Little article on Marcin
MARCIN HELD PLANS TO SHOWCASE IMPROVED CARDIO AND WRESTLING AGAINST DAVE JANSEN AT BELLATOR 155
JOSH CONNORMAY 18, 2016
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Marcin Held (Photo Credit: Bellator MMA)
On Saturday night in Boise, Idaho, as Polish submission ace
Marcin Held makes his way to the
Bellator 155 cage, he will do so with a renewed sense of confidence. It’s the kind of confidence which comes from examining ones training objectivity after a 5 round title fight loss to
Will Brooks and crafting a plan to shore up deficiencies in regard to cardio and wrestling. Over the course of our conversation leading up to this fight, improved cardio was overarching theme, and it’s an aspect of Held’s fighting style he hopes to put on full display as the “featured pre-lim” bout on the undercard.
“During the last fight, I had not done enough power, not enough cardio. It was a mistake in the preparation. This time, I change a little bit. I have good cardio now and everything is great. After last fight, I come back to the gym one week after the fight. I didn’t need a long break. I was training down in Brazil at Nova Uniao, and I loved training with them.”
“I did a lot of stand-up and wrestling and cardio big time. I thought it would be much better last fight, but I feel the best of my career. I was in Brazil, but the whole training camp I spent in Poland at my new gym Iron Horse MMA. I was struggling a little bit in Poland trying to spar with different guys, but in my gym I have a lot of really good guys so it was a really good training camp.”
Standing in Held’s path back to lightweight title contention will be a familiar foe:
Dave Jansen. The two most recently fought in 2013 at Bellator 93, where Jansen used constant pressure to stifle Held and drain his cardio with crisp kickboxing on the feet and gritty ground-and-pound on the floor. The result was a unanimous decision in Jansen’s favor which sent the young Polish fighter back to the drawing board. Shortly thereafter, Held returned to rattle off six straight wins before most recently falling short against Brooks in his quest for Bellator gold at Bellator 145.
In evaluating Jansen as an opponent, Held shared his thoughts on how his 36-year-old opponent has evolved since their first meeting in 2013.
“[Jansen] is very good striker. After our last fight, he has gotten much better. He is striking a lot. He is kicking a lot. His cardio is also very good. He can go the whole fight. I hope I am better in wrestling and the ground, and like I said I did a lot of standing and striking in this camp. It is tough to say because his last two fights [Jansen] didn’t show a lot of ground game. He know what to do [on the ground], but he is not a world class ground fight. So, I know how to fight him [on the ground].”
Entering 2016, Held’s goal is simple: focus on one fight at a time and win all of his fights. When queried as to whom he would like to fight with a Jansen victory, Held wouldn’t allow himself to entertain the question.
“For now, I am thinking only about only this fight. I lose my last fight so now I have to win, and I am very focused on this fight.”
In victory, Held conceded he was toying with the idea of a potential move to the United States in the future to enhance his training, but for now he preferred to remain mum on where exactly that might be if he pulls the trigger on the decision.
“Not yet. Not yet. I have a few options, but I don’t want to say about it.”
