In this episode, Tyron Woodley sits down with The Notorious Conor Mcgregor to talk about his journey to becoming a UFC fighter, his early struggles in the sport, and how he overcame them to become one of the most decorated fighters in the history of the UFC. He also discusses the importance of taking full ownership of your mental health and how important it is to have a healthy self-image in order to be successful in life and in the rest of the things you do to be the best you can possibly be. This is a must-listen episode for anyone who has ever wanted to know what it's like to be a professional MMA fighter in the UFC or any other professional sport. This episode is for you if you haven't done so already or if you're interested in trying to get into the UFC, this is the episode you need to listen to! Thanks for tuning in to the Unfiltered MMA Podcast! -Jon Bones Jones is the greatest UFC fighter of all time and is one of my all time favorite Fighters of all-time. I can't wait to see what he has to come next in UFC! I hope you enjoy this episode of the Notorious Podcast! -Jon sits down and talks about his career and what it takes to become a UFC Fighter. -The Notorious UFC Fighter of the Decade. Thank you Jon Bones Jones for coming on the show and for being a part of the Unrivaled Crew! Tweet me if you like the Unrelentless Crew and let me know what you think of it! . Tweet us what you thought of the episode! or don't forget to let us know what a great episode you think we should do in the next episode of Notorious and what you're listening to the next one! ;) -Jon Soriano is the best UFC fighter you've ever heard of! and if you have a favorite UFC Fighter? or what you would like to see him do next week! <3 -Jon talks about the UFC fighter from Notorious or UFC Fighter or UFC fighter? -TJ talks about what he's watching the UFC vs Notorious vs UFC Fighter, what he thinks about his future in the future? & much more! Thanks Jon talks about UFC vs UFC? and much more!! -JON talks about it all! & more! -BONUS CONTENT:
00:00:42.000I appreciate Rory McDonald going over there.
00:00:45.000I know he did what he had to do, but even that one bums me out.
00:00:48.000I want to see you fight the best guys in the world, and I think right now, over in Bellator, you have very good competition, but I don't think you have the best guys, and I think you're one of the best guys.
00:01:01.000I think I wake up every morning and think I'm the best guy in the world, too.
00:01:04.000I think that's the way to think if you want to be the best guy in the world.
00:01:07.000That's the way I've been thinking for a while.
00:01:09.000I mean, I've had some losses where I've, you know, had temporary lapses of confidence and whatnot, whether it be my training or my abilities in myself or my thoughts and my abilities in myself.
00:01:18.000But, I mean, where I'm at right now, firing on all cylinders, I feel like everything's working.
00:01:24.000Do you feel like those moments where you haven't been at your best, where you've had lapses, and then you felt those dark moments, do those motivate you to never let that happen again?
00:01:36.000Yeah, I mean, I think I actually went through, for those of the people that don't know, I went through three losses in a row.
00:01:48.000So you kind of get this, you know, oh, woe is me attitude, which I never had really had before.
00:01:52.000And all of a sudden it's like, why did this happen to me?
00:01:54.000Then had a back injury and then fought Will Brooks when I shouldn't have on one week, basically one week of training, which led to another loss, which led to another lack of confidence and then another loss.
00:02:04.000So I went through that tough, dark time, you know, and I think there were certain aspects of it that it was me taking the sport for granted.
00:02:13.000It was me taking my abilities for granted.
00:02:15.000And also just not taking extreme ownership of my mental state.
00:02:20.000Like realizing that I might be the hardest worker in the gym.
00:02:29.000But if you're not constantly taking extreme ownership of your mental state, of your confidence, your self-image, I think a healthy self-image is the most important component of being successful in life.
00:02:40.000And I just, I wasn't taking care of that aspect of my life.
00:02:42.000So you were doing all the right things physically, but you weren't doing what you needed to do mentally?
00:02:47.000I mean, I think I had never visualized until after that.
00:02:51.000I mean, honestly, I come from a hard-working My mom and dad both worked two jobs.
00:02:57.000My dad was a union carpenter, woke up at five in the morning, every single morning pulled himself up by his bootstraps.
00:03:03.000Mom the same way, working two, three jobs, both of them to make sure that me and my brothers had every single advantage in life, whether it be wrestling camps, football camps, this, that, the other thing.
00:03:13.000But we weren't exactly taught that, hey, You can go out in the world and do great things.
00:03:18.000You can go out and you can be not just good but great and be a champion.
00:03:22.000And I think I went into college wrestling and I might have told the coaches I wanted to be a national champion.
00:03:27.000I might have told the reporters, all the people that I was supposed to, that I wanted to be a national champion.
00:03:31.000But in my heart of hearts, I didn't truly believe it.
00:04:21.000Well, I think, too, I mean, I'm very hard on myself, you know?
00:04:25.000I mean, I think anybody who's successful is at least relatively hard on themselves, and I think I got to the point where I just started calling myself lazy.
00:04:32.000You know, I wake up every morning And I think, Michael, you're being lazy if you don't do something today.
00:04:38.000Listen to this podcast or watch this YouTube video or read this book or spend 10 minutes, 5 minutes, 30 minutes visualizing yourself.
00:04:46.000In a cage or on a podium or having loads of wealth or having loads of influence, having loads of impact, having ridiculous amounts of success because until you actually see it in your mind's eye, you can't actually achieve it.
00:05:01.000Or you're going to get to the point right on the cusp of about to be achieving it and you're going to have that cognitive dissonance where something pops up where you have the opportunity to break that barrier but you're going to find a way to sabotage yourself Because you don't truly believe that you deserve it.
00:05:14.000And I did that numerous times in college.
00:05:16.000There was times where I was beating top-ranked guys in the country and would somehow find a way to lose.
00:05:22.000Because winning to me, being crazy successful to me, wasn't exactly...
00:05:27.000It didn't exactly mesh with how I truly saw myself, you know?
00:06:15.000And then I came back with a vengeance and then won.
00:06:18.000And now I've won six in my last seven.
00:06:20.000The only loss was a crazy freak injury.
00:06:22.000And now we can continue to move forward and just kind of look at it as an adult instead of take the emotion out of it and look at it A plus B equals C. So it's really kind of helped me.
00:06:32.000I think for a lot of people who don't test themselves in such an extreme manner, I mean, I think MMA is probably one of the most extreme things you could do for a job other than being a soldier or a fireman or a police officer or something like that.
00:06:45.000But it's this idea that you sabotage yourself because you can't imagine yourself winning.
00:06:51.000Chael Sonnen talked about that quite a bit, about His fight with Anderson Silva, how he was dominating him, not kind of, but was dominating him, was very close to being the UFC middleweight champion, found a way to fall into a triangle.
00:07:05.000And he had done that with Paulo Filho when he fought him, and there was this thing that he would do where he would find a way to fuck it up.
00:07:14.000Even though you're there doing it, the pressure of possibly pulling it off was too overwhelming.
00:07:48.000And all of a sudden, I think we all saw the triangle coming, too, you know?
00:07:52.000Anderson, it seemed like he pushed the arm down real slow, and then all of a sudden he threw the leg over and we're all like, what are you doing?
00:07:58.000And then, you know, then 30 seconds later, he's, you know, or 10 seconds later, the fight's over.
00:08:02.000And I think it's your views or your beliefs not matching up with the reality.
00:08:08.000And all of a sudden, there's that fine line between breaking that barrier and And unless you have been there before, unless, like I said, visualizing yourself extremely successful, extremely wealthy, someone to be looked at, someone to be admired, someone to follow, unless you see that, you're going to get to the point where you tell everybody you want the success, but you're not going to get it unless you 100% truly believe in it.
00:08:31.000And it took me 30 years to figure it out, so anybody who's done that before, you know, it's okay.
00:08:36.000It'll come with time, but you really have to, like I said, take extreme ownership Of inside your brain, between your ears is the most important part of life, as we've already said.
00:09:02.000Because that's just like flexing a muscle in the gym, just like throwing a thousand repetitions, whether it be on the punching bag or drilling a wrestling move or a Or I take down, it's all the same stuff.
00:09:12.000And arguably more important on the mental side of things than it is on the physical side of things.
00:09:16.000When you keep saying extreme ownership, did you read Jocko's book?
00:12:59.000And I think the biggest detriment to the people that work hard and expect a lot of themselves is when you have achievements, you don't take time to smell the roses.
00:13:09.000You don't take time to pat yourself on the back.
00:13:11.000You think that, okay, well, if I stop and I say, you know what, I am good.
00:13:48.000You see one guy, pride comes before the fall, and then all of a sudden the fall happens, you say, okay, well, I don't want to do that.
00:13:53.000But there is that fine line, that middle ground where it's like, it's okay to love yourself.
00:13:59.000It's okay to look at yourself in the mirror and say, that man right there standing in front of me in the mirror is a badass, and you deserve to be extremely successful.
00:14:07.000But then when you go out in the world, you don't walk around like you're better than people.
00:14:14.000So, I mean, there is no, you know, Finite A plus B equals C type of way to live.
00:14:20.000But there is that middle ground between being your biggest fan, taking time to stop and pat yourself on the back and realize your accomplishments, which the mental highlight reel thing is something great because you can go through 10 things in your past and just continue to remember those times where you were in your flow state, where you absolutely performed at a ridiculous level.
00:14:39.000That you didn't, that you kind of surprised yourself almost.
00:14:42.000And I think that continues to happen step by step and brick by boring brick.
00:14:45.000You make these little bitty accomplishments and as long as you continue to remember them, you can continue to increase that confident capacity that you should have and start to go from, man, I didn't know I was capable of this, to now the confident expectancy of Okay, I said I deserve it, but now I really am starting to believe that I deserve it.
00:15:06.000And then once you actually believe, then you get in those scenarios where it's you versus him and someone's got to win.
00:15:49.000Those little things and then and then I always talk about working extremely hard and surround yourself with the best people possible and that's why I've you know I moved out to Las Vegas right when I started fighting and then moved to San Diego and then move and then move my training camp to Arizona and then now Florida and now you know so I've moved all over the country to find the best guys I possibly can so when you have a great day like that Sit down with the coach and say,
00:16:11.000hey coach, you know, talking to Henry or Evan or Kami or one of these guys that is coaching me right now and talk about it, like almost overly talk about it, which those guys are always annoying to me or they always used to be like, hey, I did this right and I did this right and I did this right because I always thought, well, you should just work.
00:16:31.000Those things need to be vocalized or they get swept under the rug and you forget that you had a great day.
00:16:36.000So now we sit down and we talk and we say, hey man, that 3-2 was really working great off the faint.
00:16:41.000We worked that yesterday as we were hitting mitts.
00:16:43.000And now you're continuing to show yourself that this thing really actually does work.
00:16:48.000You're not just working to work, you're working smart.
00:16:50.000And then you see that working smart actually turns into results.
00:16:53.000And then you're like a lab rat in the gym.
00:16:57.000Working on these little experiments that you're that you're making and you're actually Collecting the data and seeing the results now when you're talking about doing a mental highlight reel thing is this sort of a rebuilding exercise a rebuilding confidence exercise or is this just a?
00:17:14.000solidifying skill set and understanding your potential Because you've already done things before.
00:17:19.000Because you were in a bad spot when you started doing this.
00:17:23.000Is this when you started constructing this highlight reel thing?
00:17:28.000I actually read the book in college and then found it on my shelf one day.
00:17:59.000Whether you're in a great place, whether you just closed the biggest business deal you ever possibly could, or you just are down in the dumps because you feel like the biggest loser on earth.
00:18:12.000Maybe this month, It's different than next month.
00:18:15.000Maybe you wipe off an old one and you put on a brand new one that you just remembered.
00:18:19.000Because sometimes we forget successes that we have.
00:18:21.000It takes me going to my Wikipedia page or me going on some old interviews or somebody telling me on Twitter, hey, remember that time you did this?
00:18:29.000For me to actually remember the successes that I've had because I've been conditioned To pull myself up by my bootstraps every single day and forget about all my accomplishments in my past because those don't matter.
00:18:40.000Those are stumbling blocks because what got you here isn't going to get you where you want to go.
00:18:46.000And we have that mentality, but you have to take the time to remember Almost look at yourself the way other people see you because we all are all our biggest critics You know the way my fans see me the way you watch me fight is and and the the way you see my abilities Is probably even better than I have seen myself a lot in my past from an outside perspective It's so much easier to look at someone outside perspective because our own inner monologue our own and our own self-image Dummies
00:19:16.000down Who we are and how much we want to accomplish.
00:20:14.000It's a long time to question yourself every single day.
00:20:17.000To wake up in the morning Wondering if you were going to have a paycheck.
00:20:21.000Wondering if you were going to get a phone call from your manager.
00:20:23.000Wondering if you really wanted to open up your phone and see all the negative comments that I told you Michael Chandler wasn't as good as we all thought he was.
00:21:14.000Especially when you were a former champion and then you're going these 600 plus days without a win.
00:21:19.000And it really highlights the difficult nature of fighting as opposed to any other sport where there's times where it's entirely likely that you're going to go a long time without competing again.
00:22:00.000I mean, a lot of times, yeah, I mean, barring injuries or whatnot, I mean, it could be a year before you get to step back in the cage again, and then every single day you spend questioning.
00:22:09.000And every single day, you also just end up putting so much pressure on yourself.
00:22:13.000I mean, the biggest thing that I did wrong was I came into this sport, and literally 18 months after starting the sport, I was in a cage with Eddie Alvarez, top five guy in the world, beat Eddie Alvarez.
00:22:25.000Then it was like, okay, now you have to perform.
00:22:28.000That was that soon after starting the sport?
00:23:17.000You know, they fail time and time and time again.
00:23:19.000But I put all this pressure on myself to where I put myself in this prison of, Michael, you suck because you just lost to this guy who's not even signed to any organization at all, and you just lost to him in this sparring round.
00:23:31.000And my view of what the loss was was different than my coach who watched it.
00:23:51.000Now I'm focusing on the big picture of being successful instead of these little bitty instances where I'm trying to be perfect.
00:23:57.000Now when you look at yourself and you look at your overall MMA skill set, do you try to look at it almost like as if you're managing yourself?
00:24:05.000Not managing yourself like a fight manager, but like a project.
00:24:09.000Like looking at it like, okay, this is what we need to work on.
00:24:12.000This is how I need to tighten this up.
00:24:14.000Do you look at it as like an overall long-term project?
00:24:20.000Yeah, I mean, and I get that question a lot, too.
00:24:22.000It's like, well, hey, how do you prepare for an opponent?
00:24:25.000And honestly, I'd say almost 90% of my training is focusing on myself.
00:24:31.000I mean, because if I put the right systems in place, if I get the right skill sets as sharp as they can be for fight night, there's not a guy in the lightweight division in the entire world that I think can beat me.
00:24:42.000That last 10%, 90% focus on myself, the last 10% focus on the little intricacies, the little habits, the little tendencies that my opponents might have.
00:24:51.000I mean, Eddie did a great job with it in the second round.
00:25:13.000I was trying to throw big shots because why?
00:25:16.000We had that epic battle in 2011. I wasn't 100% confident in my training.
00:25:20.000So that led me to just fight like a barbarian rather than a skillful veteran that has the skills and the abilities to be able to go out there and beat any lightweight in the world.
00:25:31.000You're still relatively new with your fighting experience too, right?
00:25:55.000Adapt, but also just say, okay, I'm not a long guy, not a tall guy.
00:26:00.000I'm a shorter, powerful wrestler who can take anybody down, who's not going to get taken down, who has an overhand right that can knock anybody out in the entire world, and a gas tank that can come...
00:26:10.000That will surpass any 25 minutes that I need to fight.
00:26:14.000So I needed to focus on these certain five elements to be successful and not a thousand stuff.
00:26:19.000I mean, training with Dominick Cruz and working on footwork and doing this and doing that and rollouts and all that kind of stuff.
00:26:26.000It wasn't the right path to victory for me.
00:26:30.000Therefore, I found myself almost out training myself.
00:26:35.000If I really just would have trained basics and good cardio, good strength and conditioning, good boxing, good wrestling, good grappling, That's easy to say after the fact, right?
00:27:23.000And in my mind, the more I try to make this an intricate sport and a complicated sport, The more you're gonna find yourself having incremental Defeats, you know, like when I'm when I'm sparring outside of my element all of a sudden I find okay I tried this this round and I got beat up like you know, I got beat up which Messes up your confidence and all that stuff.
00:27:43.000Do you feel like This is something that I struggle with, too, when trying to analyze fighters' performances and their future and what you can and can't do.
00:27:52.000Do you feel like you go into MMA with a certain skill set?
00:27:57.000You started out as a wrestler, and you're not going to be a karate expert.
00:28:14.000You're strong and you've got great cardio.
00:28:16.000If you try to add a bunch of stuff to that and expand your skill level, do you feel like there's enough time in a career to really achieve the type of proficiency with, say, like...
00:28:29.000Kickboxing or something like that that a real world-class kickboxer has.
00:28:33.000You almost are better off not doing that.
00:28:36.000Yeah, I mean, I think I am the how-to manual for that, you know?
00:28:52.000A coach can out-coach and tell you seven different combinations in one minute when really it should have just been focus on cutting them off, focus on feints, focus on touching a leg, which is going to set up the punches, and focus on the punches that are going to set up the takedown.
00:30:26.000We both have stitches in our lip and our eyes and eyebrows from each other.
00:30:31.000But it's funny because when I sit there and I talk to people that I train in, I basically train in his training camp that he used to train in, and everybody always said, there's only one guy I can compare your work ethic to, your dedication to, your love for your family, your love for the sport, this, that, and the other thing, and that's Eddie.
00:30:47.000So, I mean, me and Eddie have spoken a couple times.
00:30:50.000I went up and trained with Frankie Edgar for two weeks a couple years ago, and he was out there training.
00:30:55.000So we like, it's always just funny between me and him because we You know have fought and you know but it's funny but it's not like we have so much respect we don't hate each other.
00:31:04.000Do you guys hang out and go to dinner or anything like that?
00:31:06.000No we've never done that but I mean we saw each other practice and I asked him to spar and he's like no man I don't want to get knocked out but but we were at the same we were at the same thing and uh same practices and stuff and it's kind of but you also get it's cool to get compared to a guy that you have fought because that immediately gives you that a much more respect for somebody because Because I know how hard I train, I know I show up early, and I'm always doing the little bit of extra, and everybody knows what I'm fighting for.
00:31:32.000And I think him and I are very similar in that respect, so it's kind of cool.
00:31:37.000Yeah, I would imagine no one knows each other better than you guys do after something like that.
00:32:01.000I actually spoke to one of the refs, one of the refs who called the fight for Eddie, or not one of the refs, one of the judges, like a couple months after I was at some event.
00:32:09.000And he's like, oh yeah, well he rocked you in the second round.
00:32:11.000And I was like, he didn't rock me in the second round, I tripped.
00:32:13.000I basically tripped and it looked like I got rocked.
00:32:15.000So it's just funny, that kind of stuff too, this sport is left up to...
00:32:20.000People who don't necessarily know what they're doing.
00:32:35.000But look, man, it's just a disgrace that you have people that really don't know anything about martial arts, and they're judging martial arts competitions.
00:32:45.000I mean, could you imagine if you had an Ultimate Fighting Championship eight-man tournament with all the judges?
00:33:49.000The stuff that you're saying that people who have seen the sport are thinking, but the judges may or may not have any idea what's going on.
00:34:48.000And for a guy like you, who, you know, you have a win bonus and a show bonus in the UFC. So if you're in there and you do everything right and you get robbed, you just get robbed of a decision and on your record it goes to the loss.
00:35:33.000I look back and I think, dang, man, if I would have fought just a little bit different here or that judge would have saw this a little bit different and we're talking a lot of money that I could have in my pocket or would have won.
00:35:43.000We've discussed this many times and I think, first of all, the idea of three judges is ridiculous.
00:36:35.000I mean, and there's so many competitors or so many just the average human being is between, you know, 150 and 190. There's the big guys, there's the small guys, but we're kind of in that mid-range.
00:36:46.000And I think a 165 weight class for a lot of us at 155, I mean, I would always probably stay at 155. I would love some cool matchups at 165 and be able to try to go for different belts and all that kind of stuff.
00:38:34.000I mean, I put out a post a couple months ago where I really think, you know, I've been extremely blessed to have, throughout college wrestling, I mean, I've seen so many talented guys' careers ended because of injuries.
00:38:55.000I haven't really had any really bad injuries.
00:38:57.000And I really do think it's because I keep my body in great shape and I do a lot of strength training.
00:39:02.000My body is constantly overcompensating for the weights that I'm throwing around, the med balls I'm throwing around, the comfort zone, getting my body outside of my comfort zone day in and day out that my body has just kind of bulletproofed itself to a lot of serious injuries.
00:39:19.000I mean, it's a fighting and you're jacking up little limbs and hands and feet and all that kind of stuff here and there all the time, but nothing serious.
00:39:26.000Cam Haynes went and worked out with you in one of your strength and conditioning workouts.
00:39:43.000A lot of my stuff is not crazy heavy, but it's just a lot of reps, a lot of cardio, a lot of moving stuff around, a lot of functional movements.
00:39:59.000What I always focus on is strength plus speed equals power.
00:40:03.000So we'll do one strength movement, whether it's a deadlift, whether it's a trap bar deadlift or a squat, straight into a speed movement, which would be like just a plyometric squat jump.
00:40:15.000So you got the strength plus the speed, and that's how you continue to gain power.
00:41:01.000It's also just getting your body moving like crazy.
00:41:03.000So, I mean, a lot of the stuff we're doing at my new gym, a lot of that programming is very similar to that where we have like a ripped class where it's resistance, interval, power, plyometric, and endurance.
00:41:14.000And we're focusing on all those things.
00:41:30.000Now, when you are going into a camp, who organizes your training?
00:41:35.000How do you decide when you're doing strength and conditioning, when you're doing skill work, when you're sparring, when you're recuperating?
00:42:02.000And then at night we go more individual, whether it's individual with one of the kickboxing coaches, one of the mid coaches with either Henry or Evan, or maybe it's a one-on-one with Kami Barzini, or maybe it's a one-on-one with Greg Jones, or it's a one-on-one with A grappling coach or it's your strength and conditioning.
00:42:19.000A lot of times I couple them where I'll do an hour of strength work with 30 or 45 minutes of pads as well.
00:42:30.000If I feel myself getting overworked, I will cut one of those out and focus on which one's more important for that particular fight.
00:42:37.000If I was fighting Goeti Yamauchi, who's a big-time grappler, big-time submission artist, so I focused a lot more on escapes, Defense, submission defense, and all that kind of stuff.
00:42:50.000I was still focusing on strength and conditioning and striking, but I really threw in an extra couple grappling sessions there.
00:42:58.000Do you have a head coach that decides when you're going to do what, and they look at you and say, you know, today we're going to take it easier today, we're going to do this?
00:43:06.000I think, I mean, it's that kind of loose schedule that we always have, but Henry said that.
00:43:11.000Henry and Kami Barzini has come in and really helped Helped manage some of that stuff.
00:43:17.000We made a couple of different changes.
00:43:19.000But I mean, yeah, they come in and they say, here's what we're going to do.
00:43:22.000But then every now and then it's like, hey, tonight instead of an hour long, we're going to do 30 with me and then 30 with Kami.
00:43:29.000Or Henry would do 30 minutes with pads, 30 minutes with Kami.
00:43:40.000We all have our coaches that we're supposed to listen to, but I don't have to.
00:43:43.000I don't have to do what any of these guys tell me to.
00:43:46.000But I think that's why wrestlers are so successful, because they show up, they shut up, and you tell me what to do, and you ask me how high to jump, and I just jump.
00:43:54.000Yeah, I've always said that I think there's two aspects of wrestling that make it the most important.
00:43:59.000Skill set to have an MMA and one of them is the ability to take a fight to the ground or Stand back up like just to have that to have the ability to dictate where the fight takes place is gigantic But twos might maybe just as important is the mental strength wrestlers are always dehydrated.
00:44:17.000They're always exhausted They're always pushing and they're they take pride in being the most miserable person.
00:44:22.000Yeah, you know, there's something about that like having The ability to push through discomfort, which is just something that you cultivate in an amateur wrestling career.
00:44:34.000I think you just get so comfortable being uncomfortable.
00:44:38.000Your life sucks for five years straight, especially Division I college wrestling.
00:44:45.000With that mental toughness that you're talking about, you don't just get mentally tough from working hard.
00:44:50.000You get mentally tough from working hard and losing and then winning and then losing.
00:44:55.000Having coach riding your butt because of this, and then you got a final, and you got a test, and you got this, and you got all this whole life that you're trying to manage and figure out while you're still trying to become a national champion.
00:45:06.000So you're getting thrown into the hardest sport in the entire world physically, the hardest sport mentally, plus trying to have a college career, actually get your degree the whole reason you went to college.
00:45:16.000And then really just being coachable and understanding delayed gratification.
00:45:22.000I think so many people can come into an MMA gym and they have a great boxing coach and it's like they expect after the first mid-session that they're going to look like Roy Jones Jr. Whereas when I showed up to MMA, I realized, okay, I went to Vegas and I was training with Gray Maynard and Mike Pyle and Jay Huron and Tyson Griffin and Evan Dunham and all these great guys.
00:45:40.000I knew I was going to take my licks for a long time.
00:45:43.000It might have been a year before I won a round.
00:46:38.000I mean, the funniest thing is you go to any gym around the country, if they have, I bet, you asked DC this at AKA, he's running the wrestling practice.
00:46:46.000I bet the amount of guys that show up for sparring day and grappling day is different than the guys who show up on wrestling day.
00:47:50.000I mean, first of all, you always want to try to set a time.
00:47:52.000You can never say, I'll definitely do it tomorrow.
00:47:55.000You need to say, okay, well, I have practice here, I have practice here, I need to eat here, I have an interview here, I have this here, that there.
00:48:02.000It doesn't need to be a crazy amount of time.
00:48:04.000I mean, you know, five minutes is long enough.
00:48:07.000That's a long time to be—I mean, that's a round.
00:48:10.000Do you ever grapple around and two minutes goes by, you look at the clock and there's three minutes left?
00:50:09.000I was literally a caged animal, and I hated the way I felt.
00:50:12.000I was peeing blood after fights because I was just going so crazy, and I was just—and obviously I gained a lot of fans because people loved the way I fight, but they didn't exactly care about my well-being that much.
00:50:53.000I can remember my last fight like it was yesterday because I've actually gotten better at the skill of visualization because I think that's one thing that happens too is you sit down and maybe you're listening to this podcast and you're like, okay, I'm going to smell the smells of this.
00:51:06.000I don't want to see the sides of this.
00:51:08.000And then you have a really not great visualization session and you're like, man, that was stupid.
00:51:33.000Performing at a ridiculously high level and how that's going to feel and how your brain is 100% bulletproof and how your heart rate is where it needs to be and how you are somehow confidently composed during those fights.
00:51:48.000Because it used to be the bell would ring and I would go a thousand miles an hour and the times that you've seen me exhausted in fights, I mean I passed out, literally passed out in a fight before.
00:51:58.000Right at the end of the round, thank God it was at the end of the round, Henry Hoof came and picked me up.
00:52:52.000And I always land on top, and it's something that I set up, and I probably shouldn't put myself in a bad situation, but a lot of times I get it, so I like to go there.
00:52:58.000So you mean like a crucifix where the guy's behind you?
00:54:34.000I wish I would have had the hindsight to just not chase.
00:54:38.000I mean, I have this thing where I love to hit people and run at them and go in for the kill, which has worked very well for me in my career.
00:54:46.000But in that instance, if I would have either, number one, switched to southpaw because I could push off of it, I just couldn't lift it.
00:54:52.000So I wish I would have switched to southpaw, or I would have just planted myself in the middle of the cage and waited for him to keep throwing kicks, and I would have kept handling it.
00:55:00.000I mean, only one punch really got landed in that entire fight, and that was me dropping him.
00:55:04.000Now, when that happened, how long did it take before your legs started working again?
00:55:15.000Seven days later, but for about three days, I looked down at my foot and my brain was telling me to lift my foot and nothing was happening, man.
00:55:22.000I thought it was, it was a scary time.
00:56:49.000I always say if this was back in the Viking days and you chop one of my legs off and it's me versus him to the battle of the death, I'm still winning that fight 10 times out of 10. So you wish the fight kept going?
00:58:16.000I was like, hey, maybe if I get the crowd into it, maybe these guys will get out of here and let the fight go.
00:58:19.000So I stood up and I was like, let's go!
00:58:22.000And I was sitting on the stool and I freaking looked at him and I was like, you better hope they don't let me off this stool, boy, because I'm going to come break your face.
00:58:28.000And then I stand up and then the guy pulls the stool and then a second later I'm on my butt.
00:58:33.000Now, why didn't the rematch take place?
01:00:18.000That, to me, was one of the most frustrating ones when he fought Josh Koscheck and threw that punch afterwards, and he got kicked out of the UFC basically forever.
01:00:30.000And now you see, like, Connor throwing dollies through windows and all this shit.
01:01:05.000Especially in that kickboxing range when he knows there's no takedowns, when he knows there's no threat, and there's a different distance there, and he's really good at that kickboxing range.
01:01:13.000Unless you're there to be able to really threaten with the takedown, he's going to be on his game.
01:01:19.000One of my favorite fights of his forever will be that fight with Nick Diaz, which was just fantastic.
01:01:53.000I've actually, the funny thing is like me and Michael Johnson sparred numerous times where we're kind of like talking to each other because that's against my, that was against my nature.
01:02:00.000Like that, that cocky braggadocious talking during the fight type of deal.
01:02:04.000I mean, once again, that's practice of, of almost an alter ego, almost a little bit different.
01:02:09.000In my last couple of fights, you've seen me be more present, talking a little bit, almost kind of egging, egging them on, like not being afraid.
01:02:15.000It used to just be like business, business, business, gotta fight.
01:02:28.000100% present and in the zone, like in the zone, ready to die in there, not afraid to, but also willing to fight a very smart fight, smart, sharp, composed.
01:02:38.000Missing shots, taking shots or taking takedowns when I want to and need to, and not being afraid to just fight like an extremely talented veteran rather than just a vessel of violence, you know?
01:03:25.000And that's with my career going really well.
01:03:28.000I've signed some good contracts and been able to do some really good stuff and had some big fights and had some good success.
01:03:36.000And I can imagine these people going through the grind and then all of a sudden you get injured or all of a sudden your manager screws you over and all of a sudden this and that.
01:03:42.000And I've had a really relatively, not easy road, but I've had a really good path.
01:03:48.000But I can see how people are like, man, I'm done with this.
01:03:50.000And I think going back to your point too, where you talk about fighting like a veteran, I think it's all based on the confidence too.
01:04:42.000So I believe in my toughness and my cardio and my heart and all that kind of stuff.
01:04:45.000But I didn't 100% believe in my skills.
01:04:47.000So then all of a sudden you start to mature a little bit and you start to realize that you have these skills, you have these bag of tools to use, and you can use them not just effectively, but you can use them efficiently and smart.
01:05:28.000And that's what I've always had the confidence in.
01:05:30.000But now I have the confidence in my skill sets as well.
01:05:32.000When you see a guy like, he's one of my favorite examples, Justin Gaethje, who's just a fucking savage, but you see him go undefeated in World Series of Fighting, what do they call it now?
01:05:50.000So he goes undefeated in World Series of Fighting.
01:05:52.000One of the most interesting and intriguing contenders to enter into the UFC has a spectacular debut against Michael Johnson in a fucking war.
01:07:41.000But there's a fine line between having confidence in your abilities, confidence in your striking techniques, your ability to win any other way than a brawl.
01:07:54.000And I've thought and the thought of me just outclassing somebody and piecing them up and the whole world watching and hearing the announcer saying, oh my God, Michael Chandler striking is on another level.
01:09:10.000They don't look at him like he has a heart and a spirit in his brain.
01:09:12.000They just look at a guy who goes out there and he's going to just freaking try to break somebody just through sheer, not beautiful technique, but just pressure and punch count and leg kicks and that kind of stuff.
01:09:23.000And he's going to step in the cage against whoever he steps in the cage against, even though he lost his last two fights.
01:10:04.000brawling, you know, like that's, that's what I did.
01:10:06.000And then I, then I decided I have these physical gifts and the speed and the power and the ability, the, the mental capacity to, to pick things up.
01:10:13.000I mean, I, I, I have been blessed with very, the ability to pick things up very, very quickly and, and two practices.
01:10:20.000I'm like, holy cow, this stuff's working just after a couple of mid sessions, you know, But Justin's shown no indication that he even enjoys doing any other kind of fighting.
01:12:08.000Eddie's got that boxing stance, and he gets low, and he puts a lot of weight on his legs, and he's got a lot of confidence in his hands, but Donald took advantage of that in his first fight in the UFC. When you saw Eddie beat Rafael dos Anjos and win the title, what was that feeling for you, knowing that you shared all those rounds with him, those two crazy wars?
01:12:31.000Was that feeling like, fuck, that could be me?
01:12:42.000I was at a wedding, and so we were all just hanging out, and I was like, the fight's on, and I was watching it.
01:12:46.000I couldn't hear it, but I was watching it, and he was just throwing that flurry, and everybody I was with was like, holy cow, you beat that guy twice.
01:14:23.000I mean, it's just, when you really stop and think about how fucking tightly matched that lightweight division is, and how many killers are in that division, that is a fucking crazy division.
01:14:37.000And in the UFC right now, you got Khabib, you got Tony Ferguson, you might have Max Holloway.
01:14:42.000I mean, it's crazy that Max Holloway got pulled from the New York car because he was having trouble making weight.
01:14:47.000And he's the 145-pound champion, which is just...
01:15:55.000I said when Rory went over to fight in Bellator, I said he very well might be, shout out to powerful Rory McDonald, very well might be the best 170 pound fighter in the world.
01:16:18.000But if you look at his fight with Tyron Woodley, he essentially shut Woodley's main offense down and used a brilliant strategy to beat him by decision.
01:16:27.000If you look at his fight with Maia, he got in the worst possible position with Maia.
01:16:31.000Maia mounted on him in the first round when they're not even that sweaty yet.
01:16:35.000And he was able to survive that and then pick Maia apart.
01:19:45.000Oh, there's not a day that goes by that I don't get...
01:19:47.000I mean, shoot, you posted that thing this morning, and there was 287 comments in five minutes, and it was all like, finally, hey, when are you going to come?
01:19:58.000And I get that every single day, so there's not a day that goes by that...
01:20:03.000It doesn't get talked about or thought about.
01:20:05.000Especially after Eddie went over there and became the champion.
01:20:09.000It's one of the things that I talked about when Eddie first came over to the UFC. I was telling people, go watch the wars that he had with Michael Chandler.
01:20:18.000And then I've said that also, too, when I've seen you coaching people or being in someone's corner.
01:20:21.000That right there is one of the best lightweights on the planet.
01:20:24.000And I just really would love to see you...
01:20:26.000I mean, I don't want to undercut Bellator.
01:22:20.000Why don't they just call it Paramount MMA? I think there was all kinds of new branding going on with the whole new Paramount stuff and all that kind of stuff.
01:22:31.000If there was ever a time, it would have been now.
01:24:55.000I mean, I've talked about this so many times people get angry at me, but what would you think about the idea of fighting in a big open area without a cage?
01:25:05.000Like a big open area, like a basketball arena, like a basketball court, like that size.
01:25:12.000If you had like wrestling hats where you have boundary lines.
01:25:17.000Could you actually go out of those boundary lines and they'll stop the action?
01:25:21.000Well, they'd have to bring you back in.
01:25:26.000Because it would be so big that there almost are no barriers.
01:25:28.000Well, yeah, because I think that there's something about a cage that presents an artificial boundary, and that artificial boundary can be used both to contain someone and to get out, to get up.
01:25:40.000Like, you could obviously wall walk and get up out.
01:25:44.000It makes takedowns much more difficult when there's not a cage, because you're not going to press someone against a cage and just scoop their legs out from under them.
01:25:50.000You have to get a legitimate takedown, like an open area takedown.
01:25:54.000And it makes getting up much more difficult.
01:25:56.000When someone does take you down, you can't just scoot your back up to the wall and get back up.
01:26:03.000You're going to have to figure out a way to actually get up.
01:26:06.000Well, that was one of the things, too.
01:26:07.000Going back to being a wrestler, wrestlers coming in should not just expect that they're going to be able to take guys down and not get taken down.
01:26:15.000I used to get taken down all the time off the cage, and I'm like, man, I'm a Division I wrestler.
01:26:21.000I mean, obviously, I know a lot about maneuvering the body and scrambling out and all that kind of stuff, but adding the cage wall is a lot different, you know?
01:26:53.000There's cage walls that, like if you're in training camp, if you've got a fight coming up soon, you'll spar in this certain area where they might put some tie pads on the floor, like don't go past this, and then there's your other barrier type of deal.
01:27:25.000But man, yeah, if you're not wearing gloves, if you're an elbow, I mean, I've busted a bursa sack in my elbow before and it just takes a week to heal.
01:27:33.000Or you look at your back in the mirror and it just looks like a bunch of hickeys all over your back.
01:28:41.000When they started talking about all the ideas where they were talking about putting a moat around the cage and sharks and alligators and like, we're really going to do this thing big.
01:29:03.000No, they had an MMA arm wrestling event.
01:29:06.000Oh, it was actually MMA? Yeah, where you literally tied the guy's arm together.
01:29:10.000So you were in an arm wrestling situation, and they taped your arms together, and then you were punching each other and kicking each other, and guys were throwing arm bars.
01:29:18.000Yeah, with the arm wrestling podium in front of you.
01:32:31.000That's why you've seen all these organizations come and go or these kind of crazy ideas.
01:32:36.000Nothing is sticking in a lot of instances.
01:32:39.000That's why it's cool to see the growth of MMA. It's a cool time to be a part of this generation of MMA as MMA grows.
01:32:48.000Like you talked about, Asking about myself, I mean, you're seeing all kinds of guys having success with karate style and kind of on your toes bouncing kickboxing style, point kickboxing style.
01:33:01.000And you're seeing a lot of people come in because it's cool, it's flashy, the fans love it, the promoters love it.
01:36:36.000Yeah, it's terrible if it's your knee, but it's like awesome for fans, but then the fans are like, half of them were ticked off, half of them were pumped.
01:36:42.000Well, you're seeing the leg locks now.
01:36:44.000You know, you're really seeing them in MMA. You're seeing them.
01:39:59.000So it's just like one of those things where it's like...
01:40:01.000But when a guy's making his debut and you are a world champion or a former world champion at this point, what inspires you to call a guy like that out?
01:40:28.000Getting people to talk about, I mean, over the last couple months, the amount of times, as soon as Khabib fought, the amount of people that were just talking like, hey, you're the only guy that can match Khabib's wrestling.
01:40:37.000You're the only guy that can nullify his wrestling.
01:40:39.000I mean, to get yourself in the conversation, that's what it all is.
01:40:43.000Well, Styles definitely make fights, and that was what became very interesting after the Al Iaquinta fight, where people were looking at, okay, what about high-level wrestlers who have more refined striking?
01:41:04.000And him having that fight with Iaquinta, who...
01:41:08.000He was a prohibited favorite over, but it went the full five rounds.
01:41:12.000And, you know, Iaquinta, although never won a round, showed some chinks in the armor.
01:41:17.000So chinks in the armor showed what happens when Khabib can't take you down.
01:41:21.000I mean, it's tough whenever the one thing that you've always been used to dominating with isn't working, and then you're stuck throwing punches and you're in, you know...
01:41:34.000He's a little bit behind in the striking aspect.
01:41:36.000Dude, I've got a ton of respect for the guy.
01:42:02.000Certain people get to that breaking point and they break and they concede and they go into their shell and they say, I did a good job, but this one's on him.
01:42:09.000Well, guys who don't have that deep, deep wrestling background and they face a guy who does, there's moments in the fight where you see that, where you saw that thousand-yard stare in Barboza's eyes where he's like, fuck.
01:42:48.000We live for these matchups, these stylistic matchups.
01:42:52.000So when something like that happens and a guy like Khabib has a fight where all these questions get presented, that's where a guy like Michael Chandler comes into the mix.
01:43:02.000Yeah, well, and I love, like, after that fight, too, because I said something.
01:43:49.000I mean, you watch him spar or you watch him hit mitts or you watch his composure and his confidence while he's sparring and doing all that kind of stuff.
01:43:55.000You'd think he's been striking since he was 11 years old.
01:44:27.000And it works out well for me because he's a bigger guy.
01:44:29.000I like to go with a little bit bigger guys so I can just continue to get stronger and manipulate bodies that are bigger than mine, you know?
01:44:35.000Yeah, and a lot of people were criticizing him for not being able to finish Meek, but I'm like, you're crazy.
01:45:01.000Especially for a guy like you, if you do have something like an ankle injury, like that one fight, and then you've got to stay offline for a few weeks.
01:45:37.000Each individual joint from hands to wrists to elbows to knees to ankles.
01:45:41.000I mean, in all of my strength and conditioning work, a lot of it is very, very hard, very, very tough, very, very violent.
01:45:47.000And then some of my stuff is stability stuff, core stability stuff, hip flexibility, hip strengthening stuff, because that's where all your power and all that kind of stuff comes from.
01:46:22.000Some people don't like that hot stuff.
01:46:23.000Yeah, we had training the other day and we had about 12 people in there.
01:46:27.000We were shooting some content and had some training and we had to bring towels back there because people were coming out and they're like, hey, you got any towels?
01:46:32.000Because people were sweating their butt off.
01:46:33.000And I think we're going to get some cool infrared panels to hang on the ceiling that can kind of add a little bit of heat to where it's not hot yoga, but it's definitely warm enough when you're going through your flows.
01:46:44.000You're definitely opening up the muscles and you're getting that sweat out.
01:48:06.000I mean, that's always been one of my big things.
01:48:08.000You literally lay on that thing, and if you know what it feels like to get your so-as worked on, you just kind of wobble and wiggle until it hits it, and then you can lift your legs.
01:51:16.000It's like a 2-1-1, two of the leucine, one of the valine, one of the isoleucine.
01:51:22.000How long do you take that right after training?
01:51:24.000I usually drink one blender bottle, one serving of it as I'm going into practice, and then I'll have another one going into the next practice, and I'll have a protein shake after.
01:53:06.000I try to do a soft tissue massage or a sports massage, kind of rolfing ART almost every week.
01:53:12.000I mean, like I was saying, I'm on my roller every single day before practice.
01:53:15.000And that's when I really see, you know, like these times after a fight when I'm kind of Not working out as much or I'm not, you know, not everything is on because you can't be on all the time.
01:53:26.000You know, everybody acts like they're on 365 or 365 days a year, but they're really not.
01:53:31.000You know, after a fight, I kind of go less robot mode, you know, break my diet a little bit, enjoy staying up late, enjoy just doing whatever.
01:54:54.000This was like three weeks before the fight, and I had to go see my guy CK in Florida, and he just had to work the heck out of it, man.
01:55:00.000And I think that's one of the biggest things.
01:55:04.000And I just talked to one of the guys at Mark Pro about, when we talk about injuries, we used to think rice, you know, rest, ice, compression, elevation, and that kind of stuff is, there's some conflicting kind of knowledge on all that kind of stuff, whereas instead of resting it, get in there right away and start moving it and mobilizing it with certain things.
01:55:24.000Obviously, you've got a broken leg and you need to get it set and get it rested, but...
01:55:35.000I mean, a lot of times it's just, you almost got to pick and choose.
01:55:38.000There's only so many hours in the day, too, you know?
01:55:40.000So it's like, you know, you're waking up and you've got only so much time before you go to practice.
01:55:45.000And then you only have so much time to recover before the next practice.
01:55:48.000And it's one of those things where I'm always getting a massage.
01:55:50.000I'm always working on, you know, maybe I'm Doing massage and chiropractic during one camp, you know, it's almost like you got to pick and choose your battles.
01:55:58.000If you have an awesome man warehouse like this where everything's in one spot, I would do it all every day.
01:56:03.000But if you're down in Florida and this is, you know, cryo is 45 minutes away and your massage is 20 minutes the other direction and you're fighting Florida traffic, you really got to pick and choose your Your recovery methods, you know?
01:56:14.000Now, your gym in Nashville, this is your gym, and I was following you on social media where you're putting up pictures, you're putting everything together.
01:56:33.000We're at trainingcampnashville.com and follow us on Instagram at trainingcampnashville.
01:56:37.000Now that we're open, I mean, my big thing is, you know, I'm very active on social media.
01:56:41.000We want to start doing a ton of videos, a ton of kind of cool, similar workouts like I do and pump out a bunch of information out there.
01:56:49.000I mean, my My biggest thing is I wouldn't be where I am today without surrounding myself with great people, great coaches, and be important, too.
01:57:33.000I wanted four walls and a roof where people can walk in and say, They're looking for a change or they're looking to, whether it's get stronger, get faster, lose that weight that they finally have been putting off.
01:57:46.000I wanted a place where people can say, because of that guy or those people or that coach, I was able to enrich my life.
01:57:54.000I was able to increase my self-confidence or just enrich life.
01:57:59.000Classes for like just general fitness classes for martial arts beginners classes Do you have like the full range and then also professional?
01:58:06.000Yeah, so I mean we we have a lot of a lot of stuff going on I I've almost been fighting a decade now.
01:58:12.000I've been Started out in Missouri went to the West Coast now I'm training on the East Coast and I've been to Canada been to numerous training camps in between and And the gym is called training camp.
01:58:22.000And the reason is because my life always revolves around training camp, you know?
01:58:26.000And there's a difference between, like we just talked about, in training camp and out of training camp.
01:58:46.000We have a bunch of friends in the music industry, so we, you know, Had some friends there already and visited and went to a couple award shows and said, man, this place is cool.
01:58:55.000I was just there a couple weeks ago, like four or five weeks ago, whatever it was.
01:59:56.000So back to that, we have a lot of stuff going on.
01:59:57.000We have 3,000 square foot of just fitness area where it's rolled rubber, flooring, turf, plate-loaded machines, squat racks, dumbbells, group fitness area.
02:00:06.000Right next to that, we have 3,000 square foot of mat space where we're going to have a youth wrestling club that has a half wall around it.
02:00:13.000We started a youth wrestling club this week, coupled with another 3,000 square foot of mats.
02:00:18.0001,500 there, 1,500 of the Fuji Tatami mats for boxing, kickboxing, BJJ, MMA, all that kind of stuff.
02:00:25.000And then that 900 square foot yoga studio, plus...
02:00:28.000We have our recovery area that we have a guy named Scott Dunnaway at ChiroStrengths.
02:00:32.000He's a chiropractor, ART, and corrective exercise guy.
02:00:35.000Plus, we're trying to bring in another massage therapist that's going to be there three days a week.
02:00:39.000And then I'm also going to talk to a cryo guy as well who has an extra tank that I'm going to try to set something up with, I think.
02:01:04.000Even with your nutrition stuff, it's like, oh, man, I've got to go Got to go make a Whole Foods run to get my almond milk and my avocados because I make my own breakfast but the rest of my stuff is in MegaFit Meals containers.
02:01:18.000So there's always a grocery store to go to or there's always a media obligation or there's always something and it's all time management.
02:01:24.000It was always interesting when I heard people like, yeah, I train 10 hours a day and I'm like...
02:01:41.000Then I'm like, okay, pass out, wake up, do it all over again, Groundhog's Day, embrace the monotony, chicken, broccoli, eggs, avocado, let's do it for eight weeks, and...
02:01:51.000Well, listen, Michael, I'm glad we finally got a chance to get together and have this conversation and let people know what you're all about, man.
02:01:57.000And I'm a big fan and I really appreciate you coming in here and I hope one day I can commentate one of your fights and it won't be in Bellator.