It was a bittersweet night at UFC 320 for Syndicate MMA, one of Las Vegas’ top fight teams.
While Merab Dvalishvili put on another impressive performance, beating a honed in Cory Sandhagen
with what has become typical ease, his teammate Khalil Rountree Jr. collapsed in the third round against Jiri Prochazka after winning the first two frames of their fight. He’d end up getting KO’d brutally, sending him out of the contender’s circle.In a new interview with the Jaxxon podcast, Rountree had nothing
but positive things to say about Dvalishvili and shared a crazy story that underscores yet again just how much energy “The Machine” has in his seemingly bottomless gas tank.
“Merab in the gym, it’s it’s really hard to say that he’s any different in the gym than he is in the cage,” Rountree said. “I promise you this is a 100% true story. At 12 in the afternoon on fight day, Saturday, October 4, Merab sparred five rounds in the cage live. On the day of his fight because that’s just who he is.”
“Yes, five full live rounds,” Rountree reiterated. “Five full live rounds at 12, not even half a day before he has to be in the arena to put on the biggest fight of his career. That’s just him. You cannot make it up. So to be around that, I mean, it’s just it’s just another experience.”
“You know, most guys will sit in the hotel room or try to collect their thoughts or do whatever, maybe even get a bike ride in on the Assault bike to kinda burn some energy. I’ve never in my life seen somebody spar five full rounds the day that they have to fight and go do another five full rounds with Cody Sandhagen.”
“So yeah, he’s a different breed,” Rountree concluded. “But like I said, he shows up to the gym the same way he shows up to fight night, and it’s just interesting to be around. You know? But it’s great.”
Merab would go on to party it up all night in Vegas following his win, with cameras catching him wild and shirtless at 5 am. He then suited up for Aljamain Sterling’s wedding, and was still looking fresh as a daisy for that.
Rountree could use a bit more of Dvalishvili’s cardio if he wants to keep hanging around at the top of the light heavyweight pile. While he starts out strong and fast in all his fights, he has a tendency to fall off in the later rounds. It’s cost him greatly in his last two losses to Alex Pereira and Jiri Prochazka.
