Published: June 14, 2009 11:51 pm ShareThisPrintThis 3 Resurrection Salisbury's Thistlewood victori…
Published: June 14, 2009 11:51 pm
ShareThisPrintThis
3
Resurrection
Salisbury's Thistlewood victorious at GFL 3
By Evan Mugford
staff writer
Salisbury native Kade Thistlewood isn't looking for anyone's sympathy. He isn't trying to conjure pity, and he isn't making any excuses.
Thistlewood, a 6-foot-4, 170-pound Global Fight League mixed martial artist, is looking for redemption, and he's on the fast track to earning it.
Life has been difficult for the gangly 25-year-old.
He was 3 when his mother moved to Florida, leaving his father, a military man, to take care of the toddler. His father, who was seldom around, was an alcoholic. According to Thistlewood, his father beat him when he would misbehave, and his mother, who returned when he was entering elementary school and made fleeting appearances, was a drug addict.
Thistlewood's childhood was chaotic, he said, and under constant change. He moved seven times by the time he was 10 — the age he moved into a Seabrook trailer that he shared with eight other people, including members of his step-family. Thistlewood said he spent much of his youth being consoled and helped along by his grandmother — a woman he considered his true mother.
As a youth, Thistlewood said he was poor, lonely and ostracized by neighborhood kids. Rocks were thrown at his trailer, and he was surrounded and beat up when he went for walks. At school, Thistlewood's learning disability segregated him from the other students, he said, and the playground atmosphere allowed his energy to go unchecked, whereas any disruptions at home would warrant a much harsher reprimand.
Thistlewood said he was suspended 82 times in seventh grade and 65 times in eighth grade, and in spite of his misbehavior, the school system was unable to expel Thistlewood because he was enrolled as special education.
Fed up with his son's tales of neighborhood bullies, Thistlewood's father drove the pair to meet the problem head on, he said. They confronted the group and demanded that one of them fight Thistlewood in hopes of ending the near-daily torment. Instantly, the largest of the boys, a 16-year-old, stepped forward and accepted the offer.
Thistlewood said that in that one fight, the first fight of his life, all of the anger, aggression and physical abuse was suddenly released in the form of a 13-year-old cyclone. Thistlewood broke the boy's nose, and instead of continuing his onslaught in a mad rush of vengeance, he stared at his crying and bleeding opponent with commiseration. The fight was over, and he knew it, but for Thistlewood, his own fight was just beginning.
It wasn't long afterwards that Thistlewood was committed to the Department of Youth Services for drug use and began a treatment program. The very day that 18-month incarceration ended, Thistlewood made his second mistake, he said, and was instantly reinstated. Around the time he was 16, Thistlewood said he was put into a foster home for about nine months. He found more trouble there, and was sent home with a house arrest bracelet strapped to his ankle. Thistlewood cut it off, and opted to leave the state, making plans to move to Florida. He made it to New York before he was caught.
He spent a month and a half in a New York juvenile facility until he was extradited back to Massachusetts. He was forced into a boot camp, and did very well, he said, taking classes at the Coastal Alternative School in Salisbury under Brian LaCroix, while also becoming an older peer who helped out the younger students. This was also the same time he was informed that he was a new father.
By the time Thistlewood was 19, he was a father of three — with three different women — and he married his girlfriend, Krystin. But Thistlewood's 19th year also brought sadness. His grandmother passed away, and Thistlewood said the burden was suddenly too much too handle.
He began to lean on drugs as an escape, and that same year, he was arrested on 10 different charges and went to jail for six months. Thistlewood did well during his first couple weeks of release, but eventually fell back on drugs and ran from his probation, he said. He was arrested again, and spent 18 months in jail.
"I relied on drugs because it took me away from reality," said Thistlewood. "I'm bipolar; I have mood disorders; I have ADHD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from physical abuse, and I used to take pills to take me away from it.
"I never really had friends up until I met Miles (O'Keefe)," he said. "I was always lonely, very depressed, and confined to myself. I felt insignificant because I was always picked on by everybody. I used to get jumped; I had crappy clothes — drugs made me feel like a different person, and I thought at the time that they were for me. This is what I needed."
Upon release, Thistlewood began boxing (something he and his uncle, professional boxer Harold "Bubba" Souther, used to practice) with Salisbury's Dan Greene, a renowned local boxing coach, and living with his long-time friends Miles and Sandy O'Keefe. At the age of 20, Thistlewood began to experiment with more drugs. He started taking pain relievers, OxyContin and heroin, and his use began to increase over time.
Again, on what Thistlewood called false charges of battery and assault, he went back to jail for another 18 months. With 10 assault and battery charges, and seven convicted felonies, Thistlewood said that many of his charges stemmed from having such strong ties to his friends. Ties that he know understands were reckless.
"I've fought my whole life, and they were generally never my own," he said. "I stepped up for my friends a lot. I never really stood up for myself, but when it came to my friends, I would step up for them in a heartbeat.
"I hate bullies. I can't stand people who pick on other people because they're bigger," said Thistlewood. "I always fought my friends' battles, much more than my own. I thought my friends were family, but I came to realize that they really weren't.
"Friends come and go, but family is always there," he said. "I just couldn't handle strangers messing with my friends, because I perceived it as them threatening my family. It got me into a lot of fights."
The time he spent in prison was a welcome absence from drugs, and Thistlewood said he left his incarceration with optimism. He was released in February last year, and was sober for two weeks before he began to heavily use cocaine and heroin once again. His life was suddenly crashing around him and fueling his depression; he began to believe that he was a lost cause, and contemplated suicide.
"There was a time when I just owed so much money in child support, and I couldn't get a job because of my record, I had no education, I had just broken up with a girlfriend, and I just wanted to kill myself because I didn't feel good enough," said Thistlewood. "I just wasn't in my kids' lives, and I was being the way I promised my kids I would never be. I honestly thought they would be better off without me."
He checked himself into the Baldpate Hospital in Georgetown and began to get treatment. Two days after he left the hospital, he began using again. However, it was, in comparison, a short relapse — from August 2008 to February 2009 — and Thistlewood, now a father of six with a reliable job, has found a new addiction: mixed martial arts.
He trains with Greene's Cagestrikers out of Salisbury and his coach thinks he fits the Cagestriker prototype to near perfection.
"Physically when you have a fighter that's lean and muscular with a long reach, that's usually a good sign," said Greene. "The next step is to see what they have inside of them. He's a tough kid, he's a natural athlete, and he works really hard and he's willing to do everything we ask of him, and that's what you need in a fighter. I look for tough-minded kids who aren't afraid to get in there and rock and roll, and he's definitely one of those."
One of his training partners is Salisbury's Josh Hersey, also a GFL competitor with a record of 2-1, who is glad to have Thistlewood aboard.
"He's an outgoing guy who tells you what's on his mind and he's just a good kid," said Hersey, whose nephew, former Pentucket athlete Austin Perreault, has also begun training at Greene's. "He's had a rough upbringing, but he's working hard in here and he's really putting the effort in to do something he has a passion for. He's put his mind to it and he looks like he's heading in the right direction."
That new direction began with his mixed martial arts debut at last Friday's Global Fight League 3, "Live Free and Fight," held at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord, N.H., and it was as quick as it was impressive.
Pouncing in with a pair of stiff jabs, Thistlewood overwhelmed his opponent, Keith Bishop, by closing the distance and landing a hook and a right cross. Bishop dove in for the takedown but gave up his neck, a move Thistlewood quickly exploited by cinching in a make-shift guillotine and falling to his back. It wasn't as tight as Thistlewood wanted, but by the time Bishop escaped and got to his feet, the fight was already over.
A weary Bishop retreated to the cage as a still primed Thistlewood pressed on. Behind a raucous chorus of fight fans, the ref stopped the fight seconds later as an overwhelmed and hunkered Bishop could do nothing more than absorb a barrage of Thistlewood bombs.
With his eyes set on a successful future in mixed martial arts, Thistlewood has goals that hark back to a time where poison so often prevailed.
"Eventually, I would love to start my own school and teach kids martial arts," said Thistlewood. "I would to teach kids that even if they're in trouble, or you come from a rough childhood, you don't have to dwell on that. You can become your own person.
"My goal is to teach anybody interested to train mixed martial arts (MMA), and I want to allow people who may not even have enough money. I want to have a school like Dan does," said Thistlewood. "He helps people out, and I look up to Dan a lot because of that. He helps people even though they're short on money. That's the type of person I want to be like.
"And if MMA brings me where I want to go, I want to work with kids," said Thistlewood. "There was a time when I wanted to become a motivational speaker, and if I can use this sport as a vehicle to teach kids the right way to think and train, all of this will be worth it."
ShareThisPrintThis
3
Resurrection
Salisbury's Thistlewood victorious at GFL 3
By Evan Mugford
staff writer
Salisbury native Kade Thistlewood isn't looking for anyone's sympathy. He isn't trying to conjure pity, and he isn't making any excuses.
Thistlewood, a 6-foot-4, 170-pound Global Fight League mixed martial artist, is looking for redemption, and he's on the fast track to earning it.
Life has been difficult for the gangly 25-year-old.
He was 3 when his mother moved to Florida, leaving his father, a military man, to take care of the toddler. His father, who was seldom around, was an alcoholic. According to Thistlewood, his father beat him when he would misbehave, and his mother, who returned when he was entering elementary school and made fleeting appearances, was a drug addict.
Thistlewood's childhood was chaotic, he said, and under constant change. He moved seven times by the time he was 10 — the age he moved into a Seabrook trailer that he shared with eight other people, including members of his step-family. Thistlewood said he spent much of his youth being consoled and helped along by his grandmother — a woman he considered his true mother.
As a youth, Thistlewood said he was poor, lonely and ostracized by neighborhood kids. Rocks were thrown at his trailer, and he was surrounded and beat up when he went for walks. At school, Thistlewood's learning disability segregated him from the other students, he said, and the playground atmosphere allowed his energy to go unchecked, whereas any disruptions at home would warrant a much harsher reprimand.
Thistlewood said he was suspended 82 times in seventh grade and 65 times in eighth grade, and in spite of his misbehavior, the school system was unable to expel Thistlewood because he was enrolled as special education.
Fed up with his son's tales of neighborhood bullies, Thistlewood's father drove the pair to meet the problem head on, he said. They confronted the group and demanded that one of them fight Thistlewood in hopes of ending the near-daily torment. Instantly, the largest of the boys, a 16-year-old, stepped forward and accepted the offer.
Thistlewood said that in that one fight, the first fight of his life, all of the anger, aggression and physical abuse was suddenly released in the form of a 13-year-old cyclone. Thistlewood broke the boy's nose, and instead of continuing his onslaught in a mad rush of vengeance, he stared at his crying and bleeding opponent with commiseration. The fight was over, and he knew it, but for Thistlewood, his own fight was just beginning.
It wasn't long afterwards that Thistlewood was committed to the Department of Youth Services for drug use and began a treatment program. The very day that 18-month incarceration ended, Thistlewood made his second mistake, he said, and was instantly reinstated. Around the time he was 16, Thistlewood said he was put into a foster home for about nine months. He found more trouble there, and was sent home with a house arrest bracelet strapped to his ankle. Thistlewood cut it off, and opted to leave the state, making plans to move to Florida. He made it to New York before he was caught.
He spent a month and a half in a New York juvenile facility until he was extradited back to Massachusetts. He was forced into a boot camp, and did very well, he said, taking classes at the Coastal Alternative School in Salisbury under Brian LaCroix, while also becoming an older peer who helped out the younger students. This was also the same time he was informed that he was a new father.
By the time Thistlewood was 19, he was a father of three — with three different women — and he married his girlfriend, Krystin. But Thistlewood's 19th year also brought sadness. His grandmother passed away, and Thistlewood said the burden was suddenly too much too handle.
He began to lean on drugs as an escape, and that same year, he was arrested on 10 different charges and went to jail for six months. Thistlewood did well during his first couple weeks of release, but eventually fell back on drugs and ran from his probation, he said. He was arrested again, and spent 18 months in jail.
"I relied on drugs because it took me away from reality," said Thistlewood. "I'm bipolar; I have mood disorders; I have ADHD, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder from physical abuse, and I used to take pills to take me away from it.
"I never really had friends up until I met Miles (O'Keefe)," he said. "I was always lonely, very depressed, and confined to myself. I felt insignificant because I was always picked on by everybody. I used to get jumped; I had crappy clothes — drugs made me feel like a different person, and I thought at the time that they were for me. This is what I needed."
Upon release, Thistlewood began boxing (something he and his uncle, professional boxer Harold "Bubba" Souther, used to practice) with Salisbury's Dan Greene, a renowned local boxing coach, and living with his long-time friends Miles and Sandy O'Keefe. At the age of 20, Thistlewood began to experiment with more drugs. He started taking pain relievers, OxyContin and heroin, and his use began to increase over time.
Again, on what Thistlewood called false charges of battery and assault, he went back to jail for another 18 months. With 10 assault and battery charges, and seven convicted felonies, Thistlewood said that many of his charges stemmed from having such strong ties to his friends. Ties that he know understands were reckless.
"I've fought my whole life, and they were generally never my own," he said. "I stepped up for my friends a lot. I never really stood up for myself, but when it came to my friends, I would step up for them in a heartbeat.
"I hate bullies. I can't stand people who pick on other people because they're bigger," said Thistlewood. "I always fought my friends' battles, much more than my own. I thought my friends were family, but I came to realize that they really weren't.
"Friends come and go, but family is always there," he said. "I just couldn't handle strangers messing with my friends, because I perceived it as them threatening my family. It got me into a lot of fights."
The time he spent in prison was a welcome absence from drugs, and Thistlewood said he left his incarceration with optimism. He was released in February last year, and was sober for two weeks before he began to heavily use cocaine and heroin once again. His life was suddenly crashing around him and fueling his depression; he began to believe that he was a lost cause, and contemplated suicide.
"There was a time when I just owed so much money in child support, and I couldn't get a job because of my record, I had no education, I had just broken up with a girlfriend, and I just wanted to kill myself because I didn't feel good enough," said Thistlewood. "I just wasn't in my kids' lives, and I was being the way I promised my kids I would never be. I honestly thought they would be better off without me."
He checked himself into the Baldpate Hospital in Georgetown and began to get treatment. Two days after he left the hospital, he began using again. However, it was, in comparison, a short relapse — from August 2008 to February 2009 — and Thistlewood, now a father of six with a reliable job, has found a new addiction: mixed martial arts.
He trains with Greene's Cagestrikers out of Salisbury and his coach thinks he fits the Cagestriker prototype to near perfection.
"Physically when you have a fighter that's lean and muscular with a long reach, that's usually a good sign," said Greene. "The next step is to see what they have inside of them. He's a tough kid, he's a natural athlete, and he works really hard and he's willing to do everything we ask of him, and that's what you need in a fighter. I look for tough-minded kids who aren't afraid to get in there and rock and roll, and he's definitely one of those."
One of his training partners is Salisbury's Josh Hersey, also a GFL competitor with a record of 2-1, who is glad to have Thistlewood aboard.
"He's an outgoing guy who tells you what's on his mind and he's just a good kid," said Hersey, whose nephew, former Pentucket athlete Austin Perreault, has also begun training at Greene's. "He's had a rough upbringing, but he's working hard in here and he's really putting the effort in to do something he has a passion for. He's put his mind to it and he looks like he's heading in the right direction."
That new direction began with his mixed martial arts debut at last Friday's Global Fight League 3, "Live Free and Fight," held at the Capitol Center for the Arts in Concord, N.H., and it was as quick as it was impressive.
Pouncing in with a pair of stiff jabs, Thistlewood overwhelmed his opponent, Keith Bishop, by closing the distance and landing a hook and a right cross. Bishop dove in for the takedown but gave up his neck, a move Thistlewood quickly exploited by cinching in a make-shift guillotine and falling to his back. It wasn't as tight as Thistlewood wanted, but by the time Bishop escaped and got to his feet, the fight was already over.
A weary Bishop retreated to the cage as a still primed Thistlewood pressed on. Behind a raucous chorus of fight fans, the ref stopped the fight seconds later as an overwhelmed and hunkered Bishop could do nothing more than absorb a barrage of Thistlewood bombs.
With his eyes set on a successful future in mixed martial arts, Thistlewood has goals that hark back to a time where poison so often prevailed.
"Eventually, I would love to start my own school and teach kids martial arts," said Thistlewood. "I would to teach kids that even if they're in trouble, or you come from a rough childhood, you don't have to dwell on that. You can become your own person.
"My goal is to teach anybody interested to train mixed martial arts (MMA), and I want to allow people who may not even have enough money. I want to have a school like Dan does," said Thistlewood. "He helps people out, and I look up to Dan a lot because of that. He helps people even though they're short on money. That's the type of person I want to be like.
"And if MMA brings me where I want to go, I want to work with kids," said Thistlewood. "There was a time when I wanted to become a motivational speaker, and if I can use this sport as a vehicle to teach kids the right way to think and train, all of this will be worth it."
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Comment by Christian "Lil Papi" Rivera on June 21, 2009 at 4:54pm - Awesome story... Glad to see sum1 else making the Best out of not much
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Ultimate Coverage UFC 105
Click below for all of UFC.com's written coverage of Saturday's UFC 105 event at the MEN Arena in Manchester, England. UFC 105, which is headlined by the light heavyweight bout between Randy Couture and Brandon Vera and the welterweight battle between Mike Swick and Dan Hardy, airs on Spike TV in the United States beginning at 8pm ET / PT and live on ESPN in the UK at 8pm.UFC 105 Weigh-In Results
Click below for the official weigh-in results for Saturday's UFC 105 event. UFC 105, which is headlined by the light heavyweight bout between Randy Couture and Brandon Vera and the welterweight battle between Mike Swick and Dan Hardy, airs on Spike TV in the United States beginning at 8pm ET / PT and live on ESPN in the UK at 8pm local time.GSPUK The Champs A Hit in Manchester
Thomas Gerbasi, UFC - The tune may change if Nottingham's Dan Hardy defeats Mike Swick at UFC 105 and puts himself in line for a title shot, but for now, you couldn't find a more popular fighter in the United Kingdom on Friday afternoon than UFC welterweight champion Georges St-Pierre, in town for Saturday's event at the MEN Arena as well as for a Q&A session with members of the UFC Fight Club and the media.Randy Couture Fighting like its The First Time
Thomas Gerbasi, UFC - When New York Yankees great Joe DiMaggio was asked why he played so hard, even in meaningless late-summer games or those in which his team had a seemingly insurmountable lead, he simply said, "Because there is always some kid who may be seeing me for the first time. I owe him my best." This Saturday night in Manchester, England, the MEN Arena will be filled with fans who will be seeing UFC Hall of Famer Randy Couture fight on British shores for the first time, and like DiMaggio, you can expect 'The Natural' will be giving each and every one of them his best.Laughs Punctuate The Calm Before UFC 105s Storm
Thomas Gerbasi, UFC - It could have just been a casual lunch meeting between some business colleagues at the MEN Arena Thursday afternoon if not for the assembled media in attendance, the staredowns for photographers, and the refusal of any of the six mixed martial artists at the dais to touch any of the food due to the fact that they will have to make weight Friday for their UFC 105 bouts this weekend.The best bartender/mattress salesman/rock star/cage fighter in Portsmouth
Meet Cyrus Clark, an undefeated mixed martial arts champion ... after one fight
Cyrus Clark is not a fighter.
Sure, he's had a few scraps in his life (10 by his count). But he claims he's never started one. And with his laid-back, skater-dude demeanor, he's the last guy you'd expect to see throwing down.But there he was earlier this year, moments before his mixed martial arts debut, hopping up and down like a madman, ready to rip his opponent's head off.
"It was pretty sudden for all of us," said Ted Roberts, Clark's friend from Portsmouth High School. "He wasn't a wimp, but he wasn't the kind of guy going around picking fights."
"Starting his career at 32, I think, was pretty funny," said Jay Krecklow, another longtime friend.
Clark, a lifelong Portsmouth resident and drummer for the band The Han Solos, used to watch mixed martial arts on TV at the Daniel Street Tavern, where he has bartended for the past 2½ years. But it wasn't until he and Krecklow attended a fight at the Ioka Theater in Exeter last year that he came up with his crazy idea.
"Immediately after that, that's all I kept talking about — how I wanted to do it," Clark said. "I had watched UFC, but then once I saw it in real life, it was way better, and I wanted to do it."
So Clark got a hold of Scott Millette of Hampton, who runs the 8-month-old Global Fight League, and told him he wanted to fight at the group's February show at the Capitol Center in Concord .
"He was like, 'No, no, the card's lined up,' and there was really no room for me." Then, suddenly, there was an opening. One of the fighters scheduled for the show had to pull out after losing by technical knockout in another fight.
Millette called Clark. "Here's your chance," he said.
As they approach their mid-30s, it's not unusual for men to try out extreme activities like sky diving or bungee jumping in an attempt to cling to their fading youth. But that's not Clark. He did it for the fun of it, and because, as his friend Roberts noted, it would give him a great story to tell to every girl he meets.
But in order to have a story to tell, Clark had to win the fight. And it wasn't going to be easy, as he only had two weeks to get ready, and no experience as an MMA fighter. He scarcely had time to get the required medical paperwork together, let alone train.
Cyrus had worked briefly as a bouncer, but dealing with drunks isn't much of a challenge.
("It's like handling a 6 year old," he said.) Other than that, his only physical training was running regularly, and carting around mattresses for his day job at National Discount Mattress on Islington Street.
What he did have, though, is a lot of what his friend Krecklow calls "pent-up aggression." And some experience getting beaten up as a kid by his older brother.
To get Clark ready for the fight, Millette took him to a gym in Haverhill, Mass.
"They beat the crap out of Cyrus for three weeks," Millette said.
"He gave me a crash course in stand-up boxing," Clark said. This entailed how to stand, where to hold his hands, and how to protect himself. "There's definitely an art to that."
When Clark broke a rib sparring just four days before his fight, he kept his mouth shut, afraid he might lose his chance to fight.
"I didn't realize at first I had broken a rib," he said. "Then it started to hurt. I definitely knew I was still gonna fight, though. I wanted to bad enough. I was afraid I wouldn't get another chance." For his corner team, Clark hooked up with Team Burgess at the weigh-in on Friday, the night before the fight. Then he worked his regular shift at the mattress store.
Saturday morning, a few hours before the bout, Team Burgess gave him his game plan for the fight. That helped him stay calm. It also helped that he had experience playing in a band.
"I know what it's like stepping out onto the stage," he said. "It was just a different event." The night of the fight, a group of friends showed up to support Clark.
"He was pretty pumped up," said Jason Stiles, his boss at the Daniel Street Tavern. "He was in the zone. He walked right past us." Physically, Clark seemed to match up pretty well against his opponent — at 6 feet tall, he had a 3-inch height advantage, and they both weighed in the neighborhood of 175 pounds.
Still, "Me and pretty much the rest of my friends all thought he was going to get his a** kicked," Roberts said.
When the fight started, it flashed through Clark's mind that he was going to have to try to kill the other guy, or be killed himself.
His plan had been to box, but the punches he was throwing kept missing. His opponent, on the other hand, had little difficulty landing a number of strong punches. Eventually, Clark grabbed the guy around the waist and pulled him to the ground.
Once on the mat, Clark managed to get his opponent in a full nelson. His cornermen started screaming, "Choke him out, baby" — a legal MMA move in which one fighter wraps his arm around the other's throat and chokes him into submission.
A minute and 20 seconds into the fight, Clark's opponent tapped-out, signaling that he was giving up.
Clark leapt into the air. As the referee raised his hands in victory, he pointed to his supporters in the crowd.
Despite his easy win, Clark said he has no plans to fight again.
"I'm already working 55 hours a week," he pointed out. "To really do MMA, you need to give 20 to 40 hours a week. There's no way. I'm officially retired, undefeated." Millette said he'd love to see Clark fight again. In fact, the GFL is building a new campaign, "So you want to be a Global Fighter?" around Clark's sudden success.
Still, Millette figures it's unlikely that he'll lure Clark back into the ring.
"He just wanted to do it once," he said. "He pretty much likened it to the top three experiences in his life, next to losing his virginity — he couldn't think of the third one."
By Marc Fortier
May 03, 2009 6:00 AM
Sign up to be part of the GFL community- What is it? Well its place where you can socialize with fans, and fighters from all over the Globe sharing one common bond- MMA. So whether you want to learn a new move from inside the ring, or your checking up on events, or schools in your area the GFL community takes you inside the CAGE!
Every Week Watch Inside MMA - Here on the GFL WEBSITE
Cyrus Clark is not a fighter.
Sure, he's had a few scraps in his life (10 by his count). But he claims he's never started one. And with his laid-back, skater-dude demeanor, he's the last guy you'd expect to see throwing down.But there he was earlier this year, moments before his mixed martial arts debut, hopping up and down like a madman, ready to rip his opponent's head off.
"It was pretty sudden for all of us," said Ted Roberts, Clark's friend from Portsmouth High School. "He wasn't a wimp, but he wasn't the kind of guy going around picking fights."
"Starting his career at 32, I think, was pretty funny," said Jay Krecklow, another longtime friend.
Clark, a lifelong Portsmouth resident and drummer for the band The Han Solos, used to watch mixed martial arts on TV at the Daniel Street Tavern, where he has bartended for the past 2½ years. But it wasn't until he and Krecklow attended a fight at the Ioka Theater in Exeter last year that he came up with his crazy idea.
"Immediately after that, that's all I kept talking about — how I wanted to do it," Clark said. "I had watched UFC, but then once I saw it in real life, it was way better, and I wanted to do it."
So Clark got a hold of Scott Millette of Hampton, who runs the 8-month-old Global Fight League, and told him he wanted to fight at the group's February show at the Capitol Center in Concord .
"He was like, 'No, no, the card's lined up,' and there was really no room for me." Then, suddenly, there was an opening. One of the fighters scheduled for the show had to pull out after losing by technical knockout in another fight.
Millette called Clark. "Here's your chance," he said.
As they approach their mid-30s, it's not unusual for men to try out extreme activities like sky diving or bungee jumping in an attempt to cling to their fading youth. But that's not Clark. He did it for the fun of it, and because, as his friend Roberts noted, it would give him a great story to tell to every girl he meets.
But in order to have a story to tell, Clark had to win the fight. And it wasn't going to be easy, as he only had two weeks to get ready, and no experience as an MMA fighter. He scarcely had time to get the required medical paperwork together, let alone train.
Cyrus had worked briefly as a bouncer, but dealing with drunks isn't much of a challenge.
("It's like handling a 6 year old," he said.) Other than that, his only physical training was running regularly, and carting around mattresses for his day job at National Discount Mattress on Islington Street.
What he did have, though, is a lot of what his friend Krecklow calls "pent-up aggression." And some experience getting beaten up as a kid by his older brother.
To get Clark ready for the fight, Millette took him to a gym in Haverhill, Mass.
"They beat the crap out of Cyrus for three weeks," Millette said.
"He gave me a crash course in stand-up boxing," Clark said. This entailed how to stand, where to hold his hands, and how to protect himself. "There's definitely an art to that."
When Clark broke a rib sparring just four days before his fight, he kept his mouth shut, afraid he might lose his chance to fight.
"I didn't realize at first I had broken a rib," he said. "Then it started to hurt. I definitely knew I was still gonna fight, though. I wanted to bad enough. I was afraid I wouldn't get another chance." For his corner team, Clark hooked up with Team Burgess at the weigh-in on Friday, the night before the fight. Then he worked his regular shift at the mattress store.
Saturday morning, a few hours before the bout, Team Burgess gave him his game plan for the fight. That helped him stay calm. It also helped that he had experience playing in a band.
"I know what it's like stepping out onto the stage," he said. "It was just a different event." The night of the fight, a group of friends showed up to support Clark.
"He was pretty pumped up," said Jason Stiles, his boss at the Daniel Street Tavern. "He was in the zone. He walked right past us." Physically, Clark seemed to match up pretty well against his opponent — at 6 feet tall, he had a 3-inch height advantage, and they both weighed in the neighborhood of 175 pounds.
Still, "Me and pretty much the rest of my friends all thought he was going to get his a** kicked," Roberts said.
When the fight started, it flashed through Clark's mind that he was going to have to try to kill the other guy, or be killed himself.
His plan had been to box, but the punches he was throwing kept missing. His opponent, on the other hand, had little difficulty landing a number of strong punches. Eventually, Clark grabbed the guy around the waist and pulled him to the ground.
Once on the mat, Clark managed to get his opponent in a full nelson. His cornermen started screaming, "Choke him out, baby" — a legal MMA move in which one fighter wraps his arm around the other's throat and chokes him into submission.
A minute and 20 seconds into the fight, Clark's opponent tapped-out, signaling that he was giving up.
Clark leapt into the air. As the referee raised his hands in victory, he pointed to his supporters in the crowd.
Despite his easy win, Clark said he has no plans to fight again.
"I'm already working 55 hours a week," he pointed out. "To really do MMA, you need to give 20 to 40 hours a week. There's no way. I'm officially retired, undefeated." Millette said he'd love to see Clark fight again. In fact, the GFL is building a new campaign, "So you want to be a Global Fighter?" around Clark's sudden success.
Still, Millette figures it's unlikely that he'll lure Clark back into the ring.
"He just wanted to do it once," he said. "He pretty much likened it to the top three experiences in his life, next to losing his virginity — he couldn't think of the third one."
By Marc Fortier
May 03, 2009 6:00 AM
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