In the unforgiving Octagon where fighters clash for glory, few stories resonate with the profound impact of Daniel Cormier’s silent sacrifice for his AKA faithful Cain Velasquez. Before DC became a household name in the UFC’s light heavyweight division, he was a natural heavyweight—a bulldozer of a man whose frame seemed destined for the sport’s most thunderous weight class. The path to heavyweight gold stretched before him like an open highway. Coming into the MMA juggernaut fresh off his triumph in the 2011 Strikeforce Heavyweight Grand Prix, the wrestling juggernaut was destined for greatness.

Yet Cormier deliberately veered off this course, choosing instead the tortuous trail of weight cuts and calorie counting that would lead him down to the 205-pound division. Behind this decision lay not strategy nor fear, but something far more precious: Brotherhood!

“‘DC’ was a heavyweight. Then he went down to light heavyweight,” revealed Team Khabib’s head coach Javier Mendez on his YouTube podcast. “DC didn’t want to fight Cain Velasquez ever because they’re brothers.”

“Rather than fight Cain, [Cormier] sacrificed and lost all that weight because he loved to eat… so ‘DC’ cut the weight, not for any other reason other than he would never fight Cain,” The AKA head honcho added.

While other fighters circle each other warily across gym floors, protecting their techniques and ambitions with jealous eyes, Cormier and Velasquez forged something that transcended the competitive instinct that drives combat sports. Every morning, as dawn broke over the American Kickboxing Academy, Daniel Cormier would watch his training partner Velasquez devour breakfast while he nursed a protein shake. Every evening, as his stomach growled in protest, he’d remind himself of the promise he’d made—not just to Velasquez, but to himself.

The daily torture of denied cravings became Cormier’s personal crucible. For a man whose love affair with fried chicken and cake was no secret, each pound shed represented not just physical discipline but emotional commitment. As Mendez noted, the hunger pangs hit hard, yet Cormier’s resolve never wavered. Further shedding light on their illustrious relationship, DC opened his heart during his UFC Hall of Fame induction ceremony. With tears in his eyes, the former double champ said:

“Guys! I want to give a sincere thanks to my friend, my brother in Cain Velasquez. There was never a time guys that Cain Velasquez did not show up for me. I showed up to that gym [AKA] as an undefeated US Olympian in the heavyweight division and the first thing Cain did was take me under his wing and guided me. He never saw me as competition. Every single moment that I had, Cain Velasquez was to my right and to my left. He never let me do it alone.”

What makes this sacrifice all the more remarkable is what it eventually yielded: two champions from one brotherhood. While Velasquez reigned in the heavyweight division, Cormier carved his legacy among the light heavyweights before eventually reclaiming his natural place among the big men—but only after Velasquez’s career had begun its sunset phase and he eventually moved to the WWE.

And when DC eventually moved to heavyweight at UFC 226, he dethroned the most decorated heavyweight champion in company history in the form of Stipe Miocic. Cormier would also support Velasquez during his ongoing legal issues, and while addressing the situation recently, ‘DC’ made a stunning revelation about his former teammate. It appears that the former double champion’s thirst to make it big in the UFC was inspired by his 42-year-old teammate.

Daniel Cormier once claimed that Cain Velasquez made him want to become a champion

Not only was Cain Velasquez one of the scariest UFC fighters of all time, but he was an ardent hard worker in the gym as well. While talking about visiting the 42-year-old in jail, Daniel Cormier revealed that Velasquez’s work ethic was second to none, and the fact that the former heavyweight champion pushed himself so far in the quest to become the best compelled ‘DC’ to set his goal of becoming a champion in Dana White’s promotion.

“He went to jail for a while. It was the saddest thing. I would go [to jail], sit with him, and the things we spoke about. It was so crazy because, to me, he was the reason I knew I could be a world champ. Because out of our gym, he made it possible to dream that big,” Daniel Cormier once stated on the Pound 4 Pound podcast last year. “Watching the way he worked, watching how committed he was to becoming the best in the world. I knew that I could be the best.”

In Khabib Nurmagomedov‘s team, loyalty and respect are the name of the game, and it has extended to all the other fighters who train at the American Kickboxing Academy. Having learned about Daniel Comier’s decision to choose another option for the sake of his teammate, what do you have to say about his generous gesture? Drop your comments below.