My name is James Jenkins. I train out of Serra-Longo, and I am one of the fighters on this season of “The Ultimate Fighter.”

Prior to heading out to Vegas, I had an almost regular fight camp to get in shape. I was fortunate because Al Iaquinta had been training for a fight with Gilbert Melendez, so I got a lot of great training/sparring in with him, and I was able to stay injury free. Unfortunately, Al’s fight never happened. I was also lucky to be able to ask advice from my teammates who had been on the show before – guys like Eddie Gordon, Al, Pete Sell and my coaches, Matt Serra and Ray Longo.

While I was on my way to the airport to fly to Vegas, my girl called me and told me she’s going to go, too. We decided to have her stay home because the week leading up to the fight to get in the house, they have you pretty much on lockdown. We didn’t want to drop $600 on a flight and have her stuck out there all alone, but when I left, she decided she needed to be there. So off I went, and one of the production staff members, Rambo, picked me up at the airport.

We went to Palace Station and checked in. From there, they checked all my things, took all electronic devices and put us in our room. I don’t think we got to do any training for the first two days. It was incredibly boring. We could order all the room service we wanted, but still, just sitting in a room by yourself was terrible. They took us shopping once so we could buy some groceries. Just getting out of the room and being able to talk to people felt amazing.

They took the Americans out to train at the “TUF” training center, the same place where the fights take place. It was a pretty strange feeling, knowing you’re going to be fighting one of the guys there – but you don’t know who. I was scoping out some of the guys seeing who did what, thinking, “OK, that guy looks like a striker; that guy looks like a wrester.” I remember one of the fighters, Tim Welch, fooled me with an old trick. I thought he was a southpaw from his drilling, but he was just doing that to throw us off. Some of the other guys just sat in the cage. I guess they didn’t want to give anything up. I hit the bag and got some rounds in on the versa-climber. Training at Longo’s, you get really familiar with a versa-climber.

I think it was the day before the fights, they had all the fighters come out. They had us take some photos and they were giving us our fight shorts. Some shorts were blue; the others were more of a blue-green. They gave me the blue-green shorts and it became pretty apparent whoever had the blue shorts, I could be fighting. We were sitting outside, and everyone at my table had the same blue-green shorts I had except for Brennan Sevin, who was sitting right next to me. I thought to myself, “This is probably my opponent.”

It wasn’t too long after that they did the fight matchups and called Brennan and myself. After we all piled into the vans, I had a seat open next to me, and Brennan looked in and I told him he could sit there if it didn’t bother him. Right after finding out that he and I would be fighting the next day, we rode home side by side with each other. He was actually a pretty cool guy.

Fight day, I think I was the fourth fight. We had Faber’s guys in our corner, and the other Americans had McGregor’s corner. It was the first time I got to meet Lance “The Party” Palmer. The guy looked like a damn gorilla.

It was a little strange, warming up for a fight with a bunch of guys you’ve never met before. As a fan, it was pretty damn cool to see McGregor, Faber and Dana White. I got to put on my first pair of official UFC gloves. The locker room was crazy. We had a little mat and eight guys warming up at the same time. The fights started up, and I got a good warm-up going. Everyone on my side kept winning. I finally got called to go out, so this was my big moment: I got to fight in front of Dana White and show what I’m worth. I had it in my head to have a war. I wanted to put on such good fights while I was in there that no matter what these guys say, they want to have me in the UFC.

I walked out and I saw my girl right there in the crowd. I got in the cage and Brennan was right across right from me. He was a little bigger. I’m not an actual lightweight, so I figured I’d be a little smaller than some of these guys. That didn’t bother me. What bothered me was he was a southpaw, and I just found that out in the cage with him.

The fight got started, and he threw a low leg kick. I caught it and followed him to the ground. All my pro fights have been at Ring of Combat, so it was the first time I ever got to use elbows on the ground. That was a bit of a new experience. I also got hit with elbows from the ground. He opened up an old flag football scar over my eye. I know the first round was dull, but in my head I was thinking, “It’s a two-round fight; getting one round in the bag is huge.” Brennan didn’t seem to have much of a game off of his back, but he seemed content to stay there. So I took Round 1, but it wasn’t the war I was looking for.

When Round 2 started up, I led off with a straight right that hit him. Then after that it was a battle. I remember off the bat I hit him with some clean hard shots. I thought for sure I was going to get the KO. He looked a little stunned, then he recovered. Then he started mixing in some knees. During the fight, I didn’t think they landed too cleanly, but seeing the fight, I saw every damn knee hit me in the head. He threw another kick. I was able to get another takedown, but he got up and we went right back at it. I knocked his mouthpiece out right at the end of the round. The fight ended, and I got my hand raised. It was a hell of a fight – definitely what I wanted to show them I had in me.

After that, I got stitched up and was able to spend a little time with my girl. I looked a little beat up and bloody, but I felt amazing. I remember when they were bringing in guys that had lost to see the doctor, I felt bad about how happy I was and how crushed I could see they were. I tried to hide my happiness and tried to not rub it in. You either get to be on the show or you go back home. I got to go out there and put on a great fight in front of Faber, McGregor and Dana.

We saw some of the American fights that were after me. I became friends with Billy Q when we came out to the tryouts. I was sitting in the crowd with his family watching his fight and cheering for him. The Europeans were fighting next, so we went back so we could watch them. It was pretty convenient to have them go second so we could sit back relaxed and watch them fight. I tried to get a little insight on whomever it is I might get matched up with. Then it was time to kiss my girl goodbye and get ready for what’s next.

James Jenkins (8-1), an American featherweight on “The Ultimate Fighter 22,” blogs about the season each week exclusively for MMAjunkie. Follow him on Twitter at @crzyjenks.