Dwight Grant is a fighter that is always very honest. Whether it’s about the realities of fighting or what he really thinks about matchups.
His upcoming fight against Francisco Trinaldo sees Dwight Grant, a current welterweight and former middleweight, take on a former lightweight. Grant knows about fighting people while being undersized as he was the smaller man at middleweight.
He also found out weight classes were real when he took on Cain Velasquez in sparring. When asked who the strongest person he ever faced was, his answer was clear.
“Cain Velasquez for sure,” Dwight Grant told ClutchPoints in an exclusive interview. “A lot of guys fight at heavyweight but sometimes when people fight at heavyweight you be like ‘man, you can make 205.’ This dude- I remember the first time I sparred with him. I remember thinking to myself ‘oh he’s not that fast and he’s not that strong, I’m stronger than most people heavier than me.’ I remember hitting him with a body shot and my shoulder getting pushed back. I was like ‘oh snap!’ He threw one at me and I leaned out the way and it kind of grazed my chest and [I remember] being like ‘daaaang.’
“There’s definitely a difference here, not just in size but like ‘do I really want to swing with this guy for like another five minutes?’ I like to push the envelope a little bit within sparring and have fun but then it’s like ‘this is kind of dangerous!’ I sparred with him a couple of times. He’s always been very gracious with his time. I think that’s the first time I realized that like ‘weight classes actually matter.’ It actually makes a difference. There’s no way he can ever make 205. He just felt so solid. There was no give. That’s interesting.”
Dwight Grant felt the power of Cain Velasquez in different disciplines. He even acknowledges that the former UFC heavyweight champion took it easy on him.
The welterweight thought he would have the speed advantage considering he was the smaller man. That turned out to be nullified by Velasquez too.
“Grappling and wrestling and stuff like that, he’s fast, and then the striking, he was on point,” Grant said. “Obviously, he took it easier on me too. At that point, it was at his mercy. The thing that was interesting about it was the speed advantage I thought I would have, it wasn’t really there and part of it was because of conditioning and timing. A lot of factors go into it. Personally, for me, growing up I used to watch Boxing and I would ask my uncle, grandfather ‘why are they punching so slow, we were watching these guys before and they were going fast, these guys are going slow.’ Part of it is size but also because they don’t have to. They understand positioning and speed and they’re like ‘I don’t gotta hurry up right here, I’m not in a position where I have to make a big move, it’ll come when it comes.’ Learning that now, especially dealing with different weight classes and different sparring situations is a big factor.”
Dwight Grant is currently set to compete against Francisco Trinaldo at UFC Vegas 41 on October 23. He will be looking to start a winning streak and move up in the division.
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