By Frank Curreri

Coaches and athletes often speak of how losing is far more educational than winning. And yet, if there is so much wisdom and knowledge to be gained from defeat, why is it so widely dreaded and disliked?

Some would say it’s because winning just feels so much better than losing. But even that theory has holes in it when you consider that many of the world’s elite athletes harbor the same mindset as tennis legend Jimmy Connors, who famously decreed, “I hate losing more than I love winning.”

All of which brings us to MMA fighter David Avellan, a guy with a college degree in electrical engineering who happens to be an admirer of philosophy and deep, intellectual discussions about the true nature of things. Avellan is a soft-spoken, Miami native with a Latin-tinted accent that reminds you of actor Andy Garcia. No one is accusing Avellan of being the second coming of basketball legend Bobby Knight or tennis icon Jimmy McEnroe – both men renowned as much for their tantrums as for their winning ways. Avellan is merely 2-0 as a pro, but listening to him talk it’s obvious he loathes losing – to the extreme.

“The type of mentality that I have coming into fights is pretty much a life and death situation,” Avellan said. “I will do anything, within the rules, to attain victory, at whatever cost. So I fight my heart out. If it means that I have to die in the ring to get a victory, so be it, that’s what will happen. I am very set on victory and it doesn’t matter what happens – I could have a broken arm, a broken leg, be bleeding through the nose — I will still be fighting. At that point where we step in the ring and we touch gloves, it’s time to fight. For me it’s not so much of a sport anymore when I’m fighting because I’m doing whatever possible to win. I’m not there to lose gracefully at all. I do everything possible to finish the fight.”

In recent months, Avellan hasn’t been finishing any fights at all, partly because circumstances beyond his control keep sabotaging his next bout. He was scheduled to fight in late May, but his opponent backed out, citing injury. Then Avellan signed with the WEC and was scheduled to fight Tim McKenzie in his debut. McKenzie was injured and withdrew from the bout. So Aaron Simpson, a former All-American wrestler out of Arizona Combat Sports, was tapped as McKenzie’s replacement for the Sept. 10 showdown. Then came another curveball: the threat of Hurricane Ike, which appeared headed for Miami, caused a postponement of the WEC event (now rescheduled for Nov. 5). That means Avellan has been training hard for nearly five months – and not fought once.

“I’m a little disappointed that the show got postponed,” Avellan said, noting Hurricane Ike never hit South Florida, instead changing course and unleashing its fury on parts of Texas. “It didn’t even rain here. Nothing came. It was a complete airball, which was good for my gym because my gym is OK.”

The delay means Simpson will have a full training camp for their fight – as opposed to any abbreviated camp after taking the fight on short notice. Avellan is actually thankful a possible advantage for him has been erased.

“This way I get to face somebody who is fully prepared, not a last-minute replacement,” Avellan said. “I’d prefer that, I don’t want anybody to come in with any excuses. I’m very well prepared for him. I’ve been training in fight mode for about five months now. This is the hardest I’ve ever trained for a fight. This fight gives me an opportunity to showcase my skills to the world and to my home audience. I have a lot of fans here in south Florida that have been dying to see me fight. The more time I have to prepare for an event the stronger I’ll come. Aaron Simpson is going to be facing an even better David Avellan than he was originally. I’m ready to give the performance of my life here.”

When it comes to MMA, Avellan has been remarkably patient. He’s been training MMA – Jeet kune

 

do, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, boxing and wrestling – since 1999. He and his brother, Marcos, started coaching in November 2000, teaching classes for one hour a day at a Tae Kwon Do school. After a year, while the MMA movement in America was still just a tiny ripple, the brothers decided to open their own gym, the Freestyle Fighting Academy. At the same time, David Avellan also attended Florida International University.

After graduating, he worked for less than a year at a nuclear power plant to help fund the gym. He regularly competed in jiu-jitsu and grappling tournaments – including the prestigious Abu Dhabi Submission Wrestling World Championships. Rather than dive head-first into cagefighting, however, David Avellan waited seven years to turn pro.

“It was just timing really. Earlier on for me it just wasn’t economically viable,” he said. “The money wasn’t there. I was busy with the gym. But I’ve been training the whole time.”

And yet, in what may seem to some like a contradiction, David Avellan said he did not turn to fighting for money. His gym, after all, continues to flourish with 800-plus students. Amazingly, the gym is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. You can go there after midnight, at 2 or even 3 a.m., and find a group of people training inside (which seems to particularly fit a very nocturnal, “fiesta” city like Miami, which often doesn’t come alive until 11 p.m.).

“I’m fighting because I love to fight,” Avellan said. “Of everything I have done it is the most fulfilling and the most difficult. Martial arts in general has made me the person that I am. I started with wrestling in high school. Before that I had never done any serious training or hard work in my life. I like the whole ethic about training and sacrifice. To me it’s the ultimate challenge of the mind and body, having to push yourself beyond what you thought you were capable of doing. It made me realize that there are no boundaries you can break. It made me push myself further and further. Pretty much the more I trained the more I realized that there are no limits, only the ones you impose on yourself.”

That sky-is-the-limit attitude has shaped Avellan’s long-term goals in the sport. Being a champion is not enough. Avellan said he wants “to be the greatest fighter in the world. I would like to be the equivalent of what people see Fedor (Emelianenko) as. Right now a lot of people see him as the Top Dog. That’s what I want to be.”

He delivers this bold statement in a sincere, monotone voice, with no trace of braggadocio. It is as if he’s meditated on that goal for long periods of time, replaying it over and over again in his mind. Avellan speaks in a very relaxed manner, quite the contrary to his fighting style, which is more fast-paced and relentless. David Avellan said much of his approach to competition was inspired by his high school wrestling coach, Tirso Valls, who had wrestled for Lock Haven University. Valls introduced the Avellan brothers and their teammates to grueling workouts, instilling toughness and conditioning in them that helped them overcome opponents who were far more technical. That grittiness and intensity is still a defining characteristic of the Avellan brothers and their gym. In fact, you don’t just show up at Freestyle Fighting Academy, train and tell these guys you want to fight under their banner. You have to audition for the fight team. Often times twenty or so young men will tryout for the team, undergoing a non-stop blitz of tests that include running for distance, sprints, followed by sparring on their feet and on the ground. The tests are designed to catch a glimpse of the fighter under extreme pressure. Maybe three or four fighters will make the cut at those auditions.

“The most important thing for me to see from a fighter is heart, a guy who even when he is tired and he’s hurt, he still has fight in him,” Avellan said. “The most important part of training is the intensity of the training, as far as how you condition yourself. I’ve always felt that my gym was always able to provide the best training possible.”