While Kai Kamaka
III hasn’t had the worst of it, the Hawaiian has seen the
Professional Fighters League season format take a toll on
fellow fighters.
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Kamaka headlines
PFL 9 opposite Brendan
Loughnane in a featherweight semifinal on Aug. 23 at The Anthem
in Washington, D.C. It will mark Kamaka’s third outing within a
span of four months, a campaign that began with back-to-back
decision wins to advance to the PFL postseason.
“The Fighting Hawaiian” says his gym,
Xtreme Couture, which has built a reputation for preparing
fighters for short-notice outings, has been of help while fighting
so frequently in the PFL season format. However, Kamaka has also
seen the format take on toll on others like his teammate, PFL light
heavyweight Sadibou Sy.
Kamaka revealed that the Swede, who dislocated his thumb in a freak
injury loss to Joshua
Silveira to start off the 2024 season, has been “banged up” all
season. However, “The Swedish Denzel “has since bounced back with a
TKO win Andrew
Sanchez this past June.
“The team right now has helped me a lot getting ready for this
fight. There’s a few guys in different weight classes that have
been through this process,” Kamaka III said during a recent PFL
media call. “We have Sadibou [Sy], his locker is right next to
mine. You got couple of featherweights that have done the
tournament. But they only can give you so much. I see where it can
be rough on some guys, the tournament. I’ve seen [Sy] was banged up
all season. He barely had a full camp with his hand. So I see where
it can be rough on the body. Luckily this fight is the healthiest
I’ve been all season.”
Xtreme Couture is home to a plethora of talent from all over the
world, which means it has fighters competing all over throughout
the year. And Kamaka is setting an example of stepping up for his
teammates. While the 29-year-old hasn’t burned out, he has
experienced a hectic year so far, traveling all around to corner
his teammates. With Kamaka’s schedule, he notes that his family are
also the ones making sacrifices.
“This whole year has been crazy as far as sacrifices just for
myself, coming from my family,” he said. “Since the beginning of
the year, I was cornering Dan Ige in
February against Andre Fili; I
hopped on a flight to go to Hawaii for two weeks; then headed to
Saudi Arabia to corner Ray [Cooper III] and then a few weeks later,
I corner Jeremy
Kennedy in Belfast. And then boom, four weeks later I was
fighting Bubba
Jenkins.
“So this whole year I’ve been making a lot of sacrifices for
myself. For my family. My family is making sacrifices. And then
past five months I’ve been fighting back-to-back and now going to
the third fight. It’s taking – not a toll – but this year has been
crazy one for my family.”