Life as a homebody just didn’t sit well with BJ Penn. Despite living in a Hawaiian paradise retirees would love to retreat to when their working days were done, at 33, the former two-division UFC champion still had some fight left in him.
“I was just hanging out, and being in the gym is better than sitting on the couch,”he laughed.
“It’s kinda like I’m more afraid not to fight than to fight. I didn’t know what to do, I was just sitting around. This (fighting) is all I’ve been doing the last 12 years, I might as well do it again.”So he’s back for the first time since his October 2011 loss to Nick Diaz in Las Vegas, taking on rising star Rory MacDonald on this Saturday’s UFC on FOX card in Seattle, and truth be told, few believed that his post-Diaz retirement was going to stick. It just wasn’t the way you would expect Penn to leave the sport, and remembering that his previous two performances were a one round knockout of Matt Hughes and a three round draw with Jon Fitch, there was still work to be done for someone who has been doing this for much of his adult life, even if he can’t pinpoint why.
“It does surprise me that somebody would want to keep doing it after a long time, but there’s nothing else like it,”said Penn.
“There’s nothing like walking to the ring and fighting someone else who’s just as prepared as you are. Not many things will get you as excited after you do that a couple times. Everything else is boring.”[See original news feed here]
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