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By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief
During Tuesday's media conference call for next week's UFC on Fox 5 event, welterweight Rory MacDonald was asked about whether or not Tri-Star teammate Georges St-Pierre had assisted him in preparing for B.J. Penn. After all, St-Pierre had fought and defeated Penn twice, and it seemed like he could have been of some assistance to MacDonald in camp.
However, the 23-year-old said on Tuesday he didn't seek St-Pierre's assistance, and he sounded annoyed that the name was even brought up.
"I didn't really ask him anything," MacDonald commented. "I watched [their fight]. I'm not the kind of guy that wants to know everything about somebody, I really don't care. For all I know B.J. could have completely changed his training. Maybe he's a Muay Thai fighter now, who knows. I don't really care. I just get better as a fighter, as a martial artist. I really don't care about the past."
What MacDonald is doing is being smarter about his training. After suffering a bad cut in camp that delayed this fight with Penn from September to December, MacDonald commented that he's focused on being healthy and ready to fight at any time moving forward.
"[I'm working on] being more smart with my training," MacDonald said. "When I feel like I'm breaking down a little bit, I take a day off. Or if I'm not up for sparring I'll go swimming instead. If I'm healthy I can fight on a minute's notice. I just need to be healthy."
Penick's Analysis: The tone in which MacDonald responded to the GSP question, more than the content of his answer itself, left the feeling that he's really trying to distance himself a bit from St-Pierre. There's definitely a possibility that he could be in title contention in short order, and he may be of the mind to fight St-Pierre. Separating himself as much as possible from St-Pierre will make putting that fight together a much easier prospect than were the two really close to one another.
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Jamie Penick, editor-in-chief
(mmatorcheditor@gmail.com)
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