JRE MMA Show #140 with Gillian Robertson

24:48It's beautiful. Oh, that's the Miami. What's in there? It's him. What's all the things in Vegas? Oh, Vegas. Oh, it's all him. He uses the whole blinding of his own jacket. Yeah, yeah. It's like comic book. How dope is it though that when that guy yells your name? I know. Literally last fight I had to think to myself. I'm like, all right, let's Bruce Buffer. Just focus on the fight. Just think about Pierre right now. Is it weird? It's definitely weird. I don't know. It's everything is weird about this for me. It's just like, I guess a socially awkward kind of don't really put myself out there. Well, I do with fighting, but it's like I've never really put myself out there in life.

25:30So it's like to be in these kind of positions. It's all a lot for me. Wow. Well, it's amazing that the way you handle fighting, you could handle this the same way you handle fighting. You just get comfortable with it. I think that, for me, social situations are a lot harder than fighting situations. Wow. That's crazy. Oh yeah. Is it always been like that? 100%. Sincere child? Yeah. I feel like I've always been like the socially awkward kid in the back of the class. Well, I still am at the gym. But I volunteered with animals my whole life. I volunteered at the Humane Society, a horse rescue, wildlife rehab, but just animals were my thing.

26:15And then it was just kind of a left field. I started kickboxing when I was 16. Just for fun? Yeah, I really don't know where it came like what the idea was. But I - Where'd you start? What gym? At Dean's Gym. Oh, okay. Wow. You got lucky. So exactly. One of Dean's profiters worked for my dad. So I wanted to start kickboxing and then my dad found out that this guy was a profiter for Dean. So he ended up finding his gym and that was the first gym I started at. Wow. Well, what a great place to start. And so then you start kickboxing and how long before you decide, well, what about this MMA stuff?

26:54How long was that? I think it was probably like four or five months before I started taking the MMA class there. But I wasn't like thinking about fighting. It was just, there was a kid who was on the wrestling team at my high school who started training at Dean's Gym. And he was like, oh, why don't you take the MMA class? And I thought, okay, I'll have a partner. Why don't I try it? And I just kept on doing it. And then I was training like every day for like three hours a night, you know? And they're like, all right, well, why don't we just get you a fight at this point? Wow. What was it about fighting and martial arts that you became so obsessed with?

27:32I really think it was a, when I don't know what it was at first, because I didn't start Giu Jitsu, especially in the G. Until like a year after I started training. But when I started Giu Jitsu, I fell in love with that 100 % where it's just the technique of it. And the little tiny details that you just do that matter so much. Like if you put your thumb on this side of the hand or on this side of the hand, it makes a huge difference. It's like the little tiny techniques that can make the difference where now 115 pound girl at the time could do whatever she wanted to a 200 pound guy. You know, I was manhandling these guys around the room.

28:09And I'm like, just because of these techniques that I learned. And I thought that was awesome. Yeah, that is an amazing thing. It's Giu Jitsu is the one martial art that delivers as promised where the smaller trained person can defeat the larger untrained person. Whereas a lot of other martial arts, I mean, you have a better chance. But when they're really big, you know, and some guy is swinging it. If you know that punch a little bit and you get clubbed with one of those giant hams, you get fucked up. But if you get into a struggle, like some sort of a scramble and you knock into some chairs and all of a sudden you get a hold of this person.

28:46Now he's fucked. That's what's crazy. It's like that a small person can physically control and submit a much stronger person. Regularly, it happens all the time. It happens with black belts. Even in striking, it's like a person cannot know anything. But if they're big enough, they throw their hand the right way. They can knock you out. Yeah, if you get hit with Francis and Ghana, it was pinky. You're in trouble. Exactly. And the certain people that they're so powerful, like the idea that you're going to stand and trade with them is create going to hit you once and you're dead. You know, that's like, that doesn't work that well.

29:23Giu Jitsu, it's just there's not the variant of space. So there's not that element of guessing where it's like I can control and I can feel what you're going to do by touching you. It's like it makes it a lot easier. You're not guessing with that space that's striking. You're also not guessing the variables, like how fast is this person? How fast am I accustomed to people punching me? Is this person much faster or do I have to anticipate that? Because if you ever see like street fight videos, the most horrific ones are some poor asshole who wants to start a fight with someone who's not going to get hit.

29:56And who's a trained fighter and the trained fighter fucks them up. But you could see like they have no idea how fast things can happen. Like I'm sure you've seen a Joe Schilling one. Yeah, the Joe Schilling ones are ridiculous. But there's no way that guy could have known that that can happen that quickly. There's no way. And people don't expect like for someone like me a lot of times I get, oh, I would never guess that you're a fighter. For someone like Joe Schilling is still even like, oh yeah, you wouldn't like just see him next murderer. Well, you just see him walking around it like most people you don't expect that they're Joe Schilling.

30:30You don't expect it. I know. He's like a psycho to me. Yeah, yeah. But say like Ryan Hall. Ryan Hall is a great example. Yeah. You don't expect him to be a fighter, but it's like you never know what somebody's capable of when it comes to sports like this. Oh, for sure, but you just do Mikey Musumechi. Exactly. And that's the best example. Mikey is a stone cold killer. And he looks like a guy who comes over to fix your computer. He looks like the friendliest super nerd. Oh, this video's horrible. This is a street fight in a parking garage. Have you seen this? No. These guys start fucking with this dude in a parking garage.

31:05The guy is trying to get away. No, he fucked the other guy up before this. This is a shorter version. Okay, this is a shorter version. So this guy, he's trying, he's like, come on, you want some? And he moves forward. This guy leg kicks him. And then this is where it gets ugly. Punches him. Bam. He's out.

31:27Yeah, you don't want that. Like what? It's awesome to see that stuff works, right? For people like, hey, this is real. Someone tries to attack you. You have an upper hand. But also, like, what are you doing? Yeah, fucking people. This episode is brought to you by Life Lock. Tax season is already stressful. You shouldn't have to worry about identity theft on top of everything else. And trust me, it's a big worry. Especially since during tax season, your sensitive info does a lot of traveling to places you can't control. It goes through payroll, your accountant, or your tax consultant, and countless other data centers on its way to the IRS.

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34:17A picture perfect sunset or a cute dog running up to you and licking your hand. Again, that's zippercruder .com -rogan -zippercruder the smartest way to hire. I've never been in a street fight in my life. Good for you. I'm like, I don't intend to ever. It's just, I don't get it. I don't see a use for fighting outside the cage for me. A lot of people hang your management issues. And then there's criminals too. Bad folks. Yeah, there's a lot of weird stuff in the world. But just for me, I think it's fascinating that you are more afraid of social interaction than you're afraid of cage fighting. That might be one of the greatest lines that anyone has ever said.

35:03I think that's going to get you a lot of fans. For real. For me, it's just like literally I never really did any kind of interviews or media or anything like that until I got in the tough house. So that's going from absolutely zero to 100%. What was that like? You were like 22 at the time? Yeah, I was 22 and I was having interviews every day, cameras on you 24 -7. Literally after every single interview, I had to go and change my shirt because I'd be dripping sweat like I just got out the sauna. Wow. Just so nervous after every single interview. Do you think they brought you into the house knowing that you were nervous too?

35:41That you're a little socially awkward in that regard and that maybe that would make good television? I guess you never thought of it that way. Obviously they brought you in because you're skillful. But they also cast that show as a reality show. It's a very cleverly done show. It's smart the way they do it. Even with what they're doing now with Conor McGregor and Michael Chandler, it's great. But perfect shit talking. When Conor tells him you'll do as you told me. It's amazing. I hope that fight takes place. But it's such a show. So it's not just an athletic competition. It's also they want to make sure that people are fun.

36:22Our season seemed pretty like tame though. I feel like in general. We had a lot of, there is me and Montana Delirosa were the two younger girls. And then everybody else I feel like was like older and more mature. Like around like at least like 30s. And like they were like, I don't know. Nobody was trying to start trauma. Nobody was trying to like get in each other's faces. Or we didn't have any altercations. It was like it was a pretty chill season. That's great. So no one ever encourages like any bickering or anything like that. They don't ever tell you, you know, that's been just been science and shut.

36:55Does anybody ever do that? No, nobody ever really does anything like that. But it's just like the boredom gets to you if anything else. It's like I feel like. No phones, right? No phones, no TV, no music, no books, no nothing. No books. Nothing at all. Oh my god, nothing. So it's like. Can you have a notebook? You're allowed to get a notebook. And then they gave us, we asked for coloring books and they gave us sketch pads. Oh my god, I think I would go nuts. That sounds like one of those like anti -tech retreats, you know? Exactly. Or they try to weed people off their tech, tech addictions. I was just talking to one of the boys who's actually on the Conor McGregor season over the weekend.

37:38And he said the exact same thing as me. He's like, it was the best and worst experience in my life. Because it's like when you're in the gym, there's so many highs. It's so great. But then when you go back to the house, you're just sitting there for hours and you're bored and it sucks. What do you guys do to kill time? Can you play games? Do they have like a nice, these have pool, right? Yeah, they'll, I think they had a pool table and a chest table and then they have like the list where you can order anything. Oh, so you get order like monopoly? Yeah, so we would order a bunch of bullshit. Just try and entertain ourselves.

38:09God, did you, Ebo, did you have good conversations? Or was it weird because you're all competitors? It's weird. Well, not because you're competitors because I'm weird.

38:24That's awesome. I felt like I especially back then I wasn't able to just like, I don't know acclimate to that. Going into a house with 16 different girls that I don't really know. Right. Yeah, that a completely alien experience. And you're so, you're feeling a little bit awkward and you're also 22. And then also, bam, now you're on TV. And it's my first time like really like leaving home, I would say, you know, for a long period of time. So it was, it was definitely a big experience, like a lot to be gone. How long ago was that now? Six years. Six years. So would you say that now you're entering into your fighting prime?

39:04Do you think that's happening right now? Oh, yeah. I think this is like just the beginning of my prime. I'm just getting into where I've really found the right combination for everything. And I feel like I'm just getting better every fight. Are you ranked right now? And where are you at? My next fight is, and it's the number 15 girl, Todd of the Ricky. Interesting. She's tough. That'll be fun. That'll be a good one. Yeah, I'm like, it's coming up quick June 24th. Oh, wow. That is quick. How many would you, what it was like your ideal camps eyes like in terms of weeks? I would say probably about six to eight weeks.

39:39I like just to get focused on that opponent really started breaking down their style and game planning for them specifically. But it's like with the UFC, you never know where you're getting. Right. Like how often do they call you last minute? I've gotten a handful last minute ones. And I feel like it's almost just as bad getting like the one 16 weeks out and things like that. Because you're just saying they're waiting for so long. Or you run the risk of over training. Have you ever done that with Pete to early in the camp? I feel like I train you around no matter what. So it's like it's never really like where we push it the last couple weeks, but that's about it.

40:17So you're just always training so hard that you can essentially take it. Well, that's great if you want to take a short notice fight. Yeah, I always prepare. I train probably about four or five hours the morning and about an hour at night, even if I'm off camp. Like in camp out of camp, it doesn't matter on the same schedule. Just obsession. Yeah, I got nothing better to do. But I mean, what an amazing way to get better. You know, I mean, when you think about grappling and you think about Gordon Ryan, no one doubts that he's the best no -gui grappler ever. Right? But no one also doubts that he works 365 days a year.

40:55Like that's an insane work schedule. And these are insane results. And you're essentially doing that in MMA. That's what I think you see with like a lot of black belts. Or like people who are at a high level is they stop drilling. They stop doing the stuff that like Gordon Ryan still drills every day. And that's why he's so good at what he does. And it's like people at a high level in MMA, they're just doing what the black belts do and sitting on the side until it's time to roll. You know, and it's like you got to be drilling every day. You got to be put in the hours. Like my coaches are there with me every hour of the day if I wanted to be.

41:31You know, they're willing to put in the work. And like I said, as fighters we got nothing better to do. This is what we do. Like you got to treat it as like you're going to school a doctorate, you know? Well, I think that approach, your approach is perfect. That's the right way to do it. I mean, but everybody's different. You know, people have like different ways of fighting and different ways of approaching fighting. And someone much more chaotic than like you and your style. But I think that's the best way to look at it. And I think too often people love to roll because rolling so fun. It's so fun that you just don't even want to do all that other stuff.

42:11Now, I want to get warmed up a little bit and let's fucking go. Let's go. You just want to go because it's so exciting. It's the most fun thing and it's exercise. So it's like engaging intellectually. It's physically. It's emotionally engaging. It's like sometimes you're like fuck. Like you're going to tap and you don't. And there's a lot going on. And there's battles going on. And it's a great workout. And if you can do it, and if you can do it on a regular basis, it could change your life. It could change your life. And it's available to everybody. Like this idea that it's all broods. When you go to 10th planet of jiu jitsu, you see these dudes like skateboarders and surfers and they'll strangle you.

42:50It's weird. It's like they're super nerd assassins. There's a ton of them and you're one of them on the female side. Yeah, I feel like that's, I don't know, for me, it's like I said I've never been like someone athletic. I volunteered with animals growing up, you know? I was always the quiet kid in the back of the class. And it's like just it, I don't know what you jitsu is being able to be that like, I don't know, be that voice in a way. You know, being that way to express myself. And it's, I feel like it was just like completely not who I was when I was little. You know, it's just, it's a complete, yeah, I don't know how I feel.

43:27But it's you, you know, you're just growing, you know, this is the new you. Right? I mean, it is you. Yeah. And you're gonna, if you continue and you become champion, you're gonna have to do a lot of this shit. Oh yeah. You're gonna have to do a lot of this shit. You know, I mean, how many fights do you think you are away from a title shot? It's a stack division. I don't think I'm too far away from it currently. I think that on it as after this fight, I would like, I'm not looking past that at all. But I'm also like looking at the true trajectory of where I'm going. And obviously McKenzie Durend just put on a great performance a couple of weeks ago.

44:09And she has the second most submissions in women's history. And I have the first. So it's like, I think I would like to, you know, just solidify that. Everybody calls her the submission queen, even though I'm like, I have more than her. Well, she's pretty awesome, but you are too. That would be a crazy fight. Okay. And I think then that after that fight, I wouldn't be too far away from the title fight. I was very impressed with her against Angela Hill. Angela Hill is so tough. She was taking so many shots like, oh my god. And she just kept fight would not give up that arm bar. Like so many times McKenzie came so close to getting that arm bar.

44:48And Angela was just not give it up. But I think that's the best McKenzie we've seen so far ever. Just like it was incredible, incredible performance and super aggressive too. Exactly. That's what I feel like was so beneficial for her. She doesn't have to worry about getting taken down typically. You know, so she can be a little bit reckless and coming with those strikes. And that's exactly what she needed to do with Angela Hill and she was able to do it. And she's dangerous on her feet now too. It used to be just the ground. But now she's winging bombs. She can hit Angela with a knee. You know, she's very dangerous.

45:24She says she doesn't have to be scared. So she can throw overcommit to any strike, throw with all her power. And it doesn't matter because it's like put me on my back. Like thank you. Like coming to my guard. Yeah, there's guards, you know, and then some, I mean her guard is fucking nasty. Her guard is so high level. Everything she does is so high level. It's like when you can watch Jitsu like that in MMA, like a real world champion. When it goes to the ground, like her like moving from position to position to position to finally securing. It's like, woof. It's so quick. She's so good. So good and so technical.

45:58You know, her dad's a legend. It's just like that kind of like high level Jitsu in MMA. Some of my favorite shit to watch. You know, there's certain people that just have either one or two elite high level moves that they could pull off. And when they do it, you're just like, you're doing this to the best of the best in the world. Yeah, I feel like what you did too is just like, I don't just moving with people so much. I feel like it's so impressive to watch how people can just float on top of people. It's like knowing when to control and when to release. Almost, you know, when you really need it.

46:36I don't, some people are specialist at control. But like for someone like me, I feel like I'm better at flowing. You know, and letting people fall make their own mistakes and fall into things where it's like someone like Kabeeb is that pressure kind of fighter. Right. You're better at finding the openings as you threaten them in different areas and just move into position and hold it. Or not necessarily me threatening them, but them falling into their own mistake. I feel like I like to like, I'm just sitting there doing damage until I see the opening, until I see my opportunity, until I see that one mistake that you made and I capitalize on it.

47:12And is this how you've always done it or is this something you're doing now better than you've ever done before? This is something I'm definitely doing now better than I've ever done before. Was this the same approach that you had in the beginning of your career when you first started? I don't think as much just because now I feel like I went from a two -girl who did MMA to an MMA fighter more. Where it's like now, I don't like a lot of my early submissions were arm bars off my back. Where I was just comfortable playing guard. I didn't care because I was good at Jiu Jitsu. Where it's like now I'm always looking to do damage wherever I'm at.

47:49Typically, like to sit on top and do heavy ground and pound and heavy top pressure until they're like, all right, we need to get this girl off of me. I need to stand up and then that's when I capitalize. Typically, a lot of times off the stand up is where I find my choke or if they're just staying on their back is where my arm bar open up or head and arms, other opportunities. I just don't like to give up that top position. Yeah, top position is so important. If you can control the top, it's just much easier for you than it is for the other... And it's also kind of humiliating. Someone's on top, you're in front of all these people punching you in the face.

48:25It's also just a lot to carry on top. Yeah. It makes it you gas, makes it heavy. Yeah. And I feel like nobody understands the cardio that it takes to get up and get down and get up and get down in MMA versus like if you're just doing digits who you're just doing kickboxing rounds. It's like once you mix it all together, it changes the pace. Clearly. Yeah. I remember one of the most brilliant things that when George St. Pierre fought BJ Penn, he wanted to grapple with him immediately. He wanted to really get a hold of him right away to wear his arms out. He goes, I want to be a field with blood.

49:00So like it changes it. It changes your ability to throw punches. It changes your ability to get snap off to explode. You're kind of gassed out because you've been pummeling and trying to avoid being taken to the ground. People don't know when they see like your fights. These exchanges against the cage. Those are some of those grueling moments in all of MMA. Just the battle to see who wins this thing. Yeah, exactly. Especially against the cage. Honestly, a lot of those battles. If we can find an opportunity to break off, I'm willing to because it's like if I didn't get the takedown initially, then I'm just going to be grueling.

49:38You say it's going to be hard work to get them down where it's like, let's break off reset and find the opportunity, find the right timing for the takedown instead of sitting here and just grinding it out and just tiring both of us out. It's such an interesting time for MMA because you're seeing people like yourself that are young and grew up with it and got to watch it on television. What was the first MMA fight that you ever saw? I think the first one that I ever watched was John Jones and I think it was your shot Evans. So you're watching at a very high level as opposed to a lot of the people that like even John Jones, the stuff he got to see was stuff from 10 years before that.

50:27And like the kids of today, the kids like yourself, like you, the people growing up now, you guys have the most amazing library of champions to study in all the different forms of martial arts. And to see people like yourself that are putting it together so obsessively and to watch it succeed over and over again inside the art. It's fucking cool. I love it. It's such an exciting time. I feel like it's the beginning of MMA as a sport where it's like for so long, it's been to get to guys who do a little bit of striking or like wrestlers or strikers. But now it's like, is people putting it together and making styles and systems based upon these things where it's like, I feel like honestly deans want obviously I work with him, but he's one of the best in trying to innovate.

51:18And that's why I appreciate his mind so much. I've just trying to make it MMA as a sport whenever he's on the techniques that he has me drilling where I feel like it's like Donner, he's never renovated the no no -ge game with leg locks. It's like we need to change this from being kickboxing to get to and wrestling to being mixed martial arts. Dean always has awesome input whenever we're doing the shows and that they cut to him. He'll always point out something that I probably missed. And when you're watching these high level people that are coming up right now, there is still the room for the specialist.

51:54There's still the room for like the Andersen Silva style striking that the problem is with all fights is they all start standing up. And if you are standing up with a guy like Alex Beheira, like you're in a world of danger. Is a terrifying world. Like so there are still those specialists that are so goddamn dangerous at this one aspect of the game that they can get through. And the problem with like I always wonder will there be like because Israel is a striking specialist too. But will there be an MMA fighter that is complete everywhere to the point where they can stand with a world champion kickboxer?

52:35Is that a real thing or is that only a few freaks or is that it seems like in order to be a world champion kickboxer you have to really dedicate yourself only striking. The timing that's involved the distance. No, you're not thinking about take downs. You're not thinking about anything else. For you to be a world champion MMA fighter you have to be well versed in so many different things. Can't do really of the time to dedicate to the kickboxing level that this guy is. And every fight starts kickboxing. Every fight starts way apart from each other. And when you got a guy like Beheira moving towards you with that crazy style like oh Jesus Christ.

53:11Or Adesonio, like standing up front you moving like this motherfucker has three moves ahead. We haven't even started exchanging yet. Yeah, I guess he got to hope to get those guys in their back. But it's interesting to watch like the evolution of Robert Whitaker. You know, because Robert Whitaker, you know, he evolved so much more from the first fight to the second fight. He got so much better. Yeah, no, I don't know. It's definitely when you have a good striker, it's hard to obviously like we discussed earlier with the space. You know, you can never guess what's going to happen. But it's just like I feel like if you are a good grappler or a good wrestler and you are able to get it to the match, you can be that much more effective than having a good striker in front of you.

53:55Yes, well, you certainly can. The difference is you can control what's happening. If you can get someone and you get on top of them, right? What I always wonder is like I wonder if there are the people like Beheeda or of that ilk, Cedric Dune Bay, who I think is now going to fight for a PFL. He's, have you ever seen that guy fight? Holy shit. He's a glory world champion kickboxer and he's a bad man. And he has a crazy work ethic too. He used my gym when he was in town and he has a coach and they do the strength and conditioning routines. Excuse me. They do these strength and conditioning routines where it's like one round of sprinting on the, one of those self propelled treadmills and then one round of going hard on the bag and then one round of plios and they're just rotating back and forth between all these different exercises.

54:54His cardio is off the charts and he's like, that's it. That's the game plan. The game plan is you put heat on them with technique and athleticism and strategy but you put heat on them, they can't keep up. They're not going to work that hard. If you get to that level of fitness, like you can have this extra thing that other people just don't have and Cedric Dune Bay has that extra thing. But can he wrestle? Like is he going to be able to stuff take downs? How are these guys going to deal with getting him to the ground because as you're moving in on him, you can get any second you can get knocked unconscious.

55:30You can come out of nowhere and he might just take a wild shot at you because he doesn't want to get taken down. Maybe he just, maybe he says, let's see. Let me just throw a head kick. You know, it's like, I like watching that too. I love watching someone like yourself. I love watching these MMA fighters of today, they're these full complete artists. You want to get at some of his highlights, not the training highlights, but I know he's been doing a lot of MMA training. But go to his kickboxing highlights. His kickboxing highlights are preposterous. He's a bad man. And he's got some vicious knockouts.

56:05And he's just clever in there. He's just clever. I love the way. And then he's fighting that guy's Nikki Holtskin who's a beast. I mean, Doom Bay is a constant pressure. Like you don't get breaks with him. If you get a break, it's because he wants you to have a break. I mean, he just swarms on dudes. I just feel like if you look at that pressure in MMA, it's like it would be impossible to maintain with the variable of takedown. Look at that. It would be impossible. You're true. It's absolutely. Watch this when you miss this. Look at this.

56:41He's just chilling. He's actually a comedian. Oh, wow. He's a comedian in France. Oh, wow. It's crazy. And he's one of the best kickboxers alive. Yeah. Multi -talented. Not very multi -talented. Super funny guy too. And he, you know, if he can figure out the grappling, my question is always like, is it better to be well -rounded or is it better to be a specialist? I used to think it'd be better to be a specialist wrestler. I felt like, and I still think that to a certain extent, that at least the base beginning of amateur wrestling, those guys seem to be the toughest. They seem to be, they have the most mental fortitude, the grind of becoming a successful wrestler, is unlike any other athletic pursuit that I ever, which I only wrestled in high school for one year is one of the hardest things in my life.

57:26It's fucking hard. But these guys are, it's particularly good at the most important thing. Getting the fight to the ground and getting on top of people, right? That's the number one thing. Those guys are the best at it. So I felt like that's like the cornerstone. But every fight does start standing up. And so then you get a guy like Mercro Crocop, who figures out how stuff takedowns and now you're dealing with one of the most elite kickboxers a lot. And it's horrifying, right? So it's always wonder, like, what is the best approach? Do you think it's to be a fully -rounded mix martial artist putting all your time in all these different things?

58:03Or do you think maybe there's some room for the idea of like the world champion specialist? I think it's best to focus on everything, try to make yourself a mix martial artist. I think if you are a specialist to begin with, say like someone like him who's a world champion kickboxer, you probably shouldn't be investing like all your time and to jujitsu at that point. You should probably stay the specialist, you know, like go to MMA and like learn how to defend takedowns. You shouldn't be learning like how to finish on bars necessarily, you know, putting a guillon day one. It's like you don't need to learn that at this point.

58:40You should focus on what you're good at. But if you are day one, I think you should like focus on everything and putting everything all together. Because it's like I can have someone who is a better wrestler than me but I can guarantee you they won't want to stay in my guard, you know? It's like it, and for me especially I think the two most important are striking in jujitsu because they are the finishing elements. So it's like those are the ways I can take people out of the fight where it's like wrestling, I can control a little bit more but I don't have any finishing options. Well, that's a brilliant way of looking at it.

59:13I think you're right. I think if you're starting from the beginning, I think learning everything would be very advantageous because you wouldn't want to think you're who's scoring big in the NBA this season? You are playing daily fantasy at DraftKings an official partner of the NBA. Playing daily fantasy is easy. Draft a lineup, stay under the salary cap and watch your team rack up the points for baskets, rebounds, assists, and more. Take it to the rack with DraftKings Sportsbook, new customers. Download the DraftKings app and use Code Rogan for a free shot at a share of millions and prizes with your first $5 deposit.

59:44That's Code Rogan, only on DraftKings. The Crown is yours. Gambling problem called 1 -800 -Gamberler. In New York, call 877 -8 -Hopen -Y or text -Hopen -Y at 467 -369. In Connecticut, help is available for problem gambling called 888 -788 -977 -777 or visit ccpg .org. 18 and over in most eligible states, but age varies by jurisdiction. Eligibility restrictions apply. New customers only. Minimum $5 deposit required. One single use $3 ticket rewarded that expires in 14 days and February 28. See terms at DraftKings .com slash promotions. This episode is brought to you by Visible. Is your wireless full of stuff you didn't sign up for?

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1:01:08That's Visible's best plan with premium data for $15 off each month for 25 months. Get Visible's fastest network now with even more savings. Switch at visible .com slash Rogan with the promo code Rogan for this offer from Visible. Didn't think wireless could be so transparent, so visible? Well, now you know. Switch today at visible .com slash Rogan. Terms apply, see visible .com for network management details. You know, you wouldn't want to think you're safer than you are. And then someone takes you down at will and you're like, oh Jesus. Yeah, like if you just learn martial arts, like striking martial arts.

1:01:48Maybe I should learn to do it. Maybe I need to learn. That's probably not the moment to learn. No, but I do think there's some room for people that at least if you come, maybe it's like you get to a certain age. Maybe at a certain age you must go all in on all MMA. But if you could be a specialist early in your life, like if you were a specialist in striking, I think, maybe early in your life, you would have a, like if you look at all the best kickboxers and even all the best boxers for the most part, a lot of them start when they're very young. It seems to be like striking for some reason. I think there's freaks.

1:02:24There's people that just learn it and even when they're in their 30s, they can learn it and they get really good at it. But for a lot of people, there's something about the timing of striking that if you don't pick it up when you're really young, you don't really achieve this sort of, there's like a plateau for a lot of folks. Have you ever noticed that? For me, I'm like, I don't, striking has never been like my forte. I started striking before I started Giu -Jitsu. Giu -Jitsu just clicked for me. Striking, I feel like it just takes out a little bit more of athleticism, I guess, where it's like, I'm not the most athletic fighter.

1:02:57So it's like, I feel like I can't really use my mind to just make quicker decisions and striking as much as I can in Giu -Jitsu, where it's easier to do. Well, that's a brilliant way to do it. I think, you know, especially for your mind and your approach, striking is just a means to an end, right? You're just trying to, you're trying to struggle people. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And it's like, I'm not going to say I'm never going to have a knockout because obviously I want, that's the goal is to be able to develop power. But it's just, it's so much easier for like a heavyweight to just throw his fist and knock somebody out where someone, a girl, like any of the 25 or 15 or just the smaller girls, it's like, it's really hard to develop that kind of power unless you're born with it.

1:03:42Well, that's why Valentina is so scary. Valentina is Chico when she landed that head kick on Jessica I was like, oh, that was nasty. Oh, yeah, nasty knockouts like that with girls, I feel like it's just, they're not common. So when you see them, it's like, you got to have respect for that girl. Yeah, well Valentina, that fucking left high kick, holy shit. And she set it up to the body before that. She's so good and she's always like light on her toes. You know, her style is so interesting. You know, it's a very, it's like when she, you know, she lost the title now obviously, and I would love to see the rematch because the fight was awesome.

1:04:21But if you look at her, like the best moments in her career, she's like always moving, always on her toes. Perfect technique with striking. She's rarely out of position. I feel like that's one of the things I've always admired about her. It's like, it's hard to do what Alexa did is to be able to get her out of position and be able to capitalize on it, get her to like mentally not be there for a split second and be able to see that opportunity. Isn't it crazy that she did it off of spinning back kick? I feel like Valentina was just kind of like, this chick won't go away. I thought this was going to be easier.

1:04:57And she started making like not the smartest decisions. You really think that's what happened? You don't think maybe it was just fatigue? I think a little bit that, but a little bit of frustration maybe too. Just like Valentina was winning the fight and had a lot of good opportunities. But Alexa, Alexa was the only one walking in there knowing that she was going to win that fight no matter what that night. Well, is that real? Can you know that you're going to win no matter what? You can have that attitude. You could say afterwards, I knew I was going to win no matter what. But that's two world titles that were essentially lost to a spinning back kick miss.

1:05:34Did you ever see Chris Wideman? When Chris Wideman fought Luke Rockhold, he was winning the fight. It was like a really good fight. And then he throws a spinning back kick. And he misses and Luke Rockhold takes him to the ground and beats the fuck out of him. And it was a horrible beating. It was a really dominant performance by Rockhold. It was hard to watch. And that, he lost the title. And then you look at Valentina, same thing. Spinning back kick misses. Alexa Grasso gets her back, chokes her. Crazy. It's like two world titles on a spinning back kick miss. I feel like it's just like, I don't know.

1:06:14It wasn't a smart thing. It was just like a lapse of thought for her for that second where she was just like, all right, I'm going to throw this in Alexa. Just capitalize. She saw the opportunity and took it. Well, if she landed it, then it would have been something different. She has a nasty spinning back kick. She really does. So this is Wyman. And they were in the middle of this fight. Wyman was moving forward on Rockhold. And this is Wyman was the fucking man. This was a tough fight. Very tough fight. But Wyman's putting all this pressure on him, kicks him to the body. Looks like he's putting it to him, head kick.

1:06:51So right there, right there. It's like he's beating him up. Like he's big brother in him, right? And he throws a lazy wheel kick. And he gets taken down. And now Luke Rockhold's a mother fucker on the ground. And that boy's big. Luke Rockhold's big. He made 185 for about 15 seconds. Yeah. He's as well into the 200s I'm sure when he's fighting. He's a big fellow. Big long, strong as shit with crazy top pressure. And so here you go, Wyman's exhausted down. And I can't believe he's in this position. It's a terrible position to be in. I mean, Rockhold's training with DC. He's training with Khabib.

1:07:30He's training with all those people down there. All those animals in A .K .A. Came Velasquez. It's just the savage soup down there. Yeah, exactly. And so Luke Rockhold, people forget. You know, people see some of his losses and see him in the later stages of the career. When Luke Rockhold was a champ and this right here that he won the title, this motherfucker had staff. He came into this fight on antibiotics. He just got an overstaff. You know how hard it is to get up? Antibiotics fuck you up. And to be winning this fight in this way is fucking credible. And all off of Wyman missing one shot, really.

1:08:07Look, I mean, he's just beating the shit out of him. It's hard to watch, man. Because Wyman is like really kind of helpless at this point. And he's so battered from these elbows that it's like, and he's too tough. He's so tough that guy will never quit. And so this is one where I'm like, maybe this could have been stopped earlier. You could stop this in any second right here. You know what I'm saying? Like don't you think? It keeps going too. Bro, this is crazy. This is crazy. And I might have been the round. Believable punishment dish out. I think it was the round even. I think they keep going.

1:08:40Because there's a difference. Yeah, yeah. Oh my gosh. Why? It went on after that. That's right. That's right. And it gets, oh my god, it happens again though. It happens again. That's right. Oh. How tough is Chris Wyman? That motherfucker is so tough. But sometimes careers can change off of one mistechnique, which is one of the wildest things about MMA. Careers can change. Anything can happen at anything at any moment. I feel like it's like, you can go in and you can be a better striker than the person. You can just get caught. It can be their night. They can show up better. It's like, there's a lot of my fights where it's like, I feel like I am the better fighter.

1:09:23But they showed up that night. It's always a learning process though, right? Like every experience that you have, you're putting into your mental database of like how to deal with different conditions, how to deal with different thoughts to come in your head. Oh yeah, I feel like it's a huge learning process. And for me, I think, like, I didn't really get a lot of regional experience. You know, I was three and two when I came into the tough house. Wow. So I'm going on. My next fight will be my 15th UFC fight. So go three and two tough house and then Liverpool. Yeah, exactly. That's so crazy. Oh my God, what a wild ride.

1:10:04Yeah, so a lot of my learning experience was in the UFC. In the UFC in front of the whole world. Yeah, exactly. Chris Wideman, when he knocked out Anderson Silva, that was another one of those. How did that happen? What is going on moments? We're like, everybody thought that Anderson Silva was untouchable at that point. That was that moment where, you know, you realize like this sport is nuts. Even the people that you think are the greatest of all time, they can get cracked and knocked unconscious. Like it had, like Leon Edwards, when he knocked out Camaro Usman in the last round, like, what? What?

1:10:36Camaro? When he lands that headkick and you see Camaro, who's like one of the most durable guys that's ever lived, he gets cracked, he gets back up, he seems to find always in every fight. And this one, he gets put out, it almost seemed surreal. Like when Tyson got knocked out by Buster Douglas, like, what? Like, what is happening? It's crazy. It's like, like you can be the better fighter. You could beat when that fight, nine out of ten times. And then just that one time is that night. That's what happens. Especially at a high level, right? Especially at a high level. It's like, you can't make any kind of mistake.

1:11:07It's like on a regional level, say you make a little mistake, but they're not going to capitalize on it because they're just, they're not smart enough, maybe, you know? It's like, a lot of, or like, whatever it is. But then once you get up to a high level, it's like these people are good. If you make that one little mistake, then you're getting knocked out, you're getting subbed. You don't have those kind of opportunities. So it's definitely a learning experience there. There's also the difference between people that are fighting that train and people that train like you train. There's a big difference.

1:11:37The fact that you do it constantly and consistently, it's just such an advantage, I believe. Because, you know, I mean, I know it just from training in Jiu -Jitsu. Even when I was training like four days a week, like really regularly, I would be in, with those guys that are training five, six, seven days a week, and they would be getting better than me. Like, and I knew it. You could tell. It's in your head, like, okay, do you want to go psycho and be here seven days a week? Or do you want to try to live a life? Like, how do you going to balance this? You know, they're going to get better than you.

1:12:05It's impossible to stop. It's just a thing that people do. If you can dedicate enough time and focus on something over long periods of time, if you really stay true to it, you get better and better and better. And when I see someone like yourself that does that and goes from the tough house and goes to that fight and Liverpool, to me, that's like one of the great American success stories. That was fucking, I mean, that's really amazing. It's an amazing thing to be this person who's a socially awkward kid and then all of a sudden you strangle some girl in her hometown in front of the whole world in this crazy arena.

1:12:41Like, that's wild. Oh no, it's 100 % everything is surreal about it to me. It's like, for me, it's like, I'm just a kid who loves this shit. I love this sport and that's about it. I love showing up every day. I love going to the gym every day. And it's like, even on my bad days, it's better than going to any other job. Like, I love training more than anything else. Like, I can always remember, it's like, I've worked at Vets offices. I worked at Chili's right before I got into the tough house. And I'm like, there's my worst days at the gym or better than any day. I had to go to one of those jobs.

1:13:14Of course. I remember getting off of a shift at Chili's, getting off of a shift at the Vets office, working like 10 hours a day and just going straight to the gym. And there's nothing better than the feeling of the mat's underneath your feet. Like, that's just what I love more than anything. You can't beat that kind of dedication. That dedication trumps everything. Because even if you're really, really disciplined, you're enthusiastic too. Like, there's like discipline to get you to like a five mile run, you know? But like, it's not going to, you're not going to learn as much. Just with discipline.

1:13:47Like, he kind of enthusiasm and discipline is really the right combination. You can't just be disciplined and just kind of trudge through it. Because the person that's more interested in it, it's more passionate about, more excited about it. That person's more jazzed up. They're going to learn it quicker. And they're going to put it on you quicker. It's like, it's the ultimate testing ground for ideas and focus. Really is. I don't get people who don't train out of camp. Or they're like, oh, yeah, I took like a month off or something like, what did you do? Do you do anything other than train? Like what is what is fun time?

1:14:20Nothing. No hobbies. No nothing. You don't play golf. I have like, like I live in Miami. So it's like, I'll go out like paddle boarding sometimes, things like that. But that's really like training is so much of my life. And I feel like it's like a lot of the times I'm not training. I just don't want to do anything because I'm tired of exhausted from training. Yeah. I think Masai Yamaha said that about as karate students. They were talking about why they don't, I think it's Masai Yamaha. It's not that they're more noble. They're tired from training. Something like that. I'm pretty sure I fucked that up.

1:14:59But yeah, if you're training all the time, like that's why street fights seem so stupid. You know, like, oh my god, that's like more training. Yeah, exactly. More training with danger and weapons. Yeah. No, I'm like, I don't get how people are so confident to get in street fights. That is right. It's like you said without weapons. Like that's a crazy thing to me. You don't know when somebody has a weapon. People, people, people should be a bowl. Just be nice. Yeah. Fight. Exactly. So many fucking loons out there though. Have you ever had like a girl come to the gym specifically to try to train with you?

1:15:35To come train with me, yeah, definitely. I train at a smaller gym, the goat shed in Miami. So it's like, that is a wild place that you train at. Yeah, it is. I love that you train there. Those fellows are wild. Yeah, my coach awesome. He has like a controlled chaos going on in there. But they're getting good. Oh, yeah, we did. Everybody's getting good. He said we're there at 8 a .m., 10 a .m., 11 a .m., then I'm doing cardio after. Everybody's there. Focus working. I feel like people see all the crazy shit online and don't think we're actually training. We're actually working. But it's like, there's so much technical like ability that's behind all the chaos that you guys see.

1:16:15No, for sure. You could see that on Instagram. But if to the casual observer, I see what you're saying. But the infectious energy in that gym is so apparent that it comes out through Instagram. Like, that's how you know it's a legit gym. It's a little wild. That's right. Written. Bacito. Bacito. He was just here. Yeah, he was there. He's the fucking man. Last week on his day, we had a seminar. He's the fucking man. I love that dude. Okay. Yeah. Some girl had her legs open. I don't know what that was all about. I don't look at that one, Jamie. Yeah, my amuse wild ass place. It's actually not bad, boss.

1:16:54It's not. It's clever. It's clever. Oh, you click it and it's something else. Oh, she's selling sunglasses. Oh, glasses.

1:17:05That's a gym. Yes. You got to entice them, you know? There's a lot of dirty people out there. Get the clickbait. What do you think about fighters starting only fans? Is that nuts? Yeah, I don't know. It's not my thing, definitely. Like, I was sitting like I have friends who do it, things like that. But it's just, I don't know. It's, I feel like you got to be decide what you want. I feel like it's hard to be committed to fighting when you're into doing it. And yet, like if you're taking pictures and looking cute and doing things like that, that takes time where it's like, I don't have time for that shit.

1:17:37It's not just that, but then that probably makes you as much money as fighting. Yeah, that's also a thing about it too. Or more money. There's a lot of girls making more money than fighting. I'm sure, yeah. I'm not knocking it. If I was a girl, I'd be in my underwear for sure. I'd be like, come see this. Give me money. Especially if I was young. If you're a young girl, I mean, I, I'm not encouraging anyone to start only for, but I am saying, like, what is worse? What is worse? Someone looking at your butt or, you know, you having to work some stupid job for four months. I can't remember who it was, but there's, uh, some, there's a girl she had an only fans and she was a fighter and she tweeted one.

1:18:20She's like, you guys can pay me to use my body to fight people, but you don't want me to, like, pay me to use my body to, like, unonly fans. Like, you guys are just fighting. You look someone's telling her not to do it. Yeah. I don't believe in that. I don't think you should be able to tell anybody what to do with their personal life. Especially like social media personal life. Like, do what everyone wants to do. You want to show everybody butt? Go ahead. You know, I mean, the thing is then your butts on the internet for the rest of your life. And that's okay too. I think probably there's going to be no privacy at about a decade or so.

1:18:52I don't think any, I think we're going to be like, remember back on the day when you had privacy? I think people are going to know every thought that everybody has. There's nothing hiding. You're not going to be able to hide taxes and not going to be, I think the way our lives are getting more and more interconnected with technology. We're going to come to a point in time where I don't think there's going to be anything to hide than anybody has. And that's going to be a weird time to be alive. It's where I think about things in my iPhone tells me like, oh, yeah, for sure. It's like, oh, why don't you order this?

1:19:24I'm like, how did you even, I swear I didn't say it out loud. I just thought of it and it comes up there. I was Googling something and then the thing that I Googled started showing up in my Instagram feed. Very specific. It's a very specific thing. I'll tell you what it is. It's a 1968 bullet Mustang. Tell me how specific that is. That's really fucking specific. Never should, they never showed up in my Instagram feed before. What I was Googling the scene from the movie bullet. You ever heard of the scene? The movie? Yeah. It's Steve McQueen movies, film and San Francisco. It's the greatest car chase scene ever.

1:20:01And Steve McQueen has this 1968 Highland Green Mustang. And they're going through it. See if you can find it. It's fucking wild. It's a wild scene. And this is 1968. Cars drove like shit. So I Google this. I watch this chase scene and I'm looking at like builds that people have made where they've made replicas of that car, including this company called Revology that makes this sick Mustang. And they make like a new 1968 Mustang. Instead of it being a 1968 Mustang is like a 2023 1968 Mustang, but with modern technology in it. So this is Steve McQueen and this dude getting this wild chase scene in San Francisco.

1:20:44And it goes on for what this is when movies didn't have music playing when shit was happening. Look at this. It's just the sounds of the car Steve McQueen's face. And now they'd be fucking this up. But back then they knew it. I make a fucking movie. But look at that car. Look at that car. That's a 1968 Mustang. That's a 68 charger. So anyway, this starts showing up on my fucking Instagram feed. Now that's really specific. That's how dope is that car. That's a dope. That's a fucking dope car. I saw the scenes incredible goes on forever. Do you think they cleared traffic for this for sure? They just clip that car.

1:21:28You saw that. Well, I know, but my point was I was at there's a movie I've seen recently. Same time here. I think it's a Jack Nicholson chase scene. This makes sense. And maybe New York or Chicago. I read they didn't clear traffic. They just filmed it. Oh, I don't think it's as dangerous as this one probably. They just filmed it. For something like this, this is high speeds. You can't have people walk in their baby stroller across this street when Steve McQueen kills them. Just pan -enter and say, hey, no, that's not going to work. That car is 100 % a part of the movie. So is that car? Watch how this car reacts.

1:22:03These are all like stunt men. These are all stunt men. 100%. I would assume it would be now. You see how slow that that Volkswagen's going? That dude would not be going that slow. Look at this. Heb Cubcat lost. Look at this shit. All right. There's a wild fucking movie, son. This goes on forever. This is what they used to do in movies. If you watch like old like a lot of Steve McQueen movies, Le Mans, same thing like the whole beginning of the movie. No one even talks forever. I'm really good at falling asleep during movies. You don't give a fuck about anything with training. I love it. I love it.

1:22:35I'm like anytime I lay down for too long, it's like it's a risk. So you just pass out. Yeah, yeah, I can. Movies, I don't know. It has to be like kids movies. I usually like kids movies. I'll do good with like animation things like frozen. Yeah, I'd be cool with watching that. I could probably stay up for that. But like any real movies, I just don't have the, I don't know. I don't have the intentions, man. Well, it's also like the drama that people go through in some real movies. Like the actual real drama you go through for your profession. Yeah, exactly. There are things are so mundane, you know?

1:23:07Yeah, no. I feel like I like to try to get away from that. Like I don't know. I am a huge fight fan too. So I spend a lot of time watching fights. Yeah. Yeah, every weekend. Last weekend, I was like, what do I do? There's no fight time. Just feel lost if I don't have a week, a week end of fights. Do you watch only MMA or do you watch other sports? Do you watch more time or anything else? More MMA than anything else. I don't know. Even Jiu Jitsu, I feel like I've never really gotten deep into watching. But really? Yeah, it's more just MMA specifically. But I think MMA as a sport is completely different than like say like no Jiu Jitsu versus Jiu Jitsu versus like kickboxing versus wrestling.

1:23:47It's like those are all like even I feel like people look at like MMA Jiu Jitsu versus no Jiu Jitsu. They're like, oh, what's the same when it's completely two different worlds? Well, soon as striking is involved and also the gloves prevent a lot of stuff. It's very interesting. I think the difference if I, you know, obviously never fought MMA, but I grappled with MMA gloves on just trying to get jokes when someone's not punching you. You can't get things under chin. It's so much harder. Well, it's just how you have to work for things too. I think like when I go into Jiu Jitsu competitions, I get stuck in a girl's clothes guard and I'm like, how the fuck do I open a clothes guard?

1:24:24Like, oh, I punch you in the face. That's how I open your clothes guard. I can't do that right now. So it's like, I haven't drilled that shit in years where it's like these girls are doing that every single day. Yeah, the strategy of punching in the face can't be ignored. That's a good way to get out of someone's clothes guard. Yeah. It's like, well, it's just easy. Well, let's effort. Exactly. It opens up so many opportunities. Even some missions. It's like, I feel like for the Rose grappling match, it was short notice for both of us. I think the whole card was put together on 11 days total. Oh, wow.

1:25:01So I just had like a short camp, but me just doing straight Jiu Jitsu for that short camp. I was like, it's so much harder to get some missions when you can't punch them in the face. When you can't just like get them to like try to push you off or create the space when you can't do the damage. That's a really good argument for learning it the way you're learning it then from the beginning, because that's a really good argument for learning MMA Jiu Jitsu. It's a completely different sport. I think like, I don't know. I think Nogi and MMA Jiu Jitsu, they're just like getting farther and farther away from each other as the years go.

1:25:32I think that Nogi is taking its own path and MMA is a completely different world where it's like, even my choking style, I feel like doesn't translate as well to Nogi as it works from MMA. Hmm. That's interesting. But it's like the level that exists now, both in Jiu Jitsu and in MMA. MMA is so different than at any other time. I'm looking at these guys that are just now entering into the UFC and they look like world champions. They move like world champions. It's such an interesting thing to see. And for you to be a part of it and to love it so much, it's got to be one of the wildest experiences a person could go through.

1:26:18Oh, it's crazy. Like, I'm a gym right now. We have a kid who just started training with us. He's 11 and one and 20 years old. And I'm like, where did you get the time to get those fights? That's amazing. Like my niece, she's three and just started training Jiu Jitsu. I'm like, I can only imagine like people starting MMA at this age now where it's like, you've never really seen that before. And if you keep going at the pace you're going, I think you could hit like really crazy levels. I really believe that. I really believe that you're one of the most exceptional contenders that are coming up right now.

1:26:53It's really exciting to see. I think I built a really good foundation over the last couple of years. Like I said, I learned a lot. I got into the UFC extremely young. So I feel like it was a lot of stepping stones. But now I am in the prime of my life. And I am. I have the right combination with Goat Shed and Dean Thomas. And I feel like I'm just in a good spot mentally and physically. And I feel like I'm ready for these opportunities that are coming my way. That sounds like you prepared that one. Did you prepare that one? No, I did. Not at all. That's awesome. That's perfect. Print, cut. Make it real.

1:27:28Put that shit on Instagram. Yeah, that's awesome. I'm excited. I'm excited for you. When you're watching some of these upcoming cards, what fights are interesting to you that are coming up right now? The upcoming cards. On the Mandonuna's card, the Benil Darushan, Charles Olivera, that fight. I'm like, I've been waiting for that forever. I got canceled. Now we're you scheduled. That's a good one. That is going to be a matchup. Benil Darushan's fight with Jacar Close was one of the craziest fucking fights I've ever seen in my life. It was so nuts. It was so back and forth. Benil was almost out.

1:28:03I thought he was hurt bad. And that he finds a way to win. And his grappling is nasty. He's got one of those types of grappling styles that's just ideal for MMA. He's really blended it in such a perfect way. It's going to be interesting to see because Olivera is very, very good off his back. And it's like Darushan technically doesn't need to take this fight. He could probably get a title opportunity. I'm assuming that before this, you know, it's like, I feel like he takes opportunity. Like he's just a gangster, you know? He's down to take it. He is just a gangster. You know who I was thinking about earlier, I forgot to mention nasty off their back, Paul Craig.

1:28:37Yeah. He's something different. Something different. That dude's triangle is elite. Holy shit. Holy shit. Him and Jamal Hill. Oh, never forget that his arm just like flopping around there. There's nothing worse than that. It was horrible. But luckily Jamal's arm was fine. Believe it or not, it was just dislocated. Uh -huh. Which I thought was broken. It looks so terrible. I've seen a gang of arms get broken in my day. And that one was one of the most awkward ones. Misha when Rhonda broke Misha's arm. Oh, yeah. That was a good one too. I'm like, it's so funny because in a fight, I don't have a problem like doing things like that.

1:29:13But then a watch again. I'm like, oh, that's gross. I think the scariest ones for me are the leg breaks. When Anderson broke his leg against Wideman. When Wideman broke his leg against Yariahal. Like those are the scariest ones. That was freaking out. For Wideman to be a part of both of those. I'm like, crazy. What are the odds? That's absolutely insane. There was one that happened a few years back. Cory Hill, Reston B's. And then there was Anderson. And then after Anderson, who else? Chris Wideman, Connor, no one else? Is that it? I think that's it. That's it. And one of the worst ones is Tyrone Spong.

1:29:55You ever see one? Oh my gosh, that was disgusting. It's a hard one. It's something different in kickboxing too. I feel like the kicks are just thrown with more intention. Oh my god. The way he stepped back on that is just something. And that was essentially the end of his kickboxing career. I mean, he's boxing now. That's a dangerous man. Oh yeah. No. He's a dangerous dude. He's a big dude. Yeah, that one fight where he got dropped early in the round. And the dude's swarming on him. And he measures him, measures him, measures him, ball -fam! See if you can find that. Tyrone Spong, crazy first round knockout.

1:30:30Because it's nuts. This dude comes after him, big tall dude. Hit some of the big shot and drops him. And then the way he responds and the way he cracked that dude, just how staying calm under fire, looking for a shot, extending his left hand and drops it right on him. Just like a sniper. I think some people is like, I don't know. It is. Just the way some people might. Michael Dut. Yeah, some people's minds are just. I feel like they can just see shit. That it's, I don't know, they see something different. Look at that. Boom, perfect one too. Drops him. I mean, on the chin, perfect one too. He gets up.

1:31:06Okay, stays calm. This dude's just swinging now. Now he's just wild and reckless. Measures, bam! Woo! And that's the fight. This dude gets up and he's like, what the fuck? Fuck this. It took him a second. He's like, this is not, I'm not good. It's crazy the way people's bodies react to like being knocked out sometimes. It's like, I think it is Edson and his, Shane Bergo. Yeah, Shane Bergo. So I'm like, it took him like five seconds before he really felt it. Yeah, that was one of the weirdest ones I've ever seen ever. Just something happened and he's backing up. And as he's backing up, he's losing consciousness.

1:31:48It was like he was good and then he just, he wasn't good anymore.

1:31:54Shane Bergo is such a tough man. Oh, he's a dog. Oh, he's a dog. He's a dog always. So here, he gets cracked with a good shot. Here, then he gets cracked with another good shot here. Edson with those horrific leg kicks. I don't know where the, is this it coming up soon? Oh, they put the whole fight in there. So obviously Edson is catching him with a lot of stuff. And as tough as Shane is, he's probably been hurt on multiple occasions and these exchanges right there. That's it. So it was a one two. It was the one two right there. Right there, one two, boom, boom. And then it just, the lights go out.

1:32:41Crazy. Have never seen something like that. That was weird. Yeah. But there was a hard punch that, and multiple punches before that. Edson Barrows is a guy who doesn't get enough credit. That guy has the fastest switch kick I've ever seen in my life. His switch kick is bananas. His last knee against a Billy quarantine. And then his knee against Benille Darush, both of them were fucking vicious. Insane. Yeah, I wonder how much of a struggle it is for him to get the 45. I was on the last card with him and it looked like it was a struggle. He's so shredded. He was like, we're sitting there than hour before weigh -ins.

1:33:18And everybody was just sitting in their chairs and he was laying on the floor on the back. Just looked like he was struggling. But the next day he went out there and performed 100 % apparently. Like he got that knockout, got that fight in the night bonus. So I'm like, I don't know how people do that. I don't know how to do it either. I don't get how you can make such a huge cut and just feel good on fight night. Crazy. It's crazy because it's the amount of damage that does to your body. It's not zero. So how much damage are you doing 24 hours before a cage fight? Just for that advantage. And it's like how much the oversized advantage is it?

1:33:55Maybe 5, 10 pounds. It's like how much of an advantage does that give someone if they are technically better than you? I think there is advantages. There has to be. Otherwise people wouldn't keep doing it. I think that it's also, you also feel like if you get someone who does a lot of it and then they get a hold of you, you're like, oh my god, I'm too small for this weight class. You know, if you're one of those guy, like Frankie Edgar is an animal. Frankie Edgar weighed 155 and won the 155 pound world title. And he beat BJ Penn to do it. Frankie Edgar was beating everybody and they were way bigger than him.

1:34:29He just did it with skill and heart. And also he was so durable because he didn't cut weight. So one of the things like some of these guys that cut a lot of weight, there seems to be, there's, it seems like the guys who cut the most weight have harder times after a while taking shots. It seems to have an effect. It's hard to tell whether it's just the overall cumulative effect of their career or if it's the weight cut. But there was a lot of questions about Paheda. A lot of people brought that up. Like whether or not the weight cut makes him more susceptible to getting knocked out. But we know it's not zero, right?

1:35:03It's not a zero effect. It has an effect, but it's also to be this bigger person and to be able to, especially in the early part of the fight, you can get a hold of someone. One's 70, when he walked down to the cage. Oh my God, that's crazy. That's crazy. That's 25 pounds. That's crazy. That's so much weight. Oh yeah, no, I don't know. Think about 25 pounds of water on this table. Exactly. He removed that from his body and then put it back in. What? Without an IV. No, it's absolutely insane to see. And after that being able to perform. I think that's the thing is that so many guys are doing it.

1:35:46When you see a guy who's as big as Edson at 145 or as big as Billy, I don't know what Billy cuts. But there's some guys in some weight glasses that are just like, how was Marvin Vittori 185 pounds? That guy's giant. He's huge. Oh yeah. But he gets out of 185. My, all my fights besides my last one have been at 125 in the UFC. And then my last one was at 115. So just the difference between the 25ers and the 15ers is extremely different. I feel like that girl we watched earlier, Maria Agpova, she, I remember I trained with her at ATT and she would come into camp around like 150, 155 and cut down to 125.

1:36:27Where I was coming into camp at 130 and cutting down to 125. So yeah, it's just, I don't know. I don't know how the girls do it, but I'm like, there is a huge difference between like the 15ers and the 25ers just size wise. Nobody does a crazy than Patty. Patty's out of his fucking mind because he does it in front of everybody. I feel like he tries too though. Oh, he does try too. I think it's part of his personal and now, but it's also fun. The dude gets fat in front of the world and then gets shredded again. He disappears and then gets shredded again. And then he gets fat again. Yeah, even that I don't get.

1:37:01I'm like, by the amount I train, I don't get. Look at the difference between the lower left hand and the lower right hand. And then he goes to the upper middle. When he's down to fight, he's a fucking character. That kid's a star. You know, if he gets matched correctly, and that's the thing, like if it was any other sport, you'd get matched. If he was boxing, you'd have a manager, that manager would go, okay, Patty, you got a lot of fans, but we got to set you up with the right opponents. We got to make sure that we test you in all these areas and build up all the holes in your game. And you know, like boxers like to get to the title, undefeated.

1:37:37They like to get to that title fight. 16 and oh, the challenger. That's what everybody loves in boxing. I feel like it's getting more and more like that in MMA too. I have more respect for fighters who is like, you can see that they've taken tough matchups versus the fighters who is like, they fight nobody, but they have an undefeated record. What do you think about a fighter that gets an opportunity to take a fight they know they probably shouldn't take? And they take it early in their career against someone who's far more experienced than they could be very dangerous. But sometimes an opportunity presents itself and they say, hey, do you want to fight in the UFC?

1:38:11We got to fight against this guy, top whatever contender. And people have done that before. First fight in the UFC, you're fighting a contender, which is really wild, but it happens all the time. I've never taken opportunities like that, big like, fighting contenders in the UFC, but I feel like it is important to take every opportunity that comes your way, because it's like, it's more eyes on you. You have an opportunity to show what your abilities are too, even if you are like the B side of the matchup necessarily. But every opportunity I've taken when or last, I feel like it's helped lead me to the point that I'm at today.

1:38:43And it's also built the foundation that, like, you need losses, you need to learn and you need that to fall back on. Even if you know like you're seriously overmatched, take it anyway? Uh, I don't know. It's that for me, it's like I've never said no to a fight. I think that's a tough situation. I've definitely went into fights where I know I was seriously undermatched. Like, when I fought on the tough house, like I said, I was three and two. I was 22 years old and I fought Barb Hunchack, who was 10 and two, the Invicta champ. She was like pinned to win it. And that was my first fight in the house.

1:39:23And I ended up losing second round TKO, but it's still, I had my moments in the fight. I almost finished an hour and bar at one point. And it's like I still had that opportunity, obviously got my face in front of day. And I got to be on the tough house. Like it was still an opportunity that opened doors for me in the long run. You also escaped that straight arm lock. When she had your arm extended. Oh yeah. And you got out, I was like super impressed that you got out of that. I was like, Jesus Christ, I hated the angle. When I was looking, I was like, Jesus, it was one of those, there was a moment where she was yanking on it.

1:39:57Or else like yikes. Literally, I thought during that moment, because everybody knew me, it's like did you get to girl in the house? So I'm like, oh, I cannot let her sub me. Like I'm not gonna let her get this shit. How close was it? It was definitely hurting, but it's like I feel like that little bit of frustration gave me that little bit of like push, that little drive. That's funny. Well, you got out of it, but that was a very tough matchup for you. Yeah, that's the thing about the progression of MMA. You get these tough matchups, you learn, and it's fascinating for me as someone who gets to see fights over and over again, see fighters progress through their career.

1:40:39You get to see these people that put these things together and you see the learning growth and the curve and you see where they're at now. And it's like ever since I was, even in my amateur fights, I had a lot of tough girls, but like all my pro fights, I've had one, two fights where the girls haven't made it to the UFC at this point. So it's like I fought all UFC level competition. My last amateur fight was actually again, Cheyenne Blissmas, and Rise of Warrior, my little hometown show. So it's like another UFC girl fighting when I was in amateur. So it's like I've always had the highest level of competition.

1:41:15That's very fortunate. But also Miami's a hot spot for MMA, right? A Florida in general, I feel like it's a hot spot. It's just, I don't get how people train in the cold. So I get why? They have to wear both her campaigns. Exactly. And alligators. They're everywhere. They're everywhere, but they leave you alone. Yeah, until they don't. Until they don't. It's just be comfortable to have monsters walking around you yard. That's crazy. I remember when I went to the tough house, it's like that's the first time I was really, I don't know, round a lot of girls from, they were all around the world. And they were asking me about alligators.

1:41:49They're like, what do you do about them? I'm like, what do you mean what do we do about them? Like they're just there. We just kind of ignore them. They're like, I feel like everybody expects them to be like chasing after you or something like that. They have this weird stigma around them. Well, every now and again, they do get someone. Every now and again, but like, you, we don't. We don't feel so comfortable with living around monsters. That every now and again, eat a people. We have a gator, sharks, snakes, everything's trying to kill you and for that. But if you go in the water, you don't have to worry about the sharks.

1:42:23And well, the snakes, you got a real problem in the avarglades. Yeah, that's nuts. Yeah, in the avarglades, there's like 14 of foot pythons. They're fucking huge. They just find them. They just go, they don't even have to look that hard. They look out, there's one. I saw a video of one eating an alligator. I'm like, that's crazy. Yeah, we played it a bunch of times. There's a bunch of dead ones they found with alligators like poking out of the side of their body. Yeah, they run out of things to eat. It's just insane though, like, to be able to swallow is literally bigger than you. Yeah, literally bigger than you.

1:42:55Well, they've eaten everything. There is an estimation that 99 % of all the deer's, rabbits, raccoon, everything in the avarglades is gone. Oh, wow. 99 % yeah, all from the snakes. Oh, that's crazy. There's like nothing left. It's just monster soup. It's just monster soup. It's just snakes and alligators. That's all it's left. And some poor fuck imagine if you're some dipshated doesn't know what you're doing. You want to go hiking in there. There's a half a million pythons. A half a million. Oh, wow. In Florida. I'm like, you're opening my eyes to this. Yeah. I'm like, there's a half a million pythons estimated in Florida.

1:43:34I've always seen things on the news and stuff about that. Obviously, you see the Florida man things. Like catches a python. I'm like, I didn't know there's that many of them. I think you guys are way too comfortable. I think you're way too comfortable. I don't think you realize what's like right. There's this, there's a wooded area that you go into. It's filled with monsters and those monsters have eaten every mammal. And it's like with me, I think like crocodile's alligators are so cool. It's like they've eaten every animal and they've been around for thousands of years. So it's like millions of years.

1:44:07Yeah. So it's like they're survive everything and can kill anything. They're cool as fuck. They are cool. Yeah, I think alligators are really cool to me because I'm really fascinated by them. Crocodiles are very different though. Crocodiles are like a wolf or is alligators a more like a dog. In Florida, though, like the crocodile's aren't as aggressive usually as well. Are they as big? We don't have a lot of crocodiles. Is this a crocodile with a person inside of it? It's a snake. It's a python with a five foot alligator inside its stomach. Oh, Jesus. Eight at a whole. Whoa. Oh my god. Look at that.

1:44:43That's insane. That is fucking insane. 18 foot, maybe 24 python. 20 foot python with a giant ass alligator inside of it. And where was this? Where did they find this one? Florida. This was in Florida. That's where I ever got it. National Park. Wait a minute. I thought the biggest python they ever found in Florida was like, I thought it was less than 20 feet. Well, this is 18. This is roughly 18. Oh, okay. A five foot alligator inside of it. You know what I'm saying that is? So it literally is monster soup. It's monster soup. There's nothing left. There's no raccoons. They're all fucked. Imagine being a raccoon trying to get laid.

1:45:24You're out there. Anybody? There's no one there. No one lives there anymore. There's no deer. Good luck finding a deer. They all get jacked by monsters. It's all the monsters. All the people too. There's too many buildings now. I feel like Miami. I feel like there's no, I don't know. There's no wildlife. Maybe you should encourage people to go hiking. In Miami? Yeah. Go to the Everglades. Go for a hike. So I'll have both the problems. That would be a real reality show. Here's a real reality show. Take some Cloud Seeking Dip Shit and let them camp out for the longest in the Everglades. Don't sit.

1:46:01No, don't do this. Someone's going to take this idea and someone's going to die. You got to put the disclaimer on it. One of my favorite stories about Florida was this guy was involved in a car chase with the cops. And he parks on a bridge, jumps out of the car, lands on a gator, and gets killed in front of the cops. That's one of those ones where I'm like, can we get that fact checked? How does that happen? Just an asshole. And karma come get you. Karma came and got him. Land on an alligator. It's like a movie. There's this sometimes scenes happen in real life that seem like a movie. Florida man runs from police directly into an alligator's mouth.

1:46:43When Brian Zuniga fled a traffic stop and, well, you fucking pop ups. When Brian Zuniga fled a traffic stop in Tampa yesterday, he had the right idea. Sprint away from the cops, jump offense, hide behind a water treatment plant. But Zuniga wasn't counting on justice loving reptile. He's back in custody this morning with nasty scars in his face. Oh, this is a different one. I think so. Yeah, this is a different one. This is not the one. Many of these dipshit fucking lay in the alligator's. Yeah, one guy died. This dude jumped off a bridge though. Got his arm bitten off. Yeah, that's gator man. That guy wandered around for like days with one arm.

1:47:22He's like, man, I don't know where everybody was. Oh, this one just happened recently. It's a wildest place. Who would have thought that Florida would be like the battleground for freedom in America? Like, who would have ever thought that Florida would be the place for it is all the people are like, we ain't freedom. Florida was the spot. Yeah, and no, especially I feel like during like COVID and stuff like that. It was like, I think that's what's drawn all the people to us. That's it was like since COVID, everybody, like you said, like with the freedom and everybody's just kind of rushed their way there.

1:47:55It's so fun that he got so much, the Santa's got so much criticism from that. But at the end of the day, he was right and no one wants to admit it. He said, protect your elderly, treat your elderly, everybody else, you should be able to go back to life. And he was right and everybody's like, you're killing everyone. He was right. Yeah, I think we never really, like, Jim's might have shut down for like a week, but we were still open, you know? Like there is nothing that really like shut down for a long time. And for it. And Jits who Jim's in LA got hit hard. Oh yeah, and I heard a lot about New York, how terrible it was.

1:48:29Yes. Both the Don and her desk while they all went to Puerto Rico. So they could train. Imagine that, literally going to an island in the middle of the fucking ocean so you could train. Yeah, no, no. It's so crazy. It was, I don't, like, I worked with Dean a lot during that time. So it's like, we would constantly just, wherever we can find Matt's space. But we don't even need Matt. And so like, Dean would drill on carpet with me. That's awesome. If we got it. So like, wherever it was, we made it work. We made it happen during that time. But it's like, there was a lot of opportunities. And there wasn't a lot of places closing either.

1:48:59Well, the places in LA, they, you know, people had to meet privately in different spots. They had to try to keep their game going. And then, you know, just hope someone wasn't sick. And everybody had so much anxiety. But I didn't hear of anybody really getting fucked up by any Jits or community. Now, and then it's like, like, I find Abu Dhabi during that time. So it's like flying over there. It's like, you have to COVID test, I think, 10 times before you touch the island. And it's just crazy. All the things that you have to go, that we had to go through during that time period. It's like, it feels like it was a different world then.

1:49:32I know. And it's amazing that the UFC pulled it off. It was brilliant. They, everybody was telling them, what are you doing? You're going to have fights on during the pandemic. You're going to kill people. Your risk can be a lot. And they're like, look, we're going to do it. No crowd. We're going to test everybody. Not good enough. People still didn't want it. Stay home. As if somehow another respiratory virus is going to like, dissipate because everybody stayed home. Like, stop. You're ducking nonsense. It doesn't work that way. So they did it and it all took off. And then NBA started doing it with no audience.

1:50:04And then they started creeping audiences back in in like the APEC center. And I remember the first time we did it in an audience, again, it was, I think it was Jacksonville. It was crazy because like Florida was one of the only places where we could do it. And it was a full packed arena. And I was like, this is the super spreader event of all time. This is the middle of everything. And everything was fine. Yeah, I feel like the audiences have come back stronger since COVID too. It's just like, it used to be like first couple fights. There'd be nobody in the audience during the prelims. And now it's like the first two fights.

1:50:39There's already fans there. Everybody's just like ready to get in their seats. I love that. When I get there and we're there for like 4 p .m. fights and it's already packed, though that's exciting. But I get it. It's six hours, a lot of fights. Oh yeah, no. It's definitely a lot of fights. But as the fighter, it's like, it's nice to have that crowd. There it's nice to have that energy there. And like, like probably one of my, me being Canadian fighting in Edmonton was probably like one of my most memorable fights just because of that energy and the crowd. Just because of how many people were screaming.

1:51:13And it's like, I'm not walking out and Liverpool and getting booed. You know? Right. Did that feel like an added pressure on you? It's an added pressure. It just makes me, I love it more than anything else. It's like the fights at the apex almost like don't have the same feel to me. They don't have the same vibe around them. Even like the, even the winds, I'm like, it's just like you're celebrating by yourself to have the crowd there and just that energy in the room. It just makes everything different when you're walking in the cage. I totally get it. But as a fan watching the apex is really special.

1:51:44There's something about being overwatch fights with no crowd and the fights are being broadcast on tell. I mean, I always, I was thinking at every one of them, like, wow, I'm so lucky that I can be here and do this because just to be in this moment, there's only 100 people here. And this is in the middle of these crazy, weird times. But I'm getting to experience Tony Ferguson versus Justin Gagee. This wild crazy fight with no audience. And it was a fucking war, a crazy fight with no audience. It's so weird. It feels like it's almost like two chill of a scenario when you're in there. It's like, okay, I'm in a fist fight, but it's just like, because it's so quiet, it's just so relaxed, it's weird.

1:52:24It is, it's very different to experience as a fan. I couldn't imagine the difference in like when you do something and there's no cheering, you know, maybe you hear coaches and that's it, but you also can hear like specific instruction very clearly. Oh, and you can hear her coach is very specifically then too. So it's like that definitely plays into it. And it's like, or I always like whenever, just watching as a fan, like you can hear the shit talk between the fighters, you know, on the mic. So it's just definitely adds a different aspect. Well, that's why Mark Henry's got such a fascinating way of doing it where he comes up with nicknames for every move and they're different for every camp.

1:53:03Yeah, which is crazy. Yeah, I feel like trying to remember that would be hard. Richard said he was blown away. So like this guy's, he writes out all these different names. Like this would be the name of your friend. This would be the name of your daughter. This is the street you grew up on like, what? Yeah, I'm not remembering all that. With Dean, I feel like he relies on my decision -making ability a lot and he relies on the fact that we're prepared that we spend 10 weeks, 12 weeks, whatever. Preparing for this moment. So it's like I should be ready for every opportunity or every obstacle she throws at me.

1:53:38So you will hear him in the corner, but not often. I feel like he only talks when he feels necessary. So it's like he trusts me to make my own decisions majority of the fight. That's awesome. I feel like also that's what's helped me build great decision -making and I feel like at a championship level, decision -making is what makes one of the biggest differences. That's a very good point. That's interesting. That's the thing about it. Like for the overall health of the people, yeah, because as you're going through the challenges, they're going to get more difficult and you're going to have to kind of sort it out on your own.

1:54:11Then whatever mistakes are made you correct in the gym. And it's like for me at the end of the day, it's like I'm walking in the cage by myself. You know, I need to be ready for that moment. I need to be ready to answer everything. And like, I think it was my second or third UFC fight. I had just one girl in my corner and she was a amateur fighter. Just because it's like, I just needed someone to warm me up. It's like, we have those 12 weeks of preparation and I'm ready no matter what walking there. So it doesn't really matter like who's in the corner. What does a camp look like for you? Is it laid out in advance and does it include, do you have strength in conditioning sessions that you do separate to your MMA training?

1:54:48I actually don't do strength in conditioning at all. You just do MMA. Yeah, I just do MMA. Is that unusual? I think it is. I think a lot of people think I'm weird because I don't do it. I think that it's more beneficial. Like you only have so many hours in the day and there's so many sports. There's jujitsu wrestling striking. And it's like, there's so much to learn. So it's like, I can only invest so much time into each of them. So I choose to invest my time into technical abilities and for my cardio more, I get it in rounds. So it's like, I do jujitsu rounds or like MMA rounds. I do MMA rounds three times a week.

1:55:25So it's like, I'm constantly getting that cardio we're getting that push. And I feel like there's nothing that can really match that MMA pays that MMA cardio. So it's like, you can do striking for six months then come to jujitsu and have shitty jujitsu cardio. So it's like, I think you have to be doing MMA to get MMA cardio. I don't think running or anything like that necessarily supplements it. Do you guys do things like switch out opponents and live drills and things like that to like ramp up your heart rate and simulate moments inside fights? Things like that, or like we said, say, it depends on who my opponent is in the cage.

1:56:03Like if I'm going with the boys or with the girls, if I'm going with the boys, it's like, they can push the pace for me no matter what. Just them, they're stronger, faster, typically. And so, and we have a good group of 125 pound boys who can really push the pace for me technically. And then with the girls, we usually set like goals for me. So it'll be like, just try to score as many submissions as you can this round. Or we're trying to score five takedowns around. So just make sure you push the pace to make sure that I want to be ready to shoot 10 takedowns around every fight that I go into. Just so I'm confident in that.

1:56:37And it's not like a necessity of me, like I need to get it to the ground this time. I can shoot 10 more times. We'll just come up with strikes so we'll figure out when the opportunity is right. I like that strategy because you're doing, you're essentially doing strengthening conditioning through skill drills. Exactly. All my strengthening conditioning is just getting rounds and doing sparring. Well, I mean, there's nothing that makes just stronger than wrestling, right? And if you're doing that kind of thing, like trying to get as many takedowns as possible and 20, I mean, that's, that is a form of strengthening conditioning for sure.

1:57:10Absolutely. It's a different type of, we usually, once a week we'll do big gloves, so boxing gloves and takedowns. And we just do King of the Hill. And those, there's two 10 minute rounds and those two 10 minute rounds will kill you every time. Just trying to take someone down and because we have big gloves on, we're hitting hard and then to get and takedowns. And it's like those rounds, I don't feel like there's anything that pushes my cardio like that. That's interesting. How much harder is it to take someone down with big gloves? It's definitely adds a different element, you know? Especially like I said, these rounds, we specifically like know we're going for the takedown.

1:57:45So it's hard, hard rounds. Yeah, like when you're talking big, you're talking like 16, 18, how big of a glove? Yeah, like 14, 16. Okay, just boxing gloves versus using like MMA sparring gloves, like six ounces. What are your thoughts on hard sparring versus technical sparring? I think you need a little bit of both. I think you definitely need to learn how to bring that dog out in the fight when you need to. So you need those hard sparring rounds. You need those rounds to make you confident and walking forward and confident, pushing the pace. But it's also technical sparring rounds. You need 100 times more of those.

1:58:26You can do as many of those as you want because you're not taking the damage. But that's what's going to build your reaction time. What's going to make you think more? A lot of times if you get too much hard sparring, then you get a little bit like punch shy. You don't want, you're not going to build the right reactions. So if you get more technical sparring, you're building more right reactions and you're building just, I don't know, I feel like you need both. Hmm. I think you're probably right. And I think most people would probably agree with you. But for longevity, the one concern is like how much hard sparring you do in training and how much that takes out of your longevity, how much that takes out of your overall career.

1:59:05Like Max Hallway is not sparring at all anymore, which I found really fascinating. And his reasoning is he'd take unnecessary damage in sparring. And I know how to fight and I'll just do drills and work on my conditioning and do it through drills. And he's been very successful doing it. Yeah, someone like him, it might be a little bit of a different circumstance where he just has that dog in him. You know, you don't need any. He doesn't need the hard sparring to bring that out of him at all or to like make him feel comfortable there. Like that's just Max has that in him. He's also had so many high level fights that like the timing and it's all in his hat.

1:59:41You understand what happens. He's been there with Volkanovsky over and over again. He's been in there with Connor McGregor in the early days. He's a fucking animal. Max Hallway is an animal. He's really good. Max is, yeah, I feel like he's like the people's champ. He's such a good guy too. He's like the nicest guy ever. He's so friendly and fun. But man, when he turns it on inside the cage, holy shit. He's got extra gears. That guy's got extra gears. He's another one that's a fantastic example of dedication and hard work and the results. Because like, and he'll tell you, he's like, I'm not like the most athletic guy.

2:00:19There's nothing. It's just he worked harder than everybody. He's more intense than everybody. And then when you saw him in his prime, and he was a monster, he just would put it on people and put a pace on people they just couldn't keep up with. I feel like that's so much about what it is. It's just showing up. It's just being there, willing to do the work, willing to be coachable. And it's like you have to show up. Like I feel like so many people think it's just, I don't know, and people fall in love with the start -up and the starlight of the sport. And they don't realize that it's just like, it's the showin' up every day and grindin' it and get in the work.

2:00:55And it's really gonna produce results. Yeah, it's a long process. It's a long, long, long process. But it's gotta be exciting to be in the spot of the process that you're at. Knowing how you were in the beginning, and you just started taking kickboxing classes to look at you now. I mean. Oh yeah, I feel like it's been a short process in the grand screen with things. It's been 12 years since I started training and six years of that has been in the UFC. Which is really fun. Yeah, exactly. That's crazy. Yeah, I feel like it's just gone by so fast, really. It's crazy to work with people. And I don't work with people who it's like their first day and you're trying to teach them, like, all right, move your hip over here.

2:01:38And they can't, like, figure that out. They just can't comprehend it. And you're like, was I ever like that? Do you remember what you were like when you first started? Did it come to you easily? Did you? It definitely came to me more easily. I don't remember, like, me ever being, like, I don't know. Super, super awkward. Yeah, super terrible. But I know I was, I know it definitely came easy and I was good at judy judy from the time that I started. Did you do any sports before that? I did nothing. Nothing. I did gymnastics when I was probably like five or six for a year. And my parents put me in soccer multiple times because they played soccer, my brother played soccer, my dad coach soccer.

2:02:15So it was like, they tried a couple times and I quit a couple times. And then it was just there, like, you need to get some type of like hobby, some type of activity. And that's when I started volunteering with animals. Oh, did they, was it totally out of left field? And you became a fighter for them? Oh, yeah, completely out of left field. I feel like, what the hell, girl? Everybody expected me to be a vet. That was just like the trajectory I was on. And I don't, like, let any of my parents growing up would tell me they're like, if somebody's like, trying to start problems, you just walk away, you know?

2:02:48Like, don't start any fights or anything like that. They're, they're like complete pacifists on that side. And I couldn't tell you the difference between like the WWE and the UFC when I started. Really? Like I had no idea what Brazilian Jiu -Jitsu was, nothing. I had no idea. So it's like, it was just, I really don't know where I got the thought where I wanted to do it. You just, well, was there a lot of high level people that were around you at the time? Because you walked in Dean's gym? Uh, yeah, well, it's, I guess before that, like to walk into there, I don't really know it was my motive. But in the gym, he had a couple of, I guess, the pro guys who were doing all right.

2:03:30Nobody too high level, but it was just, I don't know, I fell in love with the, just the environment of it all. I just loved the, at the grind of it all. I just remember when I was in the cardio kickbox in class with like a bunch of like soccer moms pretty much. And after the first day, I didn't expect it to be that much of a workout for some reason. So I was like, beat red in the face. And one of the moms, she was like, just make sure you keep coming back. And like, I just remember like always thinking about that because I don't know if who, like I probably would have kept coming back, but it definitely was like, I didn't want to on the first day.

2:04:06I was like, this should start. Do you think that lady saying that to you made you come back? I think it might have influenced something. Because I was like, wow. I was like, all right, now I have, like I have to. Like she's expecting me to be there, you know? Isn't that crazy? I'll just one weird moment, one weird interaction with someone could say something to you to change the course of your whole life. Oh yeah, even I feel like it's so weird that it's like something like that I walked into Dean's gym. Yeah, what are the odds? The chances that that happened is like, he stole my coat 12 years later.

2:04:35Like that's just like, I feel like you can't walk into a better spot, really? You can't, you just got lucky. I mean, but is that what it is or is the destiny? I mean, it's a great story. If I wanted to tell a story about an MMA fighter who did nothing until she was 16, it takes cardio kickboxing and then some little old lady says, you keep coming back? And she's like, oh, okay, I said, hi to the old lady, now I gotta keep coming back. She's gonna be mad at me. I feel like everything, I don't know, everything in my career kind of did just like line up like that. It was like, whenever Ron had gotten to the UFC, I was just getting into my amateur career.

2:05:12And then whenever I stopped being able to make 115, they opened up the 125 pound division. And it was like, so you had to have three, well, you had to have at least three fights in a winning record to get into the tough house. And I had, I was two and two. And I was like searching for a fight, searching for a fight, couldn't find anything. Then the week before the tough house tryouts, I got a fight. And I fought the Saturday before, then tried out for the tough house the next weekend. Wow. So I'm like, I feel like everything's just kind of lined up perfectly just, I don't know. Do you ever wonder whether or not there's like a divine plan?

2:05:47I definitely think that I was made for this, like I feel like I was made for this spot, made for this sport. And I feel like there is a reason that everything lined up. What do you think that reason is? I don't know yet, I guess. I definitely, I don't know. I think I'm a capable of something that a lot of people aren't capable of and how I can, I guess, show this sport, how I can translate this sport.

2:06:17You're definitely a unique person and a very thoughtful person and a person that if someone talked to you and they did not know that you were a professional cage fighter of the highest level, they would never imagine it. You seem so friendly and normal. And then if I show, there should be a show where people get to meet you and then guess what you do. They don't guess what you do, they just talk to you. They can't ask you what you do. They just talk to you about life. They can't ask you questions about martial arts. They can't ask you questions about anything for an occupation. Just so, how do you feel about climate change?

2:06:55Whatever, just talk to you about shit. I think what do you think she does? Zero people would say cage fighter. Zero. I feel like it's almost like two completely different people, like Jillian and the Savage. I'm like, when I'm in the cage, I'm like, it's a completely, like, after, it's actually the Marie -Aug Pova fight, I sit down on the floor and I throw up two middle fingers and post -fight one of the UFC guys. He was like, so you throw up the two middle fingers. Like, what was all that about? I was like, I did that? Like, I completely, like, blacked out, didn't remember I did that at all. Wow.

2:07:30I'm like, it's a completely different person there. I don't take any accountability for that. Ha -ha. Do you have like a switch where that person comes in or is that only when the fight starts? I wanna say it's when I were like my walk out song starts that I start. Because there's definitely the pre -fight nerves. I feel like everybody has them and I go through them all day in the locker room and then as soon as I'm making the walk, I don't have nerves anymore. Like, I'm just ready to go, ready to walk out there and it's like, I don't know. Like, even in that fight, I was sitting there and I'm choking that girl and I'm just looking at the rest like, oh, she's out trying to tell him calmly.

2:08:07I'm like, it's just something, I don't know, something weird, something different that happens whenever that I'm in the cage. Do you feel like you get like a tunnel vision? Do you feel like, or do you feel like a little ginmet like you're a different person? Uh, it's probably more of just like a tunnel vision. After the fight, I think I'm a different person. Sometimes I'm like, I'm sitting there screaming and shitting and I'm like, who the fuck is that? Ha -ha. But, uh, yeah, it's really just a tunnel vision. I remember my last fight just looking around the other arena and seeing it's just like a full arena so many people and then as soon as he's like, fighter you ready, all the lights turn off in the arena and it's like, it's just you and her then.

2:08:48And it's like, I don't know, it's just such a focused moment. It's such a surreal moment in there. What is it like here in the cheers? I feel like you got to kind of block them out to laugh to the fight. Yeah. Because even as like during the fight, it's like, if somebody's cheering you on is like, all right, now I feel like I gotta do something or you feel like they're cheering the other person on. You and like, do you guys hear booze like if it's in the clinch and some of booze? Oh yeah, everybody's screaming that the Ric Flair woo the whole time. Yeah. Like the second you gotta take down. I'm like, I'm sitting on top of this girl for four seconds and you guys are already screaming.

2:09:24Come on. Yeah, it's interesting. But that's the problem with casuals. They don't understand how hard it is to get there with consequences are. Maybe they don't even know you. You know, they don't get the consequences. I feel like grappling also isn't like a casual favorite sport. They want to see you stand in bang. So it's like me being a submission artist. It's I feel like I haven't really gotten a lot of that attention, I guess, or they don't really, I don't have a lot of fans in that department. Yeah, but if they watch that meep all Molly finish, Jesus Christ. I mean, that is traumatic. When she comes to when she's kicking, you've seen it, obviously, when she wakes back up and that is always weird to me.

2:10:06When someone comes back, it's like, where were you? Where'd you go? Where'd your brain go? I've had it once in a grappling competition where I didn't go completely out. But I tapped in the ref called it a couple of seconds later and I couldn't sit up all the way and I just kind of fell back. But I was still there. But I just remembered, I instantly felt like, well, I was scared I'd peed myself at first. I was like, I felt like I was sitting in like a cold puddle. And I woke up and I was like, no, I'm good. I'm like, I just went out a little bit, but I'm good. But I don't know, it's such a weird scenario.

2:10:43I don't know, weird feeling. Mm. I went out on a fighter jet once. I blacked out. We went seven and a half G's on this one thing and it was with the blue angels. And you have to hold onto this. You're holding onto the, whatever it is. The yolk. Is that what it is? Were they all those things? I'm all, the fighter probably will hold onto this thing and they have to do this thing called hooking. Where they go like this. Hoot, hoot, hoot, hoot. Well, you literally pumping blood into your brain and try to stay conscious. Because the pressure of the G -force, you see black on both sides like an elevator door.

2:11:20Like it's closing your consciousness. It's literally like a visual thing. Oh yeah, it's Tito and Tito now. Oh my god. How many G's do they hit them with? Well, not 100 % sure. I just thought it was going around. It looked nuts. Yeah, they hit you with crazy G's and then you black out. And that's not good. That's not good. Also, what does that do to your neck? When you go on all those G's and your fucking neck is flopping around. But I did it at one, but then the second we did another thing and I didn't hook quick enough. Or I didn't, I didn't realize it was as many G's. It was actually left G's and we had already done and it blacked out.

2:11:57And then I woke up and that threw up. I was like, 90s. He was at 90s. Yeah, that's a lot. I did seven and a half. I got to seven and a half G's. It's a crazy feeling. It's real weird. But you have to, I mean, you can only stay, I don't know how long you stay conscious for. But those guys, they don't fly with suits. They don't have like a G suit. There's a certain G suit that helps you absorb. But either way, that's the only way I've gotten. Been out. I got choked out by a plane. I'm like, I've put more people out than I've been put out. So I'm like, that's a good thing. No one has been. That's the perfect ratio.

2:12:35Exactly. Yeah, that's exactly what you want. I don't think it's that bad for you, but I don't think it's good for you either. Like whenever I see radio GJs that want to get strangled, I'm like, I don't know if that's innocuous. Yeah, I don't know the, I don't know, guess the drive behind that, like why you would want that. Steve O did it on one of his specials. He had Tim Kennedy choke him out. I watched it recently. I think Mike Bisping did it too, is Steve O. Oh God, everybody's choking Steve O. Yeah, it was just last week. Why? Did they both drop him? No, no. Because Tim Kennedy dropped him.

2:13:06He laid him down quite gently. Well, Tim Kennedy's a savage. He's a little drop. I think, I think he asked to let him drop. I think we have this conversation. Didn't we, Steve O? These guys, so silly. You know, letting people choke you to sleep and then dropping you on your head, okay? Steve O's so nuts, he's so reckless. That was my thought whenever there is the Nate Diaz altercation in a couple months. Oh yeah, I was strangled that dude. I was like, it's not about the choke, it's about him dropping him. I'm like him, it is head on the concrete. That's what worries me. Yeah, he did hit his head.

2:13:43He didn't hit his head bad though. It wasn't like from a full knockout, full knockouts are scary on concrete. Oh my God, they're so scary. Because when people's heads bounce off the curb, people die like that all the time. It's just like getting hit in the head by the world. That's what's like, your head cracks. It's fucking terrible. Don't fight kids, stay home. Go to the gym. Go to the gym and fight like a woman, right? Do you say that? Fight like a woman? Isn't that like a T -shirt line? Probably, probably. This should be maybe. Are you, do you have any aspirations outside of MMA? Like, at one point in time, do you think you'd like to do something else?

2:14:23I would like to try to maybe branch into the commentary or something like that. I really do. I just want to be in the fight game. I love fights, I love analyzing fights, so I'd like to hopefully get better at that one day. Well, the UFC always uses fighters, which is great. I mean, it's the most insightful commentation you're ever going to get. That's not a word, right? Commentation. Commentary, you're never going to get. It's from fighters. Yeah, and Laura Sanco's killing it for the girls too. She's killing it. Yeah, she's doing great. It's, I mean, obviously in Victor, there's a lot of chicks that are doing commentary.

2:14:58And it's a great thing for the sport to have fighters like yourself that can, you can have an insight into, especially if there's like a big fight in your weight class. You know, like maybe someone who you could eventually face and you've been looking at tape on them and you know, you could maybe exploit some things and talk about it. Yeah, it's, I love it like when Felt or does it or DC does it or I still love Kenny Florian. It's Michael Bissbing. It's awesome. Dominic Cruz. It's the best gig for those guys too, because you're still in it. You're still like going to all the fights, you're analyzing stuff.

2:15:35You're still a part of the excitement of it all, which is truly the most exciting thing. Like I've been to a lot of stuff. Been to a lot of sports, been to a lot of music shows, been to a lot of things. There's not much out there that's as exciting as a world title UFC fight, not much, not much. Oh yeah, I just love to, like, I'm not sure if coaching is necessarily the right set for me and I would want to do something where I'm staying with a sport. I'm staying around it. Yeah, I'm staying at commentary, some type of thing where it's just, I need to be around this kind of energy. Like you said, there's nothing that can compare to a world title fight.

2:16:10I think what someone has dedicated yourself to, you'd be very frustrated if you had students that weren't as dedicated, am I right? I feel like that's a common thing. Yeah. I think that it's hard to find somebody who is as dedicated as me a lot of times. Or people who, I don't know, I don't want to say one, it is bad, but it's like a lot of things. That is what it is. Yeah, people don't want to put in the time or the effort and I'm like, this is literally your job or your dream. Why aren't you just trying everything you can to make it happen? It's funny. It's a discipline issue and it's a focus issue.

2:16:44And some people, they don't trust in the process either. They feel like they got better for a little while and then they hit a sort of a lull and they lose faith. It happens all the time. You'll see guys going through bad stretches of the gym and then you'll see them for a while. It's like, what happened? I don't know, I got tired of you, Jetsu. And like, okay, but you were like on a good path. You just gotta be able to push through, gotta be able to get through bad spots. That's what I keep showing up is the biggest thing that I feel like is the, it just gotta keep on showing up, keep on being there, even on the day, especially on the days when you don't wanna be there.

2:17:19You gotta be there. And I don't know, there's nowhere else I would rather be and I've been just showing up for 12 years and I feel like it's worked out pretty well. It's worked out awesome. It's worked out awesome and it's great advice. It really is because as long as you stay focused and try to be positive and try to be happy, there's a process going on with anything you're trying to get good at. And if you're really involved in something and you're really interested in it and you really focus on it, you're gonna get better. And then you're gonna look back and go, wow, I'm glad I kept doing that thing.

2:17:53Imagine if I just quit. I've always said, I'm like it, if I work hard, doors keep on opening. It's always how it's worked. Me putting in the hours, me putting in the time and doors have just naturally opened. So I feel like that's just the key to it all. I think you're right. And I'm glad this door opened and I'm glad we got a chance to do this. It's a lot of fun. Oh yeah, no, it was a pleasure. My pleasure. And what are you slated for next? Do you have a fight planned? June 24th, I think it's to have at the Richie. That's right, we just talked about that earlier. So yeah, three and a half weeks out now.

2:18:24Three and a half weeks out. Wow, that's a very exciting fight. June 24th, and that's the Apex? No, it'll be in Jacksonville. Oh, that's the Florida card. That's the amateur polio card. That's right. It's going to be my first fight. See that whole card? It's going to be my first fight. First pro fight and first fight with the UFC in Florida. Oh wow. So that being my home state pretty much, it's going to be awesome for me. I'm so excited. This is a fucking great guard. This is Gregor Rodriguez, Dennis Toulouin, Brandon Allen, Bruno Silva, Neil Magney Phil Road. That's a great fight. Ooh. And is this, go all the way up to the top?

2:19:08Is this, this is ESPN? Is it ESPN plus or just ESPN?

2:19:17Because they've been doing them on ABC too. They have a card on ABC too. Yeah, it's a two PM in the afternoon. It's a little earlier, so the problem is, I bet it's on normal. Well, we just did the ABC one. I wonder if they're going to do more ABC ones.

2:19:33Very interesting. Anyway. OK, there it is. Oh, it is on ABC. Main card is ABC. Main card ABC. Yeah, see there it is. That's an interesting deal. Well, if I was a network, I'd want to get it on some of this action. They used to be so scared of MMA. But now MMA has really been normalized. Yeah, yeah. A lot of, I feel like, I don't know. Now it's like, you see things like barrenuckle MMA getting normalized more. That's kind of crazy, right? Everybody like civilized now. Yeah, I'm like, I don't know. I've been to a couple. I went to a barrenuckle MMA and just a regular barrenuckle fight. And both of them, I'm like, I'm sitting there cringing the whole time.

2:20:13I'm like, I don't get that stuff. It's a different level. Oh, it's 100%. Just hearing a barren fist hit somebody's face is a different sound. And it's something scary. Well, the cuts too. The cuts are crazy. Your poor hands too. I'm like, everybody's hands after every single fight, broken knuckles broke, like huge fist swollen. Just cause I'm like, you can't not break your hand on somebody's head. How, if you ever tried Machuara training, you ever tried that? No. Let's look, the karate guys used to do. They said, take, you know what a Machuara is? No. It's like a plank that has hard rope wrapped around it.

2:20:55And it's like bolted into the ground. And they would just practice reverse punches into this thing. It was this hard thing that had like a little bit of give to it until they developed these massive calluses all over their hands. So that's like more of a mechanical mac and wire that one looks like it has like it gives. Yes, that's what a traditional one looks like. And these guys would punch them. Look at Google like karate Machuara knuckles. See that? And they would just practice hitting their knuckles over and over again until they get preposterous looking. Just Google like for images because some dudes have like fucking insane knuckles from hitting those things.

2:21:33That guy on the far left. That guy on the far left. Yeah, that one. That's what I'm talking about. Look at the size of his fucking knuckles. Do you think that actually helps? Yeah, for sure. It builds up calluses, for sure, definitely. My friend John used to do it. I've seen it. Just to practice the bricks. He was a Taikwondo champion. And he would practice with his knuckles with bricks. And he had one knuckle that was, it was essentially like fused from calluses. It was this massive thing. The first two knuckles, like the index finger and the ring finger, were all just a callus mass that he could smash people with.

2:22:11And you see people like Moist High Fighters do that a lot with their shins, like conditioning. But I've never seen that with their knuckles. Yeah, that was what they used to do in karate. I think people still do it too. Also, it probably is probably terrible for him. Or it's a ride isn't shit as you get older, but you've got to sacrifice. Listen, thank you very much for coming here. I really appreciate it. Give everybody out your social media so they can follow you. My social media on Instagram and Twitter is Savage underscore UFC. OK, well thank you. I really appreciate you being here. And good luck to you.

2:22:41I thank you so much. All right, bye everybody.