Hercules goes zero to MMA hero

Henry “Hercules” Fadipe, an MMA fighter from the Fantom club in the north inner city and a coach at TU Dublin, became an champion earlier this month by defeating John Redmond at Cage Legacy 17. 

The middleweight bout between the two Irish MMA stars was held at the Pillo Hotel in Ashbourne, Co. Meath, and headlined the main event for the evening of October 1st.

Initially, John Redmond was due to fight Straight Blast Gym’s Richard Kiely. Unfortunately, an injury meant that Kiely was out of the fight, and Fadipe was chosen as the replacement to compete for the middleweight belt. 

Fadipe accepted the fight on two days’ notice after winning his last bout in a Polish organisation — MMA Attack — by technical knockout (TKO) over Poland’s Lukasz Stanek. 

“Yeah, I took the fight on two days’ notice. I had only trained two weeks prior for the fight in Poland as I injured my ribs,” said Fadipe. 

Both fighters have previously competed against each other twice, with both of those victories coming from Fadipe. 

“I’ve fought with injuries before, and I know my body goes into autopilot, so I wasn’t too worried about the fight,” he added.

The Nigerian-born fighter dominated the majority of the first round, attacking Redmond with vicious leg kicks and straight counters. The fight was stopped during the second round when Fadipe caught Redmond with a straight jab followed by an uppercut, causing Redmond to fall back onto the canvas, where Fadipe inevitably finished the fight by ‘ground and pound.’

“It was awesome! I’m prouder at the fact that I did two fights back-to-back than I am about winning the title.

“I’ve got three more offers on the table before the end of the year, but I’m recovering, so my manager and I will look to play it smart. From next year onwards, it’s more takeover.”

Vladimir Stanca, another fighter out of Fantom, also became a Cage Legacy super featherweight champion after a victory against Alex Josan of Full Power Gym, making it a successful night for team Fantom. 

“It was awesome! I’m prouder at the fact that I did two fights back-to-back than I am about winning the title.” 

Henry fadipe

Fadipe is very involved in teaching mixed martial arts to the students of TU Dublin and is looked at as a role model by many of those students.

“I try not to think about people watching me during the fight because it creates more unnecessary pressure for me. But after the fight, it all pours in, and the feeling is out of this world,” said Fadipe.