One of the most widely rumored stories in all of MMA history was when Charles “Krazy Horse” Bennett allegedly knocked out Wanderlei Silva after Bennett got into an altercation with the Chute Boxing team in the locker room at PRIDE: Shockwave in 2005.
A video has been around for years showing Cristiano Marcello choking out Bennett with a triangle choke in the locker room, but then Bennett woke up and knocked out Silva with an elbow strike, which wasn’t shown on the video.
“Rafael always helped me a lot in the psychological aspect [of the sport] since he became a trainer,” Master Rudimar Fedrigo said to PVT (via Marcelo Alonso of Sherdog). “I have to admit I was totally lost when I saw our champion unconscious a few minutes from the most important fight of his career. Rafael took control of the entire situation. [He said]: ‘Wanderlei what happened is that you just got punched by surprise and now he woke up the lion inside of you. Nobody can beat you when you bring that spirit. Go there, beat that guy and bring your belt back to Curitiba.’ And that´s what Wanderlei did.”
Silva after waking up from being knocked out by Bennett, would still go on and defeat Ricardo Arona at the event. The fighter, who was defending the middleweight title that night, says that Bennett’s attack could’ve cost him the championship.
“When I woke up, I asked Rafael what happened and he told me the guy had hit me by surprise, and I ran after ‘Krazy Horse,’ but he had already gone,” Silva said. “When he fought Cristiano we had about ten guys from Chute Boxe [nearby] and we allowed him to fight one-on-one. Nobody touched him. When he woke up, he attacked me by surprise. That clown attitude could have cost me my belt. Thanks to master Rafael and Rudimar I had a great training camp that allowed me to recover and retain my title.”
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