Ryan Driskill sat down with FightBook MMA ahead of his fight at CFC 9

Murfreesboro, Tennessee: Johnathan Ivey’s Cage Fighting Championships 9: The Return will take place on Saturday, March 6, 2021, at Middle Tennessee Expo in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

Ryan Driskill is a experienced veteran of MMA. Fighting all around the Kentucky and Tennessee areas. March 6th he returns to action after a long layoff to take on Claudiu Maniu in Murfreesboro Tennessee at CFC 9. Ryan was available to talk to CEO of FightBook MMA Roberto Villa about his upcoming fight and more.

Roberto: Ryan thank you for taking the time to talk with us so close to your fight March 6th. How has your preparation been going for this fight?

Ryan: No problem. We’ll I only found out about it three weeks out and the whole first week was that snow storm so pretty much all the Gyms around here were closed down. Other than that its going good training at a few different Gyms.

Roberto: You are very experienced in MMA. You even fought on CFC 1 back in 2017 where you scored a submission win. What got you originally interested in MMA?

Ryan: I had gotten into more than a handful of fights while growing up and when I was like 14 I started getting into a lot of fights at school or after school stuff like that. But I’d never even heard of MMA or watched UFC or anything of the sort. Then one day I was watching TV with my mom and she flipped the channel and they were rerunning the Forest Griffin vs Stephan Bonnar fight. I immediately said that I wanna do this. It was about a year after that I found my first training partner who introduced me to my coach. After training for maybe 2 months I had my first fight in the cage. Fought 2 times my first night out and have been in love with the sport ever since.

Roberto: Your last fight was actually at CFC 3 where you suffered a defeat to CFC standout Najee Blackwell. Why the long layoff in between that fight and this one?

Ryan: There wasn’t really one big reason just a bunch of little stuff adding up and I just had to move my focus away from competition for a while. I still always trained as much as I could but competing just wasn’t even on my mind for probably two years. I wanted to get back in last year but then we had the pandemic that just shut most promotions down.

Roberto: On Match 6th at CFC 9 your returning to the sport to take on debuting fighter Claudiu Maniu. Do you think this fight will come down to you being so experienced? You have fought in front of a audience before, you have had to push through bad things happening to you during a fight, you have learned little tricks in the cage just from the amount of experience you have. Maniu doesn’t know any of that yet. Nomatter how much he has trained he doesn’t know those things that take cage experience to understand. Will your experience be the deciding factor on March 6th?

Ryan: I mean its definitely A factor at this point having so many fights. I know how to remain calm under the pressure. That being said my opponent got a win in a kickboxing match back in November by decision so he’s at least had one experience of going out there and having to keep pushing himself. The way I see it, whoever your opponent is, is automatically the most dangerous person in the world to you. They are the only one actively intending to do you harm… Hopefully (laughs).

Roberto: Professional fighter Johnathan Ivey raves about how crafty you are on the ground. About how you go about setting up submissions from underneath and even when you’re on top of a opponent. Do you plan on getting Maniu to the ground at some point during your fight?

Ryan: Everyone always asks if I plan to take my opponents down or get it to the ground but I love stand up just as much. Normally if im going for a takedown its just because we clinched up somewhere and its just instinct to from there. But its MMA I’m ready for it to go wherever it goes.

Roberto: Thank you so much for talking with us Ryan. Do you have anyone you would like to thank or give a shout out to before we close out this interview?

Ryan: Thank you for having me and yes. I want to thank my girlfriend Taleisha for literally being my best friend and always supporting and encouraging me to go train or fight or whatever the case may be. I wanna thank The Leg Lock Monster for having me back on. Im just really excited to be getting back in there. It feels like I’ve been away from home for so long I’M GLAD ITS FIGHT WEEK!!!

Roberto Villa

Roberto Villa is the CEO, Founder, Executive Writer, Senior Editor of FightBook MMA. Has a passion for Combat Sports and also a podcast host for Sitting Ringside. He’s also a former MMA fighter and Kickboxer.