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Paulo Filho Finally Getting his Chance! Coming from the Brazilian Top Team and with wins over the likes of Yuki Kondo and Ikuhisa Minowa, Paulo Filho finally comes to PRIDE with some very good credentials, despite being only 23 years old. With very explosive takedowns and a dominant "Ground and Pound" game, Filho has also been training a lot of standing up fighting to improve his style and mark his name among PRIDE's top competitors. Paulao, like he is known by his teammates, knows the meaning of this opportunity for his career, and between him and his goal to establish himself in PRIDE's Middleweight division is non-other than Chute Boxe rising start Anderson Silva. The Brazilian Top Team member knows how dangerous Anderson can be, and if you add to the mix the currently well-commented Chute Boxe vs. Brazilian Top Team rivalry, you won't have to wonder a lot why many are considering this the best match on the PRIDE 21 card! On a quick conversation just two days before leaving for Japan, Paulo Filho shared with FCF his views on this fight and much more. Keep checking our news page to see what Anderson Silva has to say about the fight in the next couple of days, as FCF looks to heat us all up for PRIDE 21! FCF: You have been standing out for a long time, but only now you finally got your shot at PRIDE. Were you anxious for this chance? PF: PRIDE is a mega-event, and it's the biggest NHB event in the world in my opinion, so I believe it's every fighter's dream to participate at a PRIDE event, fighting with the stars of the event. This opportunity appeared and I have to confess that I'm enjoying it a lot, and I'll do everything I can to stay in the event, winning, and become one of PRIDE's great names as well. FCF: Coming from the Brazilian Top Team, you get to PRIDE with some great credentials. Besides that, you already beat some top Japanese fighters, like Ikuhisa Minowa and Yuki Kondo. How do you think the Japanese public is going to react towards you? PF: I'm already well known in Japan because I fought against some famous fighters from Japan, and I think that depending on my next fight things can improve or get worst for me there! (Laughs) Every time I fought in Japan, even beating Japanese fighters, I always got a good reception from the public, always talked to everybody, took pictures with the fans and stuff like that. So I think that my relation with the Japanese public is good, we don't have any problems, besides the Brazilian Top Team is very liked there, as is the Chute Boxe team too! The people in Japan are fans of the Chute Boxe team, so I think the public won't take sides on this fight and the result of the fight will be more important. FCF: You have been considered by the NHB press one of the best in your weight division for a considerable amount of time. Do you think about moving up in weight a bit to pursuit the Middleweight title in PRIDE? PF: My regular weight is 90 kg! And my division goes till 93kg! FCF: But you used to fight with less than 90kg... PF: Yeah, I already fought at 85kg. This was the lightest weight I manage to fight under. But it was tough! My ideal weight is around 89 or 90kg. I'll be weighting 90kg for this fight! FCF: Since you're weighing 90kg, and I know it's a bit too early to say, but how are you going to handle a title pursuit in PRIDE, with your friends Ricardo Arona and Rogerio Nogueira also fighting in the same division? PF: Ricardo is a very good friend of mine, but we're professionals. I would never fight him, he is a close friend, but I think we should handle it in the best possible way. But I don't have any intentions to fight him, Rogerio, anyone from the Brazilian Top Team or even anyone from Jiu Jitsu for that matter. I don't have this sort of problems. We will sit and talk, and if the opportunity appears the title will stay with the one who deserves it more! Apart from any belts, I think this is a personal issue and I have character, so I won't ever hinder my friends in any situations like this. FCF: By the way, is there anyone in special you would like to face in the future? PF: I have to tell you that I respect a lot the Chute Boxe team, they are all great professionals and great athletes, but I think they could be a bit more humble. I think that they became, with time and due to all the wins, a bit arrogant. So I think that facing any fighter from the Chute Boxe team fighter is a great challenge and a great incentive for me. No matter who it is, like Vanderlei Silva, Ninja or even Anderson Silva for instance. Whatever comes my way I think it's great. FCF: What about a fight against Sakuraba? You two are close in weight, and he beat a lot of Jiu Jitsu fighters in the past. Would you like to face him? PF: Without a doubt! I respect Sakuraba a lot! He is the best Japanese fighter in my opinion, and he is a very courageous guy, very respected! He would be a very tough fight for any fighter, and despite the fact that I'm explosive or strong, I believe it would be a great fight! Not only against me, but against any top level fighter, because Sakuraba is among the very best in the game! So it would be a great honor for me to face him! FCF: At PRIDE 21 you are going to face Anderson Silva, from the Chute Boxe team. What do you think about Anderson as a fighter? PF: He is a good person as far as I know. People say he is not an arrogant guy like Vanderlei or Pele. People say good things about him, like he is a very tranquil guy and stuff like that. I already watched some of his fights, he even fought Juan Carneiro, and I helped Juan in his preparation for that fight. We're always following the work of those who are doing well, and I think he is an excellent opponent. I don't know how much he is weighing, because he is reported to be gaining some weight to fight at the 90kg division. I respect him as an opponent and I wish him good luck, because we're on the same boat! Fighting to earn our money, and pay our bills. I think that every guy who steps in an NHB ring to fight deserves respect. FCF: Did his fight at the last MECA, against Brazilian Top Team member Juan Carneiro, served as an example for your preparation? PF: A lot! Juan was surprised by Anderson's jabs, and he was surprised with a position on the ground as well. So I'm also preparing based on the things I could see on his fight against Juan. Besides all the things I already knew about Anderson's game, I'm also preparing for those things he managed to do in his fight against Juan. Everything serves as a learning base, so I'm using everything! From Anderson's previous fights, to his fight against Juan, and I'm preparing my fight strategy based on all of that. FCF: So you're a fighter that likes to have a strategy planned before the fight? PF: Nowadays there's no such thing as a fighter stepping inside the ring to see what will happen during the fight. With the professional level the game is reaching, and even the monetary level the game is reaching, I think no one can enter a fight with that old mentality "It doesn't matter! I'm a brawler and I'm going to brawl! Let's see what happens!" I believe nowadays everybody knows something, everybody knows the ground game, everybody knows how to fight standing and everybody knows the takedowns. So, the better you know your opponent's game, the bigger are your chances to avoid any unpleasant surprises. FCF: The fact that he is a Chute Boxe fighter, and all that rivalry between the teams talk, motivates you even more for this fight? PF: I still wasn't able to get this rivalry thing to a personal level. I'm an athlete that already competes for several years. I competed a lot in Judo when I was a kid. I also competed a lot in Jiu Jitsu, as a matter of fact I train in Judo since I was 5 years old, so I'm already well used to competition! Therefore I don't use to let any personal issues come in to play. What motivates me is that they have a very strong team, and they are well-respected athletes! It's always good to fight against people that if you win you get even more respected. This is the only thing that motivates me more for this fight! The fact that he has a very high technical level, the fact that he belongs to a very strong team and that he is very respected. They're team is showing with their results that they're the best team in the world right now, and that's what motivates me. FCF: Anderson has a very technical Muay Thai, and you have been training a lot of Muay Thai lately with Luis. Can we also expect some surprises standing up in this fight? PF: It's like I told you, he knows some ground game and I know some stand up fighting as well now. People think that because you're a Jiu Jitsu fighter you don't know how to fight standing up, and it's not the case! I'm training a lot of Muay Thai with Artur Mariano, who is a Luis Alves student! He is a great guy and has been showing a lot of things for me! He is a very tough guy and even beat Vanderlei Silva once. He has been helping me a lot, and he's preparing me very well on the technical part of stand up fighting. So I think that if I make a mistake on the ground, or if he makes a mistake standing up some surprises can happen! FCF: You are a very explosive fighter, with a very strong ground game. Even though it's very tough to imagine what is going to happen in a fight, how do you believe your styles will clash and this fight is going to unfold? PF: Well, since I'm a ground fighter, my strategy, not only mine but any ground fighter's strategy, is to close the distance and do my Jiu Jitsu game. I happen to like to strike a lot in the ground. There are some fighters, like Murilo Bustamante or Minotauro, who likes to get the positions and lock some submissions on the ground. I consider myself a bit more aggressive. I like to strike from any place! From the mount, from inside the guard, or from the half-guard. I like to strike a lot! So I think my strategy would be like this, close the distance, to avoid his jabs and strikes, manage to take him down and from there on impose my game. It doesn't matter where I will land, on the guard, half-guard, or mounted. I will want to strike! This is my game. And if in the middle of all those strikes I can get an arm, or a neck or anything like it, I'll go for it! I'm prepared to fight for an hour if needed! It's a tough fight and I know I won't have an easy time there. I'm sure it will be one of the toughest fights of my life; even counting the ones I'll do in the future! FCF: How was your preparation for this fight? PF: This fight came in a bit suddenly! It was a fight that I wasn't really expecting. I was training very hard, very focused, but I wasn't expecting to fight in this PRIDE, I thought I would fight in the next one. Because of that I varied my training a lot. I didn't do any specific training to face Anderson. I was training a lot of things. I was training Muay Thai, I was training ground game, I was training wrestling, doing a lot of things. Each weekday I tried to do something different. I was doing my physical preparation every day, and was doing lots of different things in terms of technical training. On Monday I was doing Boxing, on Tuesday I was doing wrestling, on Wednesday I was doing Jiu Jitsu, and from then on. When I found out I was going to fight Anderson, I started to do some specific training. In the last ten days or so I was able to do some more specific preparation for Anderson Silva. But all that training I did previously, doing all those things, improved me a lot as a fighter. I ended up becoming more versatile. FCF: Was it tough to prepare without knowing for sure whether you were going to fight or not? PF: Without a doubt! But since PRIDE is the best event in the world, and the one who pays the fighters the most, with the best fighters in the world, I believe it may be a bit complicated for them to schedule the fights in advance. I also think that when you decide to become a NHB fighter, you can't get that worried with who you're going to face. As an NHB fighter, and since I like NHB a lot, I already know the aspects of every top fighter in my division's game. I'm very interested in the game, so I already know how Vanderlei fights, how Anderson fights, how Sakuraba fights. I already know most aspect of their games! So I don't need that much time to adapt. Of course the specific part of the preparation is very important, but if things needs to be that way, I don't see any problems! Because it goes both ways! This happens to me but it also happens to him. FCF: What are your plans for after this fight in PRIDE 21? PF: I expect to stay in PRIDE and show the world what I'm capable of doing. I expect them to put me against the best in the game, because a fighter's career is relatively short, so winning or losing I'm looking to be respected in the future for what I done, facing the toughest fighters. So I expect to stay in the event, facing the best and showcasing my skills to the world. FCF: Any final message for your fans? PF: I hope that they'll keep following NHB, because here in Brazil people give a lot of value to Soccer, and I would like to see people paying more attention to the combat sports, because Brazil is always producing great athletes and in my opinion is the best place in the world when it comes to fighting. I would like people to give the fighters their props more often, because it's a very tough life! What a Soccer player makes here in one month we don't make in a year, and our training routine is very tough, we have to give up on a lot of things in life in order to be a fighter. So it would be good if some companies, and even the fans could support the fighters, because fighters in general have a very tough life, and we are always making a lot of efforts to carry our country's name abroad. I hope people will give it more value, despite the results a fighter achieves. FCF: Good luck and thanks a lot! PF: Thanks a lot! |
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