Nick Catone: Slowing Down to Overcome Injuries

Nick Catone (photo courtesy of Sherdog)

For a person who has yet to find his own “off switch” and knows only one speed – full – Nick Catone was forced to make a decision this past summer that went against everything he stands for, even if it was the right choice.

The Ultimate Fighting Championship middleweight was forced out of a fight with John Salter, scheduled for UFC 113 last May, due to a trio of herniated disks. No problem, thought Catone. He received some treatment and jumped back into training just a couple weeks later. With a 2-2 record in the Octagon, Catone wasn’t going to let an injury derail him that easily.

Once cleared to get back into the cage, Catone made the decision to drop down to the welterweight division, and a fight was set up with Tomasz Drwal for UFC Fight Night 22 in September. But during training and his attempt to get down to 170, things started to unravel. Catone also had a nagging shoulder injury that he’d been battling for the better part of a year and a half, and the cortisone shots were becoming less and less effective. Then, stemming from what he believes was a combination of being light and weak, he re-injured his back.

That’s when it became obvious to Catone that it was time to take the foot off the gas, and not just for a couple of weeks.

“It was really tough,” Catone said after finishing up teaching a class at his brand new gym in central New Jersey. “Wrestling my whole life, I never really took any time off. Even since my first fight, I would always say I was going to take a week or two off and I never did. I would take three days off and start staring at the ceiling all day, so I would just go right back to training.

“It was hard to pull out of one fight, let alone two. My instincts had me back out there 12, 13 days later (after the back injury). People were like, ‘What are you doing out there?’ That’s just the way my mindset is, but in reality it came back to haunt me. It was time to sit down and look at my career long-term.”

In January 2010, Catone evened his UFC record at 2-2 with a split-decision win over Jesse Forbes at UFC Fight Night 20. The victory came after a two-fight losing streak in which he was submitted by Tim Credeur at UFC Fight Night 18 and then lost a controversial split decision to Mark Munoz at UFC 102. Getting his record back over .500 was first and foremost on his mind, but his injuries taught him that sometimes less is more. He had surgery on his shoulder in August and an epidural in his back a short time later. He may not have been enjoying his time off, but he started to see it was exactly what he needed for several reasons.

“I’ve worked so hard to get to where I am today that it’s not worth it to go in there when you can’t put on a good fight,” Catone said. “That’s how the UFC works. They want to see a good fight and I think they like me because I go out and put on good fights. Even if I went in there and won but had a boring fight that nobody wanted to see, that’s not worth me getting in there hurt.”

As much as it pained Catone to pull out of a second consecutive fight, more good has come out of his decision than even he thought, including being able to do something he originally thought wouldn’t happen until several years down the road.

Nick Catone enjoys opening his new gym with some of his coaches and training partners. (Hector Castro/MMADieHards.com)

On Sept. 18, Catone officially opened Nick Catone’s Mixed Martial Arts Academy in Brick, N.J. The facility has 2,200 square feet of mat space and offers classes in boxing, Muay Thai, wrestling, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and MMA, and allowed Catone to sink his teeth into something else while rehabbing from his injuries. It also meant he didn’t have the pressure of taking fights solely for monetary purposes, which is never a good spot for a fighter to be in. His injuries now look like a blessing in disguise.

Not only did he open his own MMA gym, but he also decided to take his training in a different direction and re-connect with the Ricardo Almeida/Renzo Gracie Fight Team. He went from bouncing around to different gyms in search of capable training partners to being just a short drive away from Almeida’s gym and an opportunity to train with the likes of Almeida, UFC and EliteXC veteran Chris Liguori, Bellator lightweight champion Eddie Alvarez and UFC lightweight champ Frankie Edgar.

“Some good things have definitely come out of (being injured), like getting my school up and running,” Catone said. “It’s definitely something I always wanted to do, but I didn’t really plan on doing it this soon. It’s tough to train full-time in this sport and make a decent living unless you’re actually getting in there and fighting, so it’s nice to have something to fall back on. At the same time, it’s nice to have my own place to train.”

Catone has been slowly training since his school opened, but was just recently cleared to return to full-contact training and informed UFC matchmaker Joe Silva of his intentions to get back into the Octagon – fully healthy. A fight hasn’t been scheduled for him yet, but he’s getting back in shape with training sessions at either his gym or Almeida’s, the latter of which boasts an impressive array of stars these days.

“I think (Almeida) has one of the best rooms on the east coast,” Catone said. “When you have six or seven guys in the UFC, Eddie Alvarez and guys like that out there, that’s huge. It’s hard to find one or two guys at that level, let alone five or six in the same room.”

After a couple months on the shelf and some wondering about where his career was headed, things are certainly looking up for Catone. He’s scrapped his plans for dropping to welterweight and will stay at 185 pounds for the foreseeable future. He has his own school, a great set of training partners and a new outlook. He’s learned that he can’t always just power through everything, and sometimes you have to take one step back to take a couple more forward. There’s an understanding of what he wants his future in the sport to be. He’s not rushing to get to his next fight anymore. He’s thinking about his next five, 10, 15 fights. He’s aiming for a career in the UFC, not just a stint and a couple of good stories to tell the grandkids.

“The next fight is important for me, but every fight is important in the UFC,” explained Catone. “If you go out there and have a bad performance, they have thousands of other guys to choose from.

“It’s an elite group and I want to stay a part of it for a long time, so I have to go out there and perform no matter who they put in front of me. I’m looking forward to getting back, and right now it just feels great to be training again with the guys.”