Up Close and Personal with Sam Stout
At just 25 years of age, Sam "Hands of Stone" Stout has had quite a career so far. The five-time reigning and final TKO Lightweight Champion has waged some memorable battles in his seven trips to the Octagon, including his previous fight against Matt Wiman at UFC 97 in Montreal. The-back-and forth war, which Stout took by unanimous decision, earned him his third Fight of the Night Award. Stout believes all of these accolades are just the beginning of even bigger things - starting with his main card bout against Joe Lauzon at UFC 108 on January 2.
"I realize there's a lot of competition and I'm not fooling myself into thinking I'll be fighting for the title this year. I know I've got a long way to go but I'm still fairly young in the sport and I think the best thing to do is just take it one fight at a time and focus on putting my all into my training," explains Stout, a veteran of seven UFC fights. "Just fighting in the UFC at the highest level, there's so many great guys in the division. It's just an honour to fight these guys."
Part of Stout's intense focus on training revolves around the Adrenaline Training Centre in his hometown of London, Ontario, which he opened up just over a year ago with fellow training partners Mark Hominick and Chris Horodecki. Having a state-of-the-art facility has been invaluable to the K-1 Kickboxing veteran, who has noticed immediate interest in MMA from the local community.
"We just recently celebrated our one year anniversary and the response from our members has been fantastic. We now have a new ring and new cage, and it's a first rate training facility. We're also seeing a lot of new people signing up. It's a great city to have an MMA gym in. In Fanshawe College and the University of Western Ontario, we have two of the biggest schools in the country here, so we're seeing a lot of students coming into the gym which is really exciting."
Stout's training camp has seen him split time between his gym in London, as well as stops in Toronto's Xtreme Couture facility and the TapouT Training Center in Las Vegas, where his coach and mentor Shawn Tompkins has put together a game plan for UFC 108 opponent Joe Lauzon.
"Shawn Tompkins is in charge of putting together my game plan and is the mastermind behind all of my training," says Stout who has trained with the renowned striking coach since the start of his MMA career. "To say that Shawn has had an influence on my career is too much of an understatement. He's been my entire career from the very start. He built me from the ground up. When I first started training with him I had no experience whatsoever. I had no martial arts training at all, so everything I am right now I owe to Shawn."
As for his upcoming bout, Stout acknowledges Lauzon's strong wrestling and submission skills, but feels that he has grown accustomed to this style match-up throughout his career.
"It's a classic match-up for me and it's something I'm used to. I rarely get into a fight where a guy wants to stand and trade with me. Only Spencer Fisher and Terry Etim have ever wanted to stand up and bang with me. He's going to want to take me down. I've surrounded myself with the right people for this fight with really good wrestling and BJJ coaches and training partners so I'm feeling very well prepared for this," says Stout, who has been rolling with Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu coach Rowan Cunningham in London and wrestling coach Nick Johnson at Xtreme Couture in Toronto in preparation for the fight.
With his constantly evolving ground skills, Stout feels he can take advantage of his opponent's flaws more than ever, and feels his striking is on another level than Lauzon's.
"I think he's a little wild and overly aggressive sometimes with his striking. I think I can find the holes and land some good punches on him. I don't think he likes to get hit, and it showed a little In the Jeremy Stephens fight. I think I'm going to put my hands on him enough that I'll be able to make him not want to be in that cage with me anymore."
