A Fighter's Heart

Since the initial publication of A Fighter-s Heart, Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) has exploded in popularity, landing on the cover of Sports Illustrated and The New York Times and prominently featured in other major media. A best seller in hardcover, Sam Sheridan-s thrilling, eye-opening first-person report on the world of MMA is set to reach an even larger audience in paperback.In 1999, after a series of adventurous jobs-working construction at the South Pole, ranching in Montana, fighting wildfires in New Mexico, and sailing private yachts around the world-Sam Sheridan found himself in Australia loaded with cash and intent on not working until he-d spent it all. He quit smoking and began working out at a local gym, where it slowly occurred to him that now, without distractions, he could finally indulge a long-dormant obsession: fighting.Within a year, Sheridan moved to Bangkok to train at the legendary Fairtex gym with the greatest fighter in muay Thai (Thai kickboxing) history. Driven by a desire to know what only a fighter can-about fear and violence, about the dark side of masculinity, and most of all about himself-he stepped through the ropes for a professional bout. That single fight wasn-t enough. Sheridan set out to test himself on an epic journey into how and why we fight. From small-town Iowa to the beaches of Rio, from the streets of Oakland to the arenas of Tokyo, he trained, traveled, and fought with Olympic boxers, Brazilian jiu-jitsu stars, and Ultimate Fighting champions. This is the chronicle of Sheridan-s quest, part insightful look at violence as a career and spectator sport, and part dizzying account of what it-s like to reach the peak of finely disciplined personal aggression-to hit and be hit.