“It's just an eye-opener” - Demetrious Johnson shares his biggest takeaway from training with Henry Cejudo
Demetrious Johnson scored perhaps the biggest win of his mixed martial arts career in the ONE on Prime Video 1 main event.
With 200 million potential viewers tuning in as the promotion made its eagerly anticipated debut on Amazon Prime Video. ‘Mighty Mouse’ delivered a memorable moment by knocking out then-flyweight world champion Adriano Moraes with a beautifully timed and brutally delivered knee in the fourth round of their world title clash.
Following his ONE world championship victory, Demetrious Johnson spoke with the promotion at the ONE on Prime Video 1 post-fight press conference. There, he discussed his training leading up to the evening’s main event.
Talking specifically about his work with former two-time opponent Henry Cejudo, Johnson said:
“It helped me just by understanding where my strength is, right? Because, you know, when you're in a gym with a team all the time, we all have the same strengths. Then when I went to Arizona, I trained with Henry and the whole team over there, you know, I can kind of sneak and see like, okay, this is where you're really strong at, we can tell because you react.”
Demetrious Johnson continued to discuss his training with Cejudo, saying:
“And when it's like, okay, I'm so strong here, and some of you guys can even deal with it. I'm going to build on top of that. So it's just an eye-opener. That's the biggest thing.”
Demetrious Johnson both loves and loathes the pressure that comes with high-level competition
As one of the most decorated mixed martial artists in the history of the sport, Demetrious Johnson has found himself in numerous high-pressure situations.
Whether it was to capture a world title, defend one, or avenge a loss, ‘Mighty Mouse’ knows the feeling well and admits to “hating” the feeling, while at the same time finding himself motivated by it.
“I’m just happy that I was grateful to be healthy enough to go out there and put him away,” Johnson said. “It was a great fight. He hit me with some good shots. He was trying to go for a D’Arce, he had me on the ground landing good knees to the head. But you know, I knew it was going to be a tough fight. That’s one of the things I love about competing, you know?"
Johnson continued:
“There’s a part of me where I hate pressure, I hate all of the eyeballs on me, but then there’s a part of me that’s like, ‘Yeah. F**k yeah, let’s go. Let’s see how hard we can push it. Let’s see if we can push ourselves to that breaking point.'”