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Joe Rogan was all praise for coach Trevor Wittman's gloves when former UFC champion Rashad Evans first showed it to the UFC commentator on his podcast 'Joe Rogan Experience'.
The gloves proposed by Trevor Wittman have been named X-Factor. They have been carefully designed to mitigate eye-pokes during a fight. Fighters often extend their fingers in order to maintain, measure and gauge the distance against their opponents. This leads to many instances of fighters getting hurt due to accidental eye-pokes.
Rashad Evans elaborated on the X-Factor gloves that are meant to evade the risk of eye-pokes and fighters breaking their own wrists due to bad positioning of the hand.
"This allows your hands to stay in a natural fist-locked position... curved right away. If you see the strapping system in there so that you don't get that boxing break in your hands, it keeps everything all the muscles, ligaments and bone in place. So in that way when you're punching, everything is in form", said Rashad Evans.
Trevor Wittman believes his innovation may prove to be a gamechanger
Popular Youtube channel 'Anatomy of a Fighter' posted a videoelaborating the benefits of Trevor Wittman's gloves. The coach mentioned that his gloves would allow fighters to pull back their power knuckles upon missing shots which would eventually help them in avoiding the risk of breaking their wrists.
"We are using leather in the hand compartments, but when its your wrist and palm when everything is sweating, we're using different materials... You don't need those hand wraps. You not gonna get those sliding knuckles", said Trevor Wittman
The X-Factor glove comes in two variants, one with a velcro strap and another with a lace up. OnX Sports, the company manufacturing the gloves, also has an Apex training glove that comes in 12oz, 16oz and 18oz variants. Many MMA pundits have backed the science behind the advantages that X-Factor provides.
However, the UFC is yet to adopt the K-1 style kickboxing gloves to mitigate the risk of eye-pokes. The most recent incident that led to a terrible eye injury in a UFC fight took place in tonight's main event. Leon Eddwards accidentally poked Belal Muhammad in the eye and the fight had to be immediately called-off.
