UFC 154's Georges St-Pierre says he was distracted by Cindy Crawford in the crowd during B.J. Penn fight

By: Jamie Penick, MMATorch Editor-in-Chief

"One time I was fighting against B.J. Penn. I had his back against the fence. I'm not kidding you, for a few seconds I look and I was staring at a beautiful woman in the audience. It was ... uh ... (snaps fingers) Cindy Crawford. I stared at her. I'm thinking, 'My God, she's so beautiful. And she's looking at me.' And just next to her, I see her husband looking at me and I'm like, 'Oh my God. I can't look at her. Her husband's looking at me.' Now I'm thinking, 'Of course, they're looking at me. I'm doing the show right now and I'm in the middle of the fight.' So I'm like, 'Go back to your focus' (laughs).

Sometimes when you fight, people don't understand - you have to fight to really understand it - time comes slow. All these thoughts come in your mind in maybe one second, but all these thoughts cross your mind in that one second. Then you go back to normal speed. It's kind of weird.

In Rocky, he has the slowdown - baaang, when he gets punched. This thing really happened. In a fight, the way it is, it's very special. When you're in a very stressful moment, like a surviving mode, stuff like that happens. It's crazy. People don't really believe it but it's actually true. You can ask any other fighter. It does happen."

-Georges St-Pierre talks to Dave Deibert of PostMedia News about one time in his career where he got massively distracted in a fight.

Penick's Analysis: That's quite the interesting anecdote from the long reigning champion. It's not often you get a look into what a fighter's mindset is like on fight night, and of all the fights to find his mind wandering like that, having it be the B.J. Penn fight is crazy. Obviously, it's hard to put yourself into that spot if you've never experienced it, but there are times when things seem to slow down in life, and your thoughts can race in a very short span of time. For him, that entire distracting sequence could have been in a two-second portion of the fight, but it may have seemed like more. Regardless, very interesting quote from St-Pierre.

[GSP art by Travis Beaven © MMATorch.com]

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Source: http://www.mmatorch.com/artman2/publish/UFC_2/article_15015.shtml

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