Recently, I had a chance to sit down with Amanda Buckner, former Ring of Fire Lightweight champion, the former Smack Girl Open weight Champion, Abu Dhabi competitor and considered by many to be one of the top female fighters at 135 lbs. Recently she traveled half way around the world to fight on the Ring of Fire card only to go home unscaved.


BH: How is training?

AB: Training has been rough as of late. Starting in the beginning of December and lasting until last week I've had a string of things that have kept me pretty much out of commission, everything from injuries to some personal issues. I'm getting back on track now though so that feels good.


BH: How is the gym?

AB: The gym is going great. We're just opening a second location so things have been crazy. Opening and running this gym has been one of the most rewarding, challenging, and scary things I've ever done. Learning to run a business when you started out not knowing anything about that process is just a crazy experience.


BH: You were scheduled to fight Ginele Marquez , at Ring of Fire in the Philippines on Decembember 9th, 2007, How was the training camp for that fight?

AB: Training for that fight was stressful because I had pretty short notice. I had about two weeks of solid training. I felt good about my conditioning but it took a lot out of me since everything had to be very intense to make up for the lack of time. To make matters worse I averaged 1200 calories a day during this time to get my weight down to where I could make 135. It is not a process I care to repeat any time soon.


BH: Yeah, I think I get more than that in my breakfast at McDonalds. Now you have a win over Ginele back in 2003, did this play a factor in your training for this up coming bout?

AB: No. Ginele is a well rounded fighter. She doesn't have any one area that she is so good at that you really need to prepare to defend that one thing at the expense of everything else. I was able to watch some more recent footage of her and she looked like I thought she would. I just trained to be able to take the fight to where I thought I would have the best chance of winning.


BH: So you arrive in the Philippines, but the fight never happened, why?

AB: Well, it's a pretty long and convoluted story. What it boils down to is that Ginelle and her team had agreed to a weight of 130lbs, I had a agreed to a weight of 135lbs. We both had contracts that supported our side. I cut the most weight that I could, getting down lower than I had ever gotten, and made 134 (with shorts and sports bra). This wasn't low enough for them to be comfortable doing the fight so it didn't happen. The promotion made a mistake and everyone involved, including the show, ended up paying for it. That's the short version. Of course there was a lot of other behind the scenes stuff that was really crappy and infuriating to me. It's hard for me to not go into a whole rant about it but that wouldn't serve much of a purpose so I'm not going to. I used to think there was nothing worse than a long plane ride home after a loss but I was wrong, this plane ride was by far the worst.


BH: Would you fight for that promotion again?

AB: I'm scheduled to fight for them in April for their next event. I went more in depth about the whole situation on the blog I kept during that time so I had a few people that were surprised that I would fight for them again. The thing people have to realize is that things are not the same for women as they are for men. There are not unlimited options and the options for fighting on shows that are somewhat bigger are few and far between. My main goal when I fight is to move the women’s fighting scene foreword. If a show provides me the opportunity to do that by having TV or internet coverage than that weighs heavily in my decision about fighting for them. Of course any fight is great but in order to have any kind of significant impact people have to see the upper level women fight. In a perfect world I would never have anything but great experiences with every promotion but that's just not reality. There's a lot more at stake than just myself and my own career and as a female that fights I have to take that into consideration. Of course there are ways that I could be treated that would be unacceptable no matter how big the promotion is or how much they are paying me. In the end the Ring of Fire did the right thing by saying that I had done nothing wrong and by paying me most of what I was supposed to get. I'm willing to give the whole thing another shot.


BH: Ok, putting that aside in speaking to other female fighters they say your technique is one of the best if not the best in the female fight world, what's your secret?

AB: I'm flattered that anyone thinks that but honestly I spend most days overwhelmed by how much I still have to learn. I'd say if there is a secret to the technique I've been able to develop it's that from day one I had a coach (Jay Jack) that treated me like a fighter and not a female fighter. The standards that were set for me were always geared to making me a great fighter and not a great female fighter. I'd say that's the biggest thing. This is very hard to find in a coach and team. Most people treat female fighters differently, even if they don't mean to and don't realize they're doing it. I can't tell you how many times I've heard someone raving about how good some girl is and when I watch tape or see the girl in person I'm thinking to myself "What the hell is he talking about". That may sound harsh but it's true. A lot of people have such low expectations of what women are capable of that if they see a girl throw a few punches without falling over they think it's the best thing since sliced bread. I feel fortunate that I was looked at as an athlete from day one. Women are capable of becoming great fighters if they have the motivation and are surrounded by people that see them as fighters and not female fighters.


BH: With other female fighters starting to come out with instructional DVD's on MMA and grappling what's your thought, would you ever do a DVD?

AB: I have a couple of projects in the works that I think will turn out pretty cool.


BH: Also looking at some of your workouts online, they are slightly different from other gyms, who designs your workouts?

AB: I design my own training, with help on parts of it from Stan Skolfield (former trainer for the Red Sox) and input from my coach.


BH: