UFC 131 – Demian Maia happy to be on his back against Mark Munoz, training all aspects of his game

UFC middleweight submission wizard, Demian Maia has been giving his thoughts on his upcoming fight with Mark Munoz next month on the UFC 131 card in Vancouver, Canada, explaining he wouldn’t be disappointed to end up on his back at some point during this one.
Speaking via Tatame Magazine Maia said:

“With me, he’ll only have two options: or he’ll want to strike, or, in case he wants to take me down, he’ll use his ground and pound game, like he always does. I can’t possibly know what he’ll decide to do, it’s up to him. I have to train and be prepared for anything.

“I’m always cool fighting form the bottom. I’ve been training it, I do Jiu-Jitsu for many years and the only difference is that in Jiu-Jitsu you don’t have to train the guard to prevent you from being punched right in the face when you have your back against the floor.”

“I always train the stand-up game, Jiu-Jitsu and takedowns, so it’s not any different now. I went to the United States a few times, like I did a little while ago when I went there to train Wrestling, specifically the take downs part, but I’m always training Wrestling, because I believe Wrestling is a part of Jiu-Jitsu, so what I do is train Jiu-Jitsu and also train the takedowns, because without it I can’t bring my opponent to my game, which is the ground game.”

Maia was last seen in action back in December when he out-pointed “Ultimate Fighter” season three winner, Kendall Grove on the season twelve finale of the reality show. Prior to that he’d scored a unanimous decision win over then promotional newcomer, Mario Miranda.