Greg Nelson coach of UFC stars Sean Sherk and Brock Lesnar.

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http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/sp ... 045294.ece


Nelson: Sherk falsely accusedBy STEVE TALLANTYRE

Published: 15 Apr 2008

FOUNDER of the Minnesota Martial Arts Academy and their MMA 'Team X-Factor', Greg Nelson is these days best known as the coach of UFC stars Sean Sherk and Brock Lesnar.


Greg’s list of qualifications and achievements in martial arts is almost endless. A former University of Minnesota Wrestling Team member and All-American high school gymnast, Greg is an instructor in Jun Fan Martial Arts/Jeet Kune Do Concepts, Filipino Martial Arts, Maphilindo Silat and Muay Thai.


And as if that wasn’t enough, Greg is also a certified instructor in Combat Submission Wrestling under the legendary Erik Paulson and a Black Belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under Pedro Sauer.

He has taught numerous Federal and local law enforcement agencies and military units, including the FBI, the US Army National Guard, and the Federal Air Marshalls.

Greg competed in Muay Thai, Amateur Shoot Wrestling (MMA), won a Gold Medal in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu in the 1999 Pan-Ams, a Silver Medal in the 2000 Pan-Ams, and most recently three golds in 2001 Grappling Games in LA before retiring to concentrate on coaching.


As well as being a husband and father of two young children, Greg is also a two-time cancer survivor after beating first non-hodgkins lymphoma and secondly beating a rare form of nerve cancer called neurolymphomatosis.



He is visiting Europe on the 18th and 29th of June to hold a two-day MMA seminar in Barcelona and here is the first part of our exclusive interview with the legendary MMA coach...


Greg, the rise of mixed martial arts seems unstoppable, with the UFC now becoming world famous. You've been part of the scene for a long time - how do you feel about the way the sport of mixed martial arts has changed since the early days?


In the early days it was really a test of art against art. I have recently watched the first four UFCs and they were really a testament to Brazilian Jiu Jitsu/Ground Fighting and how important it is to have knowledge of the ground. In the early days you had specialists who were one and sometimes two dimensional, there were stand up fighters, pure wrestlers or judokas, some "free style fighters" whatever that meant, and Royce Gracie representing Gracie Jiu Jitsu.

Having no time limit, no gloves, groin attacks, head butts and pulling hair definitely made a difference. Having a tournament format changed things as well. The winners had to recover and go at up to four fights in one night.

There were a lot of broken hands, and of course Royce won all of them except UFC 3 when he had to withdraw from the tournament.

Then the UFC changed its format to be a better spectator sport. Time limits were established, gloves were introduced to protect the hands, and a more restrictive set of rules was established.

The fighters gradually became more all-round fighters. The time of the art against art evolved into hybrid fighter against hybrid fighter. Though a fighter may have better striking skills, he must have ground skills and have a good takedown defence, or the ground fighter has to have a solid striking game along with the skills to take his opponent down.

It is a serious sport now and if you want to succeed in the Octagon you have to be a very solid all-round fighter, a well conditioned athlete who is willing to put it on the line.


Just how big do you think it can get? Will MMA eventually match boxing in terms of popularity?


I have believed for years that MMA would eventually make it into the mainstream of sports. It isn't at the top of the list yet, however MMA results are posted in the USA Today newspaper, ESPN sports and of course magazines such as Sports Illustrated.

Spike TV and The Ultimate Fighter show were instrumental in the growth of MMA’s popularity. Every week fans could tune into training and watch the life of MMA fighters.

Boxing still has a huge fan base, and more importantly they have major fortune 500 companies sponsoring, allowing them to pay the top fighters millions of dollars.

Once MMA promotions like the UFC get a big money sponsor I hope that they share the wealth with the fighters. I also think there have to be a few other big shows that rival the UFC - a little competition will allow competitors to negotiate better purses, as well as have more options as to where they want to fight.


The most famous UFC fighter in your MMA Team X-factor is probably Sean Sherk. Sean went from hero to zero in the eyes of some fans when he was suspended by the California State Athletic commission for failing a steroids test. Sean has denied taking steroids but was controversially refused the opportunity to defend himself at a hearing. What's your take on what happened?


Sean got railroaded and was falsely accused of something that he would never do...steroids. He is a trainer’s dream, a workhorse that takes care of his body, has a very strict diet, and is a cardio machine.


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His body hasn't changed over the years, he has always had a stocky and muscular build. In fact, the only change that has happened in the last couple of years is that Sean has lost weight and is now fighting in a weight class that is twenty pounds lighter than he has fought at for over eight years.

After Sean received the letter from the UFC, he immediately went to a doctor and had his blood checked. Result...zero traces of nandralone.

As for the CA commission, they had a bunch of screw ups. First, they lost Sean’s blood. Second, they did not water test their testing machine between fighters’ pee tests, and two other fighters tested positive before Sean was tested on the same machine.

There were many discrepancies and the commission delayed the hearing after getting this info and then made their decision without allowing any of the other evidence or Sean to state his case.

At this point in time Sean does not waste any thoughts on it. He is training hard for his upcoming fight with BJ Penn and winning that fight is the only thing on his mind.


Do you think Sean's popularity will recover after the bad publicity surrounding all of this? Will it affect him mentally in any way?


Sean is constantly receiving fan mail at the academy and he is still doing appearances (but has stopped all appearances and seminars during his 12-week training camp for BJ). There will always be those that support you and those that don't. Sean says that "you have to have thick skin to be a fighter." As far as his mentality goes, he is all about his training. He knows what the truth is and he hasn't let it get him down.


Sean has now served his suspension and is due to fight BJ Penn. How's he preparing for that fight and how do you see it going?


He has started his 12-week training camp, during which he puts it into full throttle. He has two or three training sessions a day and trains with Lucas Lepri, the 2007 Mundials World Champion and 2008 Mundials Silver Medalist.

Marcio Fietosa is coming in, along with other top-level BJJ competitors and fighters throughout the training camp. In addition, he is continuing to hone his striking skills and wrestling skills, especially his upper body Greco.

We have some of the nation’s best wrestlers training and now fighting out of the Academy. Jacob Volkman, an All-American D1 Collegiate Wrestler and one of the top Greco Roman Wrestlers in the nation, has switched to MMA and is currently undefeated.

He, along with Marty Morgan (NCAA National Champ, multiple US Greco National Champ) has been very involved with his upper body clinch development. We have always had some of the nation’s top Muay Thai competitors. We have been fighting Muay Thai since 1993 and many of our instructors and fighters have gone to train and fight in Thailand many times so Sean has a ton of Muay Thai training partners.

As far as any predictions go, well, Sean is always prepared and can go hard from the first bell until the last second of the fifth round. He has some of the best BJJ, Wrestling and Muay Thai training partners in the world right in his own academy and is bringing in some of the most notable names in present day BJJ.

He has made it a habit of winning and has learned a lot from his few loses. I see it being a hard fought battle, but in the end I see Sean getting his hand raised.


The lightweight division looks set to be dominated by Sean and BJ. Who in your opinion is capable of seriously challenging them?


There are quite a few top-level lightweights. The last UFC showcased a couple of very tough competitors and Kenny Florian is still doing well and will be in contention for the title if he continues to win.

Honestly, I only look at the guy Sean is set to fight and focus on him until the next one is lined up. It is ultimately up to the UFC who is going to fight whom and then we set out training accordingly.