The fact that 44-year-old Randy Couture is UFC light heavyweight Houston Alexander’s role model comes as no surprise. Alexander, is, after all, a senior citizen in the sport, at age 35. It’s no wonder that he looks up to the genetic freak/mental ironman Couture, the super-senior citizen, as a human roadmap in how to age gracefully in a milieu that tolerates aging more harshly than even Hollywood. But Alexander, a Nebraska resident who has managed to adhere to a stunningly rigorous training regimen (he works out seven days a week, four times a day, but just once on Sundays) while caring for his six children, has another, less obvious role model.

The ascending mixed martial artist, who has opened the eyes of UFC honchos and UFC fans with knockouts of Keith Jardine at UFC 71 and Alessio Sakara at UFC 75, patterns his ferociousness in the Octagon after boxing legend Mike Tyson, the poster boy for human pitbulls. “I’m tired of seeing people stand around in the ring or cage,” he tells ESPN.com cheerfully, even though he’d done a few hours worth of media already that day. “I’m a fan too. I’m watching to see a guy go after his foe, and if necessary, take a few to give a few.” Amen to that, most fight fans say, who in theory can marvel at technical excellence, but when all is said and done, go berserk over back-and-forth tradefests. “Fans want to see people fight for their money,” he says. The fans saw it, and then some, when Alexander blew through Jardine, who, incidentally, just defeated Chuck Liddell at UFC 76. Jardine, a solid meat-and-potatoes banger who likes to standup with you, throw strikes and turn your thigh to burger meat with kicks, had just stunned Alexander with a short right, and he looked to press that advantage. The two men clinched up, and Alexander lifted an educated knee into Jardine’s sternum. He then started throwing megaton hand bombs, right hooks that hit home, and quickly dropped Jardine with a right uppercut. A la vintage Tyson, Alexander didn’t take or give a breather. He kept on Jardine with a stream of fierce rights, and dropped him for good with a knee strike/right uppercut combo to the dazed man’s chin, which sent the ref scurrying in to prevent more carnage. It was a jaw-dropping (no pun intended) display of ferociousness, and comparisons to Tyson’s 1985-1989 reign of state-sanctioned muggings are not misplaced. Alexander’s decimation of Sakara was just as hurried and as impressive. A knee to the chin dropped the Italian, and Alexander hopped on him for some devastating ground and pound. Again, the ref intervened the one-sided melee to prevent excessive damage. While there is no evidence to suggest the well-conditioned Jardine overlooked Alexander, he could be forgiven if he did. Consider Alexander’s supposed win-Loss record floating around on the Internet. As of today, it stands as 8-1. Not even close, according to Alexander. The Nebraskan tells ESPN.com that he has fought for pay, but also on amateur MMA cards, over 200 times since he picked up the sport on a dare in 2001. There was a small weekly MMA event in Nebraska. Alexander was a decent athlete in high school, but didn’t move on athletically, as his first child’s birth sent him out to the working world rather than college. He got into the cage at the weekly show after a pal dared him to do so. He beat the fighter who was cleaning up week after week, winning the dare, and finding a new career in the process. At the time, Alexander was paving roads and lots, a rough task in the dog days of August. He was also a disc jockey on Saturday night on his own radio show, playing hip hop and R&B cuts. He still does the radio gig, Sundays from 7 p.m.-10 p.m. on Omaha’s Power 106.9 (www.Power1069FM.com). He was also getting the kids up, getting them to school, and picking them up at the end of the day. He sandwiched a workout before they got up, two while they were at school, and one right before he hit the rack for the night. Any spare time is spent doing pro Hip Hop talks at local schools, where he turns kids on to, and educates them on the positive aspects of that culture, which is too often dismissed as a breeding ground for thugs and misogynists. Alexander maintains he’s in no danger of burning himself out, mentally or physically, and points to the ageless one, Couture, as a role model for longevity. “At 35, I’m now in the best shape of my life,” he says. “I’m in better shape than in high school. I don’t get hurt. In the past seven years, I got hurt really bad once, when I broke my hand. In five, six, seven years, I’m going to be doing this, the Couture thing.” It’s also worth considering, if you are betting against Alexander, and think he can’t continue this run against more skilled and touted competition, or you dismiss Nebraska solely as a breeding ground for college football studs, that until seven months ago, he was coaching himself. He now has a team of respected tutors, which includes coaches Mick Doyle, Wille Stewart and his cousin Curly Alexander. “I’m still learning,” Alexander says. The fact that MMA is exploding now is fortunate for Alexander. If he keeps hammering foes and entertaining PPV audiences, his paychecks are going to get bigger and bigger. Good thing, as his oldest daughter is hitting college in two years. “With six kids, that’s a lot of college I’m trying to prepare for,” he says. “I’m glad this is happening now. I thank UFC for providing me with college money. I mean, I don’t know if I’m a future star. Justin Timberlake is a star. I’m just a hard-working guy from Omaha, as far as I’m concerned, I’m a dad.” As far as foes in the Octagon are concerned, Alexander is trouble, early-Tyson-like trouble. Michael Woods, the news editor for TheSweetScience.com, has written for ESPN The Magazine, GQ and The New York Observer

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