Training relationships in MMA can get complicated. While unquestionably an individual sport, most fighters find themselves working under something much closer to a team dynamic day-to-day. More often than not, the necessities of training require athletes to band together, under many of the same coaches, sometimes to the point of even helping one another with direct fight preparation.
And while the combat sports world is big enough to largely keep training partners from having to face one another in competition, things get a whole lot tighter when it gets down to the UFC and their top ranked fighters.