At this segment, we asked the fighters, people involved which fight they fought or saw became their turning point for their career.

—Takeru
K-1 kingpin Takeru picks his most memorable fight of when he captured the 55kg tournament title in April of this year.

“That fight got my name out there. People started to recognize me more often and people started to watch more of my fights. That was the first 1 day tournament for me and fighting 3 times a night was tough on the body but more so, it mentally drains you. My style is to put everything into 1 fight, so after a fight, I’m totally out of it. So after my fight I had to rebuild myself mentally again and again, which was extremely difficult. But because of that experience, I learned how to control my emotions and was able to grow from that.”

—Ken Hasegawa
A turning point for Ken Hasegawa was a fight with Kazuhiro Nakamura on March 22, 2014 (DEEP 65 IMPACT). Hasegawa won the fight by decision 1-4. He claims that this fight was the fight where there were dramatic changes made in his fight style.

“I used to be anon aggressive fighter who would keep distance and play it safe. But during the fight with Nakamura I was attacking non-stop in all positions and all directions. He was an opponent who could be defeated only in that way, so trained a lot for that. Getting ready for Nakamura boosted my basic level in my skills. I put everything I had into that training camp and was ready to hang them up if I had lost. I did everything I could in preparation, so my mind was clear heading into that fight”