The Amazing Voyage of Alex Karalexis

By Thomas Gerbasi


If you’ve ever watched a fight with some friends at your local club or watering hole, you’ve probably run into a guy like Alex Karalexis. You know, the one who looks up at the fight on the television and says “I could do that. I could beat that guy.”

The only difference is, Karalexis was telling the truth, and he went out to prove it.

“I was the guy, sitting at the bar drinking beers like everybody else saying ‘you know what? I can kick that guy’s ass,’” confirmed Karalexis with a laugh. “But I actually put the beer down, got up off the stool and went and worked out every day after work and did it.”

Karalexis’ early goal in the fight game wasn’t as lofty as you would expect though. He wasn’t dreaming of world titles, money, fame, and a career as a prizefighter. He was a young man with one aim – beat Ted Govola.

“He was THE local hero,” said Karalexis of Govola, who fought UFC vets Pete Sell and Rory Singer, and was gaining positive notices on the Northeast fight scene. One night Karalexis and his buddies decided to take in a local fight card that Govola was competing on. “The place was going crazy for this kid and he was beating up everybody. I was sitting there watching him fight and I’m like I can beat this kid – I can kick his ass.”

The Boston native kept the banter going with his friends throughout the night.

“A few beers in,” said Karalexis, “my buddy was like why don’t you just shut up and do it?”

The Monday after Thanksgiving 2002, Karalexis walked into the gym for the first time. It wasn’t an easy transition, especially considering his 7am to 3:30pm shift as a carpenter and the travel involved in getting around Boston for training.

“I used to sleep in my truck because I didn’t have time to beat the Boston traffic,” he said. “I just didn’t have time to go home. You have any idea how bad it sucks when you’re training for a fight in Boston in January and you have to nap in your truck in the dead of Winter? I was a carpenter – I’m lugging, building, and lifting stuff all day, I’m exhausted. I’m up at 5:30 in the morning to be on a job site at 7. I get out at 3:30, it takes me an hour, hour and 15 minutes to beat traffic to get down to the gym. Training wouldn’t start until 6 o’clock. So I would take a 45 minute to an hour nap, put my phone on silent, but program it for my mother to wake me up.”

It got to the point to where his gym mates would take him to the side and ask him quietly, “Hey dude, do you need a place to stay?”

Karalexis laughs.

“They didn’t know if I was homeless or not. I just didn’t have time to go home.”

In January of 2003, Karalexis made his pro MMA debut with a first round stoppage of Julio Colon. After another victory, via decision, over Mike Varner five months later, he got his dream fight – an October 25, 2003 meeting with Govola at The Matrix in Taunton, Massachusetts. The fight was over in less than a round, and Karalexis emerged with the knockout win and the Mass Destruction title belt.

Then he retired.

“That was it – it was my third fight, I knocked him out, and that’s all I wanted to do,” he said. “I just wanted to do that fight and just be done with it. I had no aspirations of fighting.”

But in this game you can’t just walk away like that – not after a stirring win and with an undefeated record and dynamite in your fists. So as soon as he was out, Karalexis was dragged right back in.

“I felt pressured to defend the title at least once,” he recalled, and he did, decisioning Mike Littlefield over three rounds in February of 2004. Again, he planned on walking away, but he got a call to go to Las Vegas to help former UFC middleweight contender Phil Baroni train for an upcoming fight. One thing led to another, and soon Karalexis was living in a house with a bunch of fighters, being filmed 24 hours a day for a little reality television project called ‘The Ultimate Fighter’.

Four years later, and Karalexis is still fighting, and he hasn’t picked up his hammer and nails since. Funny how life can turn out.

“It’s who I am,” he said. “I’m a fighter. I really believe that this is what I was put here to do and that I’ve found my calling.”

And through the ups and downs of his career, one that has seen him drop from the middleweight division on The Ultimate Fighter to his current weight class of 155, Karalexis has weathered storms that would have broken lesser fighters. And at 31, he feels like he’s finally starting to hit his stride heading into Sunday’s WEC bout with Greg McIntyre. Add in the tutelage of renowned trainer Mark DellaGrotte, and Karalexis expects to be at his best in Texas this weekend.

“My motto going into this fight is Mark’s - smarter not harder,” said Karalexis. “That’s my thinking. I’ve got a gameplan and I’ve never had a gameplan before. I just got in there and fought. Now, I kinda joke around, but I don’t think you’ve ever seen a more confident fighter coming off two losses. In the Palaszewski fight, it was the first time I actually felt like a professional fighter, just sitting back, counterpunching, slipping punches, moving. I used to call my style the Kamikaze Blitzkrieg, and I ain’t like that no more.”

That old attitude – one that had him wading into battle recklessly in search of a knockout - has gotten fans up on their feet and cheering, but it may have cost Karalexis in the win-loss column, and he knows it.

“That’s how I lost the Kenny Florian fight,” he said. “I had him hurt, had him against the cage, and instead of taking my time, throwing low kicks and picking him apart, he was covering up and I was still trying to throw bombs to get through. All of a sudden he countered with that elbow, cut me and stopped the fight.”

A loss to Jason Von Flue in his next fight in January of 2005 prompted a change in scenery from the UFC, and by 2006 he was in the WEC, where he reeled off three straight victories. All of a sudden, a title shot was in his future, but battles with injuries and the scale knocked him off track. And though he was impressive early on in his last two fights, against Ed Ratcliff and Bart Palaszewski, ultimately both ended in defeat. But as he enters the McIntyre fight with his back against the wall, he’s only thinking positive thoughts.

“I’ve not lost any confidence in myself,” he said. “Even if you look at the Ratcliff fight, that first two minutes, when I had gas in the tank, I was all over that kid. I dumped him on his head like three times, took his back twice, and then trying to choke him, I drained everything out of my body. I should’ve just let go of the choke and tried to smash his face in and got the stoppage. The Palaszewski fight, that’s as good a fight as I think I’ve ever fought. I’m confident and I’m as good a fighter as I’ve ever been.”

And he doesn’t plan on going anywhere anytime soon. Unlike 2003, this version of Alex Karalexis is in the fight game for the long haul. As for motivation, it’s no longer beating Ted Govola; it’s just beating whoever stands across from him on fight night.

“The more you win, the better fights you put on, the more beautiful the women get,” he laughs. “Winning’s it – that’s why you do it. Somebody’s got to win, it might as well be me. There really is no other motivation. I do it to win.”