Jon Fitch's last fight left him battered and bloodied, in needed of repair work. Five rounds with UFC welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre will do that.

Stitches took care of the cuts. The bruises faded. And the lumps went away.

But the mental pain of that UFC 87 beatdown -- it was scored 50-43, 50-44, 50-44 -- in Minneapolis last August took longer to heal. Fitch found the remedy halfway around the globe, in the unforgiving heat and humidity of a Muay Thai camp in Thailand.

Tired of Fitch's post-fight funk, his girlfriend urged him to do something.

"I was just being a sorry-ass, you know, moping around my house and my girlfriend yelled at me, kind of made me go to Thailand," Fitch explained. "She was tired of my depressed ass bringing her down, making her sad. So I had to get out of the country and go somewhere and reset and refocus and get myself back on track."

The fruits of the trip to Thailand will be on display Saturday when Fitch (21-3-1) takes on Japanese veteran Akihiro Gono (28-13-7) on the undercard of the St. Pierre-B.J. Penn showdown in the main event of UFC 94 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas.

Fitch, 30, says he is raring to go -- so much so that he actually wanted to fight earlier, only to be told all the cards were booked.

The lanky six-footer from San Jose, by way of Indiana, is unaccustomed to losing. The former Purdue wrestler won a record-tying eight straight in the UFC before running into GSP, establishing himself as the No. 1 contender at 170 pounds.

In all, Fitch had won 15 straight prior to UFC 87 and had not lost since December 2002, via TKO to Wilson Gouveia.

St. Pierre ended that run in brutal fashion, using superior wrestling skills and a relentless standup game to batter Fitch, who showed tremendous heart and resolve in lasting all 25 minutes.

"I thought `My God. What am I going to have to do to beat this guy?"' St. Pierre said at the time. "He's unfinishable."

After flying under the MMA radar, Fitch had thought UFC 87 was the beginning of his time. "It's my turn to start my legacy and my reign," he said prior to the fight.

It wasn't. And Fitch now finds himself overtaken by the likes of Thiago Alves in the ranks of welterweight contenders. He has gone from main event to preliminary card.

The GSP tape isn't pretty to watch, but Fitch has tried to squeeze all he can out of it.

"I've watched that fight maybe a thousand times," he said. "It's just like little errors lost that fight and that's super-frustrating, but at that level that's what happens.

"In the first round, I threw a bad leg kick, a very technically bad leg kick, bad position, hands in bad position. He capitalized, threw a right hand and did a lot of damage. And then again, beginning of the third round, same thing. I threw a lead left hook and I dropped my left hand after I threw it. He came back with an overhand right and got me again. At that level, with somebody like GSP, you can't make those mistakes."

Hurt early by the champion, Fitch says he abandoned his game plan and got into a `I've got to finish him' mindset.

Tightening up his game was another reason to go to Thailand.

He and training partner Nathan Moore, another Purdue alum and member of the American Kickboxing Academy in San Jose, arrived at the Tiger Muay Thai Camp in Phuket in mid-October for a month's training.

"We went right into training," said Fitch, knowing in hindsight they should have eased their way into it. "I earned my first real nickname over there and that was `Ooh-aap,' which was the sound that I made when I threw up. Because every day, at every training, I threw up at least once for the first week. That was a big part of it -- the heat, it's so humid there. it's like breathing thick air."

It didn't help that the camp owner told his crew not to go easy on the Americans.

"He told his guys to really kick my ass, because he wanted to impress me and he wanted me to refer other fighters to them. It wasn't supposed to be a picnic, it was supposed to be a real training camp. So they didn't take it easy on me at all. The Thais themselves, the trainers, they think for the most part that Muay Thai is the best, it's the toughest and they're the toughest because they do it. So they really try to test you, they really try to push you. And it takes a little while to earn their respect."

Gono will be the first to find out just what Fitch learned over there.

"My kicking's a lot better, footwork (too). I got a lot of new little nasty tricks, knees and things like that I can't wait to use."

The 34-year-old Gono is a cagey veteran, although one who may be better known for his flamboyant ring entrances than his fighting these days. He is coming off a split-decision loss to Dan Hardy at UFC 89 in October

Against Fitch, the five-foot-nine Gono is giving up three inches in height and 10 inches in reach. Still, Fitch has to be careful. Gono is tough, willing to bide his time and has a good ground game -- he almost ripped off Tamdan McCrory's arm during a submission win at UFC 78. He can also hurt you with kicks.

"He is a very seasoned, very tricky, very slick guy," said Fitch.

While Gono has won nine of his last 12 bouts -- losing only to Hardy, Dan Henderson and Canadian Denis Kang -- most see him now as the first step on Fitch's comeback trail.

Not that Fitch is talking anything for granted. He knows better.

He was about to board a plane to take part in Season 1 of "The Ultimate Fighter" reality TV show, only to get a call at the airport that his services weren't needed. They had to get his luggage off the plane.

Fitch got his revenge when he beat Season 1 winner Diego Sanchez at UFC 76 in September 2007.

He is also down to earth. Despite his success in the cage, it took a while before he was able to afford health insurance. He has washed dishes to help pay the rent and kept his bartender job until after his win over Sanchez because he was worried he could not afford medical bills if something bad happened.

A blue-collar battler, Fitch is his own hardest critic. He was inconsolable after the St. Pierre loss, tears running red as they trickled through a crescent of stitches below his eye.

"I'm really disappointed. I feel like I let a lot of people down," an emotional Fitch said that August night.

Some five months later, Fitch is ready to wage war again.

"I'm feeling really sharp," he said. "Actually I'm feeling better than I have ever."

Gono will likely get more style points for his entrance than his fighting -- in Birmingham he came in with backup dancers.

"I think after I win the fight, I'll ask him for some dance lessons," Fitch said dryly.

Fitch will walk into the arena once again to Johnny Cash's cover of Soundgarden's "Rusty Cage."

"I've gotten such a good reaction from fans from that song," he said. "No one else has really used it before.

"A lot of people haven't even heard it before. So I think we're going to be sticking with that song for a while."