BAY CITY -- Charlie Cosens does not go easy on students at his Bay City gym.  The training required to become a mixed martial artist parallels the sport itself: grueling, intense, demanding.  But there's one label often affixed to the sport which Cosens finds unfair.

"People kinda consider it to be barbaric. It's not barbaric in any way. It requires a lot of talent, a lot of different talents from other martial arts. It's very safe, it's actually a lot safer than a high school football game," says Cosens, owner of Cosens MMA and Conditioning of Bay City.

The 22 year-old is currently an MMA middleweight champion, who also teaches classes to aspiring competitors.

"It's very technical, it takes a lot of skill. Some guys will just go in there and try and make it a bar brawl, and it just doesn't work. It's a legitimate sport, it's not barbaric at all," says Bay City's Bill Fent, one of Cosens students.

Among nearly 20 moves disallowed in mixed martial arts include hair-pulling, shots to the groin and punches to the spine or back of the head.

While there's always a risk of getting hurt, MMA fighters are not nearly as prone to injury as people may think.

"There's a chance you might get injured, but there's also, you know, there's a chance you get injured driving…home from the gym. You know, if you put the effort towards it, you know, it minimizes the effects that you could receive an injury," says student Chad Herrick of East Tawas.

If there's a touch of irony to be found, it may be this: the rigors of competing as an MMA fighter may actually be outweighed by the process required to get there.

"I've had a few friends come in here and try it, and then, you know, they thought it would be something easy until they come in here and see part of the conditioning that everybody goes through. And they realize this exactly isn't for them, because it's commitment," says Bay City's Wesley Dinan, who won his professional debut Saturday night at the Birch Run Expo Center.

Make sure to watch NBC25 News at Six on Tuesday evening for part two of our series on MMA.