Christian
Leroy Duncan’s walkout music was made by his late friend, Joel
Daniel Westcarr.
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Leroy Duncan is scheduled to face veteran Gregory
Rodrigues at UFC 304
in front of a home crowd in Manchester, England, on Saturday. In a “UFC Connected” video, Duncan was seen visiting the grave of Westcarr, who he refers
to as Zozo.
“Come to visit my friend Zozo. We’re here at his resting place,
which is a place that I always come to,” Duncan said. “He was a
very talented music artist. And we’d always say no matter which way
we go, we’re gonna see each other at the top.”
Tributes flood in for much loved Joel
Westcarr, 20, who was killed in a motorbike crash https://t.co/6Sv2wJ4biQ pic.twitter.com/4Nvw4BoihM— Daniel Chipperfield (@DanChipperfield)
April 4, 2016
Westcarr was a musician who passed away in a tragic motorbike accident on April 3,
2016 at the age of 20. Duncan, who had just started his amateur MMA
career back then, recalls reading about the accident, although no
details were mentioned. It was upon calling Westcarr’s elder
brother that Duncan learned that his best friend was dead.
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“I’m waking up in the morning and there was an article saying there
was a motorbike accident, somebody had been fairly injured,” Duncan
said. “There was no names, nothing in there. I rang his oldest
brother — we’re very close til today. He was kind of broked on the
phone and he just said, ‘He’s gone.’ I remember this whole feeling
come over me. I’ll never forget the words that we said that we’ll
see each other at the top and I stand by that every day [takes a
moment].”
However, Westcarr’s legacy lives on in Duncan’s usual walkout song,
”Fly Team.” Hearing the music in front of a home crowd
at the O2 Arena is his promotional debut at UFC 286 in March 2023
was a huge boost for Duncan.
“For my UFC debut, went to the O2 Arena, heard my friend Zozo’s
song over the speakers in front of thousands of people,” he said.
“That’s a big motivator. For me, he’s always with us. I’m
representing for him and his family. My good friend. That’s what I
always got.”
Duncan’s debut ended in a injury TKO win, with his opponent
Dusko
Todorovic blowing out his knee in the first round. While Duncan
suffered his lone career loss against Armen
Petrosyan in his sophomore UFC outing, the former Cage Warriors
middleweight champ has since bounced back with back-to-back
stoppage wins. The only time Duncan didn’t use the “Fly Team” track
during his UFC tenure was prior his TKO win over Denis
Tiuliulin in November 2023.