On August 8, Beijing time, "Kung Fu Monkey" Song Yadong will face The American Kathy Kenny in the UFC 265 competition. Chinese boxing fans are looking forward to the fact that when "Yungong Xunyin" rings through the octagonal cage, Song Yadong can bring us a long-lost victory.
In UFC 259 on March 7 this year, Song Yadong, who originally wanted to break the longest unbeaten record of Asian players, did not do so, and after three rounds of battle with American rising star Keller Phillips, he tasted his first defeat since landing in the UFC and dropped out of the official rankings.
After the game, Song Yadong's performance was very mature:
Today my opponents performed better than me, the game is like that, sometimes you lose, it is impossible to win all the time, but the most important thing is that I will come back! Keep up the good work!
The 23-year-old Song Yadong currently has a professional record of 16 wins, 5 losses, 1 draw and 1 no result, including 6 KO and 3 surrender wins. He has played 7 games in the UFC, with a record of 5 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss, and every battle in the octagon cage is a valuable experience regardless of winning or losing.
After playing in the UFC for so long, the biggest change is that it has matured, gained a lot of fans and gained experience. In the past, my playing style was a bit monolithic and I relied too much on standing technique. Although I practiced jiu-jitsu a lot, sometimes I was more confident in my own boxing and preferred to end my opponents in this way. In the game against Keller, I was too relaxed when I first came on, I should have gotten into the game faster, in addition to standing, I also had to do some wrestling techniques.
Since Song Yadong lost the match, Song Kenan, Liang Na, Rong Lord, Ao Riqileng, Zhang Weili, Sha Yilan and Yan Xiaonan have lost in the octagonal cage. Talking about the eight consecutive defeats of Chinese boxers, Song Yadong hopes that boxing fans can look at it rationally and give athletes more support.
For the losing streak of Chinese boxers, I think it is a coincidence, competitive sports is to lose and win. Not to say that Chinese boxers are very poor, that is, they do not play well, and I think they will not continue to lose. I hope that boxing fans can rationally look at the victory and defeat, spray less athletes, give them more encouragement, and the more they spray, the more they will disturb their mentality.
After 5 months, Song Yadong returned to the octagon cage in order to regain the victory, and the same stubble standing in front of him was a hard stubble. Kathy Kenny has a professional record of 16 wins, 3 losses and 1 draw, including 2 KO and 5 surrender wins. Kenny also played 7 games in the octagon cage, with a record of 5 wins and 2 losses, including beating former flyweight champion challenger Ray Borg and defeating China's Alaten Black Force.
Kenny is a counter-boxer, as the American judo champion, he is full of explosive power, back sweep kicks and back hand punches are very sharp, once in the game with continuous sweep kicks to injure Alaten Black Force. But he lost in his latest match to former welterweight champion Dominique Cruze. Cruz's flexible footwork made Casey a little out of rhythm, and eventually lost and fell out of the rankings. Similar to Song Yadong, Kenny is in desperate need of a victory to secure his position at the level.
Kenny is a well-rounded player, his endurance is relatively good, the pace is relatively fast, and the fall and standing are good. My strength is that my fists are heavier than his, and my ability to grasp timing is better than his. He has a higher output frequency and plays more actively. I need to be opportunistic and control his rhythm.
This time I strengthened my physical training, improved my wrestling, and did some targeted training, which was changing rapidly on the field, sometimes depending on the opponent's tactics to deal with. I didn't want to say anything to my opponent, I just wanted to go into the cage and beat him up, do a big job, I wanted to end him!
In order to win, Song Yadong made a lot of preparations. In May, he completed the rhino-septum correction surgery, solving the nose problem that had plagued him for many years. In order to further improve his physical fitness, Song Yadong hired an American football coach to prepare for the game, jokingly saying that he practiced until he was "paralyzed from the neck down". Song Yadong often posts training videos on social media, accompanied by inspirational words such as "Never stop improving" and "No pain no gain". During his training in the United States, Song Yadong often marveled at the professionalism of his peers.
The coach asked me if I could go to class at 4:15 a.m. on a Saturday morning? I was shocked, I really didn't know how many hours he slept in a day. The coach said he got up at 2:30 every day, trained at 4:30 and stuck with it for ten years.
In this environment, Song Yadong also had no hesitation in hitting his limits again and again. He posted a photo of his abs on Weibo with a caption that read, "I'm going to lose 20 pounds." "This time to reduce weight, Song Yadong is obviously fighting.
For some special reasons, the weight reduction is relatively large, it will be a little harder, but there should be no problem.
Alpha boy band head coach "California Kid" Ullia Fibo once warned Song Yadong that no matter what his previous results were, the winning rate with his opponent was 50% to 50% at the moment of standing in the ring. Therefore, the past failures did not cause psychological pressure on Song Yadong, but on the contrary gave him more motivation.
Losing a game at UFC for the first time didn't have any impact on my life and training. I rested for a while and then went back to the training ground. I think it's normal to fail, and that's something you should go through on a life path and a career path. People can't always win, ups and downs are life, and the same is true of competitions. I'm still young, I need to learn, I have to accumulate experience, and I have to improve a lot of skills.
Chinese boxing fans hope that Song Yadong can draw an end to the Chinese boxer's losing streak, and for Song Yadong, this match is just a starting point for him to start again.
Being young is capital, and I feel like I'm going to hit the rankings again, and I have that confidence.
August 8 | UFC265
10:00 Main
06:00 Cushion + Secondary
Migu video live