{"id":36691,"date":"2026-02-07T17:11:03","date_gmt":"2026-02-07T17:11:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sherdog.com\/news\/news\/Daniel-Cormier-Reveals-How-Cain-Velasquez-Made-Him-Stop-Fighting-Southpaw-200057"},"modified":"2026-02-07T17:11:03","modified_gmt":"2026-02-07T17:11:03","slug":"daniel-cormier-reveals-how-cain-velasquez-made-him-stop-fighting-southpaw","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/daniel-cormier-reveals-how-cain-velasquez-made-him-stop-fighting-southpaw\/","title":{"rendered":"Daniel Cormier Reveals How Cain Velasquez Made Him Stop Fighting Southpaw"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
<\/div>\n

Daniel
\nCormier<\/a> became more serious about MMA after being schooled by
\nCain
\nVelasquez<\/a> in his early days. <\/p>\n

Cormier (22-3) had just transitioned from wrestling to MMA and was
\njuggling his training between Oklahoma and California. Cormier
\nbegan experimenting with a southpaw stance while sparring with
\nVelasquez at the
\nAmerican Kickboxing Academy<\/a> in 2010. That was the last time
\n\u201cDC\u201d went southpaw, as Velasquez wrecked his nose with a head kick.
\nCormier turned his back to Velasquez, who decided to show mercy.
\nCormier was in agony and knew that Velasquez could have knocked him
\nout if he wanted to. The lesson was enough for Cormier to
\npermanently shift his base to AKA in San Jose, California.<\/p>\n

\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Lesson Learned<\/h2>\n

\u201cI was going back and forth between Oklahoma and California when I
\nstarted my career,\u201d Cormier told Y\u2019all Street TV. \u201cAnd I\u2019m sparring
\nCain\u2026 I\u2019m trying to be cute, and I\u2019m fighting southpaw, which, by
\nthe way, 2010 was the last time I\u2019d ever in my life stood in a
\nfight with my right leg forward because Cain kicked me in the face
\nand broke my nose. I screamed, \u2018Oh my God,\u2019 put my hands on the
\nropes, and was like, \u2018Stop, stop, please, please.\u2019 Pain, that was
\npain. Understand that in that moment, if he wanted to, he could
\nhave finished me. And I was like, \u2018Let me get more serious about
\nthis, I\u2019m moving to California.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Cormier and Velasquez went on to become the closest of friends.
\nCormier even decided to move to light heavyweight to avoid fighting
\nVelasquez at heavyweight. While Velasquez became a
\nUFC<\/a> heavyweight champion, Cormier eventually became a
\ntwo-division champion. <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

Daniel
\nCormier<\/a> reveals how a kick from Cain
\nVelasquez<\/a> changed his stance forever \ud83d\ude05\ud83e\uddb5<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m trying to be cute and I\u2019m fighting southpaw, which, by the
\nway, 2010 was the last time I\u2019d ever in my life stood in a fight
\nwith my right leg forward because Cain kicked me in the face and\u2026
\npic.twitter.com\/Gw8TUap7uT<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 Red Corner MMA (@RedCorner_MMA)
\nFebruary 6, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

<\/center> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Daniel Cormier became more serious about MMA after being schooled by Cain Velasquez in his early days.  Cormier (22-3) had just transitioned from wrestling to MMA and was juggling his training between Oklahoma and California. Cormier began experimenting with a southpaw stance while sparring with Velasquez at the American Kickboxing Academy in 2010. That was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36692,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[150],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36691","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-martial-arts-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36691","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36691"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36691\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36692"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36691"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36691"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.martialartskleinanzeigen.com\/videos\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36691"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}