You hear the stories all the time. Commentators regularly reference it. The Octagon jitters, as they are often referred, comes for everyone – or so they say.
That because they never came for Stockton’s own Chelsea Chandler. Her debut at UFC Vegas 61 went as good as a debut could go. She battered Julija Stoliarenko, who has over three times the professional MMA fights as Chandler, and then picked up a 50k performance bonus as well. According to Chandler, she never felt even a bit of pressure in there.
“I literally felt like I was home and ready to go. I think a lot of that had to do with Invicta preparing me – that was also a really big stage that Shannon Knapp has over there,” Chandler explained. “There really wasn’t a crowd either because Mark Zuckerberg – I don’t know how it happened – but he was supposed to be there and nobody else was allowed to. But it was really quiet and I felt no stress.”
Now that’s not to say that she didn’t see some places where she could improve. Chandler was as critical of herself, perhaps more, as anyone else. However, she credits her solid team, headlined by Victor Galdon, who helped her develop and stick with the plan.
“I went back and watched the fight and I feel like there was a lot of places where I could have pressured her more, or I could have done this or I could have done that,” she said. “But the whole fight camp I said I was going to come at this calm and cool. I know I can hit her and I’m not going to rush her.”
While it might seem odd to some to see a fighter with just six professional fights look so calm in there, Chandler points out that she’s not quite the rookie everyone makes her out to be.
“I did hear a lot of people saying ‘oh, she’s a rookie’,” Chandler said. “A lot of people don’t know this, but I was in Thailand and I did Muay Thai – I’m 5-1 in pro Muay Thai. So I have those fights.”
And those Muay Thai fights are just the tip of the iceberg. Being surrounded by some excellent training partners, and some of the biggest names in the sport, have really accelerated her growth.
“I came back and I trained in Stockton with the Diaz brothers and they have hundreds of fights and just being around that aura, seeing how they act and how they take the pressure and learning from them,” she said. “Also, my day one training partner has always been Leslie Smith. She’s a veteran and she’s amazing and she’s always been a great training partner for me.”
That work with former Bellator title challenger Leslie Smith is more than just a good training partner. She sees those battles as actual fights, even if they don’t show on her record.
“People see ‘oh you have five fights’, but they don’t see all the fights I had with Leslie,” Chandler said. “Every minute of our training sessions I consider a fight because she comes one-hundred miles an hour and she doesn’t stop.”
With a win like the one she got in her debut, the likelihood that she’ll continue to be overlooked is dwindling. Regardless of what others think of her game, she’s ready to start mowing people down en route to the belt at either 135lbs or 145lbs.
You can hear the entire audio of this interview at 1:29.
