John Redmond talks move from Rush to Team Ryano and more

As his first week at Team Ryano MMA draws to a close, Dublin welterweight John ‘The Baby-Faced Assassin’ Redmond tells Tom Rooney, why he made the difficult decision of leaving his long-time home at the Rush Fight Academy, in order to take his career to the next level.

For fighters, it’s never easy saying goodbye to coaches and teammates who have been with them from the moment they took those first tentative steps in becoming among the most rarefied of athletes, a Mixed Martial Artist.

On the mats and in the ring, together they spill blood, sweat and tears, as life-long, unbreakable friendships are formed. For John Redmond, the time had come for him to leave the Rush Fight Academy, a gym he had been with since its inception in 2007, to solely focus on reaching his goal of fighting at the highest level.

This meant an amicable parting of company with mentor Paul Cowzer and his team, who he considers as family.

“There was no ill-will in me leaving; Paul wished me well, he has raised me in the sport of Mixed Martial Arts, but it’s time for me now to go focus on myself, I reached a certain level and I want to go and take it even higher.

“It was very hard, I’ve raised a lot of the lads there with Paul, and I’ll always hold them dear to my heart; they’re like brothers to me.

“This is something I want to take to top; I want to go to the UFC, so I’ve got to get with a full-time pro-team and go at this.”

The move to Team Ryano, he says, has been a re-birth and allowed him to be exclusively a student of the game, once more. And, that he was already familiar with the camp through years of sporadic sparring, has meant a seamless transition

“When I was down in Rush, I felt like I was a coach there as well as a fighter, but progressing to Team Ryano, I feel like a new a kid again, starting Martial Arts and the focus is on just me.

“What made me pick Team Ryano, is that I’ve been training on and off with those lads for years, it wasn’t like it was a new team for me and I didn’t know the guys and it was a nice progression for me to come to them, because everyone knows me.

“They’re the kind of people that are like me, and I just feel comfortable there. For me at the minute, where my career is going, it was just the move I needed to make. I didn’t want to look in two or three years and say, I should have done that or I should have done this.”

At 30, Redmond now finds himself as contender in Europe’s premier organisation, Cage Warriors, and is coming off an impressive first round submission victory of Kieran Davern at CW63 on New Year’s Eve, having lost his promotional debut to Piotr Ptasinski.

Although he has received no indication as to when his next fight will be, Redmond has intimated about his preference for a summer return, and plans to showcase his evolving skill-set.

“Maybe come back in June after getting a bit of evolution into my game, and show everybody Johnny Jitsu 3.0, not 2.0. Look, I’m going to take things and run with it.”

By Tom Rooney – @oldmanrooney

Photo: CageWarriors