Some find the fight game, some have the fight game find them. For Fernando Padilla, fighting has been around him since he could really remember. Despite being something he knew he wasn’t supposed to be doing, it always just felt right to him.
“I always had fights, since I was really young, in the streets and in school,” Padilla said. “Fighting was always there for me.”
However, for Padilla, it was never about self-preservation and certainly not about picking on others. Instead, even at a young age, it was always about the thrill of competition for him. He loved it so much, that even without a sport to chase after it, he still chased it.
“I always had that edge of competition. If a kid pushed me, I pushed them back. If they punch me, I punch you back,” he explained. “At little kid parties, I was always the kid in the bouncey house kicking someone else or wrestling with someone else.”
While practicing his karate while kids were eating cake and ice cream got the job done for awhile, he needed more. As a teenager he walked onto the mats of 10th Planet Chihuahua in Mexico and he could feel everything change for him.
“When I stepped on to MMA mats back in Chihuahua at Fight Club Chihuahua/10th Planet Chihuahua, I remember it was completely a different sensation,” he said. “Being able to do jiu jitsu, hit the bags, strike – it surrounded me with everything that I liked and I just fell in love with the sport.”
Padilla will get that next chance to scratch that itch this Saturday at UFC Tampa. He’ll take on fellow featherweight Sean Woodson on the prelims. That portion of the card begins at 7pm EST on ESPN+.
You can hear the entire audio version of this interview on the latest edition of TTP. The interview starts below at 2:15.
