In what was an action packed card for Contenders 31 at the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre. 16 explosive fights in MMA and Boxing were brought to fight fans on Saturday night, by the Norwich based organisation on their first trip to the Capital.
Fourth on the card we saw Carla Mackenzie-Le Roy of Assassins Gym take on Rox Mac of Dirty South Boxing Gym. Carla’s 3rd appearance for Contenders.
I was fortunate enough to catch up with Carla before the show began, for some insight and her thoughts on the upcoming fight at Contenders and training.
I’d like to start this off by thanking you for taking the time to speak to me today. How are you feeling in the build up to your third matched event with Contenders?
“I’m very excited. Hoping to make it 3-0 with Contenders tonight.”
In regards to training before you arrived at Crystal Palace how did you prepare for one your biggest challenges to date?
“I’ll be honest, I’m always in fight camp, so my training does not change, it is always just 100 percent on it, all the time, so that if for whatever reason I get a match next week, or tomorrow, I’m hundred percent ready. So it’s just hard-core training, like all the time ‘lifestyle’ lol.”
In regards to your opponent, have you studied Rox much since you found out you two would share the cage?
“No, I’ll be honest, it was a bit pointless. I think we were only matched like a week ago, so there wasn’t really much time to study her. But what I will say is, she is way, way, way more experienced than me, I was told she was 10-0, but I think she may actually be more in the region of fighting 25 fights. I’m just 2 fights into my career and paired with that sort of experience, is going to be one hell of a test for me but I am super excited.”
And in regards to the venue, how are you finding the Crystal Palace National Sports Centre?
“Yeah it’s a really, really nice venue, the facilities are really good. The warm up area’s are fantastic, the changing and then you’ve got the big cage, the lighting is spectacular. It really is just awesome, they’ve really pulled out all the stops for this one it’s really cool.”
Contenders, as a promotion, how do they look after fighters in the build up to your bouts?
“I’ll be honest, I’m not really involved with them too much yet. I think they are looking to contract me, which would be really cool, but at the moment, especially because we were only matched a week ago, they are not gonna of had the time to do much promotional stuff regarding our fight. But I’ve seen their promo videos and bits and pieces. It all looks really good.”
Last but not least do you have anyone you’d like to thank and give a shout out to before you take centre stage?
“It’s always gotta be my kids and my husband. My husband is my trainer, so that always makes life easy, we can just squeeze it in around work and the kids, but the kids are fantastic, in the sense that they don’t make it hard for me to train. My lifestyle is kids and training and they are superb, so thank you to my beautiful children and my lovely husband.”
I was fortunate enough to have been cageside for Carla’s match up, her experience in comparison to her opponent did not show, shocking Mac with staying close to her, throwing intense flurries and combinations of hooks. Even when in the clinch Carla kept on with a flurry of body shots, which visibly left Mac in disbelief.
This amazing performance was more than enough to secure Carla a unanimous decision victory and advance her record to 3-0-0 with Contenders.
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