Jonathan Meunier was withdrawn from the June card in Singapore that he got the call to the Octagon. And while there wasn’t a lot of time to sit back and smell the roses, Camacho did try to embrace all that he could before his debut.“I remember getting on the plane, on my way to Singapore, and I was talking to my coach, saying, ‘We’re on our way to a UFC,’” he said. “The whole week I was scrambling to medicals and doing paperwork and the next thing you know, we’re on a flight, then we’re weighing in and then walking down to the cage. I remember watching the fight again and I was walking to the cage and really just embracing it. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the win but if there’s one thing I did do, it was have a lot of fun. I enjoyed it.”
Going three hard rounds with a dangerous opponent like Li, who did a number on Camacho’s legs, may sound like an odd way to have fun, and “Frank the Crank” is probably in for another grueling battle this weekend in Sydney against Damien Brown. But as he explains, fighting past your limits and through adversity is what makes this all worth it for him.
“For me as a martial artist, I love adversity, I love getting pushed to that limit, and I love those battles where you have to dig down and you have to get up when you can’t get up.”
So is “Beatdown” Brown going to give him a fight like that? Camacho hopes so.
“When I got the call from my manager, asking if I wanted to take the fight with Brown, I said, ‘Where do I sign?’” he laughs. “Stylistically, it’s a matchup that I personally like, and I think it’s going to turn into something that the fans will enjoy. I’ve been through my wars, Brown’s been through his wars, but once the leather starts flying, you never know what’s really gonna happen. It’s a fight, and I’m super stoked to share the cage with Damien.”
And if he gets another bonus, the avid golfer may just buy a new set of clubs, something he didn’t do after his June bout, which saw him instead pick up some camera gear.
“I’m such a nerd when it comes to that stuff,” he laughs, and his enthusiasm for the stuff that most of his peers dread on fight week hasn’t waned either. Given his personality, it probably never will.
“I visualized myself signing those posters on arrival,” Camacho said of his first UFC fight week. “And it was so funny because when I started signing, the first one took so long, and I had to find my groove because there was a huge stack to get through. And the whole weigh-in process and the fight, I always visualized that. I feel that it’s going to be getting better and better, and I’m super excited for the future.”
