Words: Christopher Reive
Design: Paul Slater

Kiwi UFC fighter Kai Kara-France will this weekend fight for the interim UFC flyweight title in Dallas. It's the accumulation of a lifetime of hard work. This is his story.

Beaten, bruised and broken, Kai Kara-France couldn’t understand what he was doing wrong.

Small for his age, and timid, Kara-France spent his days at Auckland’s Mt Albert Grammar School trying to fly under the radar. But it didn’t take long for the bullies to find their easy target.

He would walk into the classroom and  get blindsided, jumped, or punched in the back of the head. He might be walking past someone in the corridor, and they would turn on him, pull his top over his head and “smash” him. It was a weekly thing.

Among the worst examples of his torment, Kara-France recalls being trapped in the bathroom by several attackers and being held by the arms while his body was being pummelled like a punching bag. People would watch, but no one came to help.

“I remember coming home one day like ‘why am I getting picked on? Why me?’ — that victim mentality where you start to question everything and telling my family. I just felt really bad,” he recalls.

“I didn’t know how to get myself out of that slump and was going through some sort of depression. At that young age where you’re so vulnerable, I can see how people don’t find a way out and go down that slippery path where you do do silly things.

“I was thankful to have enough stability around me and say ‘no, I’m going to get myself out of this’. That’s what I did and now I can help other young men on their journey to finding themselves and confidence in themselves; to learn from my experiences and keep going.”

Things got so bad, Kara-France stopped going to school — a decision his family allowed after seeing the bruises that covered his body.

He was out of school for a week; returning to meetings with the dean and forced apologies from his assailants. The bullying gradually began to stop.

It was around this time that Kara-France started training in martial arts. For some time before his high school years, he  followed a friend to Sunday classes at the local martial arts gym, Strikeforce, where he would train in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu under Karl Weber.

He stopped going “for some reason”, but after his parents learned of his situation at school, he started going back to classes on a more regular basis.

For Kara-France, who was then in his mid-teens, it wasn’t  about learning skills to be able to fight back when attacked, but building confidence in himself and the personal growth offered on the mats.

In his return to training, he began working with the likes of Dan Hooker and Rod MacSwain as his coaches.

He quickly fell in love with the sport.

IIt was around that time the UFC — the world’s biggest mixed martial arts promotion — were looking for flyweight talent to bring in for their reality TV show The Ultimate Fighter.

The show is based around a tournament model; the fighters are brought in and divided into two teams — each team coached by a  UFC star. They all live in the same house  and there is a fight each week. The last two standing usually compete for a UFC contract although for this season, the winner of the tournament fought for the UFC flyweight title.

Kara-France’s wrestling coach at the time established the opportunity, and told Kara-France he just needed to be a champion in another promotion to be considered (the season was based around every contender being a champion on the regional scene). Not long before the opportunity came around, Kara-France had won the flyweight title with Australian promotion Bragging Rights in September of 2015.

It’s an event Kara-France fondly remembers, as he shared the stage with his good friends Jamie van der Kuijl and Genah Fabian.

“I just remember being on the plane with [Jamie] flying home. He said ‘man, I can’t wait to see you guys all in the UFC. You’re going to be world champions — I can see it now.’“I was always like ‘yeah, that’s going to be us. We’re all going to be in the UFC, represent and do each other proud’.”

A few weeks later, van der Kuijl died in a quad biking accident.

“When he passed away, it really put things into perspective. It was like I had to continue on not only my legacy but his. That’s a big thing with our gym. When we lose teammates or family members — that’s what it is, it’s family — there’s so much more meaning to what we’re doing. It’s not just us in there.”

Kara-France joined The Ultimate Fighter house in 2016, selected with the ninth pick of the draft to the team coached by Henry Cejudo.  

He was in the opening fight of the season — and met Dana White for the first time just beforehand when the UFC boss gave one of his famous ‘this fight could change your life’ speeches.

“No pressure. Dana White just came in and wished me all the best, and I was fighting about two minutes later.”

Kara-France wanted to  make a statement — urged on by his want to succeed, the pep talk from his potential boss and the fact that his opponent Terrence Mitchell had showboated at his expense when the two weighed in before meeting in the cage.

Kara-France was eliminated  in the next round, dropping a decision to Alexandre Pantoja, but returned home to New Zealand as the show was due to air. He set up a viewing party for family and friends to watch the opening episode, featuring his emphatic win over Mitchell.

“People were like, okay you definitely won because you wouldn’t be wearing a suit if you didn’t’.”

It was at that time he began training under Eugene Bareman at City Kickboxing. Kara-France had done plenty of work with the likes of Bareman, Hooker and Israel Adesanya on their various trips to Thailand for training and when he was back in New Zealand he linked  with City Kickboxing as that was where his former coaches Hooker and MacSwain were training.

After the show aired, Kara-France was hoping to get a callup from the UFC. While the winner of the show is generally the only one guaranteed a contract, the promotion has been known to sign other talents who stood out. As the only knockout win of the season, Kara-France thought he would fit the criteria.

The call never came.

Instead, he tested free agency to see what was on off elsewhere in the world. He booked a fight with leading Japanese promotion Rizin in late December of 2016, taking on Tatsumitsu Wada — one of Japan’s best flyweights. It was a different experience to what he had been used to — the bout was in a ring, and the fighters entered not through a tunnel or walkway, but a ramp.

Kara-France learned a hard lesson that night in checking kicks, as Wada “pretty much tore my leg apart with calf kicks”. He admits it was a letdown, but it was a lesson he was glad to learn at that point in his career rather than later. 

However, the loss halted all the momentum he had built up and he again reevaluated. He made the decision not to go back to Thailand but to move his life back to New Zealand full-time.

On making that decision, Kara-France asked Bareman what he had to do to make it back to the UFC. He was told to  turn up and the rest would take care of itself.

Within the space of a year, Kara-France was back on a five-fight winning streak, fighting primarily on less-than-glamorous shows in China,  Australia and New Zealand.

Around the same time, City Kickboxing teammate Adesanya was starting to make waves in the UFC. After his third bout with the promotion — the first UFC card he headlined — which saw him dominate Brad Tavares over five rounds in Las Vegas, Adesanya reminded  White of Kara-France’s existence. 

Kara-France says Adesanya went in to bat for him with White, who initially looked at Kara-France for an appearance on Dana White’s Contender Series — another scouting-type show where potential UFC signees square off with a chance at earning a contract.

“Izzy said ‘no, he’s not doing that. He’s already done The Ultimate Fighter. Sign him. Put him in the UFC. He’s ready’ — and pretty much right then and there, Dana said ‘okay let’s do it.’

“Then Izzy sent me a photo and said ‘you’re in’.”

After Adesanya and Bareman got back following the bout, they put a TV on the mats of the gym. It wasn’t uncommon for the team to show a thank you message to the rest of the gym before a training session after a big fight, so Kara-France thought nothing of it. Then  White appeared on the screen.

“What’s up, Kai? Dana White here. Congratulations — you are in the UFC, brother.”

Sitting there, surrounded by cheering teammates, Kara-France needed a moment  before getting to his feet to give Bareman a hug. All of their hard work had paid off.

“I wouldn’t be here now if Eugene wasn’t my coach and wasn’t in my life,” Kara-France reflects. “He really put me on track with where I needed to me. I just kept turning up and within two years I had been signed.”