(Mirko was known for being a lightweight when it came to partying. Two Ambiens and a Zima and he was dead to the world until 3pm the next day.)

Nokaut was on hand at Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic’s gym during one of the Croation fighter’s  recent training sessions ahead of his UFC 115 showdown with leg-kick punisher Pat Barry. Apparently the biggest change he has made to his regimen, which he believes will do the most to revive the PRIDE version of himself, is doing the brunt of his training earlier in the morning.

"As the clock had turned 9 AM a non-talking sign was turned on, and Cro Cop begun his regular morning session.

The first big novelty is that Cro Cop does the most of the work in the morning, which is almost an entirely new concept for him. He used to work more on his cardio and power in the mornings, while the remaining daily session was focused on punching, kicking, ground work and other specific MMA elements. Now with Ivan Hyppolite of Netherlands, a former thai-boxing world champion, Mirko experiences big novelties in his trainings, starting with an early morning sessions packed with lots of punching and kicking, wrestling and more."

Sure, Mirko. That’s all it’s going to take. That’s how GSP came back from his loss to Matt Serra. He just started training harder earlier in the day.

I think the writer nailed it (albeit, unintentionally) when he said that the 2006 PRIDE Open Weight Grand Prix Winner has added "novelties" to his training, since the inconsequential tweaks likely won’t change anything moving forward. I don’t know what it is, but Cro Cop hasn’t looked like the fighter who lost by decision to Fedor and knocked out some of the toughest names in the game for quite some time. I don’t think adjusting his schedule is going to give him back the killer instinct he posessed while fighting in Japan.

At least he still has politics and acting if this fighting thing doesn’t work out for him anymore.