Mark Bell's Power Project - Ben Askren Almost Died. Then He Wrestled Again

Episode Date: August 24, 2026

Ben Askren tells the unbelievable story of nearly dying, receiving a double lung transplant, dropping from 195 to 138 pounds, and fighting his way back to the wrestling mat. He also opens up about becoming a Christian, rebuilding his body from scratch, and how the experience completely changed his perspective on life.Special perks for our listeners below!🥩 HIGH QUALITY PROTEIN! 🍖 ➢ https://goodlifeproteins.com/ Code POWER to save 20% off site wide, or code POWERPROJECT to save an additional 5% off your Build a Box Subscription!🩸 Get your BLOODWORK/TRT/PEPTIDES! 🩸 ➢ https://marekhealth.com and use code "POWERPROJECT" for 10% off Self-Service Labs and Guided Optimization®.🧠 Methylene Blue: Better Focus, Sleep and Mood 🧠 Use Code POWER10 for 10% off!➢https://troscriptions.com?utm_source=affiliate&ut-m_medium=podcast&ut-m_campaign=MarkBel-I_podcastBest 5 Finger Barefoot Shoes! 👟 ➢ https://Peluva.com/PowerProject Code POWERPROJECT15 to save 15% off Peluva Shoes!Self Explanatory 🍆 ➢ Enlarging Pumps (This really works): https://bit.ly/powerproject1Pumps explained: https://youtu.be/qPG9JXjlhpM?si=JZN09-FakTjoJuaW🚨 The Best Red Light Therapy Devices and Blue Blocking Glasses On The Market! 😎➢https://emr-tek.com/Use code: POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your order!👟 BEST LOOKING AND FUNCTIONING BAREFOOT SHOES 🦶➢https://vivobarefoot.com/powerproject🥶 The Best Cold Plunge Money Can Buy 🥶 ➢ https://thecoldplunge.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save $150!!➢ https://withinyoubrand.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save 15% off supplements!➢ https://markbellslingshot.com/ Code POWERPROJECT to save 15% off all gear and apparel!Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast➢ https://www.PowerProject.live➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerprojectFOLLOW Mark Bell➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell➢https://www.tiktok.com/@marksmellybell➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybellFollow Nsima Inyang➢ Ropes and equipment : https://thestrongerhuman.store➢ Community & Courses: https://www.skool.com/thestrongerhuman➢ YouTube : https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=e#PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell #FitnessPodcast #markbellspowerproject

Do you know what it's like to almost die? When I woke up, I was in a hospital in the dark with no recollection of anything that happened or what happened to me. Someone has to die, they have to find the match, go retrieve the organs, bring the organs back by, you know, flight, and then, you know, installed the organs, all within 12 hours. Hey, we're all going through hard things sometimes, and we just got to keep moving forward

and being grateful for the life that we do have. I lost 57 pounds. You know, when I woke up, I was. really scrawny. I lost almost all my muscle. This five-pound weight, this is actually hard for me to curl. In wrestling, there's all these kind of unique strengths that I think it's impossible to get in the weight room.

Awesome, man. So kind of the first question I want to ask you right off the bat is, do you know what it's like to almost die? Or do you not know what it's like to almost die since you kind of didn't remember having your stuff? having your surgery. That is that. You know what? No one's asked me that and I've I've had that thought to myself many times. I would say I don't really know because to your point when I lost you know like consciousness or memory

it was when I was walking into the hospital the second time and at that point I didn't really think anything was wrong with me and then when I woke up I was in a hospital in the dark with no recollection of anything that happened or what happened to me. So, yeah, I think that's a great question. I haven't had anyone ask me that. That's just absolutely wild. I mean, you see that in horror movies, right? Like somebody goes in the hospital for this little thing, and next thing you know, they wake up with, you know, no leg. Yeah, for real. In your circumstance, you went to the hospital, you were having some pain in your back, I think, and you went to the same hospital. You went back a second time your wife suggested, hey, you really need to go get it checked out, and you thought

it was just your back, and then you don't remember anything after that? Nothing. No, yeah, so I woke up in the dark. Do you think that your years, I mean, wrestlers are just different. You know, I've had a few wrestlers in my time in running a business. I've had a couple wrestlers work for me before, and it usually works out pretty damn good because they have great discipline, and a lot of times they have a great mindset. did you find that your mindset really helped you through a lot of this? I mean,

you still must be going through some things as well because it's going to take a long time to like really truly recover from this. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I would say my life is, I'm going to say normal-ish. At this point, I'm a little over a year out. Most things have returned close to normal. But, you know, I'm taking medicine daily, which is, you know, probably not great for my body or my performance, anything like that.

but for sure that the mentality definitely helped me out a lot. Having been through so many hard things, you know, essentially self-inflicted before that, of, you know, growing through a grinding wrestling practice for season after season after season, for sure to help me because every single day was hard for many, many, many months. Every single day was hard getting up and just even just doing the small things that were necessary. What do you tell yourself when you're in that situation? My mother-in-law just had triple bypass surgery. and she's only one week out from it.

She's 78 years old. So what's kind of encouragement you can give to somebody like that who just, like you said, she's having a hard time just standing, having a hard time just walking. Her heart rate goes, you know, racing through the roof. And it seems so far away for her to just walk or to, you know, go outside and do something enjoyable. Yeah, I would say that for me, the thing that really helped me so much was just focus on one day of time and that's it like you know i wasn't thinking about where i'm going to be in three months or six months or a year it was very literally what can i do today or what what do i have to do today right

i have to take my medicine i have to try to get a workout or rehab of some sort in which you know in the beginning was as simple as like i got to try to stand up 20 times or you know something to that effect make sure i'm eating healthy um that was it just day by day every single day what do i to do you today. And, you know, I heard, I heard you on Chris Williamson's podcast and I've heard you on a few other, a few other podcasts. Yeah. It was great that you were kind of blind to what the surgery was. I would be the same way. I would be like, I don't want to know. I don't want to know what the, you know, what the procedure is. But I did look it up and they do, they do take one out at a time. They put one back in at a time and they have your, they have your lungs like, you know, running, running on a machine separately. But to me, it's like, That sounds so crazy that we have doctors and we have people that can do that. Do you have any idea, like, where the lungs come from? Like, is there some sort of, like, storage bin of organs somewhere or something like that?

No. There's definitely not. I mean, I have a lot of thoughts on this topic. Number one is they're starting a 3D print organs out of your own DNA, which is fascinating because it would be able to be on any of the immunosuppressions. So I'm hoping that field makes a lot of progress really, really quickly. Number two thought on that is we have written the donor's family, because obviously the donor is not with us anymore.

We've written the donor's family, and we have not heard back, hoping that we do so at some point so they can know that I'm trying to make the most of it, and the gift is not going to waste. And then the third thing is that I never realized. Do you know how long that it has to be from when the person dies So the lungs are back on my body? Do you know what the match? I would say a week.

Oh, my goodness. So someone has to die, they have to find the match, go retrieve the organs, bring the organs back by, you know, flight or something, and then, you know, install the organs, if you will, all within 12 hours. And the thought of that is like, when someone told me that, I was like, wait, what? Like, is that, that's real?

and it checks out. What kind of medications are you on? And what are some of the, do you notice any, like, drawbacks with them? Well, in my new or new life, you know, I haven't ever been without them. And most likely I'll be on the majority of them for the rest of my life unless there's that,

the 3D printer thing works out, which would be really tremendous. But, yeah, you know, I, because of what I feel every day, They usually chat GPT and the other AI services, they're amazing because you can start saying like, I know one time I had a little rejection episode and I was on high dose prednisone and I would come down, you know. And so like one of the weeks I was feeling all like just awful. And it was like, hey, why am I feeling awful? Here's the medications I'm on.

And it like, it was wild. It was like, oh my God, I'm feeling that exact thing that, you know, is really really specific. So that's been really useful to try to kind of like study why I feel the way I feel and how I'm going to, you know, essentially work around it. And I'm not saying I'm one of one, but of the long transplant patients, so many people are older and sicker and they're not trying to live like a high performance life again. Like my case is pretty unique and pretty rare. And so there's so many times that I ask the doctor's questions and they're like, we never had anyone asked that one before. We're not sure.

We don't know what the answer is. And so for me, you know, it's like now that I've got my feet underneath me that I'm a year out and I'm relatively stable and I'm feeling pretty good, it's kind of like, okay, what else can I figure out that they haven't told me or that maybe they don't even know to make my quality of life better? because I'm trying to, you know, live a normal life. I'm going to try to live for a long time. And I think there's a lot of things in this field that are maybe still to be determined. You know, Ben, I'm in Seema. I'm the co-host of this show, so nice to meet you.

I'm doing well, man. What's up, buddy? You know, there was a video you posted, I think it was after the surgery where you mentioned how, like, the outpouring from everybody was, like, your own funeral. I don't know if, Mark, you guys talked about this already. No. No. But first off, what was that like getting that outpouring from people? And then, of course, with where you are now and where you were being so close to dying, did that make you reevaluate how you're going to take your new life moving forward or things that you want to do with everything that's happened?

Yeah, great question So I would say One of the things that I was I guess most happy about Is that I feel like I was living my life In a manner that I should have been I wasn't wasting

And chasing frivolous things That were actually irrelevant To me You know, I was pursuing my passions And living my life as I wanted to There's obviously a few different things That have changed But not a ton

Not a ton. And that made me feel really good about it. And as far as the question of, and this would be something that probably would have changed for me, but it's like it did feel, you know, like being able to read what people wrote about me or said about me or sent videos to me when, you know, essentially a lot of them didn't think I was going to make it probably.

It made me think like, well, if I feel a certain way about someone or the influence they've had on me or how they've helped me, I just need to go say it. You know, like, why withhold that comment for them or why should I be afraid to not express to them how I feel about them and their influence on me? And I think that's something especially probably with males that we do less than we should. So I've definitely made a point to go out of my way to make sure people know how much I appreciate them in my life and how much I think they've done for me. That has been really important. Are people less mean to you?

and do you kind of miss me and mean that's that's funny I mean the answer is probably yes because I was a humanized in a way that very few people get humanized in

you know like you know I think especially I have kids right so they watch sports on TV or whatever right and you see some on TV and you think for whatever reason oh that person's life is different than me they have this great life

where they don't have any problems and you know they're special blah, blah, blah. And, you know, because I've been able to achieve some things, I've got to meet a lot of those people. And it's like, well, no, people are just people. That's all we are, but not everyone has that feeling. And so I think when people saw me coming so close to death and that I was willing to be

publicly vulnerable about where my state was when I couldn't stand up or do anything, I think that humanized me to a certain level. And I think, yes, people are nicer to me. I think part of it's because I've, you know, inspired them that, hey, we're all going through hard things sometimes, and we just got to keep moving forward and being grateful for the life that we do have. And, you know, I think that's something that, you know, I kind of said a second ago about how I recognize that I should express how I feel about people, you know, more clearly and earlier. And there's no reason to wait on it. that's another one where you know they're I don't say I was mean to people

but there are certain people with like why do I feel this way about this person they're just a human they're just trying most of them are just trying to do the best that they can why do I feel that way about that person and maybe you know I can be more empathetic towards their plight or their cause I don't know if you guys talked about this too

but how do those because you did you guys talk about the wrestling match that's you no no we haven't got to know no how does long feel under that type of stress because wrestling stress I do wrestling stress is different the cardio you all have is different so how did that feel

yeah you know what well I actually I was so tired that I misspoke I said my lungs hurt I meant to say my lungs don't hurt the exact opposite so at this point I did so much like breath work and breathing when I was

coming back and now I so this is my chat TPT information and again but I I think, well, I'll tell you what my problem is. I promise my muscle is shut down before my lungs can get that tired. So, like, I don't, you guys have, I'm sure you guys have both done really hard workouts. And at some point in a cardiovascular workout, your lungs start burning.

You're pushing yourself hard and your lungs burn. You've been there, right? Okay. I can't get there. My muscles will shut down before I get to that point. Like, my legs will just fail, and that was what happened on Saturday night. You know, I've been trying for months now to do a lot of, like, bike cardio. cardio bike workouts on the aerodyne and at some point my legs just they just turn to jelly and they

just they won't go anymore and so I think from Chad GPD I think it's something called heart deconditioning right your heart is a muscle and if you don't use it it it gets weaker and probably for I'm going to say like probably seven months like I couldn't do anything hard enough to push myself like I couldn't even get started. And so I think that's, I'm getting better every single week, but I still, I think I got a long way. I went from powerlifting into running, and it sounds similar to my journey. When I was running, like, I couldn't do workouts that had like an input that was really going to be beneficial to me. Because usually, usually like any amount of running, because I was so out of shape, was like too much for me to kind of handle.

and so it was interesting i couldn't really get to the i couldn't get to the point that i needed to uh in my training yeah i mean that that's how i feel so you know one of the things i tried doing say the last five weeks before was like multiple workouts but like really really chop them up you know like throughout the course of the day because i couldn't do that i couldn't handle the volume at one time so then i would do like some here and then i would do some more here and then some more here is kind of like that was one of the things I was trying to use.

We're obsessed over here with breathing and different breathing strategies. There are some things that were really helpful to you and what are some things that you maybe still practice to keep your lungs at full capacity? Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, the number one was easy. It was, oh my gosh,

now I'm going to forget exactly what it's called. Anyways, one time I was researching getting better on breathing and it's called oh my gosh so anyway I found out the name of this type of breathing you do and I googled it and you guys know Bosnian you probably do right? Yes

he has a device and he has sent me one and I hadn't really started using it right this is really early on and his device is inspiratory that's what it's so I'm sorry inspiratory breathing his device is an inspiratory breathing device

so I did that thing two two times a day every day for or you know like a little like workout they do two times in every day for many many many months that that helped yeah the o2 trainer yeah you know what i'm talking about every day that thing's in spirit muscle train that thing that thing's a bitch that thing's hard yes i would do it every single day for probably six months or so like yeah that that helps you specifically what did you feel like changed for you as you started using it everyone notices different things but i'm curious what did you notice? Well,

so additionally, I had this lung function test called the spirometer that I use, and the reason I was getting frustrated was because I was kind of plateauing on it, you know? And so I started looking for, hey, what other ways can I

improve this? And inspiratory breathing device was one of the things that was mentioned, and I'm like, oh, I already have one of those. And so right after that, it was just probably the depth of the breaths, because full vital capacity is one of the measurements they do. It just started getting better and better and better all the time. And I made massive improvements.

How did the idea of you doing a wrestling match and going against another athlete that's world class, how did this start, how do you go from not being able to walk or stand into that mindset? And then how do you get your wife on board and like other people around you that love and care about you? How do you get them being like, yeah, dude, you should fight again? I don't think anyone said you should do it, but they said if you're going to do it, you're going to do it. You know, that was kind of probably more, that was probably more than more than avenue. So I worked for real American freestyle. I was the first ever athlete to sign with them prior to being sick in May of 2025.

They debuted in August of 2025. and I can tell you very specifically when that decision or when that thought came, it was they sent me a, I wanted them to come to Milwaukee and I said, hey, Wisconsin sucks in the winter, but in the summer it's really nice here. You guys should come to Milwaukee in the summer. I know we got a lot of wrestling fans up here. We'll pack the joint. And at some point they sent me a proposed summer schedule with the different dates and locations.

and the Milwaukee date was on my birthday and someone's something spoke to me and said you need to be out there and I was like I need to be out there and to that point this was probably February or so I would guess

I wasn't doing much right I was I was making a little bit of progress but I wasn't I wasn't progressed very far so that was a big reach to say hey I'm going to go wrestle I kind of like

selected my opponent in May but even in May it's like I don't know where I'm going to be in July because I'm making progress but I don't know how fast the progress is going to go you know I've never been here before I never had a double lung transplant I never had to you know

train from scratch essentially but Ballal is a great opponent he's a world class athlete but he does not have a real wrestling background so I knew like well you know maybe this is someone I could beat competitive with and that was kind of i wanted something that was a battle and i you know i was i was happy he didn't take it easy on me i had the league going to the third period and but my body was

about done and when he came out strong in the third period i was like shit like i don't know i i don't know if i have enough who was your mentor in wrestling because you have really you just some unconventional stuff i mean i've seen you like on your head and like doing all these weird crazy positions uh is that something you picked up from a coach or and did they encourage that or they were like, dude, what the hell? You're going to hurt yourself? Yeah, no, I would say, I mean, I've had many good coaches. My high school coach, John Messonbrink, is someone who still works with us.

My brother and I have nine wrestling academies. It's called Asker and, you know, Asper and Wrestling Academy System. He was an amazing high school coach. But, you know, between my high school coach and my college coaches, they saw that I was a little unconventional one that I thought outside the box. And one of the things that I'm really grateful for is they didn't shoot it down. There's a lot of coaches that would say, no, I know all the answers. I know the way it's done.

You can't do it that way. Don't do it that way. And they never, ever, ever said that to me, right? They encouraged me. They knew I was passionate. And they kind of just let me run with some of the things I was doing. And that really made all the difference. Quick question.

Did you guys at all talk about staff before I got here? No, we didn't get into, like, how. We only were gone for a couple minutes. Okay. So, you know, staff is something that you see a lot in jiu-jitsu wrestling on the mats. It's something that some people get quite a bit. Yes. I'm curious, how did that staff that you got get so bad?

And is there, I'm just curious. It makes me wonder, people get staff and it sucks. Yeah. But it's things that people need to monitor. Well, yeah. You know, the funny thing, it wasn't bad. So in one time in my life previously, I had staff where I had to get on an antibiotic for it, right? But this one was, you know, you get a little cut and it gets a little bit infected, which is, you know, technically that staff.

I will never go to a doctor ever again about my general health. All they want to do is put you on pills. Really well said there by Dana White. Couldn't agree with them more. A lot of us are trying to get jacked and tan. A lot of us just want to look good, feel good. and a lot of the symptoms that we might acquire as we get older, some of the things that we might have high cholesterol

or these various things, it's amazing to have somebody looking at your blood work as you're going through the process, as you're trying to become a better athlete, somebody that knows what they're doing, they can look at your cholesterol, they can look at the various markers that you have, and they can kind of see where you're at,

and they can help guide you through that. And there's a few aspects too where it's like, yes, I mean, no, no shades, to doctors, but a lot of times they do want to just stick you on medication. A lot of times there is supplementation that can help with this. Ameri-Health, these patient care coronators are going to also look at the way you're living your lifestyle because there's a lot of things you might be doing that if you just adjust that, boom, you could be at the right levels, including working with your testosterone. And there's so many people that I know that are looking for,

they're like, hey, should I do that? They're very curious. And they think that testosterone is going all of a sudden kind of turn them into the Hulk. But that's not really what happens. It can be something that can be really great for your health because you can just basically live your life a little stronger, just like you were maybe in your 20s and 30s. And this is the last thing to keep in mind, guys, when you get your blood work done at a hospital, they're just looking at like these minimum levels. At Merrick Health, they try to bring you up to ideal levels for everything you're working with.

Whereas if you go into a hospital and you have 300 nanograms, per deciliter of test, you're good, bro, even though you're probably feeling like shit. At Merrick Health, they're going to try to figure out what things you can do in terms of your lifestyle. And if you're a candidate, potentially TRT. So these are things to pay attention to to get you to your best self. And what I love about it is a little bit of the back and forth that you get with the patient care coordinator. They're dissecting your blood work. It's not like, you just get this email back and it's just like, hey, try these five things. Somebody's actually on the phone with you going over every step and what you should do.

Sometimes it's supplementation, sometimes it's TRT, and sometimes it's simply just some lifestyle habit changes. All right, guys, if you want to get your blood work checked and also get professional help from people who are going to be able to get you towards your best levels, heads to Merichhealth.com and use code Power Project for 10% off any panel of your choice. But lots of times, you know, you wash it really well, you put some antibacterial on it, and it goes away.

and that was that was what happened it went away like the cut healed it didn't i didn't need to go to the doctor and get medicine but somehow and i i don't really know how right and i said i don't i don't really think the doctors know how either but the staff got into my bloodstream and from my bloodstream it went into my lungs and the back pain that i was referencing was uh it was actually my lungs eating themselves from the inside. And that was the pain I was feeling. And everyone was like, well, if you would have been more careful, this wouldn't happen. And I'm like, that's not true.

Number one, the cut heel, number two, who has ever heard of something like the lungs eating themselves from the inside that sounds like some weird sci-fi movie, not real life? Why in the hell does your body decide to eat your lungs? Any idea? Like, and why don't eat something else? I don't know. I don't want to know. That's absolutely.

that's absolutely insane. Yeah, it's called necrotizing. Yeah, we had a woman on the show years ago that was a fighter. Her name was Kara, I have a hard time pronouncing her last name, but she was a fighter and she only had one lung. And what was really interesting about her is that she, her lung ended up being like 75%, so it was, it's her name right there.

Losakis. There we go. Her lungs ended up, you know, rather than her having, like, a lung, she had, you know, almost like three quarters of a lung because it was able to, uh, it was able to like adapt. What's that? Grow or something? Adapt and grow.

You like adapt and grow or something? Yeah, it's really unbelievable what the body can do. How did you know your lungs were like good enough or healthy enough? Like did a doctor kind of give you an okay? Like you're good to go, you know, return to exercise type stuff. You know, they don't, you know, they don't really give you anything like that. I mean, they obviously encourage you to exercise, but their exercise is walking 30 minutes a day, which whatever, that's good and that's healthy. But, you know, I knew very quickly, I want to be doing more than that.

Like, that better not be all I can do, you know. So I started, you know, obviously I started with walking. I started with, and then, you know, after walking, it's like, okay, I'm going to lift some light weights and maybe try to start building some muscle back because I lost 57. pounds approximately between going to the hospital and then, you know, when I woke up, I was really scrawny. I was almost all my muscle.

And then, you know, after that, it was like, okay, let's start riding the bike a little bit. And then, yeah, I just kept building up from there. Do your kids understand kind of what happened to you? Are they, like, maybe a little bit too young? No, they get it. They, you know, we kind of kept them in the dark about it for a little bit,

I mean, I shouldn't say we. My wife did because I was asleep and not conscious. So they knew I was in the hospital, but I don't think they were ever completely aware of how serious it was. Yeah, that's got to be a rough thing for everyone to go through. You were down to like 130-something pounds? Yeah, so from 195 and then the lowest that I got on the scale at was 138. Absolutely.

Yeah. You know, after doing that RAF match, is there, and competing. Like, what do you feel like you want to continue to do? Do you want to continue to maybe do wrestling matches? Is there any part of you that... No, I'm done. I'm done. Competition-wise, that's a wrap for me.

I love coaching wrestling. That's been my passion. It's been my passion for a long time. That's the main thing that I like to keep doing. Obviously, spending time with my family and helping R.A.F. grow, because I work with them at different capacity also and what was one of my life goals to have professional wrestling

exist in America. Any of your, any of the guys you wrestle with, were any of them trying to take you out? Because they're like, I can get, you know, I can get one over on Ben Ascran as you're making your comeback. Or were they like overly polite? And you were like, come on, bro.

You got to give me a better look than that. No, you know, there was a great balance because that's who I was, you know, wrestling with before is all the high school kids that we have in the room. Yeah, no, it was a great balance. They weren't too light, but they, you know, they were giving me what I, what I needed to get at that point.

Yeah, this wrestling organization that you're a part of sounds incredible. And how many fans are pouring in to some of these events is unprecedented from wrestling. And it's amazing. It's really taking off. It's really taking off. I mean, it just a couple Olympics ago, maybe like three or four Olympics ago, they were, like, getting rid of wrestling, right? or wrestling wasn't in the life?

2012. Yeah, 2012 that happened. You know, I think, in my opinion, is wrestling has never been presented in the right life. Like most modern sports have great production value, and we never had that until RAF. And I think that's one of the reasons RIF is taken off so quickly is that wrestling fans always wanted this. We always did.

We always wanted something we can watch that has great production value, where the athletes are put up on a pedestal and it looks totally awesome. And we never, ever had that for the, you know, I mean, we got to say like the NCAA championships, and that's great and it's a good presentation. But it's, yeah, it's about time that this happens. And it's taking off a lot better fighters down the road, too, with more people exposed some more wrestling. So maybe it will help enhance what's going on in the UFC and vice.

Right? Well, I think kind of opposite to a certain extent because I think that a lot of wrestlers would have never gone to fight if they got paid enough to just wrestle. I can say that of myself. If I got paid adequately, I loved wrestling. I still love wrestling. I never would have went and fought. I mean, I enjoyed fighting like it was fun, but I think the same is true with Daniel Corum. I think the same is true with John Jones.

And so now these college athletes can come out and compete in RAF and wrestle internationally. And, well, I mean, they may not be getting super rich right now, but they're making, like, you know, a decent living. And they're doing something. There are some maybe strange things that you learned along the way. Like, did you learn weird stuff about, like, the lungs or about your body? Like, I know when you're going through a surgery, sometimes you can, like, have a crazy amount of, like, water retention and in your legs and, like, all kinds of. weird crazy stuff can happen. Was there anything weird or strange that was like a setback?

Oh, I mean, I've had plenty of setbacks. Man, that kind of, that question catches me off guard. I think the craziest thing was I never, I actually said it, it came up, how fast it has to be between the time someone passes away and then them going to get the organs and then bring them back and then put them in. It seems like that, when I heard that first, I was almost like, that's like impossible. Like how could you possibly do all those things that fast? Connect the donor and the dony, right?

Like travel there, extract the organs, travel back and plant the organ. Like that one was like a mindblower. Did you maybe gain some spirituality in the process? Yeah, well, I became a Christian. And it was one of those things that it, I went to church for 15 years of my wife and I just never get over the hump

and my wife always said it wouldn't be a logical thing that got me over the hump like I couldn't think my way into Christianity and it's true and like you know I can't pinpoint what it was but I woke up

and I thought you know okay this is it I believe now and that's been kind of a fun journey since then, you know, reading the Bible a lot and trying to learn more. You know, I still feel like I'm a, even though I went church with my wife, but I still feel like I'm kind of a novice, you know, where I'm just kind of getting my feet underneath me and learning

more and understanding more. And that's been really good. Do you feel any differently from that, like just in general, like in your day to day? Because I know a couple people that at around 40 years old have gotten like baptized and stuff like that. And they've noticed like just their overall well-being is improved. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I would say obviously it goes along with dying is it just gives you a new perspective on life and what's important. And, you know, I mentioned earlier that I, you know, I think I checked a lot of the boxes where I wasn't, you know, I think like, for example, fighting or when people get in the spotlight, sometimes they think they need fancy cars and fancy clothes. They need to go all these good parties and they're not good to their family or they're not good to their spouse or, you know, that type of thing. and I never fell into any of those traps, which is good.

But I do think, you know, I have an insane amount of gratitude now for just kind of everything that's been around me. And I definitely like, feel like I can humanize other people more in the hardships they're going through. And that's also helped me out a lot, too. With your legs, you know, being like a factor that's a little bit of a limiter, or do you still want to push that? I mean, I know you said you're not going to compete, but just to mop up some of these high school kids, are you going to try to get the legs to improve?

100%. And I think, I think it's that my best guess is that the heart deconditioning thing, which it just takes time, right? Like, you can't go from benching 135 pounds to bench in 300 pounds. You can't do it in a month, right? It's going to take a lot of work. And that's kind of how I think about my heart is, like, I tried to make it, you know, get done, right?

I tried to make it in good enough shape by the time I got this July 18th day. And it just wasn't in the cars. If you think of someone going through, you know, you guys lift weights. And I know I got a lot stronger in college, but it wasn't something that happened in a month. It was like a two to three year process, right, of building the muscles up. You can't just go from, you know, a lightweight to lifting a shit ton of weight in a very short amount of time. I don't want to say it's impossible, but I think it's kind of impossible. You're the expert on that topic, so you can tell me if I'm wrong, but that's how I envision my heart?

How do you think lifting worked out for you personally? Like, do you feel it transferred over into wrestling really well? Or what's your stance on that? Yeah, I think, well, I could go deep on this one, but no, I think lifting is really important. I was never a huge lifter, but I never missed a lift in my high, college career, you know if the college coaches give you, hey, here's your lifting program. During the season, you do it with the team

and in the off season, you're kind of on your own. I didn't miss any of it. But also in wrestling, there's all these kind of unique strengths that I think it's impossible to get in the weight room. You know, just the way you watch the way the guys move their bodies. The only way to get strong in that way is to be there, be in that exact position and do that exact thing.

I actually found this new term recently. If this is old news to you, you can let me know. But some of the intramuscular coordination. And you think about, you know, with even some of the simpler wrestling moves, how many different muscle groups need to coordinate with each other in order to make the action happen? And it's kind of starts to be crazy to think about. And then you think about some of the more complex things.

And you're like, oh, my God, that's kind of like all my muscles are working at the same time in order to make this happen. So I think lifting is important. I think being strong is insanely important. You can both get that in the weight room, but there's a lot of these positions in wrestling that you can only get in wrestling. Also, I think it's important, like just as a team, right?

Like everyone getting together, and like there's something about some of that, whether the actual lift itself is like really transferring over the mat. It's like we all care about that. We want that to be the case. but there is something to be said about like doing stuff as a team and going through stuff routinely you know i get a great coach uh john wooden for uh UCLA basketball he had his athletes even tying their shoes the same way everything was like a ritual everything was like

uniform to have everybody be part of this team yeah no i uh i agree fully with that yeah i think it's uh i had a great college experience and a great team and we uh we spent pretty much every waking moment together for many years What's the potential that you see for RAF? Because the interesting thing is that wrestling, when you watch it, it's an extremely dynamic, exciting, fast-paced. You've never watched wrestling before. You might not know what's going on with all the different pins and why they're stopping in certain positions. But at the end of the day, as a spectator watching it, it's definitely much more fun to watch than Gigi Jiu-Jitsu, right?

So that makes me wonder where do you see it going? And what type of money do you see, like, maybe even the next. five, ten years. If a kid's a really good wrestler and their, you know, the Olympic thing is done and they don't want to go in fighting, what's how money do you think wrestlers could be making if they, if RAF gets to where you think it can go. Well, so, yeah, so I think, I think this is something they could do, they could pursue their Olympic dreams and do RAF. There's definitely not one or the other thing here. We actually currently have every freestyle Olympic champion for the 2024 games that's currently signed with RAF. So we have the best of the best.

The second thing here is, like fighting, wrestling is an international event. We just held our first international show in the country of Georgia. We are assigned to go to Moscow, and we are also going to Istanbul in the next few months. So it's something that, like, you know, it's not every country. Like, there's not a lot of wrestling in, say, South America or Africa. But North America, Europe, Asia, it's a very, very popular sport in a lot of these places. And so I think it's something that the whole world can watch and the whole world can get into. And to your point about it being some of the things being difficult to understand, I agree totally.

We actually, I filmed a Rules 101 video for every time there's a broadcast, right, they put the little QR code so you can go see the Rules 101 because we want to help people understand it because there are some of the positions that are kind of a little more challenges, see what is going on here and why are, these different people are getting points. Where's the 30 for 30 on this? Ah, man, that's probably, we're not even to year one, so I'm thinking that's probably a few years down the road. Yeah, like a Netflix. Or are you talking about me or Ralph? A little Netflix.

I'm telling me a Ralph. A little Netflix documentary or something like that or a book, right? Oh, what I'm talking about it on me? Yeah. Oh, I thought you're talking about Ralph. Funny enough, we are actually going to release a movie later this year. Oh, there you go. about this. You're the first person who's asked me, so you're the first person I've told.

My wife has a friend who was a movie producer. Awesome. He hit us up right after we got out of the hospital and said, is this something you would be interested in doing? I said, sure. They went in and sold the rights to Novo Studios, and we've been filming this thing for the last year. The wrestling match was kind of the crescendo, and then I did a bunch of, we did a bunch of interviewing on Sunday after it. So the filming is, I'm going to say, almost entirely complete at this point. And I don't know, probably late fall, winter, sometime like that. I bet it would come out.

That's incredible. That's really great to hear because I think so many people are inspired by your story. My brother, you know, being a filmmaker, if you guys want to hit him up, I'm sure he would love to assist and help in any way that he can because I think this story is awesome. and I think more people need, you know, as many people as possible need to hear it. Yeah, I mean, I appreciate that. But, like, they're, like, they're almost done.

Great. And I believe they were all the filming they're doing. They were here for probably a couple weeks to November and then a week in March. And, yeah, it's like it's been a, I've never done a movie before. It's quite a process, but it's looking like it's almost over. And we're in the home stretch. One thing that I heard you say on one of the podcasts is, that like nobody really knows.

And you did mention that a little bit earlier, how nobody really knows because, you know, these surgeries are unconventional. And then what you were doing in particular is unprecedented. Like, no one's really done that before. But did you have an opportunity to communicate with other people that have had lung transplants just to maybe like put you at ease in some way or to like communicate with somebody that's, that kind of made it through? Yeah.

You know what? They tried to connect you in the hospital with a few different people. And I don't know. It was just like, in the beginning it was just like I just want to be on my own path and I'm just going to worry about myself right now. But I have so many people reaching on Instagram who have either been through something similar or going through something similar. And there's been a couple that I've connected with that, I don't know,

it feels like we're on the same wavelength. So, yeah, I got a few of those people that I talk to now. and it's really good and really helpful, but to the point I made earlier, like, I want to push this thing far, like, you know, so I don't know that anyone has done exactly what I want to do to this point. Awesome, man. Thank you so much for your time today.

Where can people find out more about you? Yeah, I'm just on Instagram and Twitter, and you know what? I don't use social media as much as I used to. I'll post some here and there, but I just try to kind of do what I want to do. do in coach wrestling and be a family guy and that type of thing right now awesome enjoy the rest of your day thank you so much