Light heavyweight contender Johnny Walker had a special partner to share a training session with him last month. While spending time in Las Vegas, the Brazilian paid a visit to Overcome Academy, where he and UFC middleweight Sean Strickland had the chance to throw hands.
In an interview with Ag Fight, Walker gave the details of what it was like to train alongside such a character as Strickland. Although Johnny did find Sean’s antics to be a little annoying, the Brazilian was satisfied with the experience, claiming he was able to improve his striking technique in the process.
“We had two sparring sessions. The first one I had just come back from Brazil. I had been eating sweets, barbecue. I arrived in Vegas, I took my COVID-19 shot and booked the session. That day I had a fever, my body was aching, I was all messed up. I was unable to put on a good performance because I felt tired. Still, I put up a fight. In the last round, he was shouting ‘Come on. Let’s go.’. I was like, ‘Let’s go.’. But I felt sleepy, my body ached. Annoying guy. He has good boxing, but if you add kicks and elbows, he can’t play.”
“Two days later, after the COVID-19 shot effects had worn off, I asked him to do it again and he accepted it.” Walker said. “That time around it was different, I was the one shouting at him. He likes to yell, he’s a crazy guy, but cool. I learned some stuff from him. He used his elbow to block punches when boxing. He can stop crosses like that and it hurts the hand. I even hurt my biceps. I got that technique from him. I think it works for me, it was nice.”
In his last outing, Walker (18-6) dropped a unanimous decision to Thiago Santos, back in October. Before that, the 29-year-old had scored a knockout win over Ryan Spann, in September 2020. This victory is the only the Brazilian scored in his last four outings, with losses to Nikita Krylov and Corey Anderson prior to the win.
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