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AARON
STARK Sitting
on the Dock of the Bay
©
Marc Wickert photos
© IFL It’s
just two days before Thanksgiving and Aaron Stark has done the bolt;
fleeing the Portland, Oregon deluge that is currently only good for
ducks – not Wolfpackers. “We’ve
just been sitting down, having something to eat. I’m in Santa Barbara,
California with my wife, Tiffany, on a vacation. We’re now debating on
whether to walk all the way along the jetty – maybe later,” says
Stark. Aaron
originally started wrestling when he was five years old, and says he
can’t remember why he took it up, but recalls that someone brought a
wrestling flyer to his school, which may have resulted in his getting
caught up in the sport. “I was good at it, and kept doing it. Then I
got a scholarship to wrestle in college… I didn’t do much after
that… I was kinda bored after I got through wrestling. “Then
I went to a local fight; Randy Couture was there and one of the fighters
didn’t show up. Randy knew who I was because he was involved in local
wrestling, and he said, ‘Why don’t you come on down here?’ It was
a joke at the time, but it got my gears turning and I thought it would
be something to try. I had an amateur fight and I only intended fighting
one time; then one thing led to another, and here I am.” Aaron
recalls he didn’t really intend pursuing a career in MMA - it just
fell into place. And because the Team Quest gym is not far from where he
lives, Stark knew a lot of the guys who wrestled there and got involved
with them. “Like I said: One thing just led to another – and I liked
it when I did it.” As
well as now competing in the International Fight League, Aaron is also
manager for the Colene Clemens Vineyard in Newberg, Oregon. However, he
somehow manages to juggle both careers successfully. On
November 2, 2006, the Wolfpack team (coached by Matt Lindland) defeated
the Anacondas (coached by Bas Rutten), earning the Oregon-based Wolfpack
their place in the IFL World Team Championship Final. On
December 29 they will be locking horns with the Silverbacks (coached by
Pat Miletich) for what is expected to be a HUGE showdown at Mohegan Sun
Arena in Connecticut. And for this momentous clash Aaron says his side
is taking their preparation in their stride, just like any other team
outing. “I think it’s the same as it always is: We practiced as a team before the IFL formation, so that didn’t really change anything, and we always have guys getting ready to fight… One thing that’s nice is, because five of us are fighting on the same day, we can build towards that together as opposed to one guy having a fight one weekend, and two weeks from then another guy having a fight. It’s all together now - we can build and peak at the same time.”
So,
Aaron, there’s more momentum as a group? “Yeah;
instead of just trying to help other guys out, you’re still trying to
help each other, but you’re helping yourself as well, so there’s
this kind of energy, if you will.” Will you be sipping any Colene Clemens wine at Christmas or will you save that until after December 29th? “I’ll
save that till after.” Do
you still manage the Colene Clemens Vineyard or are you a fulltime IFL
athlete now? “Still
doing the vineyard, but at this time of year there’s not much going on
– it’s just a rainy mess in Oregon. We really don’t have much to
do until February or so.” What’s
it like having Matt Lindland as your coach? “It’s
good. We’re actually friends now, but I knew him when we were kids
because we wrestled at the same club, so we were kind of familiar… I
didn’t really get to know him all that well until I started to take
class. “He’s
a really good guy to have as a coach, mainly because he’s – this is
not a phrase I use too often – but he’s inspirational, because of
the way he fights, and his ability to be such a great competitor. He
obviously has athletic ability, though he competes at a level maybe
beyond his natural abilities. There are people out there who squander
their athletic ability, but he’s not naturally good at it: He works
really hard at what he does. And he doesn’t seem to have much
self-doubt, so that kinda transfers to other members of the team.” Could
you give a brief rundown of your bout against Alex Schoenauer please? “Yeah;
sometimes you make a game plan, and sometimes you stick to it better
than others. I went out there and I knew I didn’t want to just stand
and strike with him, because I don’t have much training as a striker.
I’m always working on that aspect of my game… But at first it seemed
like I would throw a couple of blows and take him down. However, I was
just repeatedly taking him down. “I
haven’t had the opportunity to watch that fight, but I pretty much
dominated him, I think, for most of the first round. And then I heard
the second warning go off and I thought I might go to an ankle lock. In
retrospect that was a bad idea – just because he was almost able to
get a foot lock of his own. “After
that I went back out with pretty much the same game plan – took him
down and he went for a guillotine choke. I was able to go over that,
bringing him into a front anaconda-type choke. I never did secure the
choke, but apparently I neck-cranked him enough so that it did some
damage to his ribs. “It
was very similar to a fight I had a couple of months earlier up in
Canada (against Marcus Hicks at NFC 6), where I got the same thing. I
assumed that the rib damage I’d done to the guy in Canada was from a
knee I’d thrown, then I realized after this that apparently by
cranking somebody’s neck it’s doing some sort of rib damage, so I
think I’ll stick with that in the future. I still don’t understand
the mechanics of it, but it works.” What
do you see as being Mike Ciesnolevicz’s strengths? “I
think he’s going to have fairly decent wrestling… I don’t say that
I know everything about him, but from what I’ve heard, he’s well
rounded. He’s got good striking and he’s good on the ground, with a
wrestling background. I don’t see any really outstanding weakness with
him – I’ve heard that he’s known for his guillotine chokes, so if
I do go for a takedown, I will have to be wary of that. I’m just
looking for him to be an overall well-rounded fighter from a really good
camp. It should be a good fight.”
[A
car toots its horn in the background] That
wasn’t somebody recognizing you, was it, Aaron? “No,
no, no… I haven’t had any sort of problems like that.” (Laughs) What
will be your strengths? “I
think my wrestling. I think my ground game is really good – especially
when I’m on top; I’m very strong: Sometimes I can just use pure
horsepower to take the fight where I want it to go, so my wrestling
skills are very good, and my striking’s getting better. If anything,
my striking can set up my wrestling. I’m starting to come on at a
number of different levels other than having a guy look at me and know
I’m going to try to take him down. That just makes their defense and
game plan much easier, so you have to have a number of different
threats: It makes everything more difficult for them.” Can
the Wolfpack win the IFL Final? “Well,
I hope so or else we wouldn’t… I wouldn’t say we wouldn’t go,
but just looking at the match-ups, there are a number of difficult
match-ups, so it’s not going to be easy, but as people say, nothing
easy is worth doing in most cases. But I think we definitely have the
ability to break it down – match by match. “
Like I said, there are a number of tough ones. But when I say
‘tough’, that’s not the euphemism for ‘not winnable’. I think
both teams have a lot, and it’s just going to be a matter of who comes
out there and executes their game plan and stays focused. Whichever team
does that better will come out with the win.” Who
are you tipping out of Carlos Newton and Renzo Gracie? “Boy,
I haven’t even thought about that one… I guess if I just had to…
I’ll go Carlos. For no real reason, that’s just off the top of my
head.” How
are you celebrating Thanksgiving? “Well,
I’m down here with my wife and we’re escaping, if anything – just
walking around and hanging out; getting some sunshine. It’s been
raining for I don’t know how long; I won’t say ‘miserable’,
because I grew up in Oregon and I love it, but…” Aaron,
is there anything you’d like to add? “I
think it’s going to be a good fight event and possibly our toughest,
when you break it down match by match. Even though they’ve all been
3-2 wins, I think this one will be exciting; there are a lot of good
match-ups, and I think it will be fun and exciting to watch. “The
thing we really love is having these last two fights in Portland: the
hometown crowd has really come out for us. It surprised me a little bit
because I didn’t know how much local support we would get. I knew a
certain group of people would be there for us, but for the first fight
we had around 5,500 people, and then the next one, we had 7,600 people
come, and that was a Thursday night. And most of them were supporting us
because we were local Wolfpackers. I can’t imagine how many we would
have had there if it had been on a Saturday.” Your
sponsors?
Aaron is currently available for sponsorship.
Aaron
Stark’s stats: Nickname:
Aaron MMA
record: 3-2-0 Division:
Light Heavyweight Stance:
Southpaw “I’m naturally right-handed but I fight southpaw.” Height:
6' 1" Date
of birth: 21 July, 1975 Birthplace:
Forest Grove, Oregon Home:
Portland, Oregon Team:
Wolfpack Coach:
Matt Lindland For
more on Aaron Stark: www.ifl.tv.
AARON
STARK Ready for a Corker of a Time
©
Marc Wickert photos
© IFL On
April 13, 2007, Matt Lindland’s Wolfpack will be squaring off against
Renzo Gracie’s Pitbulls in what is expected to be a top-shelf MMA
tournament. And light-heavyweight wolfpacker Aaron Stark is counting
down the days till he can get back in the IFL ring. “I’m
driving to Portland now. I’m on my way to Team Quest to do a team
practice there, and after that I’m going to go to another gym to train
with Daniel Krug. He’s a friend of mine who’s done a couple of
amateur fights, and he’s a larger guy, so we’ll do some rounds of
Vale Tudo,” says Stark. Last
time Aaron spoke to knucklepit.com, he and his wife, Tiffany,
were in Santa Barbara escaping the rain in Portland a few days before
Thanksgiving. Not much has changed since then, weather-wise. “It was
kinda nice the last few days and then it started raining again today.” Unfortunately,
the wet weather hasn’t befriended the wine-making season, which
normally starts picking up in February at the Colene Clemens Vineyard
where Aaron is an employee. “We’ve
been waiting for the vineyard to dry out. All the vines were picked last
year and we’re waiting to get our trellis system going for training
the vines up. That’s basically what we’re trying to do right now,
but it’s been too wet, so we’ll just sit around and wait. The
weatherman said it was going to rain the last few days, and we didn’t
trust him after that prediction. Then he said it was going to rain today
and it did, so we couldn’t get anything done.” Aaron
agrees if the weather forecasters got paid on performance, they’d
probably starve. “He was pretty proud of himself that the weather was
doing today what he said it would do yesterday,” laughs Stark. Aaron,
I believe Matt Lindland said after the Wolfpack-vs-Silverbacks event
that he was disappointed with your team not sticking to their game plan.
Did you stick to your game plan against Mike Ciesnolevicz? “I
did until about the third round when I got kicked in the head. I guess
you could say that kick took me out of my game plan.” Do
you think you could have changed the outcome of your fight at the time,
or did it just happen? “He
started throwing some kicks in the second round and I guess I could have
been a little more cautious or whatnot going into the third round. I’d
like to think if I had it over again the outcome would be different.” How
has your training been going since then? “I
took some time off because I had a back injury – that’s why I
didn’t fight on February 23, but that’s all better now and I’m
back on the trail. And I’m doing well, getting into the shape I want
to be and building on my skills. “Dennis
Hallman just started coming in: He’s one of our coaches now, so
we’re learning more about submissions from him. Starting yesterday,
he’s been coming down once a week and working submissions with us.
I’m really excited about that because he has a really good grappling
game, and it’s always great to add extra submission skills.” Who
have your main training partners been? “The
guys from the Wolfpack team and the Team Quest guys, which is pretty
much the same crew we’ve had for a while. We’ve got a lot of good
fighters, and I’m happy with the guys that we do have.” The
Pitbulls gave the Silverbacks a very good run for their money. Do you
expect them to come out hard the way they did against the Silverbacks,
when they take you guys on? “Yeah, definitely. We do with all the teams and we look forward to the good battles. If you know you are going to win, there’s no fun in that, so it’s good to have a challenging opponent. And I think there are some top match-ups – that’s why you fight the fight.”
It’s
just that the Silverbacks’ game plan was to come out hard and fast to
shock the Pitbulls. And apparently the Pitbulls’ strategy was the same
for that event, so when they came out, it was like bulls at a gate
rather than gradually settling into the fights. I was wondering if you
were expecting more of the same with it being full-on from the word go? “I’ve
watched a number of Jamal Patterson’s tapes, and that’s what I would
expect from him. That’s how I approach a fight, but I’m not sure if
it’s by choice or whether it’s just all the adrenalin pumping.” That
was going to be my next question: Do you know whether you’ll be
fighting Andre Gusmao or Jamal Patterson? But it sounds like you’ll be
locking horns with Jamal. “I
believe so, however anything can change. But it will be somebody.
(laughs) They’re not going to forfeit. And I watch tapes on different
opponents to see if there’s something here or there, but my overall
game plan is more or less the same all the time. “I
think Matt Lindland does a good job of game-planning for us, and I trust
his advice. I have the final decision when I go out there, but I do
trust him. So you go out there with a game plan, but there’s an
individual way that you fight. And it may be detrimental to get too far
away from what you normally do.” You
defeated Reese Andy and he defeated Jamal Patterson – do you find that
encouraging or do you just treat them as two completely different
opponents? “I’ve
watched that fight between Reese and Jamal, and it’s not a bad thing,
but at the same time, just because you beat somebody – to think that
it’s going to be easy, that would be ridiculous. It can be somewhat
encouraging, but it’s just a piece of the whole pie.” What
will your strengths be against Jamal? “Well,
I think he’s pretty well rounded – he’s got his jiu jitsu, he’s
got good striking… I guess he has some wrestling background, but I
have to think that my wrestling, overall, is stronger than his. I
don’t know if I can point to any one thing… I’m sure he’s strong
– he looks strong… I very rarely run into people I can’t match in
strength if not overpower them. But nothing really sticks out as a huge
hole in his game. I just think my complete package is better than his
complete package.” Are
you looking forward to bouncing back in a big way? “Yes,
definitely. I was happy to see Jon Krohn get his win: He’s a friend of
mine and a member of Team Quest. I had people call and indicate I
wouldn’t want him to win because he was my replacement. That’s just
ridiculous: I was happy to see him win, and I’m always happy to get
back in there. “When
I first hurt my back, and the fight started getting closer and closer, I
thought, ‘Oh, no.’ Then when it finally dawned on me that I
couldn’t fight, it bummed me off. Now it will be great to get back in
there.” Aaron,
is there anything you’d like to add? “Just
that I’m looking forward to getting back in there, and I hope we can
keep the fans that we have, get some more, put on a good show, and
hopefully push the IFL in the right direction so it continues to grow as
an organization.” The
numbers have definitely been picking up for the IFL. “Yeah,
and I think that’s a good thing. When I first heard about the IFL,
there were only four teams and that was kinda small. But it’s grown,
which is good. And they’re drawing from different parts of the country
and different parts of the world – new teams and new talent, and it
will just continue to grow.” Your
sponsors? “I’d
like to thank ChokFightgear.com.” Aaron’s
MMA record at time of this interview: 3-3.
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