CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (KCRG) – One Cedar Rapids native is set to make his mixed martial arts debut on Friday. Although this will mark his first caged bout, fighting is in his blood.
Twenty-one-year-old Blaine Stepanek has been training at Hard Drive Performance Center in Cedar Rapids for about as long as he can remember.
“I’ve been in the gym since I was probably about five or six years old. I got thrown into what we used to call ‘future sport.’ We used to do some MMA and kickboxing as kids,” he explained. “I always knew how to defend myself and I always knew I would circle back to fighting, I just didn’t know when.”
About two years ago he decided to stop playing college football and focus on MMA.
“For football, you can do as good as you can, but your team could still lose. I just like the pressure to be on myself. I just like to put it all on the line, just go showcase my skills and see what I can do,” Stepanek said.
Stepanek is a second-generation fighter. His father, Brent Stepanek, who went pro, trained at the very same gym and had the same coach.
“It’s really cool because it makes me feel old, but it just makes me think back to a time when I had this athlete that’s now a grown man competing in a cage. They were once a boy and I get to see that whole transformative process,” co-owner and coach of Hard Drive Performance Center Keoni Koch said.
“I wanted him to play college football, he wants to fight, so that’s the way it is,” Brent Stepanek said. “I said to him, if you’re going to do anything, don’t half it. You’ve got to go 100 miles an hour at it. I told him don’t do it unless you want to be a world champion. That’s what he’s set out to do.”
Blaine grew up cage side because of his dad, so it wasn’t a surprise he took this path. Those around him say his experiences give him an edge
“He’s competed in many different formats. He’s done submission grappling, he’s played football and he’s played contact sports. I feel like he has a natural competitive mindset,” Koch said.
His dad won’t physically be sitting in his corner on Friday. He may not be able to sit at all.
“Absolutely not. There’s no way,” Brent said about being able to sit. “I’m going to try, but I’m still very intense,” he added. “Football was one thing, but now he’s fighting another grown man. You want the best for him, he’s put in the work, he’s put in everything he absolutely can think of and you want that to come to fruition inside a cage.”
Stepanek will be a part of the Caged Aggression XL “The Big Show” on October 17 and 18 at The RiverCenter in Davenport.
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