Indian fighters’ work ethic is really strong, says UFC Director of Strength & Conditioning Gavin Pratt

Gavin Pratt, who was responsible for Terence Crawford’s impressive physical transformation ahead of his clash with Canelo Alvarez earlier this year, says Indian fighters have the mentality to succeed at the highest level.

When Crawford had to move up two weight classes in boxing to take on Alvarez for the undisputed super middleweight title earlier this year, he called on the services of Pratt to manage the physical change he had to undergo. The body transformation was a success as Crawford beat Alvarez to become a four-division world champion. It also cemented Pratt’s status as one of the premier strength and conditioning experts in combat sports.

Officially, Pratt is UFC Director of Strength & Conditioning, who works with some of the biggest names from the Octagon, and also with athletes from the NFL, NBA, and of course boxing.

Pratt was recently in India at the Inspire Institute of Sport in Bellary alongside Dean Ritchie, strength and conditioning director of the UFC Performance Institute in Shanghai, to hold a training session with Indian coaches. The two spoke to Sportstar about what makes elite athletes special and where Indian athletes feature in their experience.

“What makes an elite athlete is just the competitive drive. So, I haven’t met an athlete who is more competitive than Terence Crawford. And then if you think of the Chinese UFC strawweight champion, Zhang Weili, it’s the same thing. They are just intrinsically driven persons. Some athletes require a bit more assistance from us as performance staff to get the most out of themselves. But the ones that are at that ‘top per cent of a per cent per cent’ tend to be very self-motivated and dedicated to the cause,” says Pratt.

This isn’t to say that athletes can’t be helped to find that mentality.

“I think it’s part of our role to help an athlete find that mentality. I mean, at the highest level, they are going to have a large component of that anyway because their whole existence is about competition. But the challenge is about finding that elite level of that mentality. I think once you get to the top end of most sports, everyone’s good at the sport. It’s those who are what we term psycho-physiologically ready. So, they have the ability to connect their brain to the physical performance of what’s needed. That to us becomes the important thing to harness. And that comes from the performance team, technical coaches, and the athlete themselves,” Pratt says.

According to Pratt, there is no substitute for the right attitude. “For me personally, it doesn’t matter what level the athlete is at; it comes down to attitude and the desire to want to be there. I found that with MMA particularly, they’re probably the best athletes I’ve ever worked with in terms of their desire to put in the work,” he says.

Ritchie concurs with this assessment. “You want to work with athletes who are also really motivated and engaged in their performance journey. They’re asking lots of really good questions, and they want to learn more about the underpinning science behind what they do. But it’s ultimately about collaborating and giving the athlete a great amount of autonomy to help them guide their own performance plan,” he says.

‘Indian fighters have great work ethic’

While Indian combat sports have yet to make an impact at the world level, both Pratt and Ritchie, who have worked with Indian athletes, have only positive things to say about fighters from the country.

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“I don’t think you can generalise qualities about athletes from any particular country. There might be some physical deficiencies in individual athletes, but there’s certainly nothing you can generalise about athletes from a particular country. The one thing I’ve heard about Indian athletes from coaches who work with them at the performance institutes in Mexico (where Indian fighter Sumit Kumar trains) and Shanghai (where Puja Tomar—the only Indian fighter to have won a UFC bout trains) is that their work ethic was always extremely strong. And if you have that work ethic where you’re willing to do what it takes to be the best, then all the other stuff is quite easy, really. Then you’ve just got to be surrounded by experts who can point you in the right direction and help guide you on your performance pathway, and that’s what we’ve seen,” says Pratt.

Ritchie, who has worked directly with Puja at the Performance Institute in Shanghai, vouches for this. “Puja is an extremely hard worker and really disciplined. The common theme with some of the Indian fighters we get is that they’re all extremely dedicated to what they do and are really, really hard workers. They’re willing to do whatever you ask of them. And I think that’s a really, really good trait for someone who wants to be elite at their sport,” he says.

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While Ritchie has worked with other Indian combat sports athletes—including former national champion Manju Bamboria, who was sent to Shanghai while rehabilitating from injury—Puja still stood apart.

“She was just really committed to becoming better at MMA. She obviously attended all our mat sessions and was working with our technical coaches in our academy sessions as well. She wanted to find out more about nutrition while catching up with me and the strength and conditioning programme. She was working with the sports science team and the physio. Her attention to detail and her work ethic were second to none. And we saw some huge increases in her physical capacity and output as a result of that work. So, my brief exposure to Indian fighters has been really, really good. If that’s a reflection of the entire athletic cohort here, then I think they’re in a very good position,” he says.  

Published on Oct 10, 2025