Former ONE strawweight champion Joshua “The Passion” Pacio has only been in the US for about a month, but he’s already noticed some key differences when it comes to MMA training.

Pacio, together with friend and former ONE lightweight champion Eduard Folayang, has been in the US since April, working under the tutelage of renowned coaches Greg Jackson and Mike Winkeljohn at Jackson Wink MMA in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

The Baguio City native shared how the coaches broke down a game plan for him if he ever faces another strong wrestler – all due to the issues he had with now reigning strawweight king Jarred “The Monkey God” Brooks.

“That’s when I saw how good they are as strategists. When you get taken down, do this because it’s going to happen, no matter how good your defense is. But the question now is how do you respond to adversity,” Pacio said.

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“There’s three stages to it. If you get taken down, do this. If you get caught in a certain position, these are some options on how to escape it. They do it step-by-step. They don’t tell you to not get taken down. It’s kind of like [you have to] expect the unexpected.”

Pacio also noted the length and the method of training sessions as some of the major differences at Jackson Wink.

“When we came here, it felt very different. The training schedule is very organized and when they train, it doesn’t go beyond one hour – about 45 minutes to one hour. You’re there and they will teach you detailed techniques,” he said.

“They’ll teach you two to three techniques and they’ll keep drilling you on it. There’s not much rolling in the sense that when we do spar, that’s when we really get to apply it. When we’re rolling, we start with what new techniques we’ve learned so it becomes ingrained in our muscle memory. Training’s really different over here.”

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The 27-year-old believes that such training methods suit him better. In fact, he believes in letting his body familiarize itself with the movements before rushing in and applying what he’s learned too quickly.

It’s something that he plans to bring back home – wherever he ends up following his surprising departure from Team Lakay.

“What I’m seeing at home is that yes, we’d been learning techniques also, but there’s difficulty in the application part when stepping into the cage,” he said.

“They’re focused so much more on drills here rather than application. That’s the approach I want to share back home with my teammates.

“Also they have this thing called ‘fight and body conditioning,’ if I remember it correctly. Coach Greg [Jackson’s] handling that. I want to share that, too. [They are] specifically exercises honed in on combat sports.”

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