The world is a better place because of the existence of Gunnar Nelson.
A unique talent, a unique fighter, a unique personality – you would be hard pressed to find anyone who has a bad word to say about the Icelander.
The SBG welterweight proved that he had graduated from Europe’s top MMA prospect to legitimate welterweight contender in UFC London’s co-main event on Saturday night. Gunni snapped Alan Jouban’s impressive win-streak at three with a sensational second round finish of the Versace model.
Once Nelson found home with that lethal straight right in the second stanza, the end was nigh. Jouban was in trouble, and the head-kick he received while stumbling towards the fence only made his situation worse. From there, Nelson went to his bread and butter, forcing the tap on the ground with a nasty guillotine.
Poetry in motion #UFCLondon https://t.co/B8zzerZrX4
— FootballJOE (@FootballJOE) March 18, 2017
The big news story the night before the event was the evacuation of the Hilton Canary Wharf hotel due to a fire alarm as the fighters were hitting the hay before fight night. The stoic, calm as a breeze Gunni opened up his account of the bizarre incident in the post-fight press conference with a joke.
“I was just screaming scared, you know? (laugh break) It was crazy… No, we were literally about to close our eyes when this thing goes off. We didn’t know if it was just in our room.”
Like all the other fighters, Nelson was about to get some shut-eye when the alarm sounded. Disorientated and cool as ever, he initially thought that his roommate’s arse was the root of the problem.
“Actually, one of our roommates farted really bad and we were actually discussing if it was that, because it was fucking horrendous. Sorry for cursing, but.”
“Yeah, we waited a while actually. We were just thinking it would go off eventually, but the sound was just really annoying, wasn’t it? I was just wearing my underwear, about to go asleep, and I kind of peek out and I see a couple of gentlemen there as lost as I was, just kind of looking around seeing what people were doing.”
At some stage during all the confusion, he thought it was probably for the best to leave the hotel.
“Eventually, we smelled a little burn and we decided that it was maybe a good idea to get the hell out of there.”
Check out the raconteur himself regaling the room with the wonderful anecdote in the video embedded below. The hotel evacuation story begins at around the 21 minute mark.
