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Prior to becoming one of the top mixed martial artists on the European scene, Cage Warriors welterweight champion Nicolas Dalby was first exposed to combat sport through karate.

In a recent interview with MMA Plus (check out the exclusive feature HERE), ‘The Sharpshooter’ revealed how he grew bored of competition karate, and that MMA – a sport of which he was yet to understand – caught his eye; however, a simple query and online discussion was deemed as a sign of disrespect by MMA opposing karate instructors, and Dalby found himself forced out of the dojo.

“I didn’t get kicked out because I went and had a fight on the street,” Dalby explained. “I wrote on a Danish insider forum called MartialArts.tk; I wrote that we’d been speaking about MMA in the karate dojo, I was like “I hear these horror stories from my Senseis about people just getting smashed up, breaking legs, and arms at every fight,” and then one of the guys responded – my current coach, Tue [Trnka], and he was like “No, that’s not true at all, but of course you get bumps and scrapes.” So then I wrote something along the lines of “Ok, my Sensei must not know anything about this,” and apparently that was enough basis at the time to get kicked out, they thought I was disrespectful.”

Despite leaving the karate dojo on a sour note, the discipline that comes with studying martial arts had a lasting effect on Dalby, and he was set on a path that lead to the point he’s at now.

Dalby continued, “I think the years I did karate had a pretty good influence on me, because I didn’t really have a clear goal for what I wanted to do. I think martial arts helped me get more disciple, and be more focused on what I want to do.”

Nicolas Dalby (12-0) takes on Norway’s Mohsen Bahari (8-1) this weekend, Nov. 15 where the Dane aims to complete his first defence of the 170lb title at Cage Warriors 74 in London.

Photo credit: Dolly Clew|Cage Warriors