Interview with the Champion

Mixed Martial Artist Keith Rockel 

By Damian Bonazzoli

Lancaster resident and mixed martial arts champion Keith Rockel is a two time Ultimate Fighting Championship contender, the reigning Hook n’ Shoot Pancrase champion, the reigning Ring of Fury middleweight champion, and has fought and trained in numerous other tournaments and other events from Japan to Rio de Janeiro to San Diego to Indiana to Florida to Detroit. He also is the founder of Massachusetts Submission Academy in Clinton, one of the most successful mixed martial arts academies on the east coast. He nonetheless finds time to be both a businessman (he owns and operates a successful electrical contracting firm) and a family man (he is married with two children and two stepchildren). Keith was kind enough to take time from his busy schedule to talk to us about both his path to success and his plans for the future.

Tell us about how you began your training.
KR: I started training in judo when I was 27, and I did that for about five or six years.

Why did you leave?
KR: A gentleman by the name of Jason DeLucia, who also had fought [in the Ultimate Fighting Championship], started training with our judo guys. The whole realm of fighting got under my skin; I wanted to learn more and more about it, so I started training with him on the side, and that steered me away from judo because I wanted to train in more realistic fighting ways.

How long after you left judo did you have your first competitive fight?
KR: A couple of years. I was only going to fight once; when I first did it, it was more for the experience, but I went out and fought a two and a half minute fight, and I just didn’t get enough. [Promoters] were calling me within three weeks after my fight, asking me to come back.

This first fight was part of a tournament?
KR: “Hook n’ Shoot” out of Indiana. I found a home out there, and went back about ten times.

You were about 33 or 34 years old. Did you ever worry you were past your athletic peak?
KR: No, I always went by how I felt, how I performed at the club, and to be honest, I felt better at 33 than I did at 23.
Tell me about your training regimen.
KR: For me, there’s two gears, the relaxed gear, where you’re coming in and your doing your work every night for a couple of hours, a little bit of sparring, a little bit of grappling, and then there’s fight gear, where you’re seven weeks from a fight, and you fall into a ritual. I do hill sprints, I do Mount Wachusett once a week, hard sparring twice a week, and all this escalates week after week. You go longer, you go harder, and you always try to beat your time for those seven weeks, so when the day of the fight comes ~ those three, five-minute rounds ~ you can basically sprint them.

And your trainers?
KR: I have two coaches, and I’ve been with them for about six years now. Doug Kalenda is my main sparring partner, and my conditioning coach, and Pat Barbieri is my main ground guy. He gives me all the knowledge I need, as far as strategy and technique.

When’s your next fight?
KR: April 22, in the “Combat Cagefighting” tournament in Revere.

What is the Massachusetts Submission Academy?
KR: I founded MSA in 1999 because I wanted a place where we could
do the more realistic training and fighting. Opening this place gave people an avenue for that. I want to emphasize that Matt Lee runs MSA more than I do now. He and I have trained forever; when I went to Jason DeLucia back in the day, Matt was already there.

Were you ever worried you wouldn’t find an audience?
KR: No. As long as I had two or three guys to work out with, I was happy.

How many athletes do you currently have?
KR: We have about fifty, and it’s a real mix. We have about twelve to fifteen fighters, about ten police or correctional officers, and about twenty-five hobbyists.

Any females?
KR: Yeah. My sister trains, and she’s getting pretty good, and we have others who come and go.

What would you tell someone who’s a little intimidated by your academy?
KR: Not to be. You’ve got to step through the door. It’s a great, full body workout, and it’s not like it is on TV. On TV, you see the hard-core fighting, but the training is all what you want to put into it. Some of the training is hard, but it’s not all hard-core. We use protective equipment, 16 ounce gloves, headgear, shinpads, cups, mouthpieces, and if you don’t want to go that hard, you don’t have to. No pressure. Everybody’s there for different reasons, and we realize that.

Ever kicked anybody out?
KR: Oh, yes. We expect everybody to be respectful down here, no egos; everybody’s on the same team. There have been a lot of guys coming here wanting to test themselves, and, ah, they’ve been excused.

What’s the most important attribute a fighter can have?
KR: Conditioning. If you get a guy that’s in great condition, and a skillful guy that’s not conditioned, you’ve got a fight, because unless that skill guy finishes things off first thing . . . well, things change once that skill guy gets tired.

The mainstream media has some major misconceptions about your sport and the people who are into it.
KR: Yes. But the only thing you can try to do is try to educate people. There are a lot of guys I know in this field who are very intellectual; most of the people they know would be surprised to find out they do this.

What’s your most rewarding MMA moment?
KR: A fight I had up in Lowell. My opponent was a Brazilian jiu-jutsu black belt, and it was a comeback. I was cut, I was bloody, they were probably ready to stop us, but it was for a belt. I won by TKO ~ the other guy couldn’t continue.

How big can you see mixed martial arts becoming?
KR: If [promoters] commit to it…well, every year it’s been a bigger draw. It can be huge.

More information about Massachusetts Submission Academy can be found at www.masssubmissionacademy.com. More information about Keith Rockel can be found at www.keithrockel.com