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When Isabel Vel\u00e1squez saw the massive 6-foot-3, 264-pound Brock Lesnar\u2014the man her son Ca\u00edn was moments from challenging for the Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight title\u2014she prayed.<\/p>\n
\u201c\u2018Oh my god, he\u2019s a big man,\u2019\u201d Isabel said, hoping from cageside that her son would pummel then-champion Lesnar.<\/p>\n
Lesnar was confidant prior to that October 2010 championship bout in Southern California.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I get done whooping your ass, I\u2019m gonna go drink a Corona and eat a burrito just for your Hispanic heritage, alright? How about that?\u201d Lesnar boasted.<\/p>\n
The bout was a mismatch and over in a little more than four minutes, with Ca\u00edn\u2014the smaller fighter at 6-foot-1 and 244 pounds\u2014smashing a bloody Lesnar into the canvas. Ca\u00edn made history that night, becoming the first Mexican-American heavyweight champion in any contact sport.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat will teach you to talk about my son that way,\u201d Isabel boasted back.<\/p>\n
On June 13, from the home in Yuma, Arizona, which Ca\u00edn bought for her, Isabel and her husband Efrain will watch their son defend his title in Mexico City against the 6-foot-4 Brazilian challenger Fabr\u00edcio Werdum. It will also be Ca\u00edn\u2019s first fight after suffering a torn meniscus and sprained MCL, which has kept him out of the cage for more than a year and a half.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was devastating to him, but not in the way he expressed it,\u201d said Javier Mendez, a Mexican-born mixed-martial arts (MMA) trainer and founder of American Kickboxing Academy in San Jose, who first met Vel\u00e1squez in 2006. \u201cHe didn\u2019t come out and say, \u2018Goddamn it, I didn\u2019t get to fight,\u2019 but I know he felt it. It\u2019s something he carries inside.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendez saw the fighting potential in the collegiate wrestling All-American from Arizona State University the day he met him. \u201cHe\u2019s one of a kind. I\u2019ve never seen anybody with that.\u201d<\/p>\n
Humble beginnings<\/strong> His Fresno-born mother Isabel worked picking seasonal crops as a child and well into adulthood, and his father Efrain had decided to leave his desolate hometown of Sonoyta, Mexico for a better life in the United States. With a jug of water and a bundle of food, the 18-year-old Efrain walked three days through Sonoran desert, making the trip seven times. Each of those times, when his water ran out, he drank from pools where cows had bathed and defecated, straining the water with a rag. Many migrants had gotten lost in the desert. Efrain was fortunate he didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n Once the Vel\u00e1squez family settled in Yuma, Efrain would drive nine hours to his job in Salinas, where he would pick, load and stack boxes of lettuce onto pallets and flatbed trucks.<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn\u2019s older brother Efrain Jr. recalled how their father would sleep in his car and send his entire paycheck to his family.<\/p>\n With their father often away Ca\u00edn and Efrain Jr. found refuge in the wrestling room of their junior high school.<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn watched his older brother wrestle, and lose, every one of his 7th grade matches. And when it was Ca\u00edn\u2019s turn to compete in 7th grade, it was Efrain Jr.\u2019s turn to watch.<\/p>\n \u201cHe did pretty well. Of course, better than me,\u201d Efrain Jr. said. (Ca\u00edn went his entire junior high career unbeaten.) \u201cIt was pretty exciting, especially for me.\u201d<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn continued his stellar wrestling career in high school and at ASU before relocating to San Jose to carve out a fighting career, a choice that none in his family supported.<\/p>\n \u201cI talked to him, and he said, \u2018No, I\u2019m going to do this,\u2019\u201d Isabel said. \u201cI cried. You know, tears can move a person. And it didn\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt was a big risk, I would say, finishing up college, and then just packing up all of my stuff and driving out here. I didn\u2019t know anything about MMA,\u201d Ca\u00edn said. \u201cThe first week I kinda felt like\u2026I was made for this. So I knew right away then; it was the best move I\u2019ve ever made to come out here.\u201d<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn won his first nine bouts en route to the heavyweight title. He lost that title when he was knocked out by Junior Dos Santos in November of 2011, but regained it a year later and hasn\u2019t been beaten since.<\/p>\n \u201cCain is a person who doesn\u2019t give up,\u201d his father Efrain said. \u201cHe wants to be first all the time in whatever he does. He has that.\u201d<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn credits his parents for his own success.<\/p>\n \u201cWatching them work hard, I feel like I\u2019ve gotten that. And I\u2019ve brought it to what I do today,\u201d He said. \u201cFor my dad to come out to the U.S. and raise us here. I think it was the best thing for all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n Ca\u00edn Velasquez will defend the Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight title against Fabr\u00edcio Werdum in Mexico City on June 13.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When Isabel Vel\u00e1squez saw the massive 6-foot-3, 264-pound Brock Lesnar\u2014the man her son Ca\u00edn was moments from challenging for the Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight title\u2014she prayed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":35,"featured_media":26652,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":false,"newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[269],"tags":[5265,5267,5269],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-26648","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports-en","tag-cain-velasquez","tag-ultimate-fighting-championship","tag-umc","entry"],"yoast_head":"\n
\nBorn to migrant farm-working parents who picked lettuce in the vast fields in Salinas, California, the 32-year-old Ca\u00edn was four when his family moved to Yuma, Arizona.<\/p>\n