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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
If you tuned into Saturday's WEC 45 event on Versus, you witnessed an exciting debut in a losing effort from Minnesota's own Courtney Buck. While it ended in brutal fashion with a series of hammer fists from his opponent, undefeated Brandon Visher, the 27 year old gave a good showing of himself in a fight he took on four day's notice.
"I felt the fight started out in my favor," Buck told MMATorch.com. "I felt like I had some things going my way. I felt I had the reach and felt I was the faster fighter and like I was the more effective striker, from the tape I watched on him in the couple days I had to research him."
"Throughout the fight it just got out of my hands. I know a lot of people say, 'oh, you had to cut almost 20 pounds in three and a half-four days, you took the fight on four days (notice) and you couldn't research, you didn't have the time to properly prepare,' but at the same token I had two or three opportunities to capitalize on the fight and pull an upset and I didn't. So my view on the fight is yes, I had the odds stacked against me, but if I would have just capitalized on a few things I thought we had going for me there I think we would have prevailed."
Buck's story is proof of what hard work and dedication to the sport can bring. Without a background in wrestling or any of the traditional martial arts entering the sport, Buck is the everyman who got a taste of the sport, and with it a dream.
"I kid you not, I was a flabby 190 lbs.," joked Buck. "Literally, heavy chin, beer belly, and I was just sitting there watching TV and I was just thinking to myself, I was never a bully, never a tough guy, but I never got my ass handed to me in a fight in the streets. So I said, 'man, let me just give it a try, at least train and see how far I can go.'... I just remember going into the gym training, and I was like, 'I have to do this.' It's just such a fulfilling sport... The one-on-one competition, the mental toughness along with the heart and the athleticism, I think it's just the perfect sport."
He's now 6-2, but it's a record he's compiled in just over a year, his debut having come in October of 2008. To have the opportunity he received last weekend in the WEC has come as an honor to a fighter trying to make a name for himself in an ever increasingly deep MMA scene in Minnesota. "I feel like I'm part of the new generation. I feel like I was starting to attain that level of respect to where a guy could say 'he could be one of the next guys to come out of Minnesota.' We've got a lot of quality guys and I'm just honored to be in that position."
With the new year ahead, Buck plans simply on making himself a better fighter in 2010. "Essentially what I'm aiming to do is improve as a fighter. What I've learned in this year and a half, almost two years that I've been in this business is that it's full of joys and it's full of heartbreaks. Embrace the heartbreaks and enjoy the triumphs. For next year, 2010... you'll see me again, back in the WEC, this time with a "W," I guarantee it."
Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
STAFF COLUMNISTS: Shawn Ennis - Jason Amadi
Frank Hyden - Rich Hansen
Chris Park - Matt Pelkey
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