The closer it gets to fight night, the worse my solitude is. A living hell, a torment only Dante could have imagined. The week of the fight is insufferable. I feel covered in the wrong layer of skin. I can’t wait for the fight to end. It becomes weeks of this kind of emotion, mounting, growing inside me. An emotional tumor. Before the Condit fight, Kristof came to Montreal from his place in Monaco and spent over a month living and training with me, and it just about saved my sanity.
CONSCIENCE: The dual pressure of the fighting world is cruel, and worse than any sport. It obliges a fighter to perfectly combine his physical and mental focus, more than any other individual or team sport. In baseball, the greatest hitters of all time have a failing grade, and they play 162 games in a regular season. In tennis, with four majors and countless tournaments all over the world, each athlete can start over on an almost weekly basis. The same goes for golf. In football, a team can win a game even if its offense can’t score, and players get to wear those funky helmets. In mixed martial arts, an established, successful fighter has two moments in a calendar year. Two moments he can’t back away from. An up-and-comer fights more, for a few thousand dollars at a time, hoping to climb the ranks. Each of us follows the same path, but not many will reach the summit. This is not the fighter’s tragedy, it is the fighter’s reality.
If there’s a camera, I’m on. I know I have to somehow monitor what I say and I can’t act like a clown. (But I like acting like a clown!) Despite knowing I have to be aware at all times of what I’m saying or doing, I’ve always tried to find a way to stay authentic.
I know that some people think I’m doing this for the money, but they’re plain wrong. The marketing and sponsorships have a strategic purpose in my life, but finance isn’t it. I have enough money in the bank to live the rest of my life. The two most luxurious items I own were given to me. And I know what it’s like to exist based on the next $5 bill that comes into my pocket, and it’s not that bad. I know I’ll always have my parents’ basement in St-Isidore to go home to, whatever happens.
CONSCIENCE: A losing fighter can be bruised, cut into, bleed and break. A winning fighter can come out swollen and bruised and broken as well. And the next day, people look at those fighters and judge them on how they look, not just how they performed. Hence the expression, “You should see the other guy.” This isn’t meant to reduce the ardor of other sports—quite the contrary—but how quickly people forget the last eight title defenses, the number of rounds won consecutively, the statistical domination across all fighting stances. With every single loss comes great risk, because sponsors prefer champions and titles, and fickle is the nature of business. It makes for a lot of pressure, and luckily for us, Georges’s sponsors have been there for the man and not just the belts.
The counterargument is that I really do care for all of my sponsors. Without them, there is no me in the current form. They give me the tools and the means to prepare my career and plot my future. A lot of people have asked me why I ever started all the branding work and marketing planning, and the answer is really simple: I needed help to know when to say yes and when to say no. Some companies have made me extremely lucrative partnership offers—and I mean extremely—but they didn’t feel right. Each and every sponsor we work with is screened from top to bottom: What do they stand for? Do they just want my face, or are they looking at working together to build something? Where are they going in the future? These things actually matter to me.
When an opportunity with a sponsor comes in, we have a team meeting. My team takes me through all of their analysis, presents me with my options, and I make the final decision. I will say this for certain: if I don’t like the brand or what it’s doing, it’s a simple, thankful no. If I see potential and there is a win-win-win situation—for them, for my fans and for me—then we go for it. It’s that simple.
If I or anyone else wants to become the best at something in this millennium, none of us will get there alone. And I’ve always hated doing things alone.
CONSCIENCE: My own life changes the moment Georges climbs those stairs into the ring. When I see the gate close and the lock click into place, there is nothing left for me to do. I have no more impact, no purpose. The best thing I can do (the only thing I can do) is to have a plan and be prepared for any of the two outcomes. When the gate closes, there is nothing left but to sit there, to watch and pray, to hope and cheer, when I’m capable of it. I become a fan, a follower who analyzes each moment of the fight because I can’t let go of the martial artist or the fan in me. As a training partner who has seen all of Georges’s fights, I can usually predict the outcome during the first minutes of the opening round—which makes those moments excruciating. There is always the possibility of an errant kick, like Condit’s third-round knockdown, but nobody can predict freak occurrence. Even though I’m sitting next to the ring, I usually watch one of the big screens to ensure I have an unobstructed view. I look for Georges’s movement, for the distance he maintains from his opponent, from the snap and whip in his strikes, and then I know. In the pit of my gut, I understand what the outcome should be. I can just feel it.
When the gate closes, Georges must be left alone, to his own devices, and his opponent’s. Helplessness is what I feel.
Before a fight, I’m a complete mental case, a walking stress ball. Rodolphe is my friend, and I don’t know how he does this job. I’d never be able to do it. I realize now that he’s protecting me so I can focus entirely on my work. He’s my shield, and I don’t even have to carry him around. He walks next to me, always.
And then, suddenly, the fight happens, and it’s over, and a special kind of deliverance arrives in my life. I want to dance, to laugh. Life is an all-out party, and it can last for days on end. And it feels like the greatest time of all time because of the ordeal that just ended. Which means, when I pause to consider it, that one is dependent on the other.
Suffering allows you to truly appreciate release, which means there’s an odd relationship with balance. When great depths of unrelenting sorrow are punctuated by great peaks of joy and liberation, the result is delicious. It’s about appreciating the little things that make my life so great—a glass of water, eggs and bacon, a slice of chocolate cake. Getting tipsy. To truly understand the greatness of these things, I have to suffer. I have to suffer and live through it, and then I can appreciate more.
It’s why they say that true pleasure does not exist; it’s just the temporary release from suffering. Socrates again . . .
CONSCIENCE: Before the fight against Carlos Condit, I took a few moments to look around me. I was sitting a few feet from the ring. Georges’s parents were installed immediately to my left. Behind them was a man in a vintage Manchester United soccer jersey with the number 7 for George Best (clever, I know). Over 17,000 people joined us at the Bell Centre, most of whom would be cheering for Georges. Over to my right was a collection of the world’s greatest fighters, from Anderson Silva to Jake Shields. Throngs of film and television stars were there too, wearing their sunglasses at night.
Before facing Condit, I considered that I was no longer champion. I didn’t see myself as the reigning champion. I saw Carlos as the legitimate champion. I hadn’t defended my belt for a long time. I saw myself as an aspiring fighter on the path to regaining his title. It delivered a different, new kind of joy.
The hardest thing to deal with was the stress of re-entering the ring. Feeling the mat beneath my feet. Hearing the crowd chanting “GSP!” and singing their “olés.”
CONSCIENCE: And then Georges walked in.
With each of his giant paws on Georges’s shoulders, Kristof brought up his pupil to the cage, swatting adoring hands away from Georges’s face and shouting constant encouragements. “You will defeat him. You are all-powerful. You will destroy your opponent. You are the champion. This is your time.” I know, looking at Kristof’s expression, that he means it, and how it is bred in his bones.
The walk ended a few feet in front of me. Georges sp
oke his final words to his team, looked over at me, paid homage to his handlers, looked over at me again and walked up the stairs into the ring. He was completely alone now, finally, after more than eighteen months away from the fight. Back to his destiny, back to what he does best, back in the world where he most belongs.
It was time for battle.
There is no such thing as a normal friendship in my life. There is no such thing as a normal relationship either. I’m not certain I have real friends in the definitive sense of the word. If I am going to reach my goal, I simply cannot afford “normal” relations.
I look at the people who are close to me, the ones I refer to as friends, and I wonder: Will I ever have a relationship like his? Will I ever achieve marriage, children, family? Will I ever own a barbecue or have dishes in my cupboards or live life according to the rules that govern masses of individuals? I look at Rodolphe and his special lady and their dog and their house in the country and their renovations, and I don’t see my ideal. I find confusion and misunderstanding.
I have no idea why.
CONSCIENCE: The first two rounds were a blur of near perfection. I see Georges’s training come to life before my eyes. I rediscover him in his element, I recognize signs—the signs of victory, or danger. Just by observing how he controls the center, how good his distance is and how good his pace is—because his early pace will be the same as his final-round pace. He is a machine. Within that first minute, a habituated observer can clearly see if Georges understands his opponent or not. If Georges has figured him out. As time passed by, Georges could deduce that Condit was taking more and more time to think, that his instincts were dissipating. Georges was in his psyche. This is what Georges does best: create doubt during chaos, building expectations of the unexpected. Against Condit, Georges executed the game plan exactly as prescribed. Everything was going as planned—better, even. His knee was an afterthought. The injury no longer existed, it had been banished from my recollection because it no longer mattered. Its time had expired. With each connection against Condit’s lanky frame, with each takedown, with every single point scored, Georges was building his lead. He was building control, forcing Condit out of his comfort zone and compelling him, as the fight progressed and time receded, to take risks.
And then came the third round.
Out of nowhere, as he was apparently losing balance and bending down toward his right, Condit caught Georges at his own game. Georges’s eyes followed Condit’s head, and he responded with the unexpected. Falling sideways, Condit raised his left leg and pulled his foot back behind his knee. Everybody saw it happening, like a slow-motion re-enactment, like a recurring nightmare. Everybody but Georges. Like a scorpion, Condit recoiled and stung the left side of Georges’s head with a vicious kick.
Georges went down, his hands circling, looking for solid ground. His eyes stunned, lost, surprised, checking his bearings. But down he went. The air went out of the building in a single whoosh. Everybody felt it.
Hands covered mouths. Jaws dropped. Spirits fell. Condit pounced.
He pounced on Georges and the fists and elbows and strikes rained from above. It looked like he was connecting with every single blow. Like he was pounding Georges into oblivion. Like we could hear the thud and crunch of each blow. It felt like all other sounds had exited the building. It seemed like not a person in the Bell Centre could believe it. And then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the man in the George Best jersey rise. With both hands, he pointed to the fighters and screamed, “NOOOOOOO! COME ON GEORGES!!! YOU CAN DO IT! GET UP!! STAND!” His voice broke, but others joined him; he was not alone. A UFC choir improvised in Montreal.
Composed, Georges’s mother rose, her hands clasped before her, calmly, like she knew something nobody else did. Georges’s dad stood too, but he’s where the fight comes from. His hands throwing punches, his head moving, bobbing, dodging blows. Whispering words only his son could hear. Georges was not alone anymore—that’s what I think was happening. We were all in there with him, that’s what we were trying to do, what we wanted him to know, to feel, to understand. Maybe we couldn’t grasp exactly what he was going through, so the only connection possible for us was for him to understand the collective power and energy that lived inside each of us. Support.
And then, somehow, Georges fought back. He kicked at Condit’s head from the mat, he rolled and turned and stood. We all stood with him. He regained his composure. He regained his sense of self, and then he assaulted Condit. He jumped onto him and took him down to the ground and pounded on him. He unleashed the fight of a champion. The will of a victor, of a man with no concern for his own limitations, of a man with regard only for his own possibility. His own way. Less than fifteen minutes later, the referee would raise Georges’s hand and confirm him as the only champion in his category.
He had now climbed the mountain a third time, using a new route, a road never traveled by any other fighter before him. The cornerstone of the foundation of Georges’s legacy.
I look at the people I care for, the ones who exist inside my heart, and I shake my head. I don’t fully comprehend the lives they lead or the choices they make. Their normal is not my normal, that’s for certain. Yet here we are, coexisting and dependent on one another. Achievers.
As I look back, every single person who tried to change me is no longer in my life. All of the people who tried to shape me into something that better represents their idea of a normal existence are gone. My friends are fighters, coaches, managers and agents. They enter my life during training sessions, or when I need to eat or relax. The choice isn’t even mine, it’s my routine’s.
There are a select few with whom I go to the movies or a bar. I treasure these occasions, probably because there are so few of them.
My life belongs to me, and I know happiness.
CONSCIENCE: After the fight and the ring speeches, Georges and the team went back to the dressing room. We were alone in there—his coaches, his security and the medical team. This is when I realized that Georges, above all, is a performer.
We were in the room and he was getting stitches. He didn’t talk about the fight. He didn’t mention the title, or the victory, or his record-setting winning streak. The only thing he was interested in, the only thing he wanted to talk about or was remotely curious of, was Condit. He had just fought the man and won a unanimous decision, but he wanted to know one thing: “Did he [Condit] require more stitches than I did, and is he more banged up than I am?” That’s it. That’s what he said, over and over and over again, forcing the medical staff into a vague yet unsatisfactory answer. The doctor provided responses and platitudes, but it wasn’t good enough for Georges. So he asked him again and again. And one more time for good measure. Until one of the meds relented and told Georges he had fewer stitches than Condit: four.
Why does this happen? Georges, at that moment, couldn’t remember the entire fight. He didn’t yet realize how much he had dominated the other man. The final score—50–45, 49–46 and 50–45—couldn’t stand out yet, not for GSP. Right after the fight, the world was a fog, and so was Georges’s short-term memory. That’s why he asked if Condit looked worse than him. Because it’s not enough to have defeated him in the octagon. It’s not enough to have regained his world title. It’s not enough to have re-emerged after career-threatening knee surgery. Georges needed more than this: like any other fight, he needed to have defeated the man completely. He needed to have beaten him at everything, He required total domination.
Georges’s thoughts trick him at moments like these. He was thinking, I got dropped in the third round, I won the fight, and right now I’m getting stitches. That’s all he knows. It’s all the mind retains, in that moment. Imperfection—another kind of fear, but the same response as usual. Only later—the next day, when he actually watched his fight—did Georges realize how well he performed. It’s only later that he realized how, except for fifty-one long seconds of the third round, he dominated totally.
Aiming
to become a great martial artist is a lot like being a researcher in science or medicine. If you find a remedy for an ailment, others will profit from it—that’s the goal. My goal is to share all of my learning, all of my knowledge, so that other generations of martial artists will benefit from it. It will raise the bar and make humans better, smarter, more efficient.
When I am retired from the UFC, I will be able to spend more time doing this. A true master gives all his knowledge, but only when the student is ready to receive it. Some students are not ready for certain teaching. This understanding applies to all things, I think.
CONSCIENCE: After back-slapping with the team, a five-minute shower and those four stitches, Georges put the fancy suit on. He wanted to look good for the public, he wanted to put on a good face, but there’s one thing that he needed my help with. He came to me and held his necktie out. “Could you put this on for me? Please?” That’s all he wanted, a bit of help with his tie. And then we headed to the press conference. Georges faced the media with a bag of ice against his head. He answered all of the media’s questions.
Outside his octagon performances, these are the moments when I most admire my friend Georges. After the toughest war of his career, he answered the same question over and over and over again. The reporters found new ways of posing the same question, but Georges never veered from the first thing he’d answered many months earlier. Sometimes it causes me to wonder if reporters are even listening to each other’s questions. I wonder: Do they read other people’s stories? It fascinates me how a half dozen professional sports reporters, one after the other, can pose exactly the same question. I could understand Georges lashing out in frustration, and yet he never does: he just repeats his answer. It’s like he’s telling them, “You can ask me the same question 150 different ways, it’s not going to change my mind, my belief or my response.” In many ways, it replicates Georges in the ring: “You can try to hit me with that straight right if you want, but I’m going to take you down to the mat every time.”
The Way of the Fight Page 18
