Introduction
Saturday, March 9th, Danish welterweight prospect Soren Bak will be in action in his homeland, where he will be looking to close in on a Cage Warriors title shot against Thibaud Larchet. He will be looking to keep his undefeated record, as Madsen looks to inch closer to a UFC contract. Madsen represents Rumble Sports, a solid camp out of Denmark. Let’s take a closer look at this prospect as this week’s “Prospect Spotlight.”
Strengths
Wrestling: Madsen was an Olympic silver medalist in Greco-Roman wrestling, so it should come as no surprise that he uses that very much in his cage fights. Madsen is very strong on the takedown. He gets in smoothly, grabs a hold of his opponents leg(s) and smashes them into the mat. He’s also very strong in the clinch too, where he can control opponents before throwing them down. When he is on the mat, he has very good positional grappling. He likes to get to positions where he can effectively land ground-and-pound, especially side control. Any fighter who tries to engage in a battle of wresting with Madsen would be a fool.
Intangibles: Madsen has natural gifts, which is why he was the superior athlete able to achieve the dream of an Olympic medal. Madsen is incredibly athletic. He has great agility and quickness, which every fighter desires. He is very explosive with everything he does, especially his massive takedowns. With that explosiveness comes great physical strength, both in brute force and his death grip. When he grabs an opponents neck, he has the type of squeeze that takes little-to-no time to put somebody into a slumber. He even has two standing guillotine chokes, which really shows his immense power. Even though he’s not a world class striker, he does have immense knockout power in his hands, so one must be wary of that power too.
Needs Improvement
Level of Competition: So far in his short six-fight career, Madsen has not really fought the highest level of competition. In fact, his six opponents combined record is 22-14-2, with three of those fighters having one fight or less. It’s been a slow ascent. He’s obviously trying to inch closer to higher level talent, as seen in this fight against 12-4 Thibaud Larchet. It’s hard to get a great gauge until he fights guys with notoriety, so for now, he still remains somewhat of a question mark.
Age: At 34 years old, Madsen is not exactly the young, hot prospect with decades of experience ahead of him. Consider the years of vigorous, hardcore training Madsen endured training as an Olympian. I am sure that has him in good shape, but has put a lot of mileage on his body. Being a late comer means he also has less time to close the holes in his game. Luckily, he has the best base for an MMA fighter in wrestling. Of course, none of this age mullarky means he can’t compete…it just means his window is smaller to compete at the highest level and perhaps challenge for a world title.
Outlook
UFC Top-25 Fighter: Madsen having Olympic wrestling credentials and world-class athleticism are two things that could definitely put him in the driver’s seat. Even at his age, many fighters will have trouble keeping up with the grappling attack of Madsen. He has UFC written all over him. When he gets there, he definitely can coast on his wrestling to get him toward the top-25. However, there are guys with good enough wresting, especially in an MMA cage, to withstand his attack. From there, it will come down to the other aspects of fighting, which Madsen is still developing. He has a very good chance at success, though.
MMA Intel 