Israel Adesanya's coach Eugene Bareman reveals why he 'had to be mean' and change the approach towards training at CKB ahead of UFC 281

Israel Adesanya’s coach Eugene Bareman revealed that there has been a different approach to the middleweight champion’s training camp ahead of UFC 281.

Bareman was recently a guest on The MMA Hour with Ariel Helwani. He discussed Adesanya’s upcoming title defense and the changes that he felt needed to be made at CKB. During the conversation, the CKB coach stated that the coaching staff needed to draw a line to get the most out of their fighters:

“The coaches just felt that we had to draw a line in this camp and let them know our job is very specific," said Bareman. "We are here to make you perform to your utmost so that we could win. And we drew that line nice and easy and it fractured the camp and in the end, we got the desired result.”

Bareman alluded to some of the changes that were made and mentioned that there were times when he wasn’t satisfied with what he saw from his group. He added that it forced him to be mean to them to get the best out of them:

“The early camp was tough, I had to show a side of me that I don’t often show," he continued. "I had to be tough. I had to be mean. If the sparring went for an hour and we weren’t satisfied then I made them go for another hour. If we did eight 5-minute rounds, then we did another 5 or 6 on top of it if we weren’t happy. I doubled it sometimes.”

The CKB coach stressed that it was important to push his fighters to be at their best at all times and not lose focus for even the slightest moment.

Check out the full interview:

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Eugene Bareman coaches a talented group of fighters at City Kickboxing

Eugene Bareman has both a difficult and rewarding job as the coach of City Kickboxing.

The CKB Coach is relied on to coach and train the likes of UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya and UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski. He is tasked with ensuring that they both improve and, at the same time, remain two of the top pound-for-pound fighters in MMA.

Adesanya will defend his title against Alex Pereira in the UFC 281 main event. There has been a lot of interest in this bout as The Stylebender will be looking to avenge his losses to Pereira, who defeated him when they competed in kickboxing.

Other CKB fighters in action at UFC 281 include Carlos Ulberg, Brad Riddell, and Dan Hooker.