As the Noughties faded, rounding off a decade in which Mixed Martial Arts blossomed into a three-letter acronym with a burgeoning position on the mainstream sporting landscape, it was fitting that another three-letter, one-man movement known to all as ‘GSP’ would bestride those capital letters M-M-A as the leading fighter, like a modern-day Colossus.
Representations of Georges St Pierre dwell not in the realms of the stereotypical depictions of the muscle-bound Spartan, more the sealed intensity of Eastern mystique, yet without question the 28-year-old Canadian now exudes all the characteristics of the classical, rounded exponent of mixed martial arts. The added twist is that the man himself is equally resonant as an intriguing human spirit.
In 2010, the decade that finally counted for MMA, it is arguably the time, given his credentials, to bestow upon GSPthe coveted mantle of pound for pound No 1, as the world’s greatest mixed martial artist.
With a professional record of 19-2, GSP is twice holder of the Ultimate Fighting Championship welterweight title, spanning an eight-year career in which he inflicted two sets of defeats on major UFC stand-outs BJ Penn and Matt Hughes, whilst elevating himself on a shelf tattooed with shimmering superlatives above world class contenders Thiago Alves, Jon Fitch, Sean Sherk, Matt Serra and Josh Koscheck. Dangerous men all. But equally dealt with. GSP has class. Inside and outside the Octagon. And it shows.
St-Pierre has combined God-given athletic gifts with an unquenchable work ethic which has given him status as thetemplate for any hybrid-generation mixed martial artist. Wrestler, striker, athlete. And man. Couple that with growing intelligence in media work and you have, potentially, a sports star heading to a level the likes of Roger Federer, (the pre-porn seeking) Tiger Woods, David Beckham, and the like have attained…You get the picture. GSP will grow exponentially with the sport. Win or lose.
Aside from his fighting prowess, his humility, deep honesty, and clean-cut intelligence have earned him legions of new fans worldwide. Fitting, then, that as the curtain fell upon 2009, GSP was ‘Fighter of the Year’ at the second annual Fighters Only World Mixed Martial Arts Awards in Las Vegas.
The fans had spoken in the voting process, GSP finishing ahead of fellow nominees Anderson Silva, Brock Lesnar, Lyoto Machida and Mike Brown.
St Pierre’s walk to the dais drew a standing ovation from the great and good within the industry, a Who’s Who of MMA names and fighters at a glittering gala ceremony at The Joint, within the uber-trendy Hard Rock Hotel Casino Resort.
Typically, GSP insisted that when he contemplated his MMA ‘Oscar’, it would be underlined with a reminder of how he had reached that level. ‘Win an award. Learn from it’. Who could argue with the ethics of the quintessential mixed martial artist ?
Twenty-four hours after GSP had received his Fighters Only gong, I appeared with him on ESPN’s weekly MMA Live show, discussing the build-up to UFC 108, taking place at the MGM Grand Garden Arena 48 hours later. Advocating with the devil, I asked him ‘on air’ whether up-coming opponent Dan Hardy’s comments that ‘GSP was a great athlete who had learnt to fight, rather than a born fighter’ had penetrated under his skin ? Not a bit of it. It was like a lion swatting flies from the carcass of a feast with his lazy tail. “He is right,” said GSP. “That’s exactly what I am. I am a mixed martial artist.” Armour on. Impervious
After being on set at the ESPN MMA Live show, we convened for this interview, and GSP shared his thoughts on many areas of his life, both past and present. Peculiarly, GSP does not seem 28. He seems older. Perhaps physically, in wear and tear, he is. But there emanates a maturity from the man because of his relaxed state. Open, yet rehearsed. His soft, lilting French accent which caresses the English accent, and his smooth features, are offset by a steely look which indicates in clear terms to anyone, interviewer, rival, or fan…that a line has been drawn in the sand which no one has permission to cross. That duality also creates an intriguing, enigmatic quality to being in his company.
GSP discussed the seminal moments of his career; revealed an early love for dinosaurs and Paleontology; expounded his theory on what he believes the sport must do to advance its global growth and appeal; appraised his next “dangerous foe” in British striker Dan Hardy, whom GSP admits carries great danger because “he has nothing to lose”.
He then revealed being bullied at school remains one of his greatest life lessons, and admitted the fear which stalks him before fights, his sleeplessness, and admitted to be vacillating on the prospect of vacating his UFC title and holding his mixed martial arts career in abeyance for a tumble as a wrestler for Canada at the London 2012 Olympics.
So, to his Fighters Only award. Over 120,000 votes cast by fans this year, with GSP the fans’ ‘Fighter of The Year’. “Of course, it felt really good,” said GSP. “It’s an honour to be recognised by the fans with their votes and it is not every day that you receive that honour in front of so many figures from the MMA industry. It was also a reminder to me about what I need to do to stay at the top. Basically, to get better with every fight. In this sport, it is hard to be at the top, but very easy to slide down.”
In 2009, GSP defended his title with the demolition of BJ Penn, forcing him to quit after four rounds for the first time in his career, then nullified the dangerous striker Thiago Alves at UFC 100 with sublime wrestling, making the Brazilian look like a journeyman. What no one knew during the contest was that GSP had fought the last two rounds with a torn abductor muscle. Accolades rained on St Pierre in 2009, which included winning Canadian Athlete of the Year, and three other MMA industry awards, yet according to his PR guru Shari Spencer, the Fighters Only World MMA Award, regarded as an MMA Oscar, “was the feather in the cap”.
So, to St Pierre. He’s not really a saint, yet aficionados of the sport worldwide might suggest the once-bullied kid from Saint-Isidore, Quebec, is as near a spiritual figurehead as the sport could have at present. He is the stand-out figure in the sport’s new world order, at a time of growing corporate identification with MMA. If the combat was once ridiculed as bordering on barbarism, then GSP represents an antidote to the abolitionists.
St Pierre’s physical prowess as an athlete remains freakishly erudite. If you were to create a robot MMA champion, then St Pierre might form the prototype model. He insists there is little spiritual about his fight game – it comes down to statistical and structural analysis. Yet I would beg to differ.
Start with his backroom staff. The group has flags from all parts of the world order. By design and through detail, StPierre has built around himself a team of sharp minds and an impregnable self-belief in their methods. Some critics even say there is too much ‘method’. Yet they are raising the bar.
Shari Spencer, GSP’s manager and PR guru, is a seriously major asset. Strong woman, male industry, finger on the pulse, knows exactly how to present her client and friend. She explained: “George is talented and popular, but he is very shy and humble. Being down to earth, not getting above his station, is a big part of his charm.”
Spencer was instrumental in enhancing GSP’s corporate identity last year, signing individual sponsorship terms with firstly Gatorade, and then, two months ago, with apparel company Under Armour, a deal, moreover, which resonates as much for MMA in general as it does specifically for the individual. Here are mainstream corporate sponsors now seeking to align themselves to the MMA industry. Build the leading figures; and the corporates will come.
Spencer clearly understands MMA’s place in the corporate market place and GSP’s branding potential, having made GSPthe UFC’s corporate prototype.
Surrounded by a world order of diverse cultures, intelligence and debate punctuate GSP’s training camps. “We have a diverse camp, pretty much like a United Nations. GSP’s Muay Thai coach in Montreal, Firas Zahabi, is Muslim, his strength and conditioning coach, Jonathan Chaimberg, is Jewish, and I was a Southern Baptist Minister,” explained Shari Spencer. “Greg Jackson is very philosophical, and teaches many things from ‘The Art of War’ [the 13-chapter military treatise written by 6th century Chinese general Sun Tzu] and Georges also has a good friend who is a priest who takes karate with him. The conversations are incredibly philosophical, incredibly deep, not what you would expect of a bunch of fighters getting ready for a fight.”
That eclectic blend certainly helps St Pierre in his rounded outlook. “You never see a disgruntled aggressive man,” added Spencer. “You see a gentleman who just flicks a switch when he walks into the Octagon. I think he really does seek to understand a lot of different things; he is on his own journey both physically and spiritually. We have some very interesting conversations about life itself, which would surprise a lot of people.”
While Jackson, also an award winner this year, is widely-known to fans of MMA, Zahabi is less so. He is a former Canadian Muay Thai champion and BJJ exponent, has GSP’s workout routine mathematically calculated to a science, all involving high intensity work at the TriStar Gym in Montreal, with its 13,500 sq ft of state-of-the-art facilities. The detail behind the scenes, admits GSP, is what keeps him anchored on three levels before a fight, and deals with nerves before a contest.
GSP explained: “I’m not afraid to admit that I do get scared before a fight. Scared to fail, scared of getting knocked out and scared of letting people down. It used to be worse. I’ve learnt to deal with my fear better with experience. I don’t freak out before a fight if can’t sleep. But that used to freak me out.”
Yet breaking opponents down systemically with his team helps focus that fear. “My fears do affect the way I fight. I break down everything mathematically and I try to put all the chance on my side. I split a fight up into three key steps and maintain that I’m ahead in each. I have the physical step – getting in shape via training and being able to look across at your opponent and know you are in better shape than he is. Second – the technical step, which deals with the superior skills you must have going into a fight. Finally, the tactical step, which is research, constructing a game plan and knowing your opponent’s weaknesses. If I can conquer my opponent in each of those steps, I will come away with the victory.”
“Every opponent is a threat. It’s like mathematics – they are all different sums and equations to solve. People say I’ve cleared out the welterweight division. Not true. This sport is always evolving and no two fighters are the same in mixed martial arts. Every fighter represents a different style and danger. I still have many threats to conquer in the welterweight division.”
-The most pain I suffered was not in the UFC, it was being bullied at school-
It is difficult to imagine St-Pierre having a troubled childhood, yet he was bullied at school. Growing up, he immersed himself in Jean-Claude Van Damme movies, and was a ferocious chess player. He insists chess developed his mind for his sport. “That may seem like a weird combination but my love of chess helped my career in mixed martial arts, maybe more so than any other sport I took part in. Chess is all about using your opponent’s insecurities and weaknesses against him and strategising a way to win. It’s exactly the same in mixed martial arts, only a little more physical. They call mixed martial arts human chess. It’s totally true.”
St Pierre has a theory about his success. “It comes down to nature and nurture. My philosophy is that everything in life comes down to a combination of genetics and natural environment. I’m a very positive person and always look forwards. I also believe in the development of a human being. It is a journey.” Yet as we look back on his childhood, there was some darkness.
Little Georges had taken up karate at 7. “My father was a black belt in Kyokushin karate and a massive inspiration for me. I wanted to follow the family tradition. Martial arts meant so much to my father and it was such an integral part of his life. I wanted the same.”
But then the bullying started at school. “You know, the most pain I ever suffered was probably when I was growing up in school. In a sense, competing in mixed martial arts is fairly easy, compared to what I went through with bullying at school as a child.”
“In the UFC, you have months of preparation time for a fight, and you train your body your mind for an opponent. You know where and when it will take place. You also know why you are doing it. In the school playground it was different. Older kids would kick or punch me. You could not negotiate it. I have more scars on my head from school than from MMA.”
-Pipedream or Reality – GSP to wrestle for Canada at the 2012 Olympic Games?-
According to Canadian wrestling insiders, making that country’s Olympic team would prove time-intensive for GSP, who admitted to me in Las Vegas at UFC 108 that his mind “is still not made up”. If he does take the plunge, there will be complex discussions with the UFC.
Great marketing at the Olympics, or the loss of a great welterweight champion, in his prime, for two years ?
Canada qualified ten wrestlers in eighteen weight classes at the Beijing Olympic Games. The Canadian national championships take place in 2011, from which which GSP, competing in the 85kg category, would progress to the Olympic trials. He would then need to win those, in December 2011, ten months before the London Games in 2012.
Dave Mair, who worked with the Canadian team in Beijing, and Victor Zilberman, Ph.D, a member of the Canadian Olympic Team coaching staff in 1988, ’92, ’96, 2000, and 2008, both told Fighters Only they believe GSP has the potential to become an Olympic wrestler. “The odds are against him, but Georges is an exceptional athlete, and if he wanted to take on the challenge, I’d love to watch it…he is one of those guys who you could not write off. He trains with ten of the best wrestlers in the world on a regular basis…but he’d have to start 100 pc focus on it after the next fight.”
Zilberman disagrees. “In my view it would not make sense for Georges to even attempt the Olympic option, considering the level and status he has achieved in the UFC. But if he had been a wrestler, period, he would have got to the very top of the sport, and the Olympics.” It remains to be seen whether UFC president Dana White will encourage the oxygen of publicity for the sport should St Pierre elect the Olympic option. Conundrum time.
-The Serra Loss and the Hardy Threat-
GSP admits his lowest ebb as a sportsman came after his loss to Matt Serra, a salutary lesson which he is plugging into deeply as he prepares for a face-off with Hardy, the rising British welterweight fighter who is 4-0 in the UFC after 16 months in the organisation. The GSP-Hardy 5-round title fight is a contest which many insiders have as a clear St Pierrevictory.
“Losing to Matt Serra is without question my worst sporting moment. But it was also a light coming on. It was a deeply psychological thing to come back from. A deep mental process. That loss created the biggest change in my career, and in many ways, it was the best thing that could have happened to me. It increased my capacity to learn, not from someone else who is coaching me, but from my opponent. They are all dangerous.”
“Dan Hardy is a real threat and is a very tough opponent. Hardy has nothing to lose in this fight, and a guy with that mentality is the most dangerous type of opponent, because he will give everything in this fight, and he will raise his level his game for March 27 in Newark.”
“I never underrate the British fighters. They have great fighters over there. I go in France, I know the Europeans are of a mindset where they are striking orientated. They have better strikers than Americans in general, and have different strengths than the Americans. But the Europeans – the Brits – are very serious opponents now in the UFC.”
“After losing to Matt Serra, I realised that it is hard to become the champion, but it is even harder to stay as the champion. You become the guy everyone wants to beat, and for that reason, you can’t relax. I want to win against Hardy in a spectacular way – I want to submit him or knock him out.
-The Future of MMA and rule changes-
I asked GSP about sporting events in history he would like to have been present at. ‘The Rumble In the Jungle’, between Ali and Foreman in 1974 erupts from him, then he adds: “You know, I would have loved to have gone to the first Olympic Games. I’d like to have been there to do and see the training of the Greek athletes, with their most famous Pancration trainer. Apparently, I’ve been told one of the great trainers wrote three books on Pancration, but they were destroyed when the Turks invaded Greece. Unfortunately, they have been lost. What we do not have today is those books and I’m sure we would be learning from them still.” He means it.
He also has strong views on the future for the sport, and rule changes he would implement with immediate effect. “For the sport to reach another level, for it to be a higher calibre sport, we need to create a love of this sport in other countries…and soon. Countries like China. They don’t do MMA there, but we should be looking to get the sport into the major countries, especially where martial arts are strong. It is kung fu in China at present…getting MMA there would allow us to really make the sport develop.”
“…and yes, I would change the rules right away. I would allow the knee to be used when opponents are on the ground, but not allow stamping on the toes during a fight. It does nothing during the fight because you cannot feel any pain during the fight even if they are broken because the adrenalin is flowing, but by breaking the toes, you can mess up a guy’s career in the long term. It’s just not an effective attacking force in a fight. It’s a cheap shot.”
-Money means nothing – I’d still be doing this sport for free-
But here’s why this guy is really a legend in the sport. In spite of the fame, the riches, the rewards, the title belts, and the year-end gongs, he really only does it because he loves it. “Money is a bonus for me and obviously helps for the future. It enables you to do certain things in your life that you wouldn’t be able to do without it. Luckily, I’m now in a position where I can get paid for doing something I love. But you know, my primary reason for competing is still just for the love of the sport. I truly would be doing this for free, if that were the way it had to be.” GSP – MMA’s man of the moment.