KING WILLIAM COUNTY, Va. — Odyssey Martial Arts, located in a strip mall just off Route 360, may be out of the way — but some fighters drive more than an hour to train there.
Mixed martial arts is changing lives at the small King William gym, where fighters are finding community, direction, and championship success. Many of the athletes will compete at Stronghold Fights at the Richmond Raceway on April 25, including Austin Hall, who will headline the main event for a championship title.
For Hall, the gym provided much-needed direction.
"I had some disciplinary issues when I was really young. My parents were recommending to put me in some extracurriculars," Hall said. "I met my coach at a Cici's Pizza on the way to a peewee football practice, and my dad is super big fan of the sport, so he got me into it."
Hall said going to Odyssey changed him as a person.
"I'm more confident, expressive, I'm a happier person when I'm training," he said. "When I'm out of camp, I almost feel ... it gives me a sense of direction being here."
John Simmons started the gym primarily out of necessity. He began training at age 7 in 1993 after his family watched Royce Gracie win the first Ultimate Fighting Championship.
"I'm a small guy, and I was getting beat up in school, and I had to find a way to defend myself," Simmons said.
The support and encouragement from fellow fighters is something many have been searching for.
"The coach is like a father for me," said Anthony Levano. "He is really good. This is a different gym. This isn't only a team. This is a family."
"The relationship is huge," said Bishop Casteel. "If you don't have a family around you, support you and pick you up through the bad moments during camp and when you're out to help you, guide you through, you'll never be able to make it anywhere."
"There's nothing else like it," said Miguel Herrera. "You do get hit a lot, and I don't really like that part, but everything else besides it, I don't know. I just feel like it's meant for me."
Jake Lemacks said the gym saved his life.
"There's big care here, you know," he said. "At a time where I really needed some help, and I needed to learn to accept help in coming up to the next level, John, Austin and the rest of the Odyssey family were all here."
Robert Cutrell said, "Came in, got my butt kicked. I thought a wrestler was going to come in here and beat up this 135-pound jiu-jitsu guy. I'd say, in an hour, I probably got submitted 30 times. And at the end, I remember going, all right, this is where I want to be."
Simmons prefers the smaller environment because it allows for personalized instruction, which he believes leads to their success in the cage.
"We don't lose fights. We win fights all the time because I'm able to keep my eyes specifically on every exchange that these competitors go through, and make the critiques, make the changes," Simmons said. "It takes hold so much faster than if you went to a big box gym where they might have 200 students, but nobody's winning championship titles."
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