(((((((((((((What Doesn't Kill You...)))))))))))))

"What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!"


Truth be told, in sports or any type of competition, there is more to learn from losing than there is from winning. Losing his first fight and consequently his belt might be the best thing that could have happened to Lyoto Machida. In a sense, it will take some of the pressure off of him to stay undefeated. He no longer has to worry about being perfect any more. That pressure seemed to be there as of late, particularly in the last fight. Lyoto appeared to be a bit stressed and distracted. Now that he has that "L" on his record, he can get back to being himself; loose, relaxed and solely focused on the task at hand, which is training and fighting.

"What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!"

Lyoto will come back from this loss better than ever. With the help of his family and his inner circle of friends and teammates, Machida will get right back to work the minute he is medically able to. He will need a little time to heal up, both physically and mentality, and then its back to the blood, sweat and tears of the martial arts lifestyle that's been the blueprint of his entire existence. For those of you that think Lyoto is going to fold like a cheap accordion, and just disappear from the position he's held as one of the world's best fighters, you are sadly mistaken. All he knows is fighting. He's been groomed by his father since he's a young boy to do this. If you think one loss is going to change that, you obviously don't understand the budo mentality that is the essence of what makes rare fighters like Lyoto tick. Training and fighting is like breathing to him. Its something that's ingrained in his mind, body and soul. This guy literally eats, shits and sleeps martial arts, always has, always will.


"What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!"

Lyoto's father, Yoshizo, immediately began the mental healing process in the locker room right after the fight, telling his son, 'You're a samurai – on to the next. That's in the past now. You lost; oh well. You went out there, and you fought. You tried to do what you could do, and it didn't work out this time. Go back to the drawing board, come up with a better strategy, and life moves on." Unlike most fighters, Lyoto doesn't just fight for himself and to challenge himself. He fights to please his father, who is also his sensei, and to make him proud. That's a whole different type of motivation.

As far as the fight itself, Machida was more than holding his own up until getting caught with that punch to the temple. Not to take anything away from Shogun's performance, because it was fantastic, but anyone who has ever trained in any combat sport, or been around martial arts, knows that a shot directly to the temple is next to impossible to recover from. The punch that dropped Lyoto wasn't even that hard, but it directly hit 'the spot". This is the fight game, it happens. Up to that point, Machida was landing some heavy knees and was completely controlling the clinches, taking Shogun down at will. That said, Shogun landed the punch that put Lyoto on queer street and finished him off on the ground. He won the fight in emphatic fashion and is the deserved champion. For the time being, Lyoto has to be content with being the second best LHW on the planet. Most people would be OK with that, but something tells me that Lyoto will not sit still until he gets that belt back. It wasn't that long ago that something similar happened to Georges St-Pierre when he lost his belt to Matt Serra. He took a punch to the temple, never recovered and Serra finished him off to take his belt from him. We've all seen how GSP has rebounded from that loss. I expect the same if not more from Lyoto.


"What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!"

True, Lyoto Machida lost a fight.
True, Lyoto Machida got knocked out for the first time.
True, Lyoto Machida is alive and well
True, Lyoto Machida will be back better than ever!.

Trust on that!