CARRYING THE WEIGHT OF LOSS, ARLOVSKI REFLECTS

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CARRYING THE WEIGHT OF LOSS, ARLOVSKI REFLECTS
Sunday, January 25, 2009 - by Ken Pishna - MMAWeekly.com

"(Andrei Arlovski) was winning the fight handily I thought, controlling the fight like we planned," assessed Arlovski's boxing trainer, Freddie Roach. "He got a little cocky, and he tried the flying knee from too far away, no setup, and he paid for it.

"Fedor swings hard, that's his thing. He probably had his eye closed, but he just got lucky, I think," he continued. "If we had followed a more disciplined fight, and kept to the game plan, I think it was going to be easy."

That may be simplifying Fedor Emelianenko's abilities just a tad, but Roach's assessment is not all that distorted by the fighter-colored goggles of a trainer.

Arlovski was doing well up until the point that Fedor struck back with a bone-crushing right hand. He had the WAMMA champion moving backwards and as flustered as we've ever seen him.

Fedor didn't become regarded as the top heavyweight fighter in the world for no reason, however. He's been in tough positions before. Perhaps more than anything, Fedor is a master of capitalizing on that one little lapse in judgment, that sliver of an opening that can change the outcome of the fight, as he did on Saturday night.

Arlovski would likely agree, believing that it was his approach, his lapse in judgment that was his downfall against the greatest heavyweight fighter on the planet. It wasn't just the momentary lapse during the fight – deciding to throw the flying knee when he didn't need to – that Arlovski identified in talking with MMAWeekly.com after the fight.

"I just talk to my trainers about the fight and they tell me just need to be more disciplined. I think it is a problem for me," said Arlovski, the grief apparent in his quiet demeanor.

"I think it was the reason I lost my fight against Fedor tonight."

Staring straight into the camera, he didn't throw the blame at his trainers for not finding a way to get him focused.

"I can blame only on myself," Arlovski said with the full weight of the loss reflected in his watery eyes.

"I saw all my punches landed in right place. I don't know why it was idea was in my head to do flying knee... He just cocked his right hand and one thing about Fedor, his punch all the time is very accurate and he caught me on my jaw."

Relaying that he has been reminded time and again to stay focused, Arlovski says he continually put off the request of his coaches, believing there was always more time, always another day. But on Saturday night, time ran out, and he was left only to reassess.

"My trainers, they told me, do everything 100 percent. Not from one trainer, all of my trainers. Everyone had told me I have to be 100 percent disciplined and I have to be 100 percent disciplined about everything, about training, about life, about, like, I have to keep clear my head."

It took Fedor Emelianenko's crushing right hand to drive the point home, but alone with his thoughts the point was one that was not lost on Arlovski.

"I think it's another lesson for me, and 100 percent, I will take lesson from my loss tonight to Emelianenko."