Jack Shore knows that life is sometimes about contrasts.
Normally, home is the gym on an industrial estate a few miles outside the small town of Abertillery in south-east Wales.
Yet the MMA featherweight considers his answers from his hotel room just a few yards from one of Rio de Janeiro’s beaches.
This self-confessed introvert knows he is fast approaching a moment he struggles to explain as he prepares for his UFC return, 14 months since his last fight.
“That feeling of walking in there and hearing the gate lock, you can’t explain it until you’ve done it yourself,” Shore says of the MMA experience.
“It’s the best and the worst feeling in the world all at the same time.”
Shore is speaking before his bout with Brazilian fighter Joanderson Brito, scheduled for Saturday at UFC 301 in Rio, his comeback fight following hand surgery.
The 29-year-old is also reflecting on comments made by British heavyweight Simon Austin that, despite his career path, the Oktagon fighter hates fighting.
Shore has MMA in the blood, or certainly in the family, with UFC welterweight prospect Oban Elliott and current PFL featherweight Brett Johns among those who train at his father and coach Richard’s gym in the Gwent valleys.
But he admits people might find it hard to square the circle with what he does as a career and how he shies away from the spotlight out of the cage.
“I think [former UFC headliner] Nick Diaz uses the quote that he hates it so much he’s actually learned to love it, and I suppose I can relate to that,” he says.
“I’m not a natural fighter in that I’m not a naturally aggressive guy who came up fighting on the streets.
“I’ve probably disliked confrontation that much that I’ve had to teach myself to love it.
“I love the training, the lifestyle, the samurai and warrior code of it all, but I can’t sit here and say I look forward to a fistfight in front of 20,000.
“But when it comes to it, I can flip a switch and I’m not the same person as sat here now.”
Shore says there will be nerves and anxiety when that gate clicks, and that loved and hated feeling comes over him.
“It’s fight or flight and there’s a locked door so I know it’s time to dig my feet in and fight,” he says.
“You see so many people crumble in that moment – but that’s not in me. I might lose because the better man won, but not because of fear.”
