.

So what happened when Andy Wang (my parallel universe equivalent) fought in this last week’s Ultimate Fighter?

1. Andy got out-fought
2. Andy was out-sized.
3. Andy was just out-classed.

The reasons are simple actually. There are better fighters than Andy on the show. There are bigger guys (the guy he fought dropped 20 lbs prior to the fight) that dwarf Asian dudes that are smaller. There are also guys much taller, which gives a significant edge in the stand up game. Andy also thought he was a lot tougher he really was. For two rounds, Andy decided to forget about what he’s supposed to do as a 5′0 Taiwanese guy and thought he was Mike Tyson. He just kept trading punches with the taller, bigger man. Not a good idea but I could see it happening to me also. I would do the same…why go for an arm-bar when you can get a big KO?

In the end, Andy and I lost our fight in the UFC. That’s the end of our professional fighting careers. The UFC was never meant for short, stubborn, out-classed Taiwanese guys. I guess I will reserve my BJJ skills for arm-baring Workmonkey and my cousins.