Suburban Toronto’s own Claude Patrick stands with a bit of a slouch, leaning back against the wall of the Bell Lighthouse Theater, site of the UFC 140 press conference. His demeanor is so relaxed, if you weren’t familiar with the sport you would assume he was waiting for a movie to start rather than gearing up for a main card pay-per-view fight in his hometown.
“I kind of fly below the radar for the most part. I don’t sing it, I bring it. If I keep winning eventually people will take notice of that. Some guys are running around talking and talking, doing back flips and stuff like that and when it comes time to perform, they fall real short. So I’d rather leave the proof in the pudding than be talking.”
Patrick is totally at ease, joking about how he was first inspired to fight by the movie “Bloodsport”:
“I’ve seen Bloodsport about a million times. If you haven’t seen Bloodsport, I can’t talk to you.”
He settles in to discussing his opponent, Brian Ebersole, who he drew as an opponent after Ebersole’s original opponent Rory MacDonald went down with an injury. The two are familiar with each other, and Patrick has a smile on his face as he delves into how they became acquainted:
“[In 2007] I was actually going to go and teach for him in Australia. I had hurt myself and he was looking to leave Australia and go home on vacation. He was like ‘come down and teach for three months’, I was like ‘all right’. I was going to do it but I had the surgery scheduled. You know how it is in Canada, you get the surgery when you get it, so I couldn’t leave and take advantage of that.”
When it comes time to actually discuss the matter of the fight, Patrick’s tone doesn’t change. He is a picture of relaxation, but not aloofness. He knows exactly what is in front of him, and harbors no illusions about the difficulty of the task.
“[Ebersole’s] biggest thing is misdirection. He gets you looking somewhere else, whether it’s his “hairrow” or his or his funny haircut or his cartwheel kicks. You end up thinking about that stuff and not respecting him as a fighter and then you go home a loser. That’s not the plan with me, I’ve actually watched a lot of his fights before as a fan…and I like a lot of the things he does. Hopefully he doesn’t do that stuff to me.”
“He’s done really well against quality opposition. Dennis Hallman…Chris Lytle, and he did very well against both guys. I think tactically, strategically I’ve got some better ideas then those guys might have for their fights.”
He smiles again as he is asked what must be the thousandth question about Ebersole’s chest “hairrow” this week. This time the question takes the form of whether anyone in his camp emulated any of Ebersole’s unorthodox style or body grooming:
“I was in Florida training with the Blackzilian camp, no one’s going to be shaving an arrow in their chest there. But we had this one guy that came in, he started throwing spinning back elbows and stuff in training with no elbow pads on. I said ‘kid, I know you’re trying to be helpful but that’s not a good idea right now.'”
Beyond Saturday, he throws out an idea of a fighter he’d like to face, but adds a caveat:
“I did want to fight Dong Hyun Kim, but he’s fighting my buddy Sean Pierson so hopefully that fight [won’t] happen now because Sean [will] beat him. But I just focus on what I do. I’m not a matchmaker or promoter, I leave that to Joe Silva to put together the fights.”
Until then, you can find him either training or watching “Bloodsport”. He will be equally relaxed doing either. But anyone that mistakes his calm for a lack of focus may wind up on his growing list of victims.
