X Factor star Jake Quickenden urged by Khabib’s coach to do ‘countless hours’ of brutal sparring ahead of MMA debut

1 year ago 115

JAKE QUICKENDEN has been urged to do “countless hours” of sparring in preparation for his MMA debut.

The singer will grace the OKTAGON MMA cage on November 4 in Manchester against comedian Paul Smith.

Quickenden is training with British veteran James Webb and Javier Mendez – who formerly coached Khabib Nurmagomedov – warned him to get used to taking a whack.

Mendez told Safe Betting Sites: “The first thing Jake and Paul need to do before they get into the cage is to get countless hours of sparring.

“And then to understand that the real fight will be much harder than those hours in the gym sparring.

“My advice is to concentrate on their mentality, bringing your mind strong.

“You get your mind strong by sparring as much as you can, so they can get used to what it’s going to be like in that competition.

“But then also to be prepared that fight night isn’t going to be exactly like sparring. It’s going to be much harder.

“They also need to stay relaxed as much as possible and they need to put in their head ‘I’m winning’ and ‘this is how I’m going to win’ everything you’re doing is about entering that competition to win.

“Their mindset needs to be that you’re going in there to do nothing but win. They need to adopt a winning attitude.

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“Then visualise how it comes. Ok, I’m going to knock him out with a left hook.

“You have to put in your head and visualise over and over. And then stay relaxed, don’t get hyped up because you’re wasting energy.

“If you hear our corner work, we are always saying ‘relax’.”