D’Amato on Fear

CUS D’AMATO TALKS ABOUT FEAR
Posted by MMATraining.com Staff

Cus with Tyson in the 80s


Fighters are the most exposed athletes in the world. During a fight, the crowd observes every twitch and movement. Still, spectators rarely see fear in a quality fighter. “That,” says D’Amato, “is because the fighter has mastered his emotions to the extent that he can conceal and control them.”

But whatever a fighter says, the fear is there. It never goes away. He just learns to live with it. “And the truth is,” D’Amato continues, “fear is an aspect to a fighter. It makes him move faster, be quicker and more alert.

Heroes and cowards feel exactly the same fear. Heroes just react to it differently. On the morning of a fight, a boxer wakes up and says, ‘How can I fight? I didn’t sleep at all last night.’ What he has to realize is, the other guy didn’t sleep either. Later, as the fighter walks toward the ring, his feet want to walk in the opposite direction. He’s asking himself how he got into this mess. He climbs the stairs into the ring, and it’s like going to the guillotine.

Maybe he looks at the other fighter, and sees by the way he’s loosening up that his opponent is experienced, strong, very confident. Then when the opponent takes off his robe, he’s got big bulging muscles. What the fighter has to realize,” concludes D’Amato, “is that he’s got exactly the same effect on his opponent, only he doesn’t know it. And when the bell rings, instead of facing a monster built up by the imagination, he’s simply up against another fighter.”

[regiadams.com ]