Canadian middleweight Aaron Jeffery returns to action at Bellator San Diego this weekend, in an extremely high-profile match-up with ex-champ Douglas Lima.
Jeffery (14-5), who trains out of Southern Ontario’s Niagara Top Team, has spent time training alongside the likes of Aung La N Sang and Brendan Allen at Kill Cliff in Florida. It’s an environment that sees some of the top middleweights across multiple promotions pushing one another to new heights.
“It’s awesome man. It’s so cool to be in a place with so many high-level guys on the same mission. Everyone shows up every day, works hard. We all have the same goals, we’re helping each other out, we’re pushing each other,” Jeffery told Cageside Press in an exclusive interview ahead of his latest assignment. “It’s a sick atmosphere.”
Allen in particular is a fighter Jeffery knows well. The pair first crossed paths on Dana White’s Contender Series in 2019, with “All In” winning via submission, as he often does. It’s a loss that has aged well, given Allen is now considered a contender in the UFC’s middleweight division. One that perhaps shows Jeffery how far he’s come himself.
“For sure. The fight was a long time ago, I was 6-1, he was 11-3, we’ve both doubled our records since then. But to be able to get to train with him and know the guys he’s beaten in the UFC, and train with him and have solid rounds, it’s confirming that I’m doing the right work too,” noted Jeffery.
A more recent loss came at the hands of Fabian Edwards, who was expected to challenge champ Johnny Eblen next, until the bout was recently postponed. While there are always tactical improvements to be made after a loss, there was one key takeaway following the fight for Aaron Jeffery.
“I think it was more mental stuff for me. For whatever reason, I was just not able to pull the trigger and execute the game plan that I wanted to. So I just did a lot of work on kind of the mental side of things,” he explained. “Obviously again, getting better physically, technically, but I think there were some things I needed to work on from the psychological standpoint.”
With that in mind, Jeffery wound up working alongside a sports psychologist. “And speaking of Brendan Allen, he was the one who recommended him. I heard [Allen] talking about him in the gym, and he said he changed his life. If you know Brendan Allen, you know he’s not the type of guy to believe in any ‘woo woo’ kind of stuff.”
Jeffery decided to give the man a shot, and has been with him several months now. “I like it a lot,” Jeffery added.
Now it’s on to Douglas Lima, a multi-time Bellator MMA middleweight champion, at one time one of the faces of the promotion. If there was a Bellator Hall of Fame, Lima would almost certainly be in it.
Jeffery, who followed Lima’s career early on, loves the upside of the fight. “He’s good, and it’s kind of a high-risk fight because of his skill set, but it’s a very high-reward fight too. You get a name of someone that nobody knows who they are and they’re a killer, you’re like, that’s kind of a low-reward, high-risk fight. But this guy, it doesn’t get any better than that. He’s a two or three time champ, he’s been in the promotion for more fights than I’ve had in my whole career. Very big name guy, so it’s a very good opportunity for me.”
And while a title shot might not be in the offing with a win, Jeffery is hoping it might lead to a title eliminator.
Watch our full interview with Bellator San Diego’s Aaron Jeffery above.
