Fifteen months after losing a unanimous decision to Michael Chiesa, Canadian lightweight Mitch (Danger Zone) Clarke returns to action Thursday.
The Saskatoon native, who fights out of Edmonton, had the worst of the first two rounds against Chiesa but rallied in the third with some solid striking.
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Lessons were learned. While he lost, Clarke says the experience has made him focus more on the mental skills of fighting.
Still he is proud of the tenacity he showed against Chiesa, especially in defending repeated attempts at a choke while on the ground.
“I think I showed a lot of heart when I probably could have just given up,” Clarke said. “I wasn’t willing to give up. I was trying to win that fight … I wasn’t ready to cash the chips yet.”
Chiesa, meanwhile, has won two fights since and now ranks 10th among lightweight contenders.
Clarke (11-3-0) meets (Irish) Joe Duffy (14-2-0) on the main card of Thursday’s Fight Night at the MGM Grand Garden Arena. It’s the first of three UFC cards in Las Vegas during the UFC’s international fight week that culminates Saturday with UFC 200 at the new T-Mobile Arena.
WATCH: Alberta’s Mitch Clarke returns to the octagon to face ‘Irish’ Joe Duffy
Restored to health after a laundry list of ailments, the 30-year-old Clarke spent the last six weeks of his training camp in Albuquerque, N.M., to train at elevation with renowned trainer Greg Jackson.
Duffy, who trains out of Montreal’s Tristar Gym, is coming off a January loss to Dustin (The Diamond) Poirier.
Lightweight champion Rafael Dos Anjos meets No. 2 contender Eddie Alvarez in Thursday’s main event. Montreal lightweight John (The Bull) Makdessi tackles France’s Mehdi (The Sultan) Baghdad on the undercard.
Clarke and Makdessi are the only Canadians competing on the three cards.
Clarke’s body has taken a beaten in recent years. He injured his knee seconds into his second UFC fight against Anton Kuivanen, tearing a patella tendon when he kept going. Knee surgery followed.
Clarke has to spend four months rehabbing his elbow after it popped out while stopping (Raging) Al Iaquinta in May 2014 with the first D’arce choke from the bottom in UFC history.
He broke a knuckle, partially tore a hamstring and hurt his back against Chiesa.
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A freak accident followed in June when the handle of an acupuncture needle broke as it was inserted into his arm as part of an intramuscular stimulation treatment. Because his muscle was spasming, the needle was sucked into his body and he had to go to the emergency room to have it removed.
He subsequently lost feeling in his hand and had to undergo rehab. What Clarke calls a “giant mess” cost him a perhaps once-in-a-lifetime chance last August to fight on a UFC card in his home town of Saskatoon.
“It builds character and makes those victories so much sweeter,” Clarke said of the physical hurdles he has had to overcome.
The time away from the cage also allowed Clarke, who is 2-3-0 in the UFC, to give back to the community. He teaches martial arts and has tried to help out with local mental illness and kids wrestling programs.
“That also helps improve you — to help others,” he said. “I think that’s a huge part of it.”
But there was more pain when fellow fighter and former roommate Ryan (The Big Deal) Jimmo was killed in a hit-and-run incident in Edmonton last month. Two men were subsequently charged.
“There’s nothing good that can be said about what happened,” Clarke said. “The world’s a worse place without people like Jimmo.”
Clarke and Jimmo lived together when Jimmo, a native of Saint John, N.B., first moved to Edmonton. Clarke called Jimmo “uniquely himself.”
“He marched to the beat of his own drum … He was his own person. I think that was probably the beauty of Jimmo.”
Clarke, who studied environmental science at the University of Saskatchewan, is a former environmental protection officer with Alberta Environment.
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