The Michigan State MMA club meets in the basement of IM West, a location that’s reachable by going down a stairwell only easily visible to those who know it’s there, into a dark room with a long, red floor.
It’s here that club president Julio Garcia spends hours a week leading the more than 50 members through training sessions. Garcia, now a senior, has been coming down those stairs since his freshman year. It’s his favorite place at Michigan State, and the other MMA club members are some of his favorite people.
“This feels like home in here, absolutely. I get schoolwork done down here. I spend time down here whenever, even when we don't have official practices, I'll be down here,” he said.
He sees it as his job to not only instruct the club members, who range from beginners to amateur fighters, but to keep up the friendly atmosphere and open door policy set long before him.
“At the end of every practice, we go in to open mat for however long people are willing to stay. Sometimes we go until the very last person is out. But after every practice, we have free time for folks to basically work on whatever they want,” Garcia said.
That same kindness was shown to now graduate student Normand Xavier in his first semester. He came to East Lansing in 2019 from Jakarta, Indonesia, and still remembers walking into his first MMA session that semester.
“I felt welcome. If I felt like I knew the environment, it felt the same environment as the MMA gym that I have back home. even though nobody had ever been there,” Xavier said.
He didn’t know anyone in the country when he first came down those IM West stairs, but his years of MMA experience in Indonesia drew him there. He isn’t the only one that found that IM West stairwell welcoming on a new campus.
“I think a lot of international students go here, because, most likely they did martial arts back home as well. But I think it also resonated that this community is friendly and very special and respectful. That's why it's easy for the international community to blend in as well,” Xavier said.
International students make up a significant portion of the club with the sport’s popularity in Asia and Europe.
Seun Yoo came to MSU after going to high school in Hong Kong. He was also looking for community when he found the club, where he and Jordan Meriweather became friends. Almost three years after joining, they decided to take the next step in their training.
They both signed up for the Mitten Muay Thai event in Clinton Township, Michigan last fall. Only Merriweather got matched with an opponent and scheduled a fight for the bout in February, so Yoo decided to turn his training to Merriweather.
“In this club, you train with the same people constantly, you get used to them over a couple of years. You want to see the best results for them. If someone comes out and competes, we're all really happy for that person,” Yoo said.
He became Merriweather’s striking coach for the fight, training with him in that basement an extra few days a week, on top of the MMA club meetings. They became closer through the training, and it wasn’t all lost for Yoo in his new coaching role.
“When I didn't get a fight, interestingly, I wasn't really disappointed. I was just kind of more like, okay, so I can go and have Dave chicken now, you know, and make this guy work his ass off,” Yoo said.
Merriweather worked hard for months leading up to the fight, in all aspects of his life.
“When I was training for the fight, I was going like five times a week. It actually got me more locked in on school and everything, because I had to focus on a fight. So I had to eat right. I had to make sure my diet was right. Being locked in for the fight actually helped me lock in the school,” Merriweather said.
He fought in the bout on February 22, against another amateur, Cody Tapp. In the second round, Merriweather landed a KO spinning elbow on Tapp, winning him the fight. That elbow came out of nowhere, even for Merriweather.
“I've never trained elbows, because I don't even have elbow pads. I never trained elbows before the fight. But it was actually the last thing me and my coach practiced before walking out,” Merriewather said. “I ended up throwing it a lot in the fight, and it landed clean. It's like, the best way a debut fight could have gone, 100%.”
Merriweather, Yoo and a few other MMA club members will be looking for amateur fights again, knowing they have a support system and training team in the IM West basement. This is how Garcia knows he is doing his job as president. One community, all wanting to help one another in the sport, whatever it takes.
“It’s respect and everybody trying to learn. I think the people who're in charge of the community are the ones that create the environment. So if they focus on learning from each other – learning and being respectful, I think that's how we develop as a community,” Garcia said.