Athletes
Louis Cosce: Young And Hungry
The 27-Year-Old Returns To The Octagon Nearly Two Years After Making His UFC Debut, Facing Trevin Giles At UFC Fight Night: Sandhagen vs Song
In combat sports, there’s nothing like a crossroads fight, and that’s precisely what fans will see on Saturday when welterweight veteran Trevin Giles faces up and comer Louis Cosce.
For the 30-year-old Giles, it’s an opportunity to shake off a two-fight losing streak where both of the defeats came by knockout. As for the 27-year-old Cosce, he’s been on the sidelines since November of 2020, when he lost his UFC debut in a Fight of the Night with Sasha Palatnikov.
Something’s gotta give at the UFC APEX, and Cosce promises it won’t be him.
Watch UFC Fight Night: Sandhagen vs Song on ESPN+!
“I think he'll see it as soon as we step in the middle,” he said. “I'm young and hungry and I want this. I gave up everything for this and there is no Plan B for me. That's where I'm at, mentally.”
In other words, it’s all or nothing.
“You tiptoe in the creek, there's a good chance you're gonna get annihilated,” Cosce explains. “You gotta jump all the way in and put your heart and soul into this sport. And I truly believe it's gonna pay off.”
Those are familiar words to anyone who’s been around the business long enough, but Cosce’s come backed up by action. A lifelong Californian, he packed his bags and moved his family to Las Vegas after the Palatnikov fight, determined to give himself the best chance at succeeding in the sport after suffering the first loss of his pro career and a couple surgeries that kept him from bouncing back immediately.
“It was pretty much the resources,” said Cosce, who has been training with John Wood and the Syndicate MMA squad. “The (UFC) PI's down here, and back at home it's just a small gym. There's not really anything like that back at home; you just try to make it yourself. Down here they make it real easy for you; it's almost spoiling.”
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Admitting that it was a bit of a culture shock moving to Vegas after living in Arcata, population close to 19,000, Cosce and his family soon settled in and bought a house. Then let’s just say they had a rude welcome to their new digs.
“The first night here, our air conditioning wasn't working, so we had to sleep in hundred-degree weather,” he laughs. “It was terrible.”
Maybe terrible enough that Louis couldn’t even convince his brother, fellow UFC fighter Orion, to move there as well, but the younger brother has acclimated just fine, not just in his personal life, but his professional one, as he’s picked up a new way to train after a camp to forget before his last fight.
“I think the loss was a huge part of the move because there were a lot of things I didn't do in my camp,” Cosce admits. “I did no wrestling, no sparring. There's a lot of things I didn't really do. It was just a lot of bad work and a lot of the stuff was hard, hard, hard, just breaking me down. I understand that they wanted me to get ready, and I didn't have a clear concept, either; you just train hard and that's all you know. And I think that's what led to the injuries and all that stuff, just breaking myself down. In reality, if you go too hard, your body just starts breaking down, and that was the first time for me to see that happen. Now it's a smarter approach.”
That’s not to say there weren’t positives taken from his third-round loss at UFC 255. The Fight of the Night bonus helped pay for his house, he proved that if he got into a dogfight, he could respond in a positive manner, and he also realized that not everyone is going to fall down, so if they don’t, he needs to have a backup plan.
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“I definitely felt like I needed that loss to learn,” he said. “When you're winning and knocking people out, I was falling in love with it. I remember thinking, I'm gonna knock this guy the f**k out and be on my way with it. It didn't work like that. I came close to it, but it ended up changing in a heartbeat and I started getting my ass whupped. But I felt like I needed that just to learn.”
Now he gets to put it all into action. An April fight with Preston Parsons got scrapped when Cosce caught COVID the week before, but now he’s here.
It’s finally time to fight.
UFC Fight Night: Sandhagen vs Song took place live from the UFC Apex in Las Vegas, Nevada on September 17, 2022. See the Final Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC Fight Pass!
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