When one door closes, another door opens. But for Bubba Bush, the door was kicked, punched and knocked out from the frame.

At the age of 12, Bush started wrestling competitively and continued to do so through high school. While attending Texas A&M University and serving in the Corps of Cadets, Bush missed the mats and decided to join a mixed martial arts gym.

“I started training with Brazos Valley Mixed Martial Arts and Fitness in 2006,” he said. “I loved it. I remembered what it was like to be on the mats.”

Nine months later, Bush decided to get paid to, as he put it, “get punched in the face.” On April 27, 2007, Bush competed in his first professional fight, winning in the first round.

“I went straight pro because amateur wasn’t really a thing back then,” Bush said. “I figured I’d at least get paid while I’m training.”

But fighting wasn’t the goal for his career. Instead, Bush was working toward a life in law enforcement. When that didn’t work out, Bush returned to the cage in 2010 to continue his professional career.

Bush went on to have a successful career in the UFC, finishing with eight wins and three losses. His last fight was a three-round knockout loss in October 2015.

With his fighting career behind him, Bush took his passion for the sport back to BVMMA and Fitness as a coach and trainer.

“I’m currently running BVMMA and Fitness, were I coach, teach, train coaches and run the back office,” Bush said.

He’s also involved with Valor Fight League, a nonprofit, amateur MMA organization that arranges fights in the area. Bush began assisting with the promotion of local fights in April 2016, but the upcoming bouts in April 2018 will be a solo mission for Bush.

Bush’s passion for fighting and training has helped with running BVMMA and Fitness.

“What we do now is 95 percent commercial,” Bush said. “95 percent of the people in our gym will never step in the cage.”

That said, BVMMA and Fitness has a fairly large amateur fight team, including a couple fighters going pro.

“But most of the people there are just doing cardio kick boxing or Brazilian jiu-jitsu for exercise or self-defense,” Bush said. “On the side, we train around 15 people who want to be fighters or have fought before to help them push their goals.”

Bush acknowledged that while some goals didn’t work out, he’s happy how things played out.

“I love what I do,” Bush said.

BVMMA and Fitness offers a variety of classes to fit the needs and interests of their clients. A class schedule, as well class overviews and coach bios, can be found at www.bvfit.com.