Caio
Borralho has received some valuable advice from Sean
Strickland heading into the first
Ultimate Fighting Championship main event of his career.
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Borralho will headline UFC
on ESPN 62 opposite veteran middleweight contender Jared
Cannonier on Aug. 24 at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. Originally a
part of
The Fighting Nerds team in Brazil, Borralho is training at
Xtreme Couture in Las Vegas for his upcoming bout.
Borralho has the added guidance of one of the biggest names in the
gym, Strickland, who has previously faced Cannonier. Strickland
suffered a razor-thin split decision loss against “The Killa
Gorilla” in a UFC Fight Night headliner in December 2022.
Drawing from that loss, Strickland has advised Borralho to put
together a corner who can scream loud. Strickland seemingly
believes that while he landed the more effective punches on
Cannonier, it was the consistent applause from his opponent’s
corner that swayed the judges scorecards.
“The best advice that Sean gave me is, you need to have a good
corner that screams a lot,” Borralho recently told The Schmo. “Because in their fight, he punched a lot,
Strickland. But other [Cannonier’s] punches were slippery and his
corner was always screaming like, ‘Good one, good one.’ So maybe it
got the judges the wrong way. So I’m just gonna make sure I’m gonna
have a good corner and just go there, pick my shots and keep my
distance, do my game. I know I’m skilled enough to beat him. So I’m
just gonna go there and do what I do best, win fights.”
Borralho has also gained valuable experience training against
Strickland, who is known for his relentlessly hard sparring. In
addition to sparring, “The Natural” hails Strickland as a great
teammate who has now taken up a leadership role at Xtreme Couture.
Strickland is even known to clean the mats after practice.
“Great experience, you know,” Borralho said. “Everybody know Sean,
how hard he spars, how he push his friends in the gym. Actually,
he’s a very good friend in the gym, he push you up all the time. So
I think it’s always a good sparring when you challenge yourself
against one of the best guys in the world… [Strickland cleaning the
mats after practice] is the example of a champion. He’s a true
leader in Xtreme Couture. He’s always screaming with everybody,
pushing the guys, he’s a good guy, I like him.”