Mar-22-2009
For Krzysztof Soszynski, fast ones can be pulled but preferably thrown
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Death Clutch Chris Tuchscherer UFC 109 Walkout T-shirt
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By Chuck Mindenhall
Krzysztof Soszynski is called the Polish Experiment, and that seems valid in the way that Shelley’s Frankenstein became a freakish something that could only be described as a monster. For one thing, he is increasingly large for a light heavyweight; having at one time weighed 300 pounds as a professional wrestler, he now walks around at 225 as a mixed martial artist. He’s got two full sleeves of tattoos and a head that would have phrenologists scratching theirs. With three “z’s” in his name, he leads the UFC in reporter misspellings.
At first glance, just about everything to do with the 31-year-old Polish-Canadian is an imposition. That is, until you get to his voice, which has slight traces of a Manitoba accent—the Fargo trick of converting o’s to ew’s—and carries a higher pitch than you’d expect.
(This last bit has nothing to do with the six low blows Alex Andrade delivered Soszynski a year ago in New Jersey to disqualify himself. It’s a sober fact that Soszynski had the voice pre-Andrade).
“Before I started doing Jiu-Jitsu about six years ago, I was doing pro wrestling and was really jacked, really muscular,” says the one-time body-builder of his nickname. “But when I started rolling with the guys, they noticed my cardio was great for somebody 295 pounds. Somebody said, ‘man, you’re like an experiment,’ and the name just stuck.”
And so has his commitment to the Octagon.
Soszynski (17-9-1) had long been toiling in the softer lit theaters such as the IFL and the Ring of Combat for years before his stint on The Ultimate Fighter 8 showcased his wares. When he got the call to be on the show, he was already fighting out of Team Quest in Temecula, California with Dan Henderson and the eventual opponent who ended his run on the show, Vinicius Magalhaes. His ground-and-pound reputation preceded him on the show, but it was his sense of humor that raised eyebrows around him.
Some might think the fast ones he pulled on his castmates during the season were a window into his personality. Soszynski doesn’t—he reasons it was more a necessary measure to stay sane.
“It was me just being bored,” he says. “I was bored as hell. I wasn’t going to turn to the drinking, that’s not my style—I don’t like alcohol. It was just a way to make the time go by quicker. That six-week stay in the house is just a mental mess, and if you have the head for it you’ll survive, and if not—like some of the guys in the past—you won’t.”
Soszynski was ultimately submitted by his teammate Vinny in the semi-finals but was able to bounce back from the loss by winning his official UFC debut this past December in Las Vegas against Shane Primm. The Kimura that he got Primm to tap with was pretty memorable for Soszynski, but . . .
Ask him about it and he’ll instead go into graphic detail about the walk out to the Octagon and terrifying spotlight that blazed a hole in his back as realizations began crowding over him.
“That fight was very, very mentally draining for me,” he says. “I fought before on many of the top shows in front of 10,000 or 12,000 people, but this was the UFC, the biggest show in the world. On the walk up I was probably the most scared I’ve ever been in my life. You’re so excited to be here and you don’t want to let anybody down.”
And his white-knuckle affair lasted the majority of that initial round—five minutes that felt like two hours.
“I can see why when guys are in their first UFC fight they get a little gun shy and things like that, and I felt it in the first round,” he says. “I think I fought with my teeth clenched and I was holding my breath for the first two or three minutes of the first round. That’s how nervous I was.”
When Soszynski recounts the experience, it’s clear that he’s relieved that it’s all now a shrinking image in his rearview mirror. For one thing, he triumphed over his fears and finished Primm. For another, well, the debutante jitters now transfer to his opponent at UFC 97 on April 18 in Montreal.
Brian Stann—a Captain in the US Marine Corps who earned a Silver Star for valor in Iraq—will trade his well-used WEC gloves for a new pair of UFC ones. Stann (6-1) is the former WEC Light Heavyweight champion. He is a relentless striker who has stopped five of the six opponents he faced in the WEC, and the one he lost—the last against Steve Cantwell in August—he went down swinging against. To this day he holds the record for the shortest fight in WEC history when he obliterated Miguel Cosio in 16 seconds.
With very literal combat in his background, Stann’s nerves may not rattle as easily as Soszynski’s, but he will be belting in front of Soszynski’s countrymen in Canada as part of the main card at a mercilessly live event. It won’t be Rocky in Russia for Stann, but close—and Soszynski knows it.
Given these facts, it’s no surprise that The Polish Experiment expects to see some leather being thrown his way early and often.
“I definitely think Stann’s going to come out blazing,” he says. “I think he’s going to come out and stand in front of me and trade and I’m going to do the same with him. He’s got a good right hand and he’s aggressive. I wouldn’t be surprised if the fight goes to the ground eventually, with either me on top or him on top, but we’re both strikers. We both like to bang, and I’m pretty sure that’s what you’re going to see at the beginning of the fight.”
Forget about don’t blink—these types of fights always lend optimism to fighters on the prelims hoping to end up on pay-per-view air. There will be more than a roaring house of the Québécois cheering big things from Soszynski’s hands—there will be those backstage hoping for a few fireworks, too.
And then there’s a little history between Soszynski and Stann: Both trained up at Oscar De La Hoya’s former compound in snowy confines of Big Bear Lake for five weeks when Sosz was helping Dan Henderson prepare for Anderson Silva, and Stann was training for his title shot with Doug Marshall.
Soszynski remembers a very nice guy with very mean tenacity.
“Yeah, we got to train together, spar and grapple and all that stuff,” he says. “We actually know each other pretty well—I’ve met his wife and his little daughter. He’s a tough guy, and it’s going to be a good fight. Two guys with everything to prove to everybody, and we’re going to go out there banging away.”
When talking to Soszysnki you get the feeling that experiments have more in common with fights than both merely being trials. The energy that will collide on the proving ground on April 18 is very real. In fact, it’s just as the Polish Experiment wants it . . . it’s . . . it’s alive!
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