In this episode, Joe and Joe talk about the upcoming UFC Fight Night event in Los Angeles, the upcoming Glory event, and what it means for the future of kickboxing in the UFC. They also talk about their favorite UFC fights of all-time, and why kickboxing is one of the most exciting sports in the world. Joe is a long-time member of the UFC and has been in the organization for over 20 years. Joe has been with the UFC for a long time and is a big part of the organization's history. He is a former UFC fighter and is now a full-time MMA fighter. We talk about how he got into the UFC, what it's like to be a UFC fighter, and his favorite UFC fight of all time, "Raymond Daniels vs. Raymond Daniels." Joe also talks about his favorite fight in UFC history and why he thinks it's one of his favorite fights ever. And of course, we talk about kickboxing and why it's a totally different game than Muay Thai. You won't want to miss this one! Thanks for listening to the pod! -Joe and Joe -Your Hosts: -Jon Soriano -Sean -Mikey -John Doe -Sergio -Kiramode -Ben -Chad -Logan -Javier -Rico -Bryan -Francis -Jason -Robin -Israel -Matt -Manny -Robb -Jacob -David -Dan -Yuri -Jordan -Von -Cody -Shawn -Drew -Alex -Brandon -Jake -Zane -Daniel -Kyle -Steven -Justin -Gunnar -Brad -Ross -Andre -Jesse -AJ -Christian -Alec -Matthew & much more! , and much more!! We hope you enjoy the pod, and look forward to the next episode of the podcast. . Thank you so much for tuning into the pod. - Thank you for listening and supporting the pod!! - Joe and Good Morning Joe! . . . Thank you, Joe! -Joe - Cheers, Joe & Rory , and Cheers! -Sue
00:01:14.000Because it's not hard to understand what's going on.
00:01:16.000One of the things about MMA that is very important to me is when the fights go to the ground, I have to explain step-by-step what's going on.
00:01:25.000Because otherwise, people that don't know ground fighting, they're all of a sudden like, why is he tapping?
00:01:57.000It was really just sloppy boxing with some shitty kicks.
00:02:00.000But that's what, even American kickboxing, they have a kick rule.
00:02:04.000So what would happen is they would throw eight kicks in the beginning of the round, and then all of a sudden they'd box for the rest of the round.
00:02:14.000Which I think, one of the things about kickboxing, as opposed to the traditional martial arts, or like taekwondo or karate, is as soon as you start adding leg kicks, it changes the whole game.
00:02:26.000And we were talking before this fight about your fight, or before this podcast, rather, about your fight with Raymond Daniels, which is one of my favorite fights ever.
00:03:19.000His opponent's calling someone like me to do it, but you had a good point.
00:03:22.000It takes a special fighter to really close distance and pressure like that and to be able to execute a game plan with heavy low kicks like that.
00:03:30.000Yeah, you have to really have a high-level Muay Thai game to deal with a guy like Wonderboy the same way.
00:03:36.000Wonderboy is also real unusual in his use of the front leg.
00:03:40.000He has that sideways stance, and he kind of bends a little at the waist and throws all those wicked front leg sidekicks and round kicks.
00:03:48.000And on top of that, he's a really good puncher.
00:04:37.000A lot of the stuff is coming out is in Dutch and Dutch newspapers, and I'm asking all of the Dutch community kind of what's happening, and they don't really know.
00:04:44.000You hear different things in rumors, but I don't want to listen to rumors like that.
00:04:47.000I don't want to hear it from like a concrete source.
00:06:37.000I want to, you know, do so much in this sport and my goal was to be a legend in this sport.
00:06:42.000But, you know, and then it got to the point I saw my family and how much it was affecting my family, and that's when I decided, you know what, let's put this on rest for a little bit.
00:06:51.000So, you win the fight, and after the fight is over, was it immediately that you knew something was wrong?
00:06:57.000Honestly, I had some adrenaline rush, and I did the post-fight press conference, everything was fine.
00:07:03.000Just when I got back to the hotel room, I was throwing up and couldn't leave my room, and I was surprised I'd even gone on an airplane home.
00:07:10.000The doctors in Canada were like, how the heck did you get on an airplane home?
00:07:14.000It was scary times, man, and it took a lot of good mental strength to get out of it, and now I'm actually in a position where I'm super happy and I'm loving it.
00:07:24.000I got that whole color commentary roll with Glory, which has been incredible.
00:07:29.000It's great that you found a way out of it, but man, I would imagine that when you were in that dark room and you couldn't even look at the light on a charger, That must have been really, really, really uncomfortable to deal with.
00:07:46.000It was a time where it was like, I finally achieved what I wanted, and no one has really gotten to that level in the time that I did.
00:07:54.000Before I turned pro, I only had 11 amateur fights.
00:07:57.000I only had 11 amateur fights, and right away into the pro ranks, I only had 14 professional fights.
00:08:03.000So you gotta think, in 25 fights I was able to get in there, become a professional, win the world title in the biggest kickboxing organization.
00:08:11.000All within 25 fights, amateur, professional combined.
00:08:14.000And how old were you when you won the title?
00:08:20.000But think about that, you know, like the amount of fights you had, not that many in comparison to a lot of these Dutch guys that have 100 plus fights, a lot of the Thai guys that have more.
00:08:31.000And my style was a style that was really, man, you could watch any one of my fights and you're going to be entertained.
00:08:38.000And I understood the value of, you know, it's more than just a sport.
00:08:42.000You got to win, you got to dominate, you got to be exciting.
00:08:45.000I think that's what I really did in my career.
00:08:47.000And that's what I got such a huge following behind me.
00:08:50.000And, you know, it was sucked because I had more I wanted to show, put it that way.
00:08:55.000Now, when you see a guy like Mayweather who's gone through a career and he's like 49-0 and is probably one of the best, if not the best, defensive fighters of all time, and then you see what you went through with your situation, do you look at a guy like Mayweather and say, man, maybe I should take a different approach or maybe I should have taken a more safety-first approach?
00:10:46.000Now, when you watch high-level kickboxing, like Glory, and then you see what's going on in MMA, where I think the level of striking is certainly advancing, you're getting better and better strikers, but it's really not at the same level that you're seeing in, like, world champion kickboxing.
00:11:03.000And people gotta understand it's a totally different sport.
00:11:06.000The way you would fight in kickboxing, you're not gonna fight the same way in MMA. There's takedowns, and there's a lot of very successful kickboxers who don't do well in MMA. A lot don't, because they keep that traditional Muay Thai stance where they stand very tall,
00:11:21.000and they're fighting very tall, and of course a wrestler's gonna take you down.
00:11:26.000An example of a good Canadian striker is Shane Campbell.
00:11:31.000Shane Campbell fights in the UFC and he's got an incredible background in Muay Thai, but he stays true sometimes a little too much to his Muay Thai roots on the striking.
00:11:40.000You gotta keep your hips back, you gotta move, it's a totally different game.
00:11:43.000You got a four ounce glove, not an eight ounce glove, so shit changes.
00:11:47.000Yeah, it also affects your offense too when you're worried about takedowns, you're worried about all these different aspects of...
00:14:08.000Yeah, but see that the advantage in MMA of being bigger, it's not the same as the advantage of being bigger in striking because being bigger in striking is important.
00:14:17.000It's definitely a factor, but it's so much more of a factor when you're clinching.
00:14:28.000So when you were thinking about sparring with little gloves, what differences did you notice or you think about fighting with little gloves?
00:15:06.000Who was that other kid that he fought?
00:15:08.000But my last Antonio fight was against Derrick Elkins.
00:15:12.000That was one of those fights where Antonio got caught, dropped, popped back up, and Eve Levine called it off.
00:15:19.000It was an early stoppage, but yeah, he's protecting Antonio.
00:15:24.000So, it's interesting that a guy like you, who is this very high-level world champion kickboxer, learning how to fight and move with the small MMA gloves, it kind of shows you that striking, in particular with MMA striking, is still in a learning,
00:15:41.000Because guys like you come in, and you are, like, guys like Duke Rufus, a former world champion himself, who's really good at training guys and teaching guys.
00:16:51.000So there's so many different ways, but it does take good coaching, in my opinion, to take these guys to that high professional level, and there's not enough of it.
00:17:32.000If you're fighting a pressure fighter, you got to be able to move and fight on angles.
00:17:36.000If you're fighting a guy who now likes to move a lot, you got to be able to pressure fight.
00:17:41.000So you have to have the coaching and the knowledge to be able to adapt accordingly.
00:17:45.000Yeah, and I think that a lot of people don't see when you're watching kickboxing or you're watching Muay Thai, you're seeing these guys are standing close to each other and they're throwing kicks.
00:17:57.000It's hard to tell exactly why they're doing what.
00:18:01.000It's hard to tell exactly why one guy is more effective.
00:18:05.000But once you see it and once you practice it and once you do it, then it all starts opening up to you like a flower.
00:18:12.000Now, when a guy like you is doing commentary, it really helps.
00:18:17.000Because a guy who's been in there, a guy who's been a world champion, and you get to explain what this guy's probably thinking, what's going wrong, and it's sort of, I really like your commentary, man.
00:18:44.000If I come in there and I start talking, you know, his left heel is about two inches, which is causing this to happen, and his distance control is off, he needs to slip off.
00:19:56.000I think for the most part, the majority of respectful fans, they might see something that maybe you don't know that you're doing that might be annoying.
00:20:04.000And if it's annoying to them, it's annoying.
00:20:06.000It might be only annoying to 2% of the people.
00:20:09.000But there might be a way where you could eliminate that aspect of your commentary.
00:20:33.000That could be freaking dangerous, yeah.
00:20:34.000I mean, because you don't know who's making those things.
00:20:37.000I mean, that could be a 12-year-old kid who's on Adderall, who's kicking his cat, and you're reading this guy's words as if it's gospel, and you want to argue with him, and guys get online, you don't know shit, and they're like, fuck your mother.
00:20:54.000I thought commentary was going to be an easier job than I thought, but I think it's harder than fighting right now because it's still new to me.
00:21:01.000I've only done 10 Glory shows, and I don't think it's official yet, but maybe I'll make it official here, but Glory signed me full-time next year.
00:21:35.000Then from three, I have an hour to eat my lunch, or my dinner at that point, and then I have my own gym, bazooka, kickboxing, and MMA. And so you teach classes after that?
00:21:43.000I train and I teach classes a couple times a week, but we have a big program, man.
00:21:46.000Our gym's huge, it's big, it's popular, so it's non-stop.
00:21:50.000And then at night I go home and I have to do commentary.
00:21:53.000What a bunch of lucky kids to have a guy like you as a coach.
00:22:50.000So, now that you are in this position as Glory Commentator and you've recovered from your concussion, do you have any thoughts in your head of fighting again?
00:22:59.000To be honest, there's more money doing commentary than there is in the ring.
00:23:02.000And that's where kickboxing is still at.
00:23:05.000There's still not enough finances to make it worth, but it also comes down to, is any money worth health at that point?
00:23:12.000You can make $10 million a fight, but if you don't remember that fight after and you don't recover from brain injuries again, What do you do?
00:23:20.000I was having this conversation with some guys this week that are not fighters and they were asking me about certain fights where people got knocked out and you know how come you know when they came back you know they weren't as good and and my take on it was you never know how someone's gonna recover from a loss you don't know physically and your case is a perfect example we're talking about a fight you won where you won the world title we didn't get knocked out I got knocked down,
00:23:47.000Yeah, and you still had this concussion issue.
00:23:50.000And when someone would look at you, like right now, you talk great, you look fine, doesn't look like there's anything wrong with you, people would be like, oh, he's fine, why can't he fight?
00:24:20.000Depression is a big side effect of concussions.
00:24:22.000So a lot of these guys that you don't see it, yeah, they just get knocked out and then they're forgotten about.
00:24:26.000Those guys go home, they're depressed, their brain chemistry is all mixed up, their brain's not recovering the same way, so it's actually hard.
00:24:34.000And these fighters are at home probably crying themselves to sleep, they have headaches every day, but they just don't.
00:24:42.000There's not enough education on what these guys are going through and suffering with.
00:24:46.000And I know you're really big on it, but one of the big things that has helped me, and we can branch off on this, is the use of CBDs for brain injuries.
00:24:55.000That's been incredible for my recovery.
00:24:57.000Yeah, CBD is a non-psychoactive compound that's in cannabis.
00:25:03.000And it's a crazy thing that's going on here in the States.
00:25:07.000I don't know how you guys treat it up in Canada, but it's essentially being turned into a Schedule I drug now, even though it's not psychoactive.
00:25:15.000Well, it's 100% shenanigans by pharmaceutical companies.
00:25:18.000It's 100% influenced by these people that stand to lose money because CBD oil helps a lot of people with inflammation, a lot of people with chronic arthritis.
00:25:36.000And inflammation, apparently, if you talk to doctors, they'll tell you it's a huge issue.
00:25:41.000And one of the biggest issues when it comes to diseases, discomfort, and things like arthritis, again, and headaches.
00:25:46.000You know, like when you're taking a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory for a headache, like if you're taking an Advil or an ibuprofen, what you're taking is something that reduces inflammation.
00:25:56.000And CBD oil does the same thing, but it's natural, it's healthy, it's not bad for you, and it doesn't get you high.
00:26:02.000It's not like something's gonna fuck you up at work.
00:26:04.000It's been crazy because when I was going in that dark room there for three weeks, I literally, doctors were giving me like six to eight Percocets a day and they were giving me two muscle relaxants for my back pain.
00:26:19.000I don't know, something with the nerves from my brain because it must have damaged some of the inflammation and it was causing like this back pain that I couldn't even get out of bed with.
00:26:28.000So they were giving me all of these things to cope with it and then all of a sudden I got my sisters and my family to do some research.
00:26:35.000At that point, man, I would have taken anything.
00:26:37.000You could have given me coke, heroin, acid, you name it, I would have taken it to recover.
00:26:41.000Because those pills, they were messing me up.
00:26:43.000I was living in a cartoon world in that darkroom.
00:27:28.000So it helped manage to get off all of those painkillers and now I'm able to, you know, be healthy and control my brain headaches and stuff without having to take ibuprofen and Advils.
00:28:02.000And I know you have, it's on my list to watch, but because I was explaining, everyone's like, yo, you got to tell Rogan about your experience with CBD. And I haven't got to watch it.
00:28:10.000I think you wrote, it was a 2007, you came out with The Union.
00:28:14.000Yeah, that was a documentary by my buddy Adam, who lives up in BC, and that whole area is essentially run by the marijuana industry, even though marijuana is illegal.
00:28:28.000So they made this documentary explaining how without marijuana, your entire economy is fucked.
00:28:35.000Like it's this underground economy, and they call it the union.
00:28:39.000It was a really, really good documentary.
00:31:23.000Anyway, so they used to use it for parachutes, they used it for all these different things, but then when Eli Whitney came up with the cotton gin, it was easier for them to make clothes out of cotton, because hemp requires a lot to break down the fibers and turn them into cloth.
00:31:40.000It's a crazy plant, and it makes this unbelievable paper.
00:31:44.000Like, hemp paper is so superior to this paper that we all use.
00:31:57.000So instead of William Randolph Hearst embracing this, he would have lost millions of dollars because he would have had to replant these forests and turn them into hemp.
00:32:05.000He decided to go the other route and just start making propaganda against hemp.
00:32:39.000So all this shit came from this one asshole.
00:32:42.000One asshole and Harry Anslinger, who was the guy in charge of, well, you know, they originally got a lot of people that were involved in the alcohol prohibition.
00:32:51.000And once alcohol prohibition was done, they needed something else to fight.
00:32:55.000So they said, well, look, we got something right here.
00:32:57.000Which alcohol probably does more damage to your body than...
00:34:06.000All old shit from years ago that the commissioner was following from a long time ago.
00:34:12.000Even if you ask fighters, I had a conversation with Matt Embry who's fighting Robin Van Roosmalen, and we were like, I don't even know why.
00:35:00.000Yeah, you had Gabriel Varga, you had myself, now Matt Embry, Robert Thomas from Canada, and we're producing all of these crazy athletes, and we don't even have a professional system.
00:35:10.000And it's crazy, because there hasn't been one U.S. glory champion.
00:35:15.000Well, at one point in time, before MMA or before the UFC really got a foothold in Brazil, the Canada market was the biggest market for MMA. It was huge.
00:39:38.000And it's interesting because that fight essentially changed a lot of people's ideas about low kicks.
00:39:46.000Because even Duke Rufus, like they interviewed Rufus after the fight, I think he was like 19. And he's like, well, it doesn't take any talent to just kick the legs.
00:40:35.000If I'm going to sit there and I'm going to lead with a low kick against a wrestler, absolutely.
00:40:39.000He's going to take me down every time.
00:40:41.000But I think it's the timing of the low kick that people need to understand.
00:40:44.000If someone's exiting backwards, that's your time for the low kick.
00:40:47.000So if you put, especially in MMA where people can't really stand in the pocket, they move and they exit.
00:40:53.000As soon as they get outside of punch range, that's perfect low kick timing.
00:40:57.000You'll get so many free low kicks on MMA guys, and their legs aren't strong.
00:41:02.000MMA guys aren't used to that body damage that kickboxers are.
00:41:07.000And I remember my coach coached Gary Goodridge.
00:41:10.000And Gary once told me, he's like, when he fought both kickboxing and MMA, he came back and said, he's like, I knew I can go to the after party when I fought MMA. But he goes, and after a kickboxing fight, he's like, I'm not getting out of my bed.
00:41:25.000You gotta think how much shin-to-shin kickboxers go through compared to an MMA fight.
00:41:30.000How often do you see a leg kick checked in the UFC? It's getting better.
00:41:36.000But I agree with you, and that's another thing that people always complain about me, that I'm always calling for low kicks and saying I'd like to see more low kicks.
00:41:43.000I'd like to see him kick his legs more.
00:41:44.000But I think you're right, too, that it takes someone who understands Muay Thai at a very high level to be able to pull that off and do it in combination.
00:41:51.000What you're seeing sometimes in MMA is you would see a lot during the George St. Pierre era where guys were afraid to kick because George was so good at timing.
00:42:31.000I have a meme on my phone I keep sending because a lot of times in sparring, I'll smash my guy's legs and then I'll send them the picture being like, tag someone who doesn't know how to block a low kick and I just keep sending that picture out, mess around with everyone.
00:43:07.000So as soon as someone jabs, you take the leg.
00:43:10.000Because when someone punches, they have to put their weight on their front leg.
00:43:13.000And once you put your weight on the front leg, you can no longer block at that point.
00:43:17.000So if you watch any of my fights or guys with good low kicks, they usually time the low kick off the hands or the step.
00:43:23.000Because every time you step, you've got to be heavy on your front foot, and that's the opportunity to hit that low kick.
00:43:29.000So you want to look for what I call free low kicks, ones where they can't block.
00:43:32.000So as they're exiting up or as they step in, you try to find those free ones when they're planted on their legs and they can't lift up their leg to block.
00:43:41.000Jamie, put up, see if you can find Joe's fight with Raymond Daniels.
00:43:46.000Because, like I said before, there was one of my, and I'm a big Raymond Daniels fan, by the way.
00:44:07.000I mean he does a lot of wild shit inside the octagon and so this fight to me was a really important fight for just martial arts strategy and Technique to to see how a guy like you who's you know super high-level guy deals with a guy who's completely unorthodox in terms of traditional kickboxing techniques He's got a style that is impossible to emulate inside the gym.
00:44:34.000And again, I fought Kareem Gaji over 100 fights.
00:45:21.000My original trainer is Paul Minhas, and that was the one who trained Gary Goodridge through K1 and Pride.
00:45:27.000But yeah, Paul Minhas, he's the one who really developed my low kick style, and I just was able to really put it together and showcase his strategy of low kicks.
00:45:38.000The way he used to explain it is that people think a low kick is a low kick, but it's not.
00:45:43.000You've got to think where on the shin are you landing the low kick, right?
00:45:47.000If you land more of the lower part of your shin, that's more of a setup.
00:45:51.000You might want to use your low kick to set up your hands.
00:45:53.000You might want to have it as a feeler, just as a distraction.
00:45:57.000If you start landing higher up on the shin, those are more finished low kicks.
00:46:01.000The angle you throw it at, the timing you throw it at.
00:46:04.000So when Paul was training me, he would kind of classify like nine different low kicks.
00:46:10.000It's based on where on the leg it's hitting and where on your shin you're landing.
00:47:36.000You've got to think, your brain is still shook up from that first fight, not fully recovered, and in my opinion, the best fighter doesn't necessarily come out on top.
00:47:49.000It's exciting when you're watching it, because it builds up to one eventual champion, and you get to watch all these fights take place during the night.
00:47:56.000But I think, especially, you're getting hurt, and then you're recovering a little bit, and then going back in again, and you're still busted up from the first fight.
00:48:03.000I probably lost a good ten years of my life after that night, but what are you gonna do?
00:48:07.000Yeah, but there used to be eight-man tournaments.
00:49:29.000Now, when you did bring in those guys, was there anything that they could show you about how to avoid those kicks or how to move away from them?
00:49:38.000It was more of just kind of like, hey, this is kind of the distance and the setup.
00:49:41.000These are the kind of few things you need to look at.
00:49:46.000In my fight career, which I kind of have a different philosophy now, now that I'm a coach a lot more and I'm looking at fighting a little bit differently.
00:49:54.000But here I knew I was gonna fight my fight.
00:50:06.000To me, this is like the fight that I show people.
00:50:09.000When I show people the difference between a really good Muay Thai fighter who's fighting a guy who throws a lot of flashy stuff but doesn't really know the low kick game.
00:50:19.000And he throws those things but there's not a lot of threat outside those spinning attacks.
00:50:24.000He does have that explosive left hand but...
00:53:52.000Like, how does your legs get tougher from getting kicked?
00:53:54.000Well, it's like if you look at martial arts in your body, your body is your armor.
00:54:00.000So you got to look at your body as armor.
00:54:01.000If you don't strengthen that armor, you're only as strong as your armor can hold, right?
00:54:05.000So if you're not training your body to get hit, you can't really take as much damage.
00:54:12.000So if you're constantly taking low kicks every day in training, you build up that endurance and that tolerance and that strength to be able to take hard low kicks.
00:54:21.000But a lot of guys, if you're not used to that, taking hard arm kicks.
00:54:24.000My first professional fight, I left with like welts on my forearm.
00:55:17.000Every time you shin, there's those micro-fractures that then calcify, which then cause the shin to harden.
00:55:23.000And again, even if the difference between my right and left shin, my right shin is probably double the size of my left one because I use my right shin a lot more.
00:55:46.000But it's a big difference and it's weird because I've been doing it so long where I can usually stand in front of you, give you like little leg taps and I can kind of see how hard your body is if you can withstand a low kick or not.
00:56:06.000And when you fight someone, and that's where those guys that have 100 professional fights have that, there's a lot of wear and tear, but those guys have a body armor that really takes a lot to try to damage, you know, those forearms or those leg kicks or,
00:56:22.000you know, there's just years of accumulated damage and the body hardens up.
00:56:26.000It is weird because, like, you see some of the ties that just blast each other and you're watching them low kick each other and you never see them limping.
00:56:33.000You know, I mean, then you see this fight that you had with Raymond, and you see, like, after, you know, a minute, two in the fight, when you kept chopping.
00:56:41.000There was one moment in the fight in the first round.
00:56:53.000And you gotta think, I've probably sparred with thousands and thousands of different MMA fighters, and as soon as we start sparring, I'll tap the leg once, tap the leg twice, three times, and they're like, no, no, no, can you lay off the leg?
00:57:03.000I'm just like, okay, alright, cool, yeah, I guess so.
00:57:07.000I'll just hit the other leg, and if I don't hit the other leg, I'll hit your body.
00:57:11.000But I mean, yeah, it's a different type of body conditioning.
00:57:14.000Is there any way to do it other than just getting kicked there?
00:58:06.000Yeah, because it definitely seems like, I mean, especially like we said, the Thais, these guys that have 100 plus fights, and you see them getting low kicked, and it doesn't seem to affect them at all.
00:58:14.000I mean, it's landing, it's an effective strike, but the difference between the way it would affect them versus the way it affects a person who's never been low kicked before.
00:59:26.000Now, you were saying earlier, and I wanted to go back to this, that your thoughts on fighting have changed from being a fighter to being a coach.
00:59:53.000He doesn't have the training background as you.
00:59:55.000How do you make that guy a world champion?
00:59:58.000And I was like, huh, that's interesting.
01:00:00.000I'm like, he's not big, he's not strong, so he's not going to be a great pressure fighter that's going to be able to withstand a lot of damage.
01:00:12.000I want to have a system in my fighting at Bazooka Kickboxing that you can go into a street fight, you can go into an MMA fight, you can kickbox.
01:00:20.000You've got to have that knowledge and the skill set to be able to fight everything.
01:00:24.000And that's my goal as a coach right now, is to make a universal system that can handle anything.
01:00:30.000So if you've got a pressure fight versus move, if you've got to keep distance, if you need to jab or box, you've got to be able to have it all.
01:00:36.000I don't agree anymore too much with a one-dimensional approach.
01:00:40.000But the one-dimensional approach was good for you as a fighter because you found out where your skills were more directed.
01:00:47.000The way I look at it is I was an exceptional case.
01:00:51.000I'm an exceptional athlete that was gifted with a strong body, strong mind, good dedication, very motivated.
01:02:14.000And what's interesting to me is Jermaine Durandamy is a multiple-time world Muay Thai champion and who's had a hard time dealing with the clinch, dealing with people taking her down, dealing with the other aspects of MMA. She's trying to find her groove.
01:02:40.000So what I'm curious, it's very interesting because, you know, Holly, who looked like a fucking dynamo when she fought Ronda, because Ronda fought the absolute worst kind of fight that you could fight with Holly.
01:03:41.000It's probably the first kick ever taught in traditional martial arts.
01:03:46.000It's just, he made it so popular, and then all of a sudden you see it as a new trend where everyone started throwing front kicks to the face.
01:03:52.000It became like a new popular little trend there for a little bit that hey look front kicks work again It's just they were forgotten about and that's what I'm hoping with the low kick they were forgotten about and they come back Yeah, I think there's room for a lot of different kicks in MMA that aren't there yet And one of them that we're seeing in some organizations is axe kicks And I saw some well there was that guy that was fighting in MMA for a while.
01:04:47.000You know, utilize techniques that you don't necessarily think of as knockout techniques, but he would, you know, smash guys with axe kicks and front kicks and round kicks and just...
01:04:57.000For those, uh, the kickboxing fans listening, Andy Hoog?
01:08:07.000He tried right there and missed, but he throws it from tight quarters, and guys think he's gonna throw low kicks, so he mixes it up with that, he's using the low kick, and then he sets it up with either the oblique kick or the low kick, and he constantly varies him.
01:08:21.000Because that kick traditionally is meant to hit with the heel, right?
01:08:36.000And this was a great fight for him because, you know, I knew Lorenz was super talented before this, but Neil Magny was a highly rated guy and Lorenz just ran through him.
01:08:47.000I mean, is the difference in the striking?
01:08:49.000Magny is a really good all-around fighter.
01:08:56.000What Lorenzo's able to do is avoid all this stuff, avoid the ground game, keep the fight in his wheelhouse, which is in the stand-up, and just show how much more technical he is on his feet and how much quicker he is at closing the gap.
01:09:29.000Don't you think that elbows are, well obviously they're really effective.
01:09:34.000You know and elbows and elbows from the clinch and knees from the clinch are obviously a really effective techniques Why do you like rules that don't have those in?
01:09:42.000I remember listening to your podcast and someone asked I think you were talking about how you feel Muay Thai is like the purest art of stand-up fighting and It makes sense.
01:09:56.000I think MMA is probably my favorite thing to watch.
01:09:58.000But what I like about Muay Thai is when you're seeing the clinch, you're using all the potential weapons from inside that position.
01:10:06.000Whereas in kickboxing, they will separate you.
01:10:09.000For me personally, why I don't like the clinch, it slows the fight down.
01:10:13.000I'm not saying it's because you can be a crappy outside fighter, but be so strong and dominant in the clinch and win all your fights in the clinch.
01:10:55.000I can maybe only throw a A 2-3 hit combination before I have to exit and move again because I know he's going to try to grab me and clinch me and slice me up with his elbows.
01:14:46.000And again, what you were saying about with kickboxing, I think the same holds true with boxing.
01:14:51.000Those fighters, they're not cutting the kind of weight that MMA fighters are cutting.
01:14:54.000So I don't know what they would weigh in at.
01:14:56.000I would assume it would probably be like 155, somewhere around there.
01:14:59.000And then once they got into the octagon, or the ring rather, it would be a boxing match, Floyd would probably have a disadvantage weight-wise of somewhere around 15 pounds.
01:15:23.000The more I follow and train and learn boxing, something I wish I started a lot earlier on in my career, It's, man, it's like you only have two weapons, you know, and you all of a sudden have to make this complex strategy through, you know,
01:16:39.000What's your take on these fighters taking a new approach on not sparring anymore?
01:16:46.000Well, Donald Cerrone is taking that approach, and it seems really effective for him.
01:16:51.000But I think part of what's doing well for him...
01:16:53.000I mean, obviously, he has excellent timing.
01:16:55.000Obviously, he's very experienced as a fighter already, and he likes to stay active.
01:16:59.000But his take on it was that he was beating himself up too much in the gym, that he was sparring too many hard rounds, and he would go into these fights already damaged.
01:19:31.000They call him the style bender guy is all like wicked He's throwing low line technical good distance control southpaw orthodox spin kick boxes.
01:19:42.000He's so on paper That is the style to beat that Dutch style straightforward fighting, right?
01:19:49.000You want to fight on angles, use distance, use movement.
01:19:52.000Where, how do you beat someone like Stylebender?
01:19:55.000Constant pressure, you know, head-to-head fighting, low kicks.
01:19:59.000So you're going to see Willness try to use that head-to-head pressure fighting like we saw with me and Raymond Daniels versus Adesanya trying to use that movement on the outside, pick his shots, fight on angles.
01:20:10.000So on paper, both of these guys have the style to beat one another.
01:20:14.000I think that's why that fight's super exciting for me to watch.
01:20:17.000Well, Stylebender has been toying with the idea of fighting in MMA, too.
01:21:07.000And that's a hard concept for a martial artist and an athlete to be like, hey, you know, your striking is just going to be okay, but we got to work on your ground, so don't worry about your striking now.
01:21:16.000There's only so much time in a day you can do training.
01:21:19.000That's a really interesting thing that you just said.
01:22:47.000Because I always follow him on social media and stuff, and I hope, I'm actually trying to get out to TriStar, I was talking for us a little bit.
01:22:55.000I would love to go out there and train with their team and to see how we can connect together.
01:23:00.000I think that would be an awesome connection.
01:23:30.000And so for him, because he comes from that karate background, so for him to, you know, say that he liked my style and he was a fan of mine from my Raymond Daniels fight, I was like, shit, that's awesome.
01:23:38.000Well, they brought Raymond Daniels in to prepare Roy McDonald.
01:24:31.000But like at a professional wrestling level, like ready to go kind of style?
01:24:36.000It's hard to say because what I'm hearing is from just guys who train with him and guys who have trained MMA with him, they're surprised at how good his wrestling is.
01:24:43.000Like he's just a really strong athletic guy, learns quick, but his Muay Thai is obviously very, very good.
01:25:05.000Now, when you watch, like, say, if you watch Lion Fight or you watch Bellator or any of these other organizations, do you, like, make notes?
01:25:15.000Like, oh, I'd like to see this guy over in Glory.
01:25:24.000I mean, I know you said that they have 18 events this year, which is amazing.
01:25:27.000And they're going to be split between, we got some good investors in Glory from China, so we're going to actually try to get a few shows out in China.
01:25:37.000We're looking at South America, and then the rest mixed between the U.S. and Europe.
01:29:06.000But it was interesting because Botter, who's just a notorious psycho, came out in the first round pretty controlled and measured, you know?
01:29:14.000And approached the fight intelligently, too.
01:29:18.000Said, no, we're going to do three rounds.
01:29:19.000I haven't been fighting in a long time.
01:34:51.000This is the first time, even when I've won my world title, I'd work during the day as a teacher, eat my lunch as I drove to the gym, and then I would train at night.
01:34:59.000I won a world title working a full-time job.
01:35:49.000So when you look at training methods, like some of the methods that are being employed today, some of the various strength and conditioning methods, is there anything that you think that really stands out?
01:36:02.000Well the main thing for me is guys in combat sports who are using CrossFit as a form of weight training for fighting.
01:36:10.000I don't necessarily agree with that, based on many things, because you're doing an unsafe exercise, like a deadlift or a clean, and you're doing it over time, where those movements are made to develop power, hip strength.
01:36:27.000So a lot of guys are hurting themselves.
01:36:30.000I saw some CrossFit guys and they're doing these terrible rounded back deadlifts and they're just trying to get the bar up and weight and they're hurting themselves and they're doing too much.
01:36:40.000But a sports-specific, properly tailored strength program is very important.
01:36:46.000But CrossFitting is just killing guys.
01:36:48.000Their body, the damage on the joints, it wasn't made to help you enhance.
01:36:53.000There's different ways to do it in a safer way that helps protect your body.
01:36:57.000Too many people are, you know, canceling fights with injuries.
01:37:02.000They're doing things that, you know, things like CrossFit where they're constantly killing their bodies.
01:37:07.000That's interesting because some people think that, you know, fighters are overtraining and some people think, no, the problem is they just haven't built themselves up to the point where they can do this the way they need to.
01:38:37.000Everyone knows how sore and how shitty they feel 24 to 48 hours after a workout.
01:38:42.000And that's good because your body's breaking down and has to get stronger.
01:38:45.000But when you have, when your goal is to fight and be good at your sport, you can't have that soreness because it's going to take away from your training.
01:38:53.000So that's why we really have to periodize our training to make sure we can peak on fight night.
01:38:58.000There's a lot of talk in MMA circles that strength and conditioning is the most important thing, that once you're in camp, that's what you should concentrate on is your cardio, your endurance, and that your fight skills actually come in secondary because you already know how to fight.
01:39:13.000There's some people that believe that what you need to do is work on your fight skills all the other time, not that you abandon them, but that they take second place, and that the most important thing is having a phenomenal gas tank.
01:40:03.000The more you release the cortisone, the more that your body breaks itself down, the more stressed you get, the less sleep you're going to have.
01:40:10.000All terrible shit when you're fighting in a few days, right?
01:40:13.000So my whole strategy was just to say, I do my work.
01:40:17.000And the problem with you said about overtraining and guys fight.
01:41:06.000I don't agree with guys who think they can just train for camps.
01:41:10.000A real fighter, a real athlete, a real martial artist is gonna train all year round.
01:41:16.000Yeah, you have to look at it also in terms of You're involved in one of the most dangerous pursuits athletically than someone can engage in.
01:41:25.000And any time that you're getting better is going to take away some damage that you could possibly sustain.
01:41:32.000It's going to make you better administering damage.
01:41:42.000You're not going to be, right after your fight, you're not going to be training at that hard intensity that you were before the fight, but it's still important to constantly train and constantly improve.
01:41:51.000Now, when you say that you were kind of naturally good at it mentally, no one coached you into how to relax about it?
01:41:58.000You just kind of instinctively knew that's the way to do it?
01:42:52.000In his hometown, you know, I'm going to press conferences with Goken Saki, Daniel Gita, and I'm sitting there and I'm like, I have six professional fights and all the Turkish cameras are all around us and I didn't know what was going on.
01:43:14.000I'm like, all right, cool, let's do it.
01:43:15.000And then at that point, I just had that much confidence and belief in myself that nothing mattered.
01:43:20.000Now, when you go into a fight like that and you approach a fight like that and you're saying that these guys had so much more experience than you, so you had to almost approach the fight as a more experienced fighter?
01:45:25.000So that's one of the biggest parts, is having that confidence in yourself and that mindset.
01:45:30.000I wanted to go back to what we were talking about with strength and conditioning, where, like I said, there's a philosophy that many are taking in MMA, that the strength and conditioning is more important during fight camp than actual fight training itself.
01:45:44.000Do you think that maybe the physical requirements of fighting five-minute rounds And, you know, a lot of the grappling and clinching, which is just unbelievably grueling on your body.
01:45:52.000Do you think that there's different physical requirements in that sport, maybe, than kickboxing?
01:47:19.000And seeing a lot of those UFC guys now are hopefully seeing all these videos and these drills that I'm posting and what I can have to offer.
01:47:25.000There's so many times I watch the UFC, I'm like, if this guy had a little bit of, you know, me coaching him, and I'm sure they have great coaches, but...
01:47:33.000You know, they just need that little extra.
01:47:37.000And I think this is also such a cool time for fighters to be able to hear these words from guys like you and to be able to easily access those videos that you're putting up and all these striking breakdowns that guys like Lawrence Kenshin are putting up and all these other people.
01:47:50.000I mean, it's an amazing time as far as the amount of information that you can get for fighters.
01:48:17.000They think they're just they know and everything and that's terrible mindset I think you're totally right and I think that There's no way like you what you were saying about if you want to be a very good MMA fighter There's no way you're gonna be the best at everything.
01:48:30.000It's impossible so When you got a guy like George, you know, one of the beautiful things about him was that he was aware of where his limitations lie.
01:48:40.000He was aware of where his strengths were, and he knew how to put it all together.
01:48:44.000I always talk about fighting as if, like, it's a language.
01:49:44.000I mean, it's so heartbreaking when you see someone get devastated and smashed like BJ Penn did against Yair Rodriguez, but on the other hand, so beautiful when you see what Yair was able to do to a legend like BJ Penn.
01:51:08.000But I think that, you know, one of the things that we're learning now is the right way to learn.
01:51:15.000Like you were saying, that so many fighters are over-trained, you know, and that so many fighters spar too hard.
01:51:22.000Like you're saying, people think that hitting the pads and getting tired is good work.
01:51:27.000It's tough, though, because when you have a fighter's mentality, you gotta think it's easy to be outside, and I could say it because I've been in it, but when someone on the outside says, oh, these guys, you know, they need to train harder, they need to keep doing more and more and more, and when you're fighting, you're like, shit, I gotta fight in three weeks.
01:51:43.000You never think your conditioning's good enough.
01:51:45.000You could train every day, all day, put your best effort in, you're never gonna think your conditioning's good enough.
01:51:51.000You're going to be like the day before the fight.
01:51:53.000You've done everything possible in your training.
01:51:54.000You're going to go on and you're going to second guess your conditioning.
01:51:57.000You're going to wonder if you did enough.
01:51:59.000You're going to wonder, shit, I should have trained now.
01:52:01.000Why didn't I, my Sunday rest day, I should have been training.
01:52:05.000But really, you have to get in that mindset that, you know, you don't need more all the time.
01:52:10.000And that's why guys are getting injured.
01:52:11.000They're putting their bodies, they're not letting themselves rest, and they're getting sick.
01:52:15.000I bet you if you go on one of your UFC shows and you ask every fighter on that card who's sick, I bet you 50% would be sick with some sort of cold or infection or sinus infection.
01:52:27.000Most of those guys are probably sick because their immune system is crashed from not eating, constantly training, stress, not sleeping.
01:52:35.000I bet you more than half are sick with something.
01:52:54.000It's one of the things Steve Maxwell told me.
01:52:56.000He said it was very important to find out where you're at.
01:52:59.000He goes, when you're in shape, find out what your resting heart rate is, measure it in the morning, and if you wake up in the morning and it's 5 to 10 beats over what it normally is, take the day off.
01:53:08.000It's like your body's fighting something off.
01:53:10.000And you probably won't even think that, and you just got to push through.
01:54:11.000Well, sometimes it's important to push through it, but other times when you know you're at that level, it's like, hey, you gotta pull yourself back.
01:54:17.000See, that's the crazy thing about fighting and training and learning.
01:55:33.000So you need to train the proper energy system in order to, you know, be the most successful.
01:55:38.000And that's kind of that anaerobic system of constantly pushing yourself, letting yourself recover, pushing yourself, letting yourself recover.
01:57:44.000If I knew what I was doing, if I was working something technical or drilling, it's different.
01:57:49.000But when it's time to work, you gotta put the work in.
01:57:51.000You gotta be able to cut out all those distractions that you have.
01:57:56.000It doesn't matter what you have to do after.
01:57:58.000It doesn't matter what's going on in your day.
01:58:00.000If your girlfriend or boyfriend broke up with you or whatever the frick it is, you gotta be focused.
01:58:06.000And you have an hour and a half to do it.
01:58:08.000Now, when you see MMA fighters that are putting in two-a-days on a regular, sometimes three, what do you think of that?
01:58:15.000I think it's okay if you're doing it right.
01:58:17.000I mean, MMA, there's more things happening, right?
01:58:21.000So, if you're doing a roll in the morning, It's okay, but you're not going to go the hardest rolling you have and then hit the hardest strength and conditioning you have and then at night do your hardest kickboxing session.
01:58:32.000There's no way the next day you're actually putting 100% of your energy in those sessions.
01:58:37.000So maybe sometimes if they're doing three sessions, they might put 60% in each session.
01:58:44.000You're never really hitting that last 40%, which is probably the place you want to be.
01:58:52.000You want to be in that place where you're not comfortable.
01:58:56.000You want to be in that place where you're tired, because that's what fighting is, getting yourselves to that point.
01:59:01.000You want to throw up if you have to, you know?
01:59:04.000They say it's your mind gives up before the body does.
01:59:09.000So when you're tired and you're starting to feel all that lactic acid and you shut down, they say it's your brain shutting down first and you have some time to keep going.
01:59:16.000So you gotta prepare your mind to be able to withstand that.
01:59:19.000If you're hitting bag for 10 rounds and you're looking around and you're fucking around, like...
01:59:31.000I don't believe in doing something that doesn't have a purpose.
01:59:34.000Well, that's one of the things that I really like about the way you drill and one of the things I like about the way you shadow box is that you do everything like you're in a fight.
01:59:41.000Everything, guard is high, stance is perfect, footwork is perfect.
01:59:46.000When you say that you lift weights, what kind of weightlifting were you doing once a week?
01:59:53.000It's the basics, but the most effective.
02:00:19.000If I was in hypertrophy phase, I was probably doing 10 sets of 10 on a lower weight.
02:00:23.000As I was in power strength phase, I was doing 5 sets of 5. As I was more of the explosive phase, I would do more of like 5 sets of 3. And then I'd maybe superset it with an explosive jump or a standing long jump or a...
02:00:38.000You know, a skater-style movement, but I'd always use it.
02:00:43.000There's one times where I would do, you know, five heavy explosive squats, and then I would line up on the track right after my set, and I would do, like, ten-yard sprints just to work that explosiveness.
02:00:54.000So that whole point of getting strength into explosiveness.
02:00:57.000So that kind of running you believed in?
02:01:10.000Even that sled running, you know how all the guys are doing the prowler, poles and sleds?
02:01:14.000If I did that, I'd be out of commission for a week.
02:01:17.000Because my body would just take a beating and then I wouldn't be able to function and do what I really had to do, which was kickbox the next day.
02:02:43.000The first thing they think they have to do is cut their carbs out.
02:02:45.000But now there's all this new research about fats and how important is intermittent fasting and how important it is to keep high fats in your diet.
02:02:53.000So guys are doing the avocados and coconut oils to kind of get that fat.
02:05:23.000Well, she said it herself, and apparently she was kind of short, and her mouth was below the outer lip, and so she was breathing in the liquid nitrogen.
02:05:35.000And you can't, that's like getting choked out.
02:05:55.000The kind I do, if you go to cryo-healthcare, Jamie...
02:05:58.000The kind we do, you have to wear a mask, you wear like a surgeon's mask over your face, you wear earmuffs, you wear gloves, and you wear...
02:07:02.000Well, Dr. Rhonda Patrick, who's actually on tomorrow, who's a huge proponent of both sauna and cold shock therapy, and she believes that heat shock proteins and cold shock proteins that you get from sauna and you get from cryotherapy,
02:07:19.000they provide your body with some incredible anti-inflammatory responses.
02:07:25.000And your body, essentially, when you go to a sauna, your body's freaking out.
02:07:31.000But if you do it in a controlled environment for a certain amount of time, your body produces these heat shock proteins that are really beneficial for you.
02:07:42.000There was a study that she was talking about where the sauna showed...
02:07:46.000A 50% drop in mortality across the board from all things, whether it's from cancer, disease, all these different things.
02:07:54.000Like the people who regularly did sauna had such a healthy response to that sauna and having those inflammatory markers reduced in the blood.
02:10:38.000Martial arts, all sorts of training is good for your body.
02:10:40.000But I feel like what yoga does for your balance and for all the things that connect, like for your joints and your spine...
02:10:48.000I've never done anything where I can feel my back pop loose, like pop, pop.
02:10:53.000Like, there's things you do in yoga where you...
02:10:56.000You bend down and you reach behind your heels and you tuck your hands under your heels and then you straighten your legs out with your body flat and so you're pulling your body apart with your legs.
02:11:07.000Like you're literally pulling your spine apart.
02:11:09.000You hear it go thunk thunk thunk thunk.
02:11:11.000It's so good for you and you leave like Like, my back is always, like, from all the years of jiu-jitsu, there's always, like, a pain.
02:12:22.000It's one of the more underestimated things in terms of its difficulty factor.
02:12:28.000You know, it's just very underestimated.
02:12:31.000Do you think MMA fighters should be doing it?
02:12:33.000I think what you were saying about you could only do so many things is very important, which I think one of the reasons why your philosophy about only working out one time a day, no running, I think, well obviously it worked out great.
02:13:36.000Now they think you should warm up and get your body sweaty and loose, but that in actually stretching, while you really stretch something out, you actually lessen the amount of power that you can generate with those muscles.
02:14:10.000If there's any, there might be a trade-off, like maybe it makes you a little less powerful, but a little more mobile, and then you can generate more power and build more power up and still keep that mobility, that would be optimum.
02:14:23.000But I think there's probably a middle ground there that you need to reach.
02:14:27.000What do you think of, I know George St. Pierre came and made gymnastics popular.
02:14:31.000And then Conor McGregor with that movement.
02:14:35.000I think footwork is critical in MMA. I think it's really important to be able to get out of the way and move in as fast as possible.
02:14:43.000And it's one of the things that Conor is spectacular at.
02:14:46.000Conor is so good at sliding back, sliding back, BAP! And there's also a totally different philosophy that's a part of striking with those little tiny gloves.
02:14:56.000It's much more difficult to put yourself up in a shell.
02:14:59.000I mean, the way you would fight was so fucking classic.
02:15:01.000I really, you know, I'm not kissing your ass anymore.
02:15:39.000I can still make it work in MMA because one of the tricks that I teach my MMA guys is instead of keeping that front arm pinned, you keep it up here.
02:15:57.000So now it's harder for straight punches.
02:16:00.000And you gotta think, you gave me a straight punch and I put my elbow in front to block the center line, if you punch your two knuckles on an MMA glove on my elbow, good luck.
02:16:51.000But then I heard that shit's super bad as you get older.
02:16:55.000You get massive arthritis and you can't write your own name anymore.
02:17:00.000I played around with doing some bag work with no gloves on.
02:17:05.000I keep my wraps on sometimes, mostly just to avoid the scraping and the cutting, but I'll hit the bags with no gloves on and I'll literally hit my hand on different angles.
02:17:15.000For example, I'll sit there and I'll hit the side, I'll back fist it.
02:17:18.000You need that Like I said earlier in the podcast, you need to strengthen everything.
02:17:23.000You need to strengthen all those little parts.
02:17:25.000And that's why one of my last Instagram videos I said, add weighted just a one pound or two pound dumbbell to your shadowboxing.
02:17:34.000Because again, you're working those little joints you might not necessarily work.
02:17:38.000Like if you have those dumbbells and you rotate your hands in a circle, you're going to feel your elbow work at different movements and different ways that help strengthen the joints.
02:17:47.000So those little minor things add up at the end.
02:18:43.000That's another Steve Maxwell thing he brought up on this podcast about being able to loosen the shoulders up and alleviate a lot of the impingements through hanging.
02:18:50.000And people who are interested in this, they're listening, if you have a shoulder injury, there's a bunch of videos of it online while they explain it.
02:18:58.000Another thing that I got into recently was bottoms-up kettlebells.
02:19:02.000You know, like this is a kettlebell here and when you most of the time you hold a kettlebell you'd hold it like this.
02:20:31.000But I think that there's something to the ability to move your body.
02:20:35.000And it's one of the things that Eddie Bravo's brought up many times with...
02:20:39.000We have seen over the last few years is break dancers who have gotten into MMA or gotten into Jiu Jitsu rather and they're fucking phenomenal.
02:20:49.000I mean two of Eddie's best students, Richie Martinez and Gio Martinez are fucking break dancers.
02:21:44.000I think that comes from a lot of these break dancers.
02:21:47.000But it's a matter of, like, how much time do you spend doing that?
02:21:52.000And is it something that you start doing when you're 28 when you're a professional fighter as a world champion?
02:21:56.000Or is it something you need to do when you're 15 and you're a crazy kid fucking around in high school and you get really good at it and then you translate that ability to move your body directly into martial arts?
02:22:07.000See I look now and as a 31 year old, I look back now and I say what would I have done if I knew I was gonna end up as a professional fighter?
02:22:16.000What would I have done from a young age in order for me to improve to where I was?
02:22:45.000Yeah, you're used to standing on one leg all the time, so your ability to maintain that position is much better than someone who's not.
02:22:51.000And I noticed that even translating directly into yoga.
02:22:54.000But I think it depends on what kind of fighting you're trying to do.
02:22:58.000Like, if I wanted to get into MMA, one of the things that I tell people is that wrestling is probably the most important skill The ability to dictate where the fight takes place.
02:23:10.000That was a gigantic key to the success of Georges St-Pierre and the success of many, many fighters.
02:23:15.000And also the success of many strikers is their defensive wrestling, their ability to keep the fight standing.
02:23:20.000So if you have the ability to take a guy down and you have the ability to make sure he doesn't take you down, then you can better dictate where the fight takes place.
02:23:29.000So I think and I think it's also a skill that's really that's that translates so incredibly well when you learn it early in life, but Striking Is the scariest shit.
02:23:41.000And striking is also something that I think there's a diminished effectiveness in learning as you get older.
02:23:48.000There's something about, like, I've seen people that didn't start doing jiu-jitsu until they're 30 and they developed elite black belt skills.
02:24:12.000But back to the question about training.
02:24:16.000It depends on what you would want to do.
02:24:18.000So with striking, then, you were saying?
02:24:20.000Striking, I think footwork and movement.
02:24:25.000I think the ability to get in and out.
02:24:28.000When you look at guys who are really good at not being there when their opponent attacks, when you look at guys who have fantastic footwork and I think maybe if you want to be a striker, I think really just working...
02:24:42.000I think what you're saying about your training regimen, that you would essentially...
02:25:04.000Things have to have a purpose, like my strength training.
02:25:08.000There's all these new tools and these new fun things like, hey, let's do this crazy exercise where I'm doing a deadlift into a squat into some shoulder press.
02:26:59.000So you have to be able to pick things up quickly.
02:27:01.000And now I'm at the point where I can look at someone, as soon as they get into their stance, I'll be like, okay, you've got to do this, this, this, and this.
02:27:07.000Well, it's funny, too, when you can tell when a guy's going to kick.
02:27:53.000So there was essentially no way to have a career other than teaching.
02:27:59.000And so when I started getting into stand-up comedy, I realized, like...
02:28:02.000I got talked into it by guys I used to train with.
02:28:04.000And when I started doing it, I realized, like, oh, wow, like, I could make a living doing this.
02:28:09.000Like, this is actually, there's a real path.
02:28:11.000Like, there's guys that I know that make a living doing this.
02:28:13.000Where everybody I know that's fighting is broke, or they're slurring their words.
02:28:16.000And, like, guys from the gym that would be in gym wars all the time, and now they're all fucked up.
02:28:20.000They don't want to know where they parked their car.
02:28:21.000There was a lot of that shit that was scaring the fuck out of me.
02:28:24.000So when I started getting into comedy, I quit teaching.
02:28:29.000And I suffered financially because of it, but I would rather do that at the time, my mind was, I would rather suffer financially than give anybody a half-assed coaching job.
02:28:58.000You can train them as much as you can, but you've got to let them go when they get into that ring or get into that cage and hope that it all plays.
02:29:07.000But the other problem I find with MMA is a lot of coaches, there's too many coaches I find.
02:29:14.000You have, a lot of these guys have a boxing coach that's telling them to box a certain way.
02:29:19.000Then all of a sudden they're going, hey, I got to do Muay Thai now.
02:29:22.000So they have a Muay Thai coach is now telling them to do Muay Thai this way.
02:29:26.000Then all of a sudden, hey, we got to do spinning shit, so let's do what it was here.
02:29:30.000So now all of a sudden you have three different coaches all telling you to do different things.
02:30:33.000And also I think what's really important about guys like Matt and Farras is that both of those guys are highly accomplished martial artists in all disciplines.
02:30:40.000So they really know how to put it all together.
02:30:52.000I mean, there's maybe a dozen of them on the planet, and that's a problem.
02:30:57.000If you're not near any of those, and you start out with someone, and then that coach becomes like a mentor figure to you, and then you realize, oh, my coach is kind of limited in a lot of ways.
02:31:06.000It's very difficult to separate yourself from someone.
02:31:10.000And you can't be a fighter who you put all your trust into this man to help you out, then all of a sudden you're like, oh, he's lacking things.
02:31:53.000And then there was kind of, sometimes you can kind of get angry about it, man.
02:31:56.000Why did I waste so many years with this guy if this is the way it should have been done from the beginning?
02:32:02.000Yeah, I mean, obviously people are limited geographically as far as having a good coach near them.
02:32:06.000But I urge anybody listening to this to put the research in before you join a gym.
02:32:11.000It's so much harder to unlearn something than it is to learn it.
02:32:16.000One of the things that I would deal with in teaching Taekwondo is guys who came from other martial arts that didn't know how to do certain things correctly.
02:33:17.000No, but I think those guys that you talked about right there, Farasa Habi, Matt Hume, those two guys are, in my opinion, like cream of the croc.
02:38:29.000Because these people living with autism, they're just so obsessed with that one thing.
02:38:35.000I have students who are so obsessed with the train system.
02:38:38.000And then all of a sudden, they can't think of anything else but the train system.
02:38:43.000And they'll tell you anywhere how to get in Toronto.
02:38:45.000They'll tell you which bus, which way, the most intelligent people you've ever met.
02:38:50.000But if you ask them a simple question, They won't know it because they just don't care.
02:38:54.000Their mind is so focused on one thing and autism is just beautiful and crazy at the same time.
02:38:58.000I think it's beautiful to see someone so obsessed and not caring about other things than what they're focused on.
02:39:04.000It doesn't work well in society, obviously, but they're so absorbed in it.
02:39:08.000And I think back and I was like, man, a lot of us have these personalities.
02:39:12.000To be able to be so obsessed and so routine, like these guys, these individuals with autism have to do everything in a particular way, certain time, a little bit of OCD in there.
02:39:22.000I think to be successful in things, you kind of have to have that little bit of personality.
02:39:26.000Yeah, and they can make incredible progress.
02:39:28.000And that's one of the things that a lot of those people are recruited by Silicon Valley companies.
02:39:34.000Like, specifically recruited because they know that they can achieve, you know, some incredible, great, you know, feats of success.
02:39:43.000I have a student at my school that probably knows UFC more than you.
02:40:16.000That, you know, human beings are interacting more with computers than ever before, and they're interacting less with people in a lot of circumstances.
02:40:23.000And he thinks that what you're seeing is like this eventual transition between humans now and humans of the future.