JRE MMA Show #45 with Justin Wren & Rafael Lovato Jr.

00:01five four three two one boom and we're live with my friend Justin Ren in the house and one of the baddest on the planet Raphael Lovato absolutely dude I'm bummed that you're happy that you're doing well but I'm bomb you fighting for Bellator oh I really am man I want to I want to commentate your fights I know for a fact the Bellator of right now is like is high it's a higher level than it's ever been before right I mean you look at they've got Mousasi you Rory MacDonald Lima you know Machida I mean it's high-level now man it's like Bellator is very close to comparable still I would love to see you over the UFC yeah well we'll see what happens but right now I'm really happy where I'm at how old you know I'm 35 and you didn't start MMA until you were like 31 32 yes 31 house four years ago yeah 2014 is my first fight were you doing a lot of MMA training before that because when

01:06you're you work for people that don't know you're one of the most accomplished Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belts in the world and when you're competing as brazilian jiu jitsu martial artists were you training striking were you training other things as well well you know that's a kind of my life story I guess you know my father is a lifetime martial artist and so I had a whole martial arts up great upbringing well before I ever found out about Brazilian jiu-jitsu my father was a Jeet Kune Do instructor and so growing up you know the main thing that we were training it when I was a child was the jeet kune do-- system which was basically mixed martial arts before mixed martial arts you know bruce lee's philosophy was way ahead of his time he believed in you know learning from all the arts and creating your own personal system of self-defense that involved you

02:00know each range of combat and so you know I grew up doing several different forms of martial arts boxing muay thai Escrima Wing Chun pin jockey lot I mean you name it I've probably done it and when my father discovered Brazilian jiu-jitsu I was an early teenager like around 12 years old he learned about Brazilian jiu-jitsu in one of the Jeet Kune Do instructor conferences that takes place in California they brought in the Gracie's they had you know they did like shoe fighting and different sort of you know martial arts and that included grappling but it was very you know rough and not near the the technique that Brazilian jiu-jitsu has so whenever he first started learning Brazilian jiu-jitsu he fell in love with it my dad's a smaller guy at that time he was probably like 140 550 pounds and so it was perfect for him and he fell in love with it and he comes home and he starts telling me

02:59about Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and teaching me what he learned and we lived in Oklahoma and the instructor conference was in California at that time basically the only Jiu Jitsu was in California maybe a little bit in Florida and then hence it was in New York so everything was as far as possible from us because we were right there in the middle of the country and you know he fell in love with Brazilian jiu-jitsu and so he started making trips to California to learn Brazilian jiu-jitsu and I was just a teenager I'm a young kid so you know I was already doing some boxing at the time as competing an amateur boxing and I'm used to training with adults and once I started learning Brazilian Jiu Jitsu you know I fell in love with it right away because that gave me something that I could do where I could be competitive with the adults right away you know it was a long lengthy kid

03:46and the guard just you know felt natural to me and just being on the ground I really loved it and I loved that the technique of Brazilian jiu-jitsu how technical it was and and the science of it so I fell in love with it right away and I mean we sacrificed a lot to learn jujitsu being in Oklahoma always travelled to learn the first time I went to Brazil I was 16 years old it was in 1999 to train and compete in the World Championships and you know we just never stopped and we became the first American father-and-son Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belts but you know going back to your question the the full spectrum of martial arts was always in my blood you know even as a jiu-jitsu competitor you know someone that found his passion in jiu-jitsu I still consider myself a martial artist first and foremost not just a jiu-jitsu practitioner and so it was always in the

04:44plans to one day do MMA but I really wanted to go as far as I couldn't in Brazilian jiu-jitsu you know I was there when BJ Penn won the World Championships in 2000 and I watched him win and I said you know man I really want to be the next American to win the world that immediately became like my my big life goal my first life goal and and I achieved that in 2007 but you know I like we all saw BJ go straight to MMA after he won he never even did another tournament you know that was the only tournament he ever did as a black belt was the world's and he won and then and then switched to MMA and so I really wanted to be an American you know just kind of representing for us in Brazilian jiu-jitsu competing at that high level and winning as much as possible and kind of you know at that time it wasn't like today the worlds were still in Brazil the sport was just dominated by

05:36Brazilians and pretty much still is today but you know now if we've come a long way and I just wanted to be that force to show everyone like hey we can do it you know what I mean we're you know it's possible you know because at that time it was it was a whole nother scene you know the worlds in Brazil at the end of the tournament you're lucky if you had a handful of non Brazilians on the podium at all the belts you know including blue purple Brown I mean all the belts let alone black belt and so I stayed in the sport to really try to get a second gold that was the main thing that was keeping me in it to win a second gold at the worlds as a black belt I ended up meddling eight times never got that second gold but towards the end I was just like you know it's time to switch you know I really felt like MMA was calling me Jitsu was getting a little too

06:27comfortable you know and I had been find it too comfortable yeah like it wasn't motivating me and inspired me the same way that it was in the beginning you know it kind of lost a little bit of that hunger just because I've been at that level for so long and I've already you know competed against the the best guys of my generation so many times and you know it didn't take a lot for me to get ready you know I was kind of just used to it you know is the same tournaments the same season year after year yeah same guys it just stopped bringing out the fire now every now and then I felt it you know especially when I went back to compete in Brazil you know the world switched to the u.s. in in 2007 the year that I wanted and so I stopped having that thing to to push me to go to Brazil to compete and so I went back a couple of times to compete in the Brazilian Nationals and I had really

07:22good performances there I ended up winning the absolute in 2013 in Brazil the the alway class division became the first non Brazilian to ever win a major absolute title and I did in a Brazil that was a day I was extremely inspired you know competing in Brazil brought that out of me but I just didn't feel that way all the time you know just got too used to it and so I just felt like it was calling me you know I knew one day I was going to do it I had to have one fight just as a martial artist I had to do at least one before was all said and done and I really just kind of took it as a one fight basis you know like I knew I needed to do it once and you know the time felt right like okay let's let's go let's switch back in to you know kind of tapping into who I was as a martial artist though the training that I had as a kid as a child under my father under the the G kundo system and

08:17and I did one fight and I enjoyed it and I said I got to do more I got to do at least one more well you the whole time you were doing jiu-jitsu were you training kickboxing at all were you doing any wrestling like well all did wrestling you know to some order your train yeah supplement Brazilian Jujitsu the nogi competitions a BCC things like that you know and I just believed in training everything to judo as well but like what about practicing ground-and-pound and all the other things in MMA well whenever I was younger my father he had some fighters that he was training and so I trained a lot with them and then whenever I took over the Academy we had a couple guys that were fighting then as well one of which went to the UFC and so I was sparring with these guys helping them get ready and in 2008 I met who is now my main MMA coach he's my muy Thai instructor his name is Mauricio Amado

09:16his nickname is Vale he's brothers of Andre Dida and they are both shoe box is that what you were in Curitiba you've done yes yes exactly that's where Dida lives his brother and just a fight in Pride k1 I think he won yeah okay one he did a dream he did some MMA as well but he's more of a kickboxer yeah striker and I met Matti CEO and I really fell in love with his style of Muay Thai and I had some guys fighting at that time what's the difference in his style well it's it's totally designed for MMA you know it's not muy Thai from a Muay Thai you know that they call it their system evolution time basically means evolution you know and it's evolved into this system that is designed for MMA you know you're you're not just training striking for striking you're doing striking to set up takedowns or defend takedowns and it was just a you know in a credible system Justin whenever we

10:26fought last year he got to train with my TCO and experience it for himself and something special yeah and Matty steel himself is just an amazing martial artist you know the the passion that he has is you can't get him to stop yeah with a lot of guys like what was different for you man I think the way that they they move and see the punches coming and the blocks are different and the movement I mean just so much movement movement movement and do you do mean to compensate for the fact that you're using smaller gloves like a different way of yes protecting yourself how would you explain that just moving yeah I mean the the offense and defense is so intertwined you know you do everything on both sides and it's all you know very powerful as well as it's designed for you know inflicting as much damage as possible and for me it was so good because they can work with

11:27me as a Jitsu guy much different because they don't have to worry about someone trying to take me down you know I can pretty much throw whatever whatever is possible everything in the kitchen sink and for the most part you're yeah it's okay it's okay and and then also I have the threat that being able to threaten someone with a takedown which opens up a lot of striking as well and so the the way they have this system designed you know is just perfect for me and Matty so as a person is just an incredible guy that I really fell in love with and honestly if it wasn't for him I wouldn't be I wouldn't be doing MMA he just made me feel like I had the the right person in place the family to to go into and make confidently him and enjoy you know what I mean cuz I in the beginning I wasn't sure how much I was gonna how much I was gonna like the whole process but you've

12:16been working with him for what 10 years yeah we've been training together 10 years years yes and so I was bringing him out to help my guys get ready that were the guys that were fighting MMA and at the same time always training with him it wasn't my focus then but I I love to cross train you know and just the movement you know I love the movement and keeping my body guessing doing different things and and so when I decided okay let's go all-in on MMA he was the this person to call and since then he he basically spends half the year in Oklahoma with me and lives with me and I go to Brazil to train with Dida and his team there but what made you decide to do that like I mean that's a big commitment to try to go all the way to Brazil for your camps well how many camps you done nine and nine yeah I've had nine fights basically every fight Wow well how much time do you spend on there

13:07at least two weeks sometimes a little more there's been a couple times a little less but right around two weeks this next time if you fight Gegard Mousasi you might spend three or four weeks yeah I'm thinking probably a month well you know it's just kind of full circle for me you know like I said I went to Brazil first time 16 years old going to Rio to train Jiu Jitsu compete in the World Championships did your dad go down there with you whenever you're 16 actually my dad has never gone to Brazil he you know he's not a flyer he doesn't fly he does not like to fly when he was going to California he was driving what driving home yep 12 over 20 hours drove to your last fight in Boise Idaho yeah three hours and he used to be in the Air Force and that's kind of why he had a bad experience oh and he lived in Spain he was stationed there when he was in the Air Force but you can get him to fly

14:03it's a bit of work it's gonna take a little bit of some drugs and maybe a drink or two to calm him down but yeah he would I mean we did road trips on my spring break Christmas break from Oklahoma all the way to California to train so he has not made a trip to Brazil yet but I think it's coming soon he's he took a long break from from from flying and in 2009 he had a heart attack unfortunately but he bounced back and since then he's kind of reformatted his life a little bit and and one of the things that he put his mind to do coming back was the the the famous walk in Spain left my mind right now they made a movie about it before and that pushed him to today miss walk yeah why I can't remember it right yeah you know where you walk like you walk to hike yes yes it's a long walk I feel so bad that I can't remember the name yeah it's like a six week walk and

15:08and you end at a special Cathedral there it is man the Camino the Camino you know yes and the Santiago is the Cathedral there it is the picture there so he did that and so he had of course he had to fly to Spain to do it and so he in Spain to walk six we yes that's yes they're specially trained for it and you know and he that was one of the maybe trained to walk six weeks yeah well you were in a backpack and so every day he would just backpack through they have special hostels that you would stay in on the walk I mean there's a lot of people that do it you know you're not gonna be by yourself there's people doing it all so it's like that trail in Georgia what does that called again Appalachian Trail yeah one that goes all the way up to Maine I had a friend that just did that six months yeah I know six month walk yeah it's so proud of him for doing that but

16:00we started flying again and yeah I think he'll be going to Brazil soon but you and your dad to me or something really special like you embody the heart of a true martial artist you've live it as a lifestyle and for you even and for him to be supporting you you know you coming out of the womb basically starting martial arts and then how he's supporting you as a 16 year old going down to Brazil yeah and how long did you stay there whenever you're 16 two weeks little over yeah I mean it yeah my parents both my parents just have given me incredible support my mom I mean my dad is a full-on martial artist mean you know live he follows his passions martial artist musician he plays the organ just a very unique individual and you know he opened a martial arts school my mom giving us incredible support and you know I just basically followed his footsteps and whenever I started to

16:53commit myself to you know going all in they've always been behind me and I mean I that the timing of it is just very special because he was inspired by Bruce Lee and that's what pushed him to you know follow the G kundo system and so I got to come in in that which is a very you know unique style I when I was a child I was training with Danny Anderson or Richard Steele some of the most incredible martial artists that I've ever lived that's very fortunate and then I was at this special age of a teenager you know when Brazilian jiu-jitsu first started making its way to the US and I had the support of them saying yeah you're gonna go to Brazil you're gonna compete in the worlds and I got to see jiu-jitsu you know very early on the first World Championships was in 96 and I competed in 99 and so I got to experience Brazilian jiu-jitsu and and almost its roots in Brazil and see what it's become

17:47today you know worldwide such a big sport and now I'm also fighting MMA so it's really cold my whole martial arts Johnny shoot a box is known for some of the roughest sparring ever and there was old school the way they used to do it do they still spar like that because it used to be just gym wars I mean and the criticism was that a lot of these guys were they were damaging themselves so badly in training that they were limiting their careers yeah I would say they learned from that a little bit a little bit but it's it's definitely it's definitely hardcore got down and could achieve uh and that's one of the reasons that it that I liked it so much it gets me out of my comfort zone and do you feel that energy every day you know you wake up and you kind of have to process what you're about to go to you know the professional training every morning but how often did spar down there there's

18:43some version of sparring almost every day basically every day but it's a different aspect you might be boxing only there's a Muay Thai only day there's MMA sparring there's you know grappling with ground and pound and wall wall work you know it's interesting because there's so many different philosophies when it comes to how often you should spar there is you know and there are definitely days where I have to kind of speak up and say you know what I'm gonna I'm going to pull back just a little bit today just depending on what my body feels I try to listen to that as much as possible aren't you firing partners with like Vanderley down there still yeah yeah yeah actually this seemed about that is so sparse Angela you just fight them right this scar right here is happening could achieve a sparring with Wanderlei you know you you you get more comfortable with it and the guys are

19:40awesome I mean the that they are definitely my MMA family that's just the way they do it it's not it's not a personal thing no trying to hurt you know know each other they sing and dance and you know hug and you know I mean afterwards everyone's so happy you make it through it in you celebrate it it's a crazy story I heard was Shogun and Vandelay were arguing over the price of a pit bull puppy and so they decided to fight and if Vandelay won then he would get the puppy for free and if Shogun won then van they would have to pay him what he wanted and vandal Enoch Shogun out in training and it was a laughing when you woke him up holding the puppy like what the yeah and they're really good friends yep yeah it's a little different needs to talk to them about traumatic brain injuries right yeah I think one of the things that they though the worst things they were doing there they were

20:33sparring full-on like they like two days before the fight yeah that was you see it was saying that times they were sparring right the day before their weigh-ins aren't so yeah there's some really funny stories yeah well I guess you get used to it so there's that but you also you leave a lot of your chin in in the gym yeah I mean there's just only so much punishment a body can take yeah don't don't take it wrong I mean that it's controlled now but yes but I would say it's still more hardcore than the average place for sure it's I mean that's that is so open in terms of how people decide to structure their camps some people have very little sparring like cowboy was telling me here are those bars at all I mean he does just technical working pad work he's like I already know how to fight Italy completely opposite right yeah use the spar spar spar spar no yeah but that's when he

21:31started doing much better he said he said it really made a big difference because he was going into fights damaged because you know he's such a he's so hardcore himself that sparring with him ultimately must become more hardcore just he's such a wild man Robbie Lawler did something similar to a thing I think Tony Ferguson was yeah about no sparring yep Tony had no no sparring in preparation for his last fight that's that's what I saw him in the post fight interview what makes sense about that with him though is that he was coming off in catastrophic knee injury I mean he literally tore his ligament off the bone and how to have it put back on and then six months later he was fighting that's incredible there's not a whole lot of human beings like that guy yeah he's a real freak that level of grit determination to come back from the injury you had to perform

22:19like he did yeah yeah that was my favorite fight of the night yeah I really enjoyed it I was bummed out that Pettis hurt his hand yeah forward no he doesn't man he never gets tired that's the crazy thing about Tony you know when Eddie Bravo does his camps with him up in Big Bear and he says it's nuts man everybody hill sprints everybody else is exhausted and Tony's just lapping them just running back up I mean he's just never out of gas he he'll work out six hours hard a day and on top of that what he does is he gets there they rent a house and then he builds his own gym so they'll have like a house that they rent he'll Matt up the living room and then he'll go outside I'll put up a Wing Chun dummy heavy bags w2 yeah he actually used Wing Chun in the fight with Pettis he trapped his hand and hit him with an elbow once and I remember watching it going like holy he just used wind

23:15Chun inside the cage like it works like if you really know your he trapped his hand and then came right over the top with an elbow and I went look at that because he's always practicing it yeah you know he's always practicing kung-fu but he's a very very unusual guy like there's all this talk about a Conor rematch because financially that would be a fantastic fight right financially but when you look at what happened that was a dominant victory I mean there was one round where Connor did pretty good the third round other than that khabib just sort of dominated him yeah I mean dropped him in the second beat the out of him in the fourth and the third was around where Connor did pretty good because most of it was standing up I think he won that round right was that the first round you've ever lost yeah I think there was yeah but I mean wasn't he won it like running away it wasn't

24:02like that he blasted him in the body had him hurt and you know what there was nothing like that it was just he edged him it's hard to make I mean I guess you could say that's the same thing that sort of happened the Nate Diaz fight and then Connor came back and won the rematch so this is the argument the argument is Connor was rust-eze out of the cage for two years he gets back in let's do every and then financially Jesus Christ me it was the biggest fight of all time they're saying is above 2.4 million pay-per-view buys which is bananas that's that's huge so if it's bigger than that and then they had if they could talk people into a rematch I get it but I don't want to see that I want to see Tony I want to see Tony dirty yeah he's more than earned it and the khabib the suspension my my take on it would keep you know this that the whole thing is it's not

24:57professional it shouldn't happen but neither should people be screaming at him while he's fighting yeah you know and and I guess that was going on the entire time he was apparently having like Dylan Danis was in the in Connors corner was screaming it could be while the fight was going on which I guess gets annoying yeah you see the new angle I there's a new angle of video where two Biebs Russian manager as as Connor is tapping he comes right behind Danis and slap someone yes act like three or four times I did see that yeah kind of instigating something yeah there's that and then someone said could be that Connor swung first which is true but to be but already gone over the cage and some guy that's coming at him and Connor swung at him but I think it was already chaos at that point yeah you know it's all very unfortunate but what happened really not no one got hurt

25:52you know me what was your any point of view down there I mean did you did you feel at all like oh man this rides coming towards me or anything like that that it spread around it's like oh now they're beating the out of each other over here it didn't feel any more dangerous I was hoping the chairs wouldn't start flying and then it wouldn't get too crazy and I was really really really hoping that someone wouldn't do something stupid and hurt someone to the point where they would get kicked out of the UFC or suspended but that might be the case was that one gentleman what is his name Zuba what is his name my I should check my Instagram because it's it's filled with free Zuba that's what I just saw that yeah here's like training partner yeah that's the guy that got fired yeah his fight with Kurtis is supposed to be with Artem and not a bad idea to cancel that fight because it's so close

26:56to this and obviously it's gonna be so so charged up let me find homeboys yeah they just moved artemon to fight Michael Johnson I think well I'll be good flavor yeah a real good fight yes Jabari ah they call it yeah see save Zuba this shit's all over my Instagram you crazy Russians I see what you're doing that's like all my mentions xub Arya I can't pronounce his last name tuk hu govt good luck good luck John and pronounce it he pauses it flawlessly force bar is a very good fighter to do it's very unfortunate I hope they can work everything out he was supporting his brother he felt like there was a fight going on he was showing his loyalty I get it there should have been more security they should have been better they should have talked to these guys beforehand they just stopped all this nonsense beforehand it's it's bad for the sport it's bad for the

27:59image it's bad for them it's it's just you know there's not nothing good about it but touka Bebe's point there's nothing good about Conor throw on that dolly at the bus that was worse that was worse yeah I mean someone should get really up fights get something because people got a contract yeah I mean um you know I mean chiesa got pulled from his fight he had a big cut on his head he's still dealing with injuries I think from that really yeah yeah I saw that one of the Bellator in Chicago there and he was like man I still dealing with like flash concussions or something like that and I don't know it was it was really serious for him it for him I think he took the worst of it how did he get a concussion from it don't quote me a hundred percent all right I know he had glass in his eye and yeah I just know that he was still dealing with residual effects yeah residual effects

28:54for me I'm torn because I I was at a conference it's called like the summit of greatness and we had a bunch of people that came over there was like 13 different people that came over to our Airbnb had a blast there was some incredible people there there's a guy that that I think you need to know of his name is Nick Santana Stas Oh and he's a guy that uh that is incredibly inspirational to me I've gotten to know him and he's got only one arm no legs he's got one finger on one hand but he the way that he's overcome adversity in his life incredible dude he first started with skateboarding with one arm and doing handstands on the skateboard well after that he started doing a bowling and then from there he had a little bit of an arm on on his left arm sorry yeah his right arm and he wanted to wrestle but his parents said that he had this his bone was growing faster

29:50than his skin and so on one of his arms it has like a problem with it and so he wanted to wrestle but they said if he landed on that part of his arm that the bone would stick through it would stick through and like stab into the mat and that there's no way he could wrestle and he looked at his mom and dad and he thought about it for months and he said mom and dad what if we just cut it off oh Jesus and they're like what and Nick says what if you just cut off my can can I wrestle then you know my other arms Wow and they said Nick you're being pretty extreme here listen I call it cutting gone off let's call it amputation and and no you can't do that well he just kept pushing the issue there he is right there and his Instagram it wound up getting it cut off yep so right there it used to be five or six inches longer than that and he went and got it lasered off and what he says is

30:39that he wants so ya buddies with a rock he's a bodybuilder too he just wrote a book it's available in Amazon I think it's called like from victim Victor yeah I mean that tire flip on his Instagram it's wild if if you want to pull that up but it's he's a really inspirational guy to me and he might literally so on that top left picture he calls that on his other arm he calls that his potato that's what he calls it but he had to have five or six inches cut off so that he could wrestle and really inspirational guy to me he's been on like ed my let's podcast and was house and his stories there are incredibly inspirational I thought the Neil Melanson story was crazy was that Neil Melanson yeah he he broke his toe real bad yeah and they were saying you couldn't roll for six months you had to put in a splint he said how about you just cut it off Wow and they said okay so they did it you've

31:39seen no man see that's a giant girl sure if he says cut my toe off you just go okay I gotta train so you keep training Wow so nicking him they've got some screws loose but they're committed you know yeah how committed are you that you want to achieve this this goal this dream his dream he grew up in New Jersey he's like I want to be a wrestler Wow and so I'm gonna I'm gonna do this incredibly inspirational guy so him and 12 other guys came over to our Airbnb and we watched the fights and it was Connor verse to be banned we loved watching everything that night and then whenever that happened so I'm torn on it because I love those guys as fighters and I absolutely love them as fighters and then whenever that happened is just something that in me I don't know if I was embarrassed or if I was disappointed but we were introducing some guys Steve Weatherford who played for the New

32:31York Giants he came over for like he played for the Giants for like 10 or 12 years lives in San Diego great guy but he's not a big MMA fan so I was explaining everything to him and when that happened is just pretty disappointing yeah then I spoke at that anti-bullying Coalition in Tulsa and I went there and there was this girl there that she looked real sweet real quiet introverted and she worked with mental health and her name was Ali all of a sudden she found out I was a MMA fighter and she said oh my gosh you know my husband's a huge MMA fan I'm not at all I never really even sat down and watched it with him but then he decided to take me to the t-mobile arena for the her first fight was Connor khabib and she was in there and she said she loved it before that the Michelle Waterson was an incredible inspiration to her her saying that she wants to be the first mom to be a UFC champion

33:24she said it the night was going great and then whenever that happened she said it was it literally scared her because fight started popping off to the right over and left over behind her she's poured out into the arena and so that was her first introduction to MMA so I was a little tough to see but at the same time I get it like those emotions are flaring and you were talking about it too and kind of your perspective of martial artists and yeah I mean same thing that that you were feeling just you know that little bit of kind of sadness and disappointment of you know the the biggest event the most views and most people watching and that's the last thing that they see that's what they you know go to bed thinking about and feeling about and and I just you know I don't think even Kievan Connor could be that's not who they are as martial artists you know sure all the motions

34:14were flying and they you know they have a history and and it's hard to let that go but I just don't I don't feel like that's even who they really are you see and all there are other fights they respect their opponents you know she I'm gonna disagree with you I mean look Connors that's what he does yeah he talks to people and with her head I mean it's a giant part of his game and I know that that was part the strategy of him throwing that dolly at the bus that shits way out of line I mean throwing a dolly at the bus that's not what a martial artist does when you if you stop and think about what we value about martial arts in terms of teaching children honor respect and discipline and the things when we think of as a classical martial artists like lyoto machida or someone like that bowing to their opponent that does not this is this is theatrics this is hype

35:13but in all fairness the UFC used that to sell that fight I mean that was a big part of their promotional campaign was seeing Conor throw the dolly at the bus and the screaming and the yelling you know you're setting you're setting an exam of the actual contest itself there's all this extracurricular violence right there's throwing a Dahlia - bus shattering in the window all these guys running and screaming get off the bus and then they're promoting this they're showing this and then everyone's shocked then it escalates after the fight itself you know one of the in in some ways one of the more interesting moments of the fight was khabib on topic honor beating the out of them going let's talk now have you seen that video yeah that's terrifying that is said come on let's talk BAM and he's just slamming I'm told he's gonna do that before the fight - yeah yeah we're gonna talk we're

36:07gonna talk when I'm on top of you and you're tired and I'm beating the out of you that's we're gonna talk and that's what he did you know this is all not what khabib does right this is outside of his his if you look at his standard behavior he's very respectful I mean he's never had an incident like this ever in a fight all of his fights before that or him shaking his opponents hand doing the standard stare down standard stuff talking about his skill set and what he's gonna do and there's no disrespect there's no insults there's none of this that's what I mean about khabib yeah but not Connor you mean this is a but but here's the other thing on the other side it makes it fun I'm very torn because all the that he talked to Jose Aldo look that was a big factor in Josie aldo charging at him losing his composure face-first and clip with that left hand that's a big factor

37:01is the emotional angst that he had gone through for months and months on the road with this guy the middle yeah yeah I mean that mental warfare is a real thing it just didn't work with kabhi it had the opposite effect and with kabhi he's like I can't wait to get my hands on you it wasn't I can't believe this guy's saying these things to me with kabhi bid but it ramped up the violence to the point where he was letting you know like hey this is real to me like if you if you want to act thuggish and you will just keep going which is oxy I'll keep taking like he didn't want to stop after Connor had tapped like he was holding on to him and he's letting him know hey like this is real this is not just talking Connor was saying to him this is just business it's just business and he's like let's talk now let's talk now like he's like this is not business to him so to him

37:51fights I mean this is what he said in the press conference it should be this is a respect sport and this just sport should be about two men expressing themselves to the best their physical ability inside the cage just doing their best against the best fighters in the world and that should speak for itself and that they should have respect and honor outside of it I wish you would have had the chance to say that you know the sad part was him letting the emotions take over and what he felt and instead of just getting the belt tied on and kind of killing them with kindness at the end and saying that and having that chance to put that in everyone's minds and any years he did in the post fight interview but I mean how many are the post fight press conference but how many people got a chance to see that list I mean just a few thousand I'm sure and as in comparison to the 2.4 million

38:43the download the pay-per-view and the many many many many more that saw YouTube exclus and Instagram is clear yeah I mean everybody saw it it's it's unfortunate but it's also a financial windfall like it's like the whole thing it's weird because part of what makes Connor so interesting is that he's so good at talk to the he's hilarious and he knows how to back it up but when we saw him fight khabib he just he fell short it's really that simple when skill versus skill he fell short and the the the shit-talking led to kabhi being taking it very personal and very personal at the end and pointing at Dylan dannis and jumping off the the top of the cage the whole thing was just it's so crazy but the idea that people should be surprised after Connor throws it Holly at the bus and then still winds up able to fight I mean just what did he do paid some money and did some I mean yes we got to do

39:45some some service what is his community service I don't even know what he has to do I don't either that's where it's not yeah it's kind of crazy throwing a dolly is way worse than punching a guy who punches people for a living which is Dylan Danis is a professional fighter he's a professional fighter jump so he takes a swing and I'm there screaming in Dylan's like to you and he's like you and there's a bunch of people get involved and then a bunch of other people jump in the whole thing was nuts but the idea that we should be shocked after him throwing a dolly at a bus because khabib zhan the bus that those Russians don't play like that man yeah this is the videos afterwards when Gaston were there shooting 47 so I wrestled there when I was like 18 wrestled there and it was crazy they're taking us around everywhere in G wagons and the ones in front of us had like armed I don't know

40:37machine guns on top of them the one behind us are machine guns on top of them and then what was that we were we were walking through one of the streets and there's these big chains that are in between the road and the sidewalk and we're walking down the sidewalk and all of a sudden there's like a laser that comes over and and our guys are like we gotta go we got to go all sudden a car came up onto the sidewalk started driving like they're gonna plow us now we had to jump into the road to not get hit and I don't know why that happened but after that we weren't allowed or the hotel we were in we had like balconies to where we could look out well they had to move our rooms to where we're inside to where we couldn't have a balcony and everything else to where the just because of that threat because of the laser that came because of the truck that came up onto the sidewalk and tried

41:24to run us over there was some crazy rumor that someone got arrested outside of the t-mobile rina see if that's true if someone got arrested with a gun outside the t-mobile Arena on after the fight or during the fight because there was there was some sort of crazy talk about threats the problem is you don't know how much of that's right you know I mean I probably should have researched that before we talked about it but you see anything did they they post that you know I heard the same thing though you are - yeah yeah I think I heard it on Instagram but yeah they don't play around different world man especially Dagestan that's all hard part of the country not that Dublin isn't hard but it's like that they're not known for their humor and yeah well III went into a sewer I went into a store like a little market and I was whistling in Dagestan and I didn't know

42:26that that was something disrespectful but someone came right up behind me and just slapped me on the back of the head like probably like a khabees dad came up and I knew that he was a bad dude so I was gonna do anything I just didn't know translator had to come up and say you don't one public you know oh you're having a good day yeah whistle that good but uh but I was just kind of whistling to myself I didn't even know I was doing a thing about air guitar yeah that's probably that that's probably bad and I don't show the bottom of your feet like if you that's for sure you can google that but if you are sitting there and you like cross your legs and you show the bottom of your foot that's culturally really disrespectful to show the yeah bottoms of your shoes or your the bottom of your feet so they just don't play around there and then about so if you have your like your foot on

43:12top of your thigh like yes don't do that don't do that someone would come and slap your leg and oh sure your feet we're both on the ground so just a lot of the world man they're always climbing up those mountains I mean it's just jagged mountains I remem most beautiful places I've ever been I'm just stunning but just the the hard life do you see that Nike or sorry Nike but Reebok video that khabib did yeah it was it was awesome yeah it was awesome but you seen that that's that's the real life there's a photo of him that he posted on his Instagram with his father him and his father standing right after the fight he did it like to explain like that this this what this is about to him is honor it's not about money it's about honor and respect and it's a photo of him standing with his father with this incredible mountain range behind him Wow yeah it's a it's a different part of the

44:06world so that that strategy with Connor backfired do you think there's a point where they're you know the that's incredible what a photo mmm that they should say hey let's let's turn the talking down a little bit how can you that's what that's what got Connor to the dance I mean it's one of the reasons why it has escalated it has since all day yeah then Mayweather bringing in his dad and then assaults and different stuff like that and then khabib going after his family religion right yes yeah yeah so it's it's gotten it's almost like he has to I think you were saying yeah he's got one up or so you know and it for me it just kind of felt like you know it wasn't a surprise it was kind of like the Karma for the UFC promoting the bus and right you know and and letting it just keep getting deeper and deeper you know they say it's the story and it is the story but at a

44:59certain point if it's something that was illegal hurt somebody maybe you don't use that I was honestly shocked that they were using it in promotion I was like well I shouldn't be shocked I thought that when I saw the promo and I saw the the Dali flight at the bus and then the video from the inside with the glass shattering I was like okay I guess I shouldn't be shocked because it did happen you know it is a part of the story but I mean is this is this encouraging this like what is I mean they're using it to sell the biggest fight in the history of the sport turned out to be true it is the biggest fight in the history of the sport is that good that doesn't seem good let's see it seems that from my perspective but it's you know it's entertainment versus sport right when it comes to sport like you'd never use that to to advertise the Olympics right right they would never

45:51have an assault to advertise the Olympics but this is something different it's commerce there's a lot of money involved it's it's a huge cultural spectacle it's Conor McGregor who's he transcends sport he's this superstar in just the world of just show business so it's different but different but at the same time what this might be more for the purist or hardcore MMA fan or martial artist that competes but but what what originally drew you to the martial arts I mean I haven't heard that firsthand from yeah but but wouldn't drew you to the sport initially well I mean like Raphael I found out about Bruce Lee when I was kid I mean Bruce Lee was the first I saw those Bruce Lee movies I lived in New Jersey in an apartment complex and my my superintendent for the apartment complex his son was my age and I went over his house we watched a Bruce Lee movie I was

46:43like holy look at this and they hit kid at Noon chucks and she and I whacked myself in the back trying to practice nunchucks but I remember watching that guy throw kicks and you know jumping off the tables and beating the out of all these dudes are coming out Wow and every kid wanted to be Bruce Lee every kid wanted to be Bruce Lee and then I I took a kung fu class and then I took karate and then I got into Taekwondo and then I got into my tie and all these other different things but to me it was just martial arts was you know was it was a way to learn how to fight first of all for sure but then was also a way to test yourself but it was always there was no talking back then martial arts tournaments it was not-- there's no trash talking even if you know there was like little subtle things that people would say to each other at the weigh-in under each other's breath like I'm gonna

47:34you up or something like that was very quiet it was very little of that most of it was bowing you know shaking hands and then there was this the fight but there was also no money involved it was just fighting you know and I think that when you're you're dealing with money and you're dealing with promotion let's let's just be completely honest Connor throwing that dolly at the bus and Connor talk and all that probably made that fight twice as big maybe would have got 1 million pay-per-view buys at one of getting two and a half million it's worth a lot of money think about two and a half million versus what one extra million people buying it it whatever the it cost what does it cost seventy bucks or something ours is $64.99 it's a lot of money men talking about money you know and then it's worth more for other fights because the whole card was so amazing it's gonna get more

48:33belittle - was your third favorite moment of the night was it Derrick Lewis Derek Lowe or Sony Derrick Lewis yeah Derrick Lewis winning by knockout yeah and and in a fight were said the thing about Derrick Lewis is he can always just land one punch we had just got done saying that like 10 seconds before he landed his howitzer on the top of that dudes head and then the post-fight interview we said he takes his shorts off it was my balls is hot I'm like oh my god but I mean I always knew Derrick's hilarious he's always hilarious so I was looking forward to talking to him but his Instagram if you want to know what Derrick loses about you got to see his Instagram and I brought that up and now he's got like he's a million more than a million what is he yet now I've hundred some thousand and just a couple days after that fight that's so awesome but it's true it's ladies instagrams all

49:27motorcycle accidents dudes jumping off roofs and landed on their heads which so forth up Instagram of all time but he's just a funny dude man he's really funny and him and Daniel Cormier like them promoting a fight is gonna be a breath of fresh air yeah because like did you see the thing where you know like Danny was joking Ryan said he say he's gonna knock me out yeah man use disrespect and Papa right let's play this cuz it's so funny Derrick Lewis told me - you didn't hug me out right before we walked out of here there the music what's your issue with Daniel I want to know - he disrespect that popeyes chicken on a commercial for music and stupid editing but that he's just a funny guy man he's just a funny guy and he's look I mean he joked around about it with DC he's got 1.3 million followers now that is hilarious I think it's like he just gained a million

50:34followers yes I've been following him for years now yeah I think he gained a million followers and he you know they were talking about it and he said to Daniel you know Dana said he goes you wanted you don't really want to hit me he goes I'll fight anybody for money it's just classic he's just a funny guy and what there won't be any of that there won't be any nonsense but it'll still sell a lot cuz it's fun to sell a lot of Popeyes - it's gonna sell but it'll definitely sell a lot of pay-per-views the real question is is he gonna be able to deal with Cormier is wrestling core Mary's experiment this is the level of fighting that Cormier is experience is just significantly higher but Derrick Lewis has unbelievable power I mean his power is no joke men if you look at some of his ko victories he's a brutal puncher brutal he is but I think if he and I I'm a big Derrick

51:30Lewis fan but I think if he fights DC like he fought volkov it's gonna be a tough night for him I know that I know that it could go anyway and that one shot from Derrick Lewis can put DC out or anyone in the world out mm-hmm but I just see DC's wrestling his his dirty boxing I mean everything if you if if Derrick Lewis is turning his back to DC like he was with volkov I'm he's gonna close the distance he's gonna take his back he's gonna exploit that he's gonna take him down sure there's a difference between six foot seven right seven five foot ten that's true there's a giant difference in size between volkov and DC DC is a real light heavyweight whoo my opinion could fight in Rafael's weight loss nothing DC really got his diet in order he could be one-eighty fiber it's true but he can flip over Josh Burnett over his head he sorts of guys there's something about

52:18that that round body type though I mean there really is like the barrel that the the you know the ability to kind of be uncrackable you know and of course he has the power and he has the wrestling so I mean he's like a version of Fedor you know right very similar very similar seeing him knock out steep a with one shot like that was stunning like wow and he was saying that he was doing that in training he said he hits way harder as a heavyweight I think just the way he likes to live his life and how he likes to eat he just has more energy as a heavyweight mm-hmm you know he might be a betters going through a whole life of cutting weight mm-hmm an entire life of it and well I had to withdraw from the Olympics because of kidney failure right from weight cutting and I think his life should be a movie for sure I mean the way the stuff that he's overcome the stuff that has happened to him the

53:07missed opportunities and wrestling not missed opportunities he's one of I mean he's so great yeah but not being the champion not being the world champion up being the Olympic champion yeah I mean coming to in the life stuff that he's gone through I'm just happy that people like him now yeah remember he was getting booed for launch was repeatable every time he got booted like brookmire it took a while for people to understand him and now I think that people you know after people seeing him choke out Rumble Johnson and then seeing him knock out steep a people like oh he's a bad and he's a really nice guys it's great food one of the best commentators now oh he's a Larry that's also what wouldn't made him grow on people as well look you hear him in commentary and you realize like he's not an egomaniac he's a really good guy who knows a lot about fighting knows a lot

53:53about wrestling and a man I'm so looking forward to John Jones coming back to Ron Jones fighting Gustafson that is very fascinating it's not gonna I know they're gonna strip DC so is that is that fight for a title or yeah I guess interim or the real deal I think that's the real deal yeah which is weird right yeah like why let the guy be champ champ if you're not gonna let them I mean yeah I don't know it's like I don't know I mean I'm so torn on all this he's probably gonna fight the winner anyways and then it will be for the belt so maybe keep the belt Hey I mean look I love the UFC obviously I've been working for the FC forever but I think there's an obvious conflict of interest when the promoter is also responsible for who holds titles and who gets to fight for titles it's weird you know I mean in every other sport there's like a sanctioning body that decides

54:48this is you know Rafael Lovato won five fights in a row he's the undisputed number one contender he will be next in line for the title you know not well Logan Paul's so five million YouTube buys these next like it's weird like it's it's weird that commerce I mean it plays a giant part in any sport right but should it be the ultimate decider and what what happens and what doesn't happen would you ever support the Muhammad Ali Act coming over to MMA I don't know exactly how that act is structured what is what is what does it say I don't know a lot about it but I know that I believe the mob so we get we could talk about it from an educated perspective or sure I think that the promoters have to split 50% of the revenue with the fighters I think is that what it says I think so I think that is part of it they would start doing that Hollywood arithmetic movie comes out you know no dude it's

55:50hilarious when they look people who have written movies and produced movies and so and dealt with with studios they factor in all this other like this is how much my car cost this is how much it costs for gas is how much it costs to rent this building this is electricity oh there's no more money left over okay here it says the Ali act amending professional boxing Safety Act of 1996 specifies that a sanctioning organization may not receive any compensation from a boxing mass match unless it files its bylaws and a complete description of its ratings criteria policies and general sanctioning fee schedule with the FTC the act further directs the FTC to make this information available to the public a sanctioning organization does not have to submit this information to the FTC however it makes the information accessible through a public website or if you can translate that I don't know

56:49I've heard that part which I'm not sure that that's specific the splitting the revenue but then I also think it takes out of the promoters hands what is that where it says law 15 us and what does that double squiggle what is that I've never seen that thing before you ever see that thing before have you seen it you've seen it yeah I mean in this context yeah I've never seen that thing before that's what the sort of law is I mean think so like a dollar bill thing like that's like yeah like a law that's a symbol for a law have you seen that way I think so there's a there's a law that fight for the Forgotten has been looking into for bullying prevention it's called David's law out of Texas and that that same squiggly thing didn't even show up on Google you just googled it and didn't show up look at that did not match any documents so okay whatever that is I mean I guess that's a law

57:42thing I'm look I am it always I always favor the fighters always because they have a very short amount of time to do it they put the most on the line they have the most at risk the consequences of their actions are you know in terms of losing in terms of just their the the possibility that get horribly injured in training and not get compensated there's all sorts there's a bunch of factors that I don't feel are fair or just look I was very upset when Tony went Tony Ferguson got stripped yeah I mean he's eval he ripped his knee apart and they stripped him I mean look I get that there be upset that the fight would happen or that the fight would not happen and that he would you know someone else would have to take his place I understand that but stripping him doesn't make any sense like how could he get stripped for an injury it's one thing if he did something to someone

58:39like the John Jones situation crash in that lady's car took off in the scene that makes sense it's an ethics violation right this is not an ethics thing he fell you know it's unfair to promote the fight yeah just ripped over some wires and it was erroneously stated by many people me included because I read it some more that he was wearing sunglasses it was not wearing sunglasses inside he was just wearing glasses just stepped over so it was just a freak thing man just a freak thing stepped over some wires and especially a guy an injured too easy didn't make any sense crazy I mean it's horrible but there's no no one to say no to that right it's like how does that work how do you decide like haughty aside who gets tripped and who doesn't who's got an interim title I mean how many interim titles can you have it's like this you know this it's just weird

59:28just for the rankings and the ability to get your shot you know just that by itself I think deserves a sanctioning body 100% let alone the ability for them to get paid more and be more you know fair across the board and everything well you see how like you sada has completely taken away like the UFC has nothing to say about you sada testing and about the the punishment that it implements it's completely independent so what they do is they come in they randomly drug test fighters they they make sure the fighters give their whereabouts at all times they have to register and login and let everybody know wherever wherever they are and if they violate that you saw the hands out the punishment and we've seen these punishments and they're strict they're very severe and they they they take away a fighter's ability to make an a living if they violate any of their

60:23policies or if they test positive for any supplements they've since made what I think is a welcomed amendment where if a fighter if it's possible that it's a tainted supplement or they have a trace amount of something in in there they don't say anything until after it's resolved so instead of like putting the fighter on blast and putting it out there to the whole world hey this guy tested positive instead of doing that they resolved it and then smart yeah which is the way they should do it but still look at a guy like Josh Barnett okay Josh Barnett was ultimately exonerated but he had to go like two years where he couldn't make a living and when you're Josh's forty years old this I'll have two years of spare you don't have two years Yeah right that's crazy so but my point is that is a completely independent entity right it's outside of the UFC's ability to they

61:19don't control that they step back they take care it kind of should be that way and when it comes to who gets to fight for the title yeah if a title is a title like if it's if it's the World Championship and you look at a guy like Tony Ferguson I think I believe he's 11 and 1 in the UFC right he's on this crazy win streak he's beaten you look at his his like who's who of who he's beaten crazy there's really no one else for him to fight he has to fight he's beating the elites oh the only person he hasn't beaten is Connor and could be those are the two guys man I mean we came to him yeah you look if you looked at it that way you would say he's next but if you were mr. moneybags like a little Connor wants a rematch Oh Connor let's give you a rematch come on the other area where the sport and entertainment process right what do you think about tournaments coming back to the UFC I

62:15mean they haven't done that but what do you think about them doing that for finding out who's gonna fight for the title Bellator is doing it now PFL has been doing it my buddy Josh Copeland just made it he was ranked eighth seed came in bought two times one night and in Vinny Magalhaes as well right yeah awesome trying to beautiful he's like one of the most underappreciated guys in MMA you know because one of the few that can jump guard and you're yeah and that guy wraps his legs around you he just had a rocky start because his striking wasn't there he wasn't there but now it is he's head kicking people and knocking him out did you see them do you see Josh Copeland's a knockout a heavyweight it was one of the best knockouts at heavyweight in a long time no I didn't see the time it's almost Instagram if you're able to pull that up Jamie it's pleased that some oh

63:03my Instagram and it was awesome he got the deepest cut one of the deepest cuts I've ever seen in my life you could see his skull and it went it went farther than his eyebrow and he got cut probably five seconds before he gets the knockout punch and if he would have got that they were stopped it came in ranked eighth now he's going into new New York City Madison Square Gardens New Year's Eve and fighting for a million dollars how does this work how does what is the million dollars what does that mean like this every weight class went a million I believe if they have ten they're giving away 10 million so at least 10 weight classes I think for the women wait what do they air on NBC Sports NBC sports so it's like a one of the cable channels right and then for Josh they they just fought in New Orleans and he had to fight a two round fight first and then

63:54he flew around to do really nice because they wouldn't allow you in the state commission wouldn't lie fight more than five rounds in one night and so the first round her first fight first part of the tournament was a two round fight and he had to fight the number one seed and he beat him and then an hour later he had to fight again here's Josh it was just a brutal knockout but he got cut right over the eye and then right here he just oh oh damn roof damn one of the one of the best nutcase I've seen in a while but it's uh did he looks weight thicker then he was fighting in the UFC he's really gotten his nutrition under but if you can see that cutter his I mean it was brutal bas Rutten was interviewing outdoors he's like Josh I can see your skull ring that's a haymaker of a right hand holy yeah I mean yeah he looks much better physically than he did when he was

64:49fighting in the UFC yeah he's been working his butt off he's earned it and now I get to fight for a million dollars which he trained you down with you guys in Oklahoma he he isn't whenever I am in camp he'll come down for like two weeks before my fight a super nice guy yeah super yeah he really seems like a really nice guy I've met him before but I don't know he's a he's a nine-time competitive Rocky Mountain oyster eating champion which by the way is bull testicles people don't know he's only I've been with that we go to so have you ever heard of the Big Texan the 72-ounce steak the large this is in Amarillo 72-ounce steak you have to eat in an hour you have to pay for it 72-ounce steak huge large baked potato loaded dinner salad shrimp cocktail huge dinner roll you have to drink a 72-ounce soda with it and me on a diet so no doesn't have to be a regular I don't know who decides that

65:41yeah that's preposterous the the man vs. food guy barely finished it finish it barely finished at man where's the food I think it was like 58 59 minutes something like that Josh did in 32 minutes and then get this so have y'all ever seen the endless shrimp at Red Lobster so Josh went to Red Lobster in the shrimp and and he asked them what was the most someone's ever eaten in shrimp and he had already eaten a bunch he always says you don't go to Red Lobster and not start off with the cheddar biscuits you know you have to eat those he had like three or four of those or a whole basket of them and then the lady said I think the most anyone's ever eaten was I think it was 226 226 shrimp and Josh 226 like coconut a fried shrimp whatever josh is like there's my mark that's what I'm gonna do or that's my that's my goal kind of counsel and the guys told us food stories all night

66:42that it just is wrong he's got like four or five restaurants he's literally not allowed into yeah it's not a joke so Josh gets to like 250 and they're like okay you broke the record and he's like no I'm still hungry and so he gets tough 300 he gets the 300 300 shrimp he ends at 400 and calls ago 400 shrimp does that look good put it on like a cube if you had like a box 400 fried shrimp in it I don't know he smelled like garlic for three days afterwards yeah then then we went to I don't know I'm going on this tour we went into all-you-can-eat a crab restaurant or just are heated and was all-you-can-eat crab legs and he's just ordering bucket after bucket after bucket of crab legs and they come over and finally said this sir there's got to be a limit somewhere and so so they ask you to we have to ask you to leave so he can eat but now he's gotten his diet under control and everything else

67:38whenever he came to grudge whenever I got off the Ultimate Fighter he came in at over 350 pounds I think was 356 or maybe is 3/4 SiC something like that when he's down - now I think he walks around it like - 45 to 50 he looks a lot slimmer but he also looks thicker looking his shoulders in the chest he's been worked with Lawren Landau who almost a great guy that Brendan worked with it I was in Colorado as was in Colorado okay so he's trained with elevation and I and me and why am I forgetting the main place that he trains at but uh Ryan anyways trials MMA in Fort Collins his where he's trained and mainly and but I'm just so stoked for million dollar tournament Bellator is doing the million dollar tournament now I think it'd be something I'm not what is 50 cent have to do with Bellator he's like offer and I'll shamble inning yeah he's talking to kebede now come on

68:29what does he do with Bellator does he have I think he's gonna promote it I actually I'm still I'm where you are I'm like what does he have to do it see he's promoting a shampooing people money and his champagnes on the on the canvas and on one of the cancers on champagne yep so he's given everyone the champagne after they win their fights and stuff like that and since it's a strange combination him 50 cent and and he keeps saying he wants to fight people - yeah what is going on with that I don't know but if you support in Bellator I don't know there we go I'm not necessarily against it but I don't know what do you think he's actually gonna fight someone or is he just it seems like it's all just a lot on yeah I think it's fun I think it's we're promotion of this new champagne mmm do you enjoy working for them yes I do very much it seems like a great organization

69:17everybody that I know that one over there really enjoys yeah super professional everyone's really friendly he's got a lot it's a great guy a lot of jiu-jitsu guys on the staff too so oh yeah I like to feel that love that says it was funny the last time you know Shawn G he's always in my corner and you know one was a Chicago rich rich Chow who's also I hope I said this last name right Joe Joe who's also Joe I think it might be just okay he trains jujitsu and and Shan ji was a matchmaker for Bella yes yes yes Hawaii next yeah and they've met before in Chinese like hey you're gay let's roll you know let's let's go train and reach oh no I don't have McGee I'm too busy he's got a lot of things going on well in in Idaho for the last one rich had his key and he was totally ready for Sean G this time and man they ended up training like probably I think they did at least two maybe

70:17three sessions and each time was like an hour or over an hour straight and you know they had a lot of fun and rich was like ready for ready for it he's like hi Maggie next day he's text John J I'm ready let's go again you know that's awesome yeah it's so so policy you get hooked up with him and solo well tell everybody with that you know salut Ribeiro and Chon G you're just two elite legends black belts unless they're done in San Diego yeah they're from the Amazon from announce saw was a six-time world champion he's the older brother Shan ji seven-time world champion two-time absolute world champion he's the greatest heavyweight that ever there's ever been in Brazilian Jujitsu it's a really cool story I was 19 years old I was a brown belt and I competed in my first professional event it was a noogie Pro tournament in Ohio was the part of the Arnold Classic event that goes on

71:15with the bodybuilding and all that they had a hatred to competition and they had a pro noogie tournament it was only three weight classes like a light weight a middleweight and heavyweight and at that time it was like the biggest noogie tournament that there was besides 480 CC and a lot of the ATCC champions would do that event to win the money of course and then also just kind of prepare for a DCC later in the year and I knew saw he had a his home bases affiliations associate association schools were were in the beginning in that area of the country in Ohio and he always competed at that tournament so deshawne G and so I knew there was a great chance that you know I would get a chance to face Solow going into that event I had to send my like resume in to get accepted into the pro tournament and I never forget the email they send me where it was like you've been

72:15accepted congratulations saltybet it was in your division good luck you know how am i okay how awesome I'm already thinking how awesome would it be to have a match result I'm 19 years old Saul was already six-time world champion a legend already and so you know go to the tournament and sure enough it was destiny man we're on opposite sides of the bracket and you know he clears out his side gets the finals no problem and I fight my way to the finals I had four matches and actually in the semi-finals I ended up going against one of his black belts and it was the first time I ever faced a black belt at that time there wasn't a whole bunch of no key opportunities you know where you could be an on black belt and fight a black belt and I was losing on points and at the end I started coming back and I was able to submit his black belt and go to the finals and his black belt kind of

73:09threw a fit and was pretty disappointed wouldn't shake my hand wasn't there when the referee was raised her hand and I could feel all this energy because it was kind of I think everyone thought they were gonna close it out together you know and how would they do that though would they fight it out every tournament's different oh wow yeah they probably battle out um and then they would share the prize money there was a substantial prize money for first place I think it was like five grand and second place was like 1500 something like that it's the first time I got paid to compete like I ever won money I was super pumped but yeah so you know I'm going into the finals consol and I just beat one of his black belts and I was just like wolf I was so nervous so scared you know but he's an absolute legend yeah and I'm 19 I'm a brown and you know it wasn't like today where you see all

74:02these you know legends and these world champions all the time like at that time they were all in Brazil you know and so it was hard to see this guys like the only time you saw him is if you were in Brazil and they were still very like they had this mystique about them and you know it it was just a different vibe they were way more scary I guess you could say way more intimidating back then so I was definitely super intimidated but you know same time I was fired up you know I want to be a world champion I get to face you know a legend and let's go and so we had a good match I was able to last for a good amount of time but he eventually passed my guard mounted me and submitted me at the variant and you know I wasn't disappointed I was happy it's like mana my you know this was the first time I got to face someone like that and I did my best I was able to keep my guard for

74:54a while so I was proud of that but at the same time you know he he mounted me tapped me and and you know that's what he was supposed to do you know but he he was so nice to me afterwards gave me a big hug and we talked and and that was kind of that at that moment but I felt like I'd earned his his respect you know fast forward a few months later I'm in Brazil and at that time there was two world tournaments there was a second organization called the sea BJJ oh so there was the sea BJJ and then there was a sea BJJ oh and they were paying there was a World Championships that were paying Nauvoo now kind of created that event they separated didn't want to support the original World Championships and they made their own World Championships and and they were paying and that was the way they could get a lot of guys to come over and support that tournament and it was big it was

75:48pretty much the same it was basically the same thing there was only a couple teams that didn't support that tournament and at the same time there was a couple teams that competed that tournament they didn't support the original worlds so depending on what division you were fought in it was either exactly the same or it was tougher you know especially in the lightweights because no Vanya had all the best light weights at that time and so I'm at that event I competed there and Salah wasn't competing that year and so he was very approachable he wasn't fighting he was just coaching and and I competed I was a brown belt still and I come over and I say what's up to Solow and he's a my brother good to see you that how you doing it he's like where are you training and tell him where I'm training he's like well you want to come train with me so yeah I would love to and he was like

76:37here's my card give me a call Monday I'll come pick you up sure enough a column he comes to my hotel him and Shawn G they picked me and a couple of my friends up they drive me all the way to Copacabana we were staying in Baja and we go and train and man like just seeing the way he interacted with his guys the energy the way I felt there you know at this time there was there was a lot of them you know how do I put it like it there was a resilience and then you're a gringo you know it was it was hard to go to Brazil and like learn a lot and have someone really kind of open up and and help you and show you and teach you a lot I mean Eddie would know I'm sure you've heard the stories I remember being a Brazil with Eddie a long time ago back in the day you know you just especially if they felt like you were a threat you know they wouldn't show you a lot because what a few minute of

77:33fighting one of their buddies know what I mean and so this was the first time that I wasn't treated that way and you know Solow and Sean G really opened up and was it was like you know bringing me sort of into their family right away do you speak Portuguese I'm not 100% fluent but I'm pretty good you know I can go to Brazil and and do whatever you know I need to do and be on my own and be fine at that time my Portuguese wasn't as good as what it is today did you take classes or the next year actually the year after this in 2004 I lived in Brazil for four months and that's when I really got pretty good at Portuguese but you know anyways he was open to answering my questions he was teaching me stuff and and we trained I trained there all week in between the time from the first worlds into the other the main worlds and I just kind of knew like immediately like man this is

78:32this is what I want you know and it was the first time I ever had someone of that level be open to helping me and take me under his wing and so we stayed in touch shortly after that trip to Brazil he came out and to Oklahoma and taught a seminar at my dad school that time my dad was running the Academy my dad loved him right away as well he stayed with my dad and you know like once again we spent a whole week on the mat together he's helping me did an amazing seminar it's all it was just an amazing guy to just a you know he's like an encyclopedia of jujitsu and just you know one of the most amazing martial artists have ever met and I mean we just never stopped have his style in a way they him and challenge II have that smashing just yes sure game it's just such a hard style it's I love that style meets love I love watching it I love I love that it's just total control you

79:35know and it's just pressure and you know I mean everybody that I've talked to that's rolled with him award Sean she says it's you have a building on top of you and these guys are on you exactly two of the greatest car plat gar pastors that have ever existed and they're mounters they smother they make people tap just from their mount I was a guard guy right i didn't really a great combination of those two things yeah it all came together for me but I mean this was a time I'm a brown belt transitioning into becoming a black belt the next year I get my black but when we really started training like day to day that that year I spent four months there I trained with Shonda you every day you know you know I be I become a black belt and they're literally just I mean destroying me you know they were their home base at that time in the US was Toledo Ohio in the middle of nowhere

80:30that's where their affiliates were in that area Michigan Ohio down into Virginia they had Philadelphia why did they go to San Diego it was 2007 2007 so this is like oceans training with them down there cuz he was down there with them for the BJ Penn fight well yeah that was before that it was around the same time oh seven oh eight really yes she vs Diego 7:08 yeah wow man I'm confused I felt like it was like 2003 or something like that its I'm too many fights I'm kind of terrible Sanchez was in the Ultimate Fighter at like 2005 right well he was in the first season which is a 2005 yes number 11 2009 uh-huh okay yeah so I I said Oh 708 it's probably only 9 mm-hmm but yeah I mean they were just destroying me with that pressure and it was like the exact answer to my guard because they you know you fight your way inside so I couldn't use my length right

81:30and I didn't understand how to frame how to protect myself and I just literally got smothered and you know just destroyed on a daily basis and in Toledo Ohio would just be the three of us you know they didn't have like a big team and so I would go there and stay with them and we would just train for hours every day and the bike the airdyne bike would be the the evening training partner you know someone two guys were out the other guy wasn't you by that thing I got one of those rogue echo bikes out there that's the version of the airdyne holy is that think death yeah it's a lot harder to me we have solve screaming in your ear time and how would you do it would you do it Sprint's or like what do you what are you doing that thing you had to keep a certain pace and whenever they were in a scramble and and going hard you had to sprint at the same time on the bike oh

82:21wow yeah and so you didn't want to be the one like going too slow and in the middle of training saw looks over and he's like you know yelling at you to pick it up you know what I mean so you had you had to push up you had to push it and then it was your turn to go in and you know so I'm going back to back between solo and Sean G and they're done and the Aerodyne those were the mats in the living room or something like that or was that mark layman and stuff that was layman okay yeah just mats in the living room at the house there's another appreciated guy very much mark layman's goddamn encyclopedia of Brazilian jiu-jitsu I remember he had everything sort of written out like way back in the day like most people just had moves in their head but layman had things written up think he might have done it on its computer yeah it was on his computer yeah another guy though it had a big

83:08influence on was he days he went back home to Wisconsin right and I think he might have a school there now I think because I know he was doing team takedown right he's with Hydra Windham twice when Hendricks was at his best you that's right you were there as well and then I haven't heard from him I was I was wondering like yeah he went back home he's had some back issues you know that kept him from training but I think I want to say I heard he is teaching now he is back to teach is teaching and I think he's also some of his family either it's a bait and tackle shop or maybe it's like the standing paddle boards or something like that on a lake and I think he's helping with that business as well too so his back from jiu-jitsu right I think that's yeah if there is a number one injury that people up in jiu-jitsu it is the back right back neck yeah back and neck have you had any of

83:58those problems I used to have some neck issues you know it wasn't never anything too serious but if there was something that kept me from training for a week or two it because my neck would flare up but fortunately my strength conditioning coach that I've been with now for about nine years he really changed the way I trained I used to think that you know the supplementary like strength conditioning type stuff like I had to just destroy myself and lift hard and do all this crazy stuff and I didn't feel like it was productive unless I couldn't walk at the end and then I would go train and get hurt you know because I couldn't move us to Ty to soar and so my strength and conditioning coach Luke Tyree he really kind of put me on a different path and made it a lot more back to the basics pure clean movement and everything just about health and awareness a lot of so what kind of stuff

84:56do you do now well you'd be surprised how little I do you know I don't there are times where we push it but I don't I don't ever leave feeling like I'm not gonna be able to train later you know actually a lot of people do strength conditioning type training you know later in the day after they've already done their martial arts training so they you know don't feel tired when they do their martial arts training the strength getting training that I do actually makes me feel healthier and makes me feel kind of awakens my body I feel looser and so I I always doing them in the morning that's the way I like to start all my days but you know we do a lot of kettlebells I've been playing a lot with the mace lately as well I do a lot of air time bike I'm on the bike a lot sledge drags you know we just pick heavy things up and moving around you know the only lift I really do on a regular basis

85:53somewhat is deadlifts with the trap bar so it's safer and there's just also a lot of movement a lot of mobility involved why is deadlifts safer with the trap bar I because you're not carrying the weight in front of you so it's not as much pressure on your back you know it's it's you're kind of inside of it it's a little more natural to bring it up what's that other machine that Luke has that you also love it's the reverse hyper first hyper things amazing for your back isn't it mm-hmm so critical for decompressing the compressing your spine and then strengthening up all that area in a real weird way that's very difficult to do outside of that machine mm-hmm and here's the first one that just say crawl why don't you you know he taught me how to crawl and you know just start crawling for five minutes 10 minutes hang you know get on the pull-up bar hang you know we he would incorporate

86:47all these recovery techniques and exercises into my training and a lot of movement and would be the first one to say and I know you want to go this hard today but no you're gonna tone it down how are you feeling what's on your schedule you know and really just you know put it to where it fits nicely into my routine and isn't something that is everything you know it takes it all out of me and he kind of opened my eyes to the movement area of his training and that kind of led me into another person I'm training with now these days his name's Cameron Shane who's a an innovator when it comes to movement he has a system the Budokan movement system and he's an incredible guy he's in Florida in Miami and he is a yoga you know he's a yogi he's a martial artist first fell in love with yoga and then created this free-form mobility and movement that you see guys like ito portal preaching and

87:47doing now is really well known for his work with Conor and I'm really into that as well and so I've been working with him now for a year and I love that movement I just love it him it's all when Sean gr also that they spent a lot of time with Alberto mono from janeski natural so I said was yeah exactly exactly so I love yoga I love movement and that's a big part of my recovery and training without impact you know and it's kind of implemented into my strength conditioning program as well so your conditioning program used to be just was it you on your own or was it someone else that was like brutalizing you a little bit of both and it was just hardcore yeah go full blast and try to build your strength up and break your body down but yes while you're doing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu it's not really the best way to do it yeah I was I was 100% like going for all the

88:49major tournaments in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu at that time and I would kill myself in strength conditioning go to Train neck would get jacked up you ever around with that iron neck have you used that before is that like a halo yeah I've seen it but I have got one here you gotta try it yeah easy I'd love to it's one of the best things ever for strengthening your neck and I've I've heard you talk about it I love it the decompressing on the the hangs yeah yeah those are great as well yeah yeah more people should be doing that right yeah it's great hangs from a chin-up bar to weave shoulders is just great to just uh so what you're basically following is just like a protocol where you're not going to failure you just strengthening things up and you're probably doing like more workouts but less time yes exactly a lot of people are leaning towards that now yeah I do something every day mm-hmm

89:37Monday through Friday and then Saturdays like a long hard training day in the mornings and then Sunday's is like a yoga recovery day that's the other thing Luke tell me about his active recovery you know I used to think well I need to take a day off I need to rest and I would basically lay around you know and I thought that was helping and it wasn't he was the first one to really give me the accurate active recovery like go take an hour-long walk you know stretch move breathe do yoga you know something like that and that helps tremendously - I don't get to a level of soreness anymore where I feel like I can't do anything you know whereas that used to happen to me but I was younger and I had this you know stubborn mindset and and I just thought well no I gotta go go go go you think you're doing well right you're pushing hard and you think that's really the way to do it yeah just

90:28the harder you push the strong you'll get it's just all about overcoming weakness in your mind right yeah exactly you had that thing in the back of your mind like what if the other guys doing more yes you know and I got a Gauhar today I've always wondered how many fighters ruined themselves before they get to the fight because they just over train mm-hmm I think it's real common and I think you can get to a level of spectacular strength and conditioning you can get there but it's not something you're gonna get to in a two-month camp you know and I wonder how many guys are coming into camp where they're not in the best shape yeah they're just pushing it so hard during camp that by the time those eight weeks are done they're worn out man yeah and they take the taper off the last week or so but it probably isn't enough yeah it's gotta be a lifestyle yeah a hundred percent has to be a

91:17lifestyle the way you you eat you move the way you view your training are you saying sled drags so you're putting a harness on and dragging the sled behind you are you pushing the sled yeah I mean both harness that's maybe around your waist or you can you know hold like you know some handles and push it pull it are you doing any running at all hill sprints I don't do like a lot of long-distance extended period of time running just hill sprints I feel like that's the easiest on my body and also translates the most into what I need and you decided Justin to go down to Oklahoma to train with him um and you moved there what what what caused that move like what was the motivation behind honestly it was a couple things there's some really great people my sports agents out of Oklahoma City my business manager is out of Oklahoma City an organization we partner with is out of

92:13Oklahoma City and then that water for yeah they're out there yeah they're out of there and then Jessica was out of there company that was spokesperson for but then the thing that was the deciding factor my wife and I we watched if anyone's got a flow grappling subscription or you need to go get one because they did a documentary on Raphael and it's called the American and it's his life story his life journey and he gets to see how hard he works you have to hear all the history but then to me it was like this guy's like a modern-day samurai and then whenever I went down and trained with him it was suffocating and I've trained with Shane Carwin and Frank Mir and Randy Couture and all sorts of big heavyweights that are known for being so much pressure I've never been claustrophobic under any person in my entire life except Raphael and it just feels like you set a

93:05building or like this building of melted hot you know cheese or blanket that's going over your face and she's saying but it's just like it's melted all over you and you can't get them off and you take inch by inch by inch and I have a good wrestling game but I wanted to get my jujitsu there where every time I take someone down I'm gonna finish them and I've done that in fighting statistically every fight I've taken to the ground to finish but I wanted to get even more proficient at that and just seeing the way that he he coaches he teaches honestly like I've been coached by Cael Sanderson and Kindle cross and Kenny Monday Olympic gold medalist and wrestling fantastic people amazing coaches there's something really special and different about the way he teaches and coaches that you really start to grasp everything what is it about it he breaks it down bit by bit inch by inch I

93:59mean the way that he will because he's an active competitor too and he's a great teacher I mean when did you start teaching Raphael I mean you were in high school probably right yeah yeah because it was just my dad and I in Oklahoma you know I was the most advanced student there you know and so I started helping my dad teach when I was like 16 you know if he if he wanted to go travel and train I would help teach if he needed a night off or whatever I was sort of the the next one and I started teaching adults right off the bat you know I'm 16 years old and I'm teaching grown men but I've been teaching teaching now for almost 20 years yes and then there's things that I'm doing and he'll say turn an inch this way I'm just an inch and I turn an inch and I hear my guy I'm training with you know and it's just a small little inch of an adjustment get your chest up

94:51higher get you know finish this way get your chest down low I mean the and I can hear them very distinctly whenever I'm training whenever I'm competing whenever I was in my last fight I can hear everything he's saying too and so when I trusted so there's this level of trust that I don't know why it's there but you're just a fantastic human being and thanks yeah this guy this guy blew me away he's he's been such a blessing in my life and you know I was very kind of like skeptical of him at first just because you know he's a big guy heavyweight MMA fighter is like man is how is this gonna work is he gonna be open to putting on the gay what is his mindset is he see a fighter or is he a martial artist you know how I just didn't know how I was gonna work you know I'm not a we don't have a a fight team you know what I mean we have a martial arts school and so you're always

95:44just a little you know when a fighter wants to come and you know how is this gonna work yeah some of them are a little rough around ya yeah that's saying it lightly and especially when you have kids and classes right yeah right but of course I don't have anything to do with fighting they just want to learn right and that's the most important thing just learning and and becoming part of the team got part of the family of course I did my research from Jeson and you know I knew he was an amazing person but I just didn't know what he trained like what his energy was like inside the academy you know but he was open to putting on the get the first conversation we had I said hey man you know I'm gonna I'm gonna want to put Aggie on you are you okay with that what what's so critical for you about the gay for me I can't pass on what I had what what I really have to offer you know my passion my

96:35love there's no way I'm gonna be able to pass that on to you if you don't put on the key if you don't get inside my head and and learn what I have to say and how I feel about Brazilian Jujitsu well what is specifically why the gay it's just for me that's jiu-jitsu like for me that is jiu-jitsu nogi is jiu-jitsu as a part of it but it's it's submission wrestling submission grappling you know the the beauty of jiu-jitsu for me is with the key the the inches the details the way you can make a mistake here and that's your downfall 1012 moves later you know minutes later the way it feels you know the tightness of it everything jiu-jitsu is you know I mean I just was my passion for me I feel like whenever I put on the ghee it was tough I didn't want to put it on but then whenever I did and it was just tough because they couldn't power out of stuff you can slip out of things that's the

97:35big fact yeah in so offense for me it's helped expand my knowledge of every position you have to be for me and learn from him it's it's both are technical but there's one that seems a little bit like maybe you expand your knowledge and then whenever you take it off I feel like I feel like I understand the noogie positions a little bit better a little bit more that more refined more refined more refined that's the word yeah it's like a gas is a friction because of the fact that people can grab you that when they can you have to yeah slow it down over the place to slow it down yeah truly understand it I feel like before I was able to must a lot of things I was able to slip out of things as able use my weight right a lot more and and I still get to use that whenever I take the key off whenever I'm in the key it's to learn and it's to really expand and knowledge base the depth of

98:28it that's what it was to it's like you know you're not going to fully become part of the team and the family if you're not in the classes you know and like you know saying you know I'm gonna want you to do the classes and in 98 percent of my classes are all in the ghee you know we take it off we do Nokia afterwards you know we have our sparring or MMA training everything else but I want you to come to class you know you I'm not gonna do like a lot of special treatment just for one individual you need to you know be a part of this family and that is to put the Gion and come to jiu-jitsu class if you had a lot of other guys who were professional fighters come and specifically come down to train with you like this no no no Oklahoma's not like that sort of hotspots you know I mean it's rare for for people to come when he told me it made sense that he was going down there

99:20and then when I saw the results soon as I saw that one fight where you mounted that guy and got an arm triangle I go well there you go yeah I mean now you're finishing from the top he's not just punching a guy when you're on top of him now you know you're strangling people and though he learns like a sponge I mean he he's because of that attitude that he has in our connection that we made so quickly it made it really easy for me and I mean obviously it's a great athlete great wrestler and the fact that he was open to it you know I mean I was selling like Justin you got to play guard you know you're gonna start on your back like all these things he was accepting of it and then he just made it so easy to absorb all the knowledge and it's just like you know playing a video game with him so here's what you're going to do and boom he did it what a wrestler falls in love

100:05with jiu-jitsu I mean you already have this ability to manipulate bodies that it's at such a high level and the strength that wrestlers have but so many of them for whatever reason never make that leap it's uncomfortable it's uncomfortable going to your back is not I mean you've been trained your whole life mmm not to go to your back right now and so to do that go to guard to have someone put you in a you're not supposed to be getting pinned you're supposed to be turning your back and getting up but but getting comfortable with your back just flat on the mat but then getting to your side because you understand that you're just gonna get smash and smash and smashed if your shoulders are flat against the back are you catching triangles and doing think he's got a good omoplata man don't let people know ya flexibility I think I do for heaven he's been working

100:52with the strength conditioning coach to I mean he's kind of gone all-in with his his his regimen is kind of becoming mine I'm inspired by it but yeah I've got got an omoplata the the triangles little harder I got a got small lakes where heavyweight short short legs they're thick not short they're just so wide okay I wear like a 30 inch inseam or whatever 30 inches long or the really it's either 30 or 32 so instead of I think most heavyweights like 34 36 yeah different things like that so that short torso is really long the doctor told me that if I didn't have short legs I'd be like six foot seven but yeah I got short little legs and just coming in the Academy it's been really great you know I came in and was really wanted to be coached and I wanted to be have a mindset of being coachable and just absorbing everything he teaches but then on the flip side last year we had like

101:48this holiday break Christmas party and and Raphael said you know what if we could like transform a community with clean water and so what if we like to set a goal at raising and what does that cost and I was like man it's like $4,200 he's like man let's set a crowdfunding campaign let's let's do it and hosted a party and we were able to raise fourteen thousand four hundred dollars through the Academy and the team just came around it and said hey we're gonna this is your passion you're sharing in our passion like we're gonna we're gonna do something great in the community and in the world and so that's been great Raphael and I are partnering again we are getting ready to launch a nationwide through fight for the Forgotten a nationwide bullying prevention campaign and curriculum I grew up getting very totally about that like really extensively in the podcast yeah terrible stories yeah I

102:43mean and it made me and so this last year I got injured at a shoulder surgery I got missing Como stem cells in their MSC stem cells I'm getting better hopefully I'll fight for quarter when did you get your surgery so I got it in like late March what was it labrum it was actually Naaman labrum and rotator cuff I think but my rotator cuff was just fine and it's it's kept me out for a while but the whole time I've been and it was actually after being on the podcast last time talking about bullying it's like how can we make a difference and there's such a response from Jerry the Jerry like community saying let's do something here also let's make a difference here in the United States a bully how can you use it so how can you prevent building bullying what do you think I've always said that one of the best ways is teach people to actually fight yeah I think that a lot of bullies

103:33are hugely insecure and if they just learned how to fight they wouldn't act like that right I think I think martial arts is gonna be a tool so what we want to do this year is is to get into a hundred martial arts academies with a bullying prevention curriculum a lot of people don't know that a hundred and sixty thousand kids in the United States alone 160,000 kids everyday skip school skip school because of bullying yeah that's three million school days lost a year I'm sorry a month three million school days lost a month and then I started digging into it because Oklahoma has become home now and like twenty eight point nine percent of the students deal with depression that's debilitating that affects them for two weeks or more school I mean depression addiction suicides and school shootings are all through the roof and you know the suicide rate that you said so so insane

104:24in Oklahoma that says that at-risk youth behavior survey and they say that 15.4 know fifteen point one percent of the students are dealing with suicidal ideation like seriously considering suicide and then seven point four seven point four percent of the students have attempted suicide attempted it I was one of those kids I was one of those kids in sits seven out of a hundred kids have attempted suicide just in Oklahoma schools and that that that goes around the country to around that six percent eight percent I was on a bullying prevention summit in San Antonio with congressman or US representative will heard he brought me in to speak with Maureen Moloch and Maureen she has a foundation called David's legacy she started it because her son in San Antonio was getting ridiculed in cyber bullied relentlessly you know whenever we were growing up bullying

105:16would end at 3 p.m. right because you're out of school but now it just increases because kids aren't in school they aren't in class right and so so that's whenever they can really take off and start bullying well David had over 300 comments of people that were just brutally cyber bullying him a ton of them are calling for a suicide it went on for weeks and weeks they moved him from schools he attempted suicide not once or twice but his third time his third time he was successful and I'm very proud of Maureen very proud of her because she got a law passed called David's law David's law is about cyber bullying we want to see if we can get that into Oklahoma what is the law so the law basically Maureen's family was told basically at school they the school was good to him they were trying to make a difference but they're basically saying their hands were tied

106:08their hands are tied from from doing anything about it because it was an overwhelming response of students I mean 300 students and then it was off school property and it was online so there they said their hands were tied well now the law basically brings into effect that law enforcement and the schools can get involved off a school campus and they can look into the cyber bullying and they can take action against it so it basically just means hey this is serious and it's not okay and we're gonna stand up and do something about it Texas I'm proud of Texas that's my home state they passed it 33 to zero no one voted against it and it's really great we're working with a state representative named Colin Waukee in Oklahoma and a judge Trevor Pemberton and then there's this principal named as kind of sound like a joke last week it was a MMA fighter with a politician we went to dinner with a

107:01politician a judge and a high school principal you know MMA fighter what brought us all together you know it was bullying prevention but uh debri on Davis she's the high school principal of Edmond North it's one of the biggest and one of the best public schools in Oklahoma and in the last nine years of her working and public schools she's been to nine funerals of kids that have all committed suicide and it's it's just on the rise in such a brutal way and and one of the things that really touched my heart and wanted me to get into to this like hey we've fight for the Forgotten we're always going to be focused on the pygmies we're working with even expanding into the in Uganda we're working with the pygmy king of the baht wah pygmies in Uganda we're looking to do land water and food initiatives among them but there's kids in our own community right here that feel forgotten and whenever I

107:55was a kid sitting at the lunch table by myself getting pelted in the back of the head with chocolate wads food fists when kids were pulling up my shirt and slapping my belly and twisting my nipples in front of the girls and acting like they're hitting me with a harpoon you know because I'm the size of a whale and all this stuff you know in in telling me you should just kill yourself telling me you should just kill yourself you're worthless you're nothing I mean I felt forgotten and thought you know I am worthless and I should just kill myself and dealt with that over and over and over and now the kids are taking action on that in such a an incredible way that we've got to stand up and do something and so we're we're partnering and I'm really excited we are hopefully getting into 100 martial arts academies this year to equip them with bullying prevention curriculum it's called heroes

108:48and waiting and you know a real inspiration to me there's two things there's a TED talk called the psychology of evil I'll text you that link it's it's incredible but it's the psychology of evil and it's by getting with Philip Zimbardo or something and in there he kind of coins a term called heroes and waiting Philip Zimbardo yeah yeah and then you you with the on it video that you did be the hero of your own movie you know be the hero of your own movie I love that I love that that that you've spoken out and said that about people that you can be the hero of your movie well heroes in Waiting the curriculum that we develop a century and Maya which is the martial arts industry association it's all about teaching kids it's it's bullying prevention but it's also character development so and that is what prevents bullying yeah absolutely the only people that bully are people with weak

109:44characters yeah and kids that are usually there's something wrong at home right you know a lot of these kids that are bullies they're usually getting abused at home or either by an older brother or by their dad or cousins or whoever the it is it's and then they're taking it out on someone who they feel is weaker than them right this is one of the reasons why I think martial arts is so important for young men because I mean we know from our experience in gyms when you're dealing with like high level martial artists on a regular basis like there are some of the nicest friendliest people you're ever going to meet because they don't have any insecurities I mean and whatever insecurities they have they get out in the gym to get out through training they get all other frustrations they don't have all this pent up up energy that a lot of kids have like kegs kids are always dealing with

110:31existential angst and the the their whole life is just this weird ball of confusion and hormones and you know that the the whole idea of life itself is so confusing than anytime they have any sort of control over anything they exercise it whether it's control over another kid or control over you know throwing a rock through a window or just they don't know what the they're doing you know they have all this pent up up energy and pain and I think that so many of them are just severely lacking in guidance and discipline and just those things alone guidance and discipline and also the lessons that you learn from martial arts that you can overcome things you can get better at things and that when you feel like quitting and you don't you actually grow and learn like your experience is like training with Sean G and Sol oh just like that it's one of the things that

111:27made you such a champion I mean yeah training with people that are like well it all started with my dad and yes in having that when I was a kid ass you know you're so fortunate because of that I mean and those experiences are what shaped you into the person that you are today and a lot of people don't get those experiences and unfortunately they act in disgraceful ways and this is what we were talking about earlier I mean to bring it all back to like what is martial arts and our is martial arts shit-talking and throwing dollies or is is martial arts really competing in one of the most difficult endeavors in all of all of the world of sports well so I came from a wrestling background I believe that is without a doubt a martial art yes it is not a martial art person and then in my coaches one of the most important martial yeah absolutely absolutely and one of the toughest to do

112:19yeah one of the toughest without a doubt and then but then coming into Raphael's gym I mean Academy in school it started teaching me like the martial arts principles we didn't really talk about that so much in in wrestling it teaches you that that naturally the hard work is a methoxy can't cut it right but then what are the six blades like yeah so Sol Sol oh he his logo it's this star and he considers the minute middle the spirit of the samurai and then there's six blades to the star and they stand for six different values loyalty respect honor discipline attitude and family and those are the core principles and sort inside the children's program in my academy and sort of just there it is right there the it's a very famous logo yes it is I have right here I carry it with me everywhere I am yeah that's it but you know besides for the you know the those are the the the core values

113:26and then you know being a forever student and dedicating your life to learning and bettering yourself I mean these things that martial arts gives you I just I you know there are certain areas and other sports that they give you a piece of that but nothing is like martial arts you know for me everything I know I've learned through martial arts there's yeah I think what you're saying that there's there's other sports that teach discipline like just maybe if you become a long-distance runner there's discipline involved that's going to build up your character but not specifically emphasized the way it is in martial art yes and so I've been looking into it researching and we're partnering with century we're partnering with zebra we're partnering with gameness we're partnering with suplex I don't know if you've seen the Bulgarian bags and the throwing dummies yeah and

114:12the gladiator wall we're partnering with them gladiator wall go ahead of your wall is the wood that is you can hang on it and you can do all sorts of stretch the different bars there's like a ladder actually Jamie if you could pull up fight for the found out of work I've actually got something to show in there soup lasts on there I wish to give a shout out to the cash out - oh my gosh the cash app is one of my favourite sponsors has done an incredible thing in donating five dollars to fight for the Forgotten every time someone signs up and uses the code word Joe Rogan yeah which is pretty amazing of dollars yeah they've built two wells more of them more more coming in January we're starting to implement but cash app came to me and we were trying to do a $50,000 fundraiser to drill a deep deep well in Tanzania for the Masai warriors and we're going to do that water boys which

115:02is Chris Long's foundation Chris long place for the Philadelphia Eagles he won the Superbowl donated his entire salary really great guy climb Mount Kilimanjaro with them and we were partnering together to help this village to get 7500 people clean water so it's about six dollars per person I started posting about that and Garrett McManus from cash app hit me up and was just like hey we want to do something big with you guys and we already had another $50,000 donor that was being anonymous and cash up came in and said hey we're gonna match that $50,000 match you have so cash app gave us $50,000 if we could raise 50,000 and so we ended up raising 50,000 50,000 $625 and then and then it was tripled so it came out to being one hundred and fifty two thousand six hundred twenty-five and cash app gave us fifty thousand dollars because they believe in the mission of vision a fight for the

115:50Forgotten they believe in you they believe in this community and man I absolutely love cash app in fact on this crowdfunding tournament we're doing on the website fight for the Fiat and org the slash heroes we're doing a hero's in Waiting crowdfunding tournament and so we're inviting in 100 martial arts academies and a hundred individuals to help us raise $4,200 so yeah we're doing it through December 31st so we're giving us quite a bit of time but what we're going to be doing is the crowdfunding tournament is going to fund wells soil transform a community with a $4,200 and it will equip their martial arts academy with a bullying prevention curriculum so that which is amazing by the way yeah yeah everything that you could ever ask for to help pass that knowledge along and increase your program you know help your school bring more kids in make a bigger impact

116:47so not only you're helping the kids but then you're also raising money inside the Academy to help towards you know the fight for the Forgotten yeah and its it's gonna be a thing where so that it's there's 12 weeks of Matt chat topics and I love it because heroes and waiting talks about hey everyone is a hero in waiting and what is a hero a hero is someone who sees a need and takes action immediately and so we're teaching the kids that hey guess what 87 percent of the time whenever you see bullying and you say something can be as easy as hey that's not kind or you include the person that's being bullying into your group hey come over here within 5 seconds the bullying stops 87 percent of the time all you have to do is say one thing 87 percent of time almost 9 out of 10 times you can shut down bullying whenever you see it happening because here's the problem

117:35whenever people think you're when you see bullying happening a lot of times you might think you're an innocent bystander but but your body language and you being around and involved in the bully seeing that he takes you being that you're a silent supporter so you're not an innocent bystander you're now involved when you see it and so you're being a silent supporter if you're not standing up and doing something about it and so we're doing this competition and whoever whoever is the top crowdfunding team is going to get their gym renovated by zebra you're going to get $10,000 worth of zebra mats century is going to come in and do $10,000 worth of gear they're going to do gloves head gear sparring equipment shields the Bob the dummy sue Plus is going to do the the Bulgarian bag throwing dummy and then the top end of it fundraiser is going to get a free home

118:26gym from zebra and century gear Bellator just let me know last night that whoever is the top fundraising individual is going to get flown out all inclusive to to the January 26th the Heavyweight Grand Prix finale between Leto and Ryan Ryan beta forum yeah at the Forum in LA so you're gonna get they're gonna get three nights of hotel rooms are gonna get their airfare paid for and so basically what fight for the freons trying to do is raise four hundred and twenty thousand dollars throughout the rest of the year and what we'll be able to do with that is hopefully drill equivalent to a hundred water wells or serve 30,000 people minimum hopefully will be around forty five thousand people with clean water and then it's it's pretty easy if people go and hit sign up Jamie if you could just hit the link it's uh it's signup we're trying to make it really fun to tell people how to

119:17get to it it's fight for the Forgotten dot org forward slash heroes yep forward slash heroes and then here whenever they go down you can hit become a fundraiser and whenever you hit become a fundraiser you can either create a team which we did with Lovato's a couple nights ago you can hit join a team so if a team's already created you can join that team or if you're an individual martial artist or just someone that's passionate about the cause you can hit start fundraising as an individual oh and then we're gonna have a top ten prizes basically bike Price backs the top crowdfunding team is going to get a championship belt to fight for the forgotten championship belt two through ten are gonna get championship trophies and then anyone that hits the goal of $4,200 is going to get a fight for the Forgotten gold medal for hitting the goal but the if if you actually click

120:05out of that and then scroll down Jamie you can actually see how it's kind of started a little bit more but there's already a few teams Wow there's four teams now that have signed up and some of them I raise it we haven't announced it yet so there's team lavato down there there's in it what it will do is they'll show the top team so you can track it and make it competitive so you can go on there make a comment whenever you donate but basically I guess martial arts and more I do know them if you click on their page it's a guy out of South Carolina North Carolina Jacksonville and he just got hit by the her came brutally he they can't go back into his home for another year yeah a year he can't go back into his home he's living in the Academy why a year his homeowners association said it's gonna be like a year of clean I'll fix everything right that's what it's

120:53predicted to be but he set the goal at $4,200 he wants to teach his community this is James Wright and he's wanting to you know teach the kids hey we are still heroes in Waiting we can still make a difference in our community with bullying prevention and globally with a community that needs clean water and so that's what we're trying to do is make a difference in both places Austral the wells and equip the martial arts academy with bullying prevention beautiful and let's wrap this up yeah I just wanted to back it up one more time you know justin has inspired me so much to you know get involved in these sort of things and and you know I'm happy to have my school involved and I'm just kind of out there calling out for all the others used to schools you know in the country like I mean if we just get two schools per state that's a hundred and if each one met you know

121:48reaches the goal of forty two hundred then we've done it and so you know it's it's a great cause it helps the school the the material that they get is very helpful to implement into their children's programs it even comes with marketing material to help get those kids in the doors so it's totally worth it and then you know it's always great like like he said you know when we had the the school Christmas party last year you know it's always great to get everybody behind something behind a cause and you know to get your whole school to rally together you know for this cause would be you know a great thing for your teams and you're introducing families and it's not that hard to do you know it's not that hard to hit 40 200 and if we get a hundred schools to do it then then we've done it so I'm here you know to support Justin in that beautiful it's always great to

122:42have you brother thank you brother so I'm actually so happy for what you've been able to accomplish so happy to know you and to be a part of this and is to spread the word that's beautiful well I think you man this couldn't be done without you and your help I mean honestly it's it's skyrocket at us to be able to make the difference we want to knock out the water crisis and to stand up and speak out against bullying here what's my honor and thank you for being here Raphael and kube luck to you I know you're supposedly next in line for a shot at the title in Bellator guard Mousasi everything looks good appreciate it thanks for being here was awesome as an honor all right we'll see you later folks