At age 26, UCF Heavyweight Champ Francis Ngannou sold his motorcycle and left his little village of Batie, Cameroon, to embark on an eighteen-month journey to France in pursuit of a career in boxing. After living homeless on the streets of Paris, he met Francis Carmont who introduced him to Fernand Lopez and the MMA factory, a mixed martial arts gym based in Paris. A fan of boxing heavyweight legend Mike Tyson, Ngannou was initially interested in learning how to box but Lopez saw his potential in mixed martial arts and convinced him to try MMA instead. Lopez gave Ngannou some MMA gear and allowed him to train and sleep at the gym for no cost thus starting Ngannou’s MMA career.
Only two years later, Ngannou made his UFC debut at UFC at Fox 17, against fellow newcomer Luis Henrique, winning the fight via knockout in the second round. At this stage, Ngannou claims that he had no idea of UFC or MMA rules – he was just there to seize an opportunity to fight in the United States.
Francis Ngannou was a natural, a huge heavyweight fighter who, thanks to his background working in a sand quarry in Batié at 10 years old due to lack of funds, could hit like a brick. This allowed him to score early-round knockouts and/or submissions in his first six UFC matches, culminating in the highest-profile fight of his career where Ngannou faced veteran Alistair Overeem at UFC 218 and scored a vicious first-round knockout which earned him his first title shot against the then longest reigning heavyweight champion Stipe Miocic.
This would be Francis’ first-ever five-round match, and his lack of experience in the octagon showed. He’d never fought past the third round before, and so the fatigue quickly caught up with him. And because a string of early-round knockouts meant he’d spent very little time in the octagon, the more experienced Miocic managed to outstrategize him by keeping the fight at the mat, wrestling ‘the predator’ to exhaustion, and winning the fight via unanimous decision.
This was the first actual loss that Ngannou had suffered in his short career, his first in the octagon, and one that would haunt him in his next fight against heavyweight legend Derrick Lewis. In that fight, it was evident that Francis had lost all the confidence he’d gained during his quick rise within the heavyweight ranks. He was hesitant to strike, which was quite a shame and disappointment for a fighter who had gained a reputation for being a brutal knockout artist. He overthought every move, afraid of running out of gas like he’d done in the Miocic fight and he was even surprised when the final bell rang.
In the aftermath of the match, Ngannou vowed to return a much better fighter and apologized to his fans and the UFC community. And true to his word, Francis worked on his skills and confidence and came back stronger than ever, scoring first-round knockout victories against Curtis Blaydes, Cain Velasquez, Junior dos Santos, and Jairzinho Rozenstruik on his well-deserved way to a rematch with the now two-time heavyweight champ, Stipe Miocic who had recaptured the title from veteran and Hall-of-Famer, Daniel Cormier.
This time around, Ngannou was ready. He showed such maturity and improvement from his first fight against Miocic, successfully defending a takedown attempt, something he’d failed dismally to do in their first fight, and finishing Miocic with a brutal second-round knockout to finally claim the heavyweight title and earning him a performance bonus. Francis Ngannou was officially a star, big enough to score a fight against one of the greatest boxers of all time, Tyson Fury. Big enough to score one of greatest boxers of all time, his idol Mike Tyson, as coach for the bout against Fury.
Francis Ngannou’s career in the MMA can be put into perspective in our daily lives because it reiterates a truth that is often easy to overlook. It is this: that we do not live in a vacuum and as such, we are always in competition with people in our personal and professional lives. For us to come up on top, we must constantly be willing to outimprove, outstrategize, outwork, and outlast our competition. This is the only way to stand out in a sea of eight billion human beings. Only the last man standing will come out on top. Coming up with new strategies to thrive and get things done will give us an edge over our competition. Finding ways to improve ourselves, to become better at our crafts, marriages, hobbies, business, etc. ensures long-lasting success, and further allows us to measure our personal progress, which is the most critical metric of all.
The alternative to outworking, out-improving, outstrategizing, and outlasting everyone is to fall off and eat the competition’s dust. Take the NBA player Ben Simmons for example. After being named a consensus first-team All-American and the USBWA national freshman of the year, he was selected with the first overall pick in the 2016 NBA draft by the Philadelphia 76ers. He was named the 2018 NBA Rookie of the Year, was selected three times to the NBA All-Star, and two times for the NBA All-defensive team.
This all came crashing down during the 2020-21 NBA season, where Simmons struggled at the free-throw line and became the worst free-throw shooter in the postseason. After losing to the Atlanta Hawks in game 7, Simmons came under heavy scrutiny for his inability to shoot the ball and lack of aggression on offense having failed to attempt a single shot in the last quarter of five out of the seven games.
After a rough patch with his team, with Simmons electing to stay on the bench instead of playing despite still getting paid millions as per his long-term contract, he was finally traded to the Brooklyn Nets where the disappointments and injuries continued to manifest in the few games that he played. Instead of working on his shooting game and physique, outworking, outstrategizing, out-improving, and outlasting his competition, Simmons was seen partying with celebrities or sitting courtside clad in the freshest clothes and flashing a golden smile.
During his 2022-2023 season with the Nets, Simmons posted career lows in minutes per game (26.3), points per game (6.9), rebounds per game (6.3) assists per game (6.1), and free-throw percentage (43.9) and ESPN described Simmons performance as a steep decline from his days as an All-Star. Perhaps Simmons will bounce back as Francis Ngannou did in the UFC, but for now, some may think that his career is as good as dead.
The moral of the story remains, that we must constantly take inventory of ourselves and identify areas in which we can outstrategise, outwork, outimprove and outlast the competition. We must not forget too, that we are always in competition with ourselves. We should aim to outdo our past efforts whenever we can. This is the only way to achieve guaranteed success in all things we do, because we do not live in a vacuum, and therefore cannot afford to ever think that we have reached our ceiling.