How long did you train before your first fight? (Smoker, pro, whatever)

[IkkussSpikkuss]

Just out of curiousity I was wondering how long you guys trained before your first fight. I don't care if it was a pro fight or a smoker. But how long did it take for you to consider yourself ready. I was on a slow curve I guess. I learned quickly, but to be honest I was scared of being embearassed, so I waited almost 3 years for a smoker, (MT smokers first then MMA smokers) and then about another 2 years before my first pro fight. So what did you guys do?

P.S. If you had to do it over again would you have done it differently? How? I would have fought earlier. I was scared for no reason. Who cares if you lose a smoker. Its for experience and training more then anything else. I would have fought my first smoker after about 1 1/2 years and fought pro about a year later. But who knows, maybe I would have gotten f*cked up and quit. Maybe it was best the way I went.

 

[Lucky Strike]

I just started and my goal was to have my first amatuer fight by my birthday (october) but seeing where i'm at and where I need to be I don't think my goal is very realistic.

Hopefully i'll be ready around spring time next year.

 

[FIGHTING TALK]

Not quite sure what a smoker is, but I have had two fights that were a good step further on than sparring.
It was a local no-gi grappling tournament and it wasnt like whether we were ready or whatever, our trainer just said a name and you went forward to wrestle another guy in front of all the other competitors and a handful of onlookers from various local gyms.
It was a tournament style competition, I won my first match pretty easily, scoring heavily for mount, guard-pass into side control and sweeps (I think). He was very aggressive at the start and tired himself out while he fought to pass my guard, which he couldnt. I swept him and controlled him from there without ever really getting close to submitting him. In the last 20secs he got top position back but again my guard was strong so I won clearly.

The second match was a wonderful learning experience, I was matched with a guy who had lost his first match in the higher tier, he was submitted in the first minute so was really fresh compared to me but was smaller. I totally dominated him with position even more easily than the first match, I was far too strong, too big and too determined... but I must have got over-confident because with less than a minute left he choked me and I tapped without even thinking about it... it was a nasty choke! We shook hands and I was very happy with my performance overall, despite the softness of the loss!
I had a big smile the next day! I couldnt stop thinking about how great it felt to compete.

That was after 3-4 months training, lots of sparring in that time though.

 

[gumby raptor]

I had previous martial arts experience (8 years roughly) in TKD and kickboxing before i started focusing on MMA. I had about a year and a half of MMA training before my first amauter fight.

 

[IkkussSpikkuss]

Not quite sure what a smoker is.

Its basically a Muay Thai or MMA fullcontact ametuer fight.

 

[iwannafightu2]

3 months

 

[Eduardo R.]

About 8 months.

 

[Chris Kimmerly]

I did TKD and boxing for a few years then decided to do MMA. Six months of MMA training I had my first MMA fight

 

[Brandon Clark]

i trained for about a year off and on and then hit it hard for 3 months. i got approched to fight in an amautre muay thai fight even though i had been training mainly MMA (mostly boxing and BJJ) but since i'm a real light guy, 125lbs natural, fights don't come around too often. so i took it. if i could do it over again i would. i was ready but my conditioning was way way under par and there were a lot of contract problems leading up to the fight. i was told it would be a 125-135lb bout and that my opponent wouldn't have more then 2 amature fights so i said ok. when i got the contract it was for a 135-145 bout and the dude was 5-2 amature. i've never weighted 135 in my life and it said in the contract that if you DIDN'T weight in enough that i would be held finacially responsible for damages lost (IE promotion costs etc) so i told them that i wasn't fighting because i couldn't make the weight. then they told me yes i was fighting and they'd change the weight and that my opponent would cut to 135 because he walked around at 143. by this point i was down to about 118 because i was training 5 days a week and i couldn't keep weight on, so i pretty much lost all mental edge i thought i had because the dude had 7 fights and weighted 20lbs more then me. anyway my pride got in the way and i took the fight and won the first round and then lost the 2nd and 3rd due to conditioning and a mid size tear to my MCL that happened in the second round. so if you are planning to fight make sure you are physically ready and mentally ready because if you don't think you can win (like i didn't) then you won't.

 

[US Tomato Can]

1 month.

Has nothing to do with anything but I always imagined you a lot bigger Brandon.

 

[Rachid Ghanoudi]

I had my first fight after four months of training, but at the same time I had done other martial arts before starting boxing and picked things up fast. I think that if your trainer feels you are ready and you trust your trainer, then it's all good. As for going pro, it depends on the level you want to achieve as a professional fighter. In boxing you need to win a lot of your fights if you ever want to move up the food chain and going pro before you are ready can have serious consquences not only for your fighting career but for your health. Again, if you found the right gym and the right trainer he'll know if you're ready to take the next step and will be honest with you.

 

[Brandon Clark]

1 month.

Has nothing to do with anything but I always imagined you a lot bigger Brandon.

haha even people i know say that. they find out how much i weigh and are always like "you're kidding right" or some chick goes "OMG you weigh less then me!" shit gets old. lol

 

[Justin Pressley]

about 1 year

 

[US Tomato Can]

some chick goes "OMG you weigh less then me!" shit gets old. lol

Just tell them, "It's not that I'm so thin. It's just that you're so fat". And then laugh

 

[Henry Swanson]

1 year.

 

[JamC]

7 months

 

[Rudy Richter]

Roughly 1 year...

 

[Arnis_7788]

14 when I took up kickboxing and 16 when I had my first ametuer fight. I fought with International rules. IKF.

 

[Strika]

My first grappling competition is in April. And that would be 4 months from the time i started.

 

[RedNeckJiuJitsu]

Eh... My first amateur fight is comin' up in a week. Takin' it on 2 weeks notice one weight class heavier than I'd like (205), but I'm still confident. I've been doin' karate/kickboxin' for about 2 years and grapplin' for about a year,