When a fighter wants a fight bad enough, it can be easier to ignore pain of the body than to inflict pain on the psyche. Just ask Shane Brenner, who damaged his knee five days before his much-hyped main event fight with Steve Sharp.

“I was in top-notch shape. It’s too bad I had to do that that Tuesday before the fight,” he said. “Ego and pride will make you do things that perhaps your body can’t do.”

So while Brenner can walk around fine, his only training is calisthenics for now. Soon he’ll talk to a surgeon about repairing his anterior cruciate ligament and some other ligaments.

“Technically speaking you can go without an ACL just to live a normal life,” he said. “If you live an active life, though, you have to get your ACL replaced.”

Brenner was in training the Tuesday before his Saturday fight when the knee gave out. He knew it wasn’t right, but with such an important fight coming up he didn’t want to let down himself or the fans. He delayed a trip to the doctor.

“I wanted to wait until after the fight. I probably should have gotten it checked out before, but I thought it would hold up better. I didn’t think it was as bad as it was.”

How bad it was after training isn’t known, and while he might have been able to get it taken care of with the insurance policy Jeremy Horn’s Elite Fight Night was required to take out on the fighters, this operation will be on his personal insurance.

Once the surgery is done, he’ll be out a few more months before serious training can begin. Brenner will continue working at a call center taking hotel reservations, but rather than hitting the pads after work, he’ll probably be doing laps in the pool.

“I think I’m going to do some swimming because I never have been a really good swimmer,” he said.

Fight fans probably won’t see Brenner back in the cage before February.

“It’s not all that bad. It’s been more family time. When I’m training I don’t get to spend that much time with the kids.”

When he comes back, he hopes to entrench himself in the mix for 145-pound dominance against the likes of Travis Marx and Camrann Pacheco, who he thinks would give him and the fans a great fight.

But there’s always unfinished business with Sharp, who in a show of class chastised the fans who were leaving the arena, telling them to wait and hear what Brenner had to say. Sharp then handed the mike to his fallen competitor, who was still sitting on the canvas having his knee attended to.

“It just gave me a lot more respect for the guy,” he said. “That’s the funny thing about the sport. The more you respect someone, the more you want to fight. I want to beat that guy so bad it’s not even funny.”