Mark Bell's Power Project - MBPP EP. 662 - Out of Retirement and Into Bare Knuckle Fighting ft. Chad Mendes & Amadeo Novella

Episode Date: January 18, 2022

Chad Mendes is an American professional bare-knuckle boxer and former UFC top contender and collegiate wrestler who is currently signed to Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship. Today he shares with us his passion for hunting, why he came out of retirement and what he's expecting out of his debut in Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship. Amadeo Novella is Chad's Strength and conditioning coach and owner of Capital Strength and Conditioning here in Sacramento. Buy Chads new cookbook: https://amzn.to/33vibZ5                                                            Follow Chad on IG: https://www.instagram.com/chadmendes/ Follow Amadeo: https://www.instagram.com/capitalstrengthperformance/ Special perks for our listeners below! ➢Bubs Naturals: https://bubsnaturals.com Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% of your next order! ➢Vertical Diet Meals: https://verticaldiet.com/ Use code POWERPROJECT for 20% off your first order! ➢Vuori Performance Apparel: Visit https://vuoriclothing.com/powerproject to automatically save 20% off your first order! ➢8 Sleep: Visit https://www.eightsleep.com/powerproject to automatically save $150 off the Pod Pro! ➢Marek Health: https://marekhealth.com Use code POWERPROJECT10 for 10% off ALL LABS! Also check out the Power Project Panel: https://marekhealth.com/powerproject Use code POWERPROJECT for $101 off! ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code POWER at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $150 Subscribe to the Podcast on on Platforms! ➢ https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast Subscribe to the Power Project Newsletter! ➢ https://bit.ly/2JvmXMb Follow Mark Bell's Power Project Podcast ➢ Insta: https://www.instagram.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ https://www.facebook.com/markbellspowerproject ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/mbpowerproject ➢ LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/powerproject/ ➢ YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/markbellspowerproject ➢TikTok: http://bit.ly/pptiktok FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell ➢ Snapchat: marksmellybell ➢Mark Bell's Daily Workouts, Nutrition and More: https://www.markbell.com/ Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ https://www.breakthebar.com/learn-more ➢YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/NsimaInyang ➢Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/?hl=en ➢TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@nsimayinyang?lang=en Follow Andrew Zaragoza on all platforms ➢ https://direct.me/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell

Power Potion Family, how's it going? Now, we partnered with an amazing brand, Bubz Naturals. We actually have some of the products on the table. They're MCT oil powder, they're collagen protein, and this f***er. Yeah, this f***er. They're apple cider vinegar gummies, okay? One thing I want to let you guys know real quick

is that the Bubz products, number one, they mix super well. So I've had different MCT oils, and I've talked to people who've used MCT oil and mentioned this to their copy, and it doesn't mix well. Well, their MCT oil is amazing on coffee in the morning just on its own, but their collagen protein and collagen is great for joint health, hair, skin, nails, all that stuff that also mixes just so well into coffee and everything. It's that's the, one of the crazy things. Um, but secondly, these fricking apple cider vinegar gummies, I don't ever supplement apple cider vinegar, but they put them in gummies, which is great. Two per serving. We have literally eaten one of these full things.

Andrew and I have split this and Mark, Mark has to be so careful. Like we give him two and we take it away because it tastes so good, but it's actually really good for you. So, Andrew, tell them how to get it. Yes, guys, seriously. Have just the recommended dosage. Just have two of those gummies. Don't have two full bottles the way we do. Head over to BubzNaturals.com and check out Enter Promo Code Power Project to save 20% off your entire order.

promo code POWERPROJECT to save 20% off your entire order. And what's really cool about Bubz Naturals is they actually donate 10% of all their profits to various charities, starting with the Glenn Doherty Memorial Foundation. Again, BubzNaturals.com, promo code POWERPROJECT to save 20% off. Links to them down in the description, as well as the podcast show notes. I don't like low show on my hands, though. That's why. I get super high. I do.

If you're very from the end, though, you don't feel it. No, you still do. No, you got to really rub it in. That's the problem. Especially if they do start to sweat a little bit and they get all slippery. Yeah, dude. They're always oily. I just can't do it.

All right, listen. It's all about the application. I used to also think, oh, lotion's slimy. But when you really rub that shit in, you don't feel it. It gets into the skin. I got to toughen up my hands anyways. I learned that from a woman. I didn't know that.

I think using lotion is a little bit like using a chapstick. Once you start using it, then you're kind of stuck with it, and you got to use it. It's like, damn, I forgot my lotion. There you go. There's also a difference. It smells lather. It smells all right. It smells alright. But

Amadeo can probably relate and you to an extent, you know, when you get ashy, you know, like you got that white shit, right? So you gotta, you don't want to be looking all ashy. Like elbows, knees, psoriasis. Exactly. Knees.

I'm fully lubed up for this podcast. Take the shirt off. Knees. Ankles. I'm fully lubed up for this podcast. Let's go. You just take the shirt off. Oh, yeah. All this feels good, Zima. Thank you. I'm here. What else you got?

What else you got? Let's see. You like some deodorant? That's the one you gave me. Actually, that's accurate. That's usually what happens when somebody tries to give me something around here it's usually mine one of the guys in the gym the other day he was like over by the dumbbell rack and he's like is this yours yeah and so i took him around the gym i took him from corner to corner to corner and he didn't get it he didn't understand what i was

doing i was like see from over here all the way over to this way, all the way through here, and we literally walked the whole perimeter of the gym. And I'm like, and all the way over that way. I was like, that's all mine. And then he was like, oh. And then it wasn't funny anymore. Because he got sad. I was like, oh, I wasn't trying to.

I was just trying to be a playful idiot. That's funny. Dude, so what's going on since last time we saw you? It was maybe two or three years ago, I think, right? Yeah, we were just trying to figure that out, but just, dude, a lot of stuff, actually. I mean, we just had our second baby. Damn. Yeah, two girls.

I'm officially a girl. You and Amadeo? Mm-hmm. Well, he's... It's a new world out there right 2022 now damn um but yeah we started a few businesses and just things have been non-stop but good and what was the reason uh for your departure from ufc was it just uh was it career like career, you were kind of just a little bit done with the sport or what was it? Yeah. A couple of things. I mean, for me, uh, where my contract

was, I signed a way too many fight, uh, fight deal contract back in the day. And at the time it was a decent deal, but it was an eight fight contract. And you know, when you're getting to the top, you're really fighting one time a year, maybe two times a year. There's just not that many fights that make sense for you. So that contract takes a while. I see. I see.

So like an eight fight thing, like in the beginning you might get through three or four fights pretty quick. Yeah. But then the next three or four fights might take a while. Yeah. But, well, when I re-signed that, I was already, you know, fighting for the title.

So I was, I don't know why we signed it. We shouldn't have signed a deal that long. But anyway, so my last fight, it just wasn't worth it for me, what we were going through, what I was putting my body through, putting my wife through. Like, it just wasn't worth the money to me. And, you know, we, I had started another business, Fins business fins and feathers and that was doing really well and uh we basically just decided me and i told these guys that night like it was uh it was time so i how uh how tough is that on your family and some of the people around you when you're

constantly like in these fight camps or constantly like wondering when you're going to fight next you got to be prepped but at the same time you're not quite in camp yet type of thing it's tough man and i'll be honest so i'm fighting february 19th um we've been training for probably what seven months yeah some seven eight months because the fight just got postponed a couple times but um this is the first time i've done it with kids and it is night and day man like i i miss the days where you could just go and train all day and then look forward to coming home and showering relaxing and just you know now you need somewhere else to go exactly now you train out all you know you train at the gym and then you come home and

it's non-stop like doing stuff all day there's no rest time and home is harder at the gym and then you come home and it's non-stop doing stuff all day there's no rest time home is harder than the gym so it's definitely a lot more challenging but I think we're figuring it out getting the system down there's been some other stuff family medical issues that have kind of come up

so there's just a bunch of different things thrown in the mix but all in all I think everything's good. And training's been really well. You know, I've been feeling really good. Amadeo's been pushing me. Joey's been pushing me. Everything's kind of clicking and coming together.

So I'm ready. I'll be ready February 19th. Do you think that it's possible to, like, when you look at yourself when you were a little bit younger and maybe you didn't have your business and you didn't have your daughters like you were mentioning, obviously you have more time to focus on training. But do you think that there is a difference in your level of, I don't know, intensity at getting ready? Since it doesn't seem that you're necessarily hurting for money. You have a great business, right? And a lot of fighters when they're young, all they think about is fighting because that's where they're going to make their money. So have a great business, right? And a lot of fighters, when they're young, all they think about is fighting because that's where they're going to make their money.

So it's like, I got to survive. At this point, you don't necessarily have to survive anymore. Do you think there's a difference there? I think so. And it's definitely a big weight lifted off my shoulders. I'm sure anyone in that situation would probably feel the same. It's pretty much what you just said.

You're starting off, you're trying to make a name for yourself in the sport, you know, especially coming off the wrestling career that I had, there was so much pressure on me to, you know, there's so many people like, Oh, he's going to be such a killer in there. And it's like, you know, that's a lot of pressure that you have to live up to and perform for. And, uh, you know, you get into it, you start building your yourself up. Um, but you know, the way that the UFC structures payments, it's usually split 50-50. So, you know, yeah, it might look like a big chunk of money when you see it. But if you show up, you make weight, you get half of it.

If you win, you get the other half. If you lose, you don't get that money. So that is also a big stress factor. And, you know, I got to make sure that I'm doing everything I need to do because that's a lot of money that I'm going to be losing out on if I don't win this fight. Um, so yeah, I mean, I think all in all, you know, with, with everything being a lot more comfortable in life, you know, going into this fight as something that I'm looking forward to as fun. Like, I'm 36 years old.

I'm still, I feel like, in my prime. I'm not, I didn't leave the sport because I felt like I couldn't compete with the best in the world anymore. I just made the decision. It wasn't worth it. You know, this is the biggest payday that I'm ever, that I ever got in the UFC that I'm about to get in this fight. Wait, seriously?

Oh, yeah. I mean, it's pretty cool to have that type of uh you know end game in in sight you know it makes it worth going through the grind and putting your body through hell and cutting the weight and you know pushing through those times with amadeo and you don't want to do it and uh you know it definitely makes it a lot easier so yeah all in all i think you know life is a little bit, uh, less stressful as far as financially, uh, talking, but outside of that, the family having kids running businesses, you know, that's all different stress, but I'm a huge Rocky fan. I don't know if you remember

the scene in Rocky when he goes to his wife and he's trying to explain how he wants to come out of retirement and they're going back and, and it's not going so good. I'm imagining that's how a lot of this went. 100%. But then she finally tells him, she's like, I want you just to do one thing. And he's like, what's that? And she says, win. And then the music hits, and then he's back to training and all that kind of stuff. Do you have an epic talk like that with your wife about bare knuckle fighting now?

Like, hey, I'm not in UFC anymore. So that's the good news. But the bad news we're taking the glove down it was tough man and and bare knuckle uh had kind of come to us for probably the last now it would have been year and a half two years um you know and there was a number that was thrown out and i'm like not happening like it's again that's just not worth getting back in. Everything's good.

I don't need to fight. Obviously, I would love to, but it's got to make sense. And they just kept throwing numbers at us over that amount of time. And finally, towards the end, it was a number that it's like, all right, I'll go in there and beat somebody up for that. And it was tough sitting down with the wife and trying to even bring that up to her uh she wasn't she wasn't a big fan of it she still isn't a big fan of it but it's pretty much like the rocky scene you know i i explained to her and this is this is how i explained it you know in the ufc you have you know four ounce gloves they they got about a half

an inch of leather and padding that covers your knuckles i love this justification story that we got going on there's nothing on your shins i can get head kicked you know right shin upside my head these are all good explanations i get elbowed yeah you know limbs ripped off, torn ligaments. Yeah, I don't have any type of pad on my knuckle, but the concussion I feel like getting hit in the head is going to be the same with an MMA glove on or bare knuckle. Basically, it's the cuts that are probably going to happen a little bit more with sharp knuckles versus the leather on the outside of it.

But, I mean, like I said, getting kicked in the head, I mean, I don't but i mean like i said getting kicked in the head i mean i don't know if you guys have ever been get kicked in the head but it doesn't feel good yeah i've only held pads and got kicked in the head and that already like kind of got me all dizzy like fuck i can't imagine actually getting kicked in the head or the knee that i took from aldo when i turned around he as i shot any dude like i got kicked in the face pretty good by john cena that was pretty bad. And my eye just went, bam. And then maybe two, three days later,

like no one really told me, but you can't sneeze. I didn't know about that. Blood vessels. Yeah, that was fucking nasty. What happened? Did some shit pop? It just blew up. It just like sat there.

And I had to wear like sunglasses for like two weeks. When you break your nose, you can't blow out because of both your eyes. Okay. Both your eyes. They just swell up. I got kicked right by his heel, right on my eyeball. It hurts so bad. Yeah, it doesn't feel good.

All right, that makes me kind of curious. What does a training camp look like for a bare-knuckles fight versus just boxing or for UFC? How the fuck are you going to simulate bare-knuckle shit? I mean, it's the same as MMA. I mean, we do put like puffy, they call them puffies, where they're smaller gloves and you're just moving. You don't go full blast with those. But basically we spar with the same 16-ounce gloves that we would in MMA.

Any boxer spars with 16 ounce gloves also. Um, basically you're just getting the movements, figuring out, you know, body positioning, um, timing, um, you know, space awareness and all that stuff without getting punched bare knuckle. This might sound like a stupid question also though, but like, for example, sparring with gloves for UFC or whatever, when you, if you're sparring, punch bare knuckle this might sound like a stupid question also though but like for example the sparring with gloves for ufc or whatever when you if you're sparring no one's gonna hit you at 100 but even if you get hit you know what that hit feels like would you need to know what like would you need to simulate what a bare knuckle hit feels like before you get in or you don't need to even

understand that no i don't think so i mean i know's not going to feel good. I've been in street fights, and I've been hit bare knuckle. But, you know, obviously getting in there in a competition and, like, actually, like, fighting with technical purpose and the mindset to win, I mean, it could be completely different. I've never done one, so I'm going to sit here and tell you that I think it's gonna be fine but until you get in there and you get hit by one who who knows guys that can take a punch they're not necessarily like train it right i mean i know you can kind of train the body a little bit to get

used to some body shots type thing but uh there's no one wants to inflict like more damage to their head regardless right so you can't really train for it. You can train neck muscles and do a lot of that stuff. But, yeah, you don't, you know. I do see some videos sometimes and it's just I don't get it, but there will be coaches just like wailing like four or five punch combos on people's heads and it's like I don't get that at all. Those are the guys who shouldn't be coaches. Yeah, exactly.

The whole point of boxing is to not get hit. People forget about that. Why is your strength coach so big? Super intimidating. Stay a little close to the mic there. Amadeo, how is this different from training him previously for

I mean, I guess in both cases you're training full body but you don't have to really worry as much about him getting up and getting down, getting up and getting down. So how's the training different? I would say the biggest difference is that there's far more skill in boxing than there is in mixed martial arts because with martial arts, you have to deal with everything.

You have to deal with the wrestling, jiu-jitsu, kicks, elbows, all that. With boxing. He's just focused in on one skill. So he has to become a better boxer and then obviously that's going to take much more time and repetition. But it's also like MMA's five minutes. He's got two minute rounds.

It changes the whole training process a lot. It's two minutes on, one minute off versus five minutes, one minute. It's much more skill based. Is there anything like from a training perspective that's different like you have them like do dumbbell bench press for time or like any sort of like upper body type stuff where he hits the bag fast you know for

time period type of thing the energy stuff so the the energy system trainings that we're going to do isn't going to change very much except boxing. Even if just regular boxing, three minute rounds, it's tends to be much more anaerobic based. Whereas MMA is aerobic based because it's so much longer and there's a, it's like, there's probably less shots thrown in MMA because there's so much like

circling or grappling or jockeying for position. Where boxing is just kind of, you're right there in their face. So I almost need a little bit more repeated explosiveness in boxing. Yeah, the explosive repeat is going to be necessary. I've seen him train. He's good at that.

That's probably my favorite. I mean, I've always been more of a shorter- timed, explosive athlete. You know, more, I guess, type two muscle. You know, obviously cardio and conditioning is always something I prided myself on through wrestling, but it was mainly me just having to push through the uncomfortable shit, you know? It's not something that I felt good always when those wrestling matches went all the way to the end

or MMA fight or the round was balls to the wall for the entire five minutes. But you're just able to push through that. But I feel really good when I can explode and be as powerful and as fast as I possibly can for 30 seconds and then move around for a bit and then do the same thing again, boom, boom, boom. So we've been doing a lot of, you know, minute, 30-second to a minute explosive-like type training, and then we'll take, you know, we'll get our heart rate back down to about 130, right, is what we were doing, and then get after it again.

What about strength? What do you guys work on in terms of strength? He's a speed guy. So when you have somebody who's really fast like that, it's really just like keeping your health is the goal with any athlete. But I usually spend more time on that strength side of the spectrum because I don't have to teach somebody to be fast. He's just got it.

So it's more about keeping his joints healthy, the tendons, ligaments, muscles, prepared and ready to handle that amount of stress. You might take him to, what, 80%, 90%, or do you go with maxes and shit too? No, we don't hit that many. We're not hitting maxes very much. In martial arts, I probably would, closer to a fight, more so because you're getting a big endocrine dump. All the hormones that are coming along with that are very beneficial but um with him like i said

it's really just about keeping them healthy you know the best athletes are always going to be the healthy ones so i'd take them in there at 100 you know and not get two lifts in then you know at 80 because we did a deadlift yeah one of the things i've heard you talk about before, which I haven't really heard other strength coaches talk about, but it's a cue that I took from you, and I use it in my own training, is that you should feel better when you're done with your training session and not worse. And when you said that, I was like, okay, I've been doing it wrong for about 25 years. Not all the time, but there's some training sessions where.

I understand the principle, though. Vic, you're not always trying to correct. I think it was Joe Ken who said, one workout will never make an athlete, but one workout can break an athlete. Coach House. Always comes back to him every time. Do we want to anger Coach House?

No, I'm not going to even do that. Nope, not on this episode. I want to go back to something you guys were talking about in terms of bringing your heart rate back down. Is there a specific way of breathing? Like after all your years of fighting, is there a specific way of breathing that you have when you fight that you find that's easier for you or helps you calm down? I'm wondering this because we've had some people come on here and talk about how beneficial nasal breathing can be. We've had some people come on here and talk about it doesn't matter.

From your experience, what is – is you think there is a difference? I guess I've never like paid attention. Does one work better than the other? What I typically do is after a round, we come in, he's in my ear, calm your breathing. And so for me, it's real long, deep breaths, typically through my nose. And just try to get as much air in my lungs as possible. And I usually hold it even for a couple seconds and then let it out and push it out and just do that, you know, five, six times.

And that usually gets my heart rate down enough to where I'm not heavy breathing anymore. Now I can keep everything calm and collected and get back to thinking, you know. I think the worst thing in a corner, and I've had cornermen do this, where it's like immediately you come back and you're still in that very high mindset and heart's racing. And they're already spitting all kinds of info in your ear. And it's like, hold on. Like, let me get my wits about me for 10, 15 seconds. Yeah.

Because I'm not retaining any of that right now. I'm thinking I need to calm my fucking heart rate. So for me, it's like the first 30 seconds of that one minute is like calming. Like the best corner men are like, okay, breathe, get everything back under control. And then here's a drink. You know, this is what we can do. Start telling me stuff in between. What is it like for you?

What's the experience like when you walk into the cage like maybe your first ufc fight and the door slams behind you and the opponent's in there and shit starts to clear out because you have kind of quite a few people in the ring in the beginning and you're announced and stuff and then it's like the bell actually finally rings dude it's one of the craziest feelings like i i try to compare it to anything else in my life that I've felt and I can't like, it's so unique. It's like the whole world is watching you, uh, all this hard work that you just put in, uh, through this entire training camp, uh, you know, all the weight cut that's all done. You know, you have this guy who you've been studying and watching for X amount of weeks standing right in front of you.

You have so much of the unknown and the what ifs playing through your head. You know, it's a it's a game of inches and anything can happen at any time. You make one small mistake and that could be it. So you're just trying to think about all the positives and re, you know, reinstate in your mind, like I'm here for a reason. You know, I know what it's going to take to beat this guy. We have the game plan. Let's get over there and beat this dude's ass. And, uh, you know, it's, it's crazy. It's a crazy feeling. Your adrenaline's through the roof, you know, you're trying to keep everything calm and collected. And as all this is going on, that time is getting closer and closer to go time.

And usually by the time you're done thinking all this stuff, it's like, you ready? You ready? Let's get it on. And everything's gone. Let's go. It's kind of a blur once the fight starts. Are you able to, because some people can say, I can see people in the audience. What's it like for you?

Are you able to, because some people can say, like, I can see people in the audience. And what's it like for you? I'd say the first probably half of my fights in my career were blackout, just I don't even know what's going on. You know, it's just all instinct. And then from there on, it was a lot more, I guess, cognitive in there. You can calm yourself down a little bit. The slow down a little bit. Yeah, which I almost don't like. I actually liked the blackout, let my body and everything,

all the hard work take over and just go. Sometimes I feel like it's a little bit easier to deal with for some reason. Sometimes when I'm too calm and I can hear everybody talking, I think too much instead of just letting my body do its thing. That'd be distracting.

You're like, I got to watch out for his left hook. And then all of a sudden you get booted right in the chest by his right foot or whatever. You're like, fuck, I can't breathe. Oh yeah, yeah. I have a question about that though. Wait, so you said when you're too calm, there are so many other things you pay attention to. I'm curious about that because some people, when they're able to be so super calm then they're able to focus on that

one thing but for you what what do you mean exactly like and when you say you blacked out not black out yeah but like and you ran on instinct were you like do you feel that you were like more emotional a little bit angrier when you're fighting at that no no no it was never never anything emotional um i've never gone into a fight angry trying to kill a guy. It's a sport, and it's like I know what the game plan is. I know what we've trained through this whole camp, and I need to get out there and implement that and do it to win the fight. It's about winning.

But what I mean by blacking out, I don't necessarily black out, but it's such a high pace, such an emotional, I guess, adrenaline ride that you're not thinking much. It's all reaction. It's, you know, you're basically just going into, I don't even know how to explain it, but you're not like thinking of process. You're going out there and your body's just taking over, you know? So that's the blackout phase of it. But there's been fights where I'm like so calm that, like I said, I can hear like so many people in the crowd talking. I can hear his cornerman yelling stuff at him, my cornerman yelling stuff.

You know, I remember just seeing everybody all around me, my wife, you know, friends. And it's almost distracting a little bit. And not that I can't focus, but I feel like sometimes it is easier just to let your body take over and not have to think and hear and listen and, and go through all that stuff. It's just like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, just smoked them. You know, have you been able to, uh, like tap into like maybe a different type of motivation now that you have your daughters? Yeah. I mean, I, I think this will be the first fight that I've, you know, fought with kids. Um, but it is, it is crazy going to the gym and training hard and killing myself and then coming home and just, you know, having my daughter so excited to see me after being

gone all day. Singing a lullaby. Yeah. It's like you go from this, like just animal in the gym, like tough, everything's like hardcore. And this little baby slipped in your hand. And then you get home and it's like, yeah, it's like, oh, it's so cute. It is pretty crazy, but I enjoy it.

You mentioned the game of inches thing. And Seamus into inches, especially with the last few podcasts we've had. Hey, go check out a link for the penis pumps, guys. We're going to add some inches and girth to your dick. Back to the podcast. I'm being real. You mentioned the game of inches aspect of things, and you're a fighter that everyone knows

could have easily been a champion, and it was literally small things. For example, I think it was Jose Aldo when he grabbed that cage at that moment in the fight. If he didn't grab that and you were able to take him down, knockout might not happen there and then the same thing with the connor fight when you i think you managed to take him down and then something happened after you took him down but like it was for the submission

and got him the guillotine yeah exactly and then he came back up and boom right so those are like decisive small moments that if they changed you you might have had a belt, right? How does, how, after coming out of the UFC and now you're going to bare knuckle, how do you feel about that? And where everything, you were just like an inch away or a moment away. That's the name of the game, man. That's what, you know, can either make or break a fighter. can either make or break a fighter. We know it's a game of inches and we know that on any given night, anybody can lose or win a fight, become a champion or lose the belt. And it's like, you have to understand that, recognize that and almost be at one with that.

Because if that's something that you're so stressed about all the time, that's going to eat you alive. It does bum me out a bit, those fights. I didn't win. I was so close to becoming a UFC champion. But in my mind, I really try to tell myself everything happens for a reason. It just wasn't meant to be, and there's a reason for that somewhere, whether I know what it is now or I'm going to find out soon. But, um, I just try to stay positive in that sense and tell

myself that's, that's the reason why, you know, cause sometimes, I mean, there's, there's times where I'm just like, so down. I'm like, how, like, why? Like, you know, him grabbing the cage. If that was that, was that the deciding factor in that first fight? You know, I don't know. Maybe he would have just beat my ass the rest of the fight after that. I don't know, but you know, maybe not. Or, you know you know the the second fight with aldo when he hit me after the bell you know it really rocked me and dude every hit after that i was just like you know would that have changed something like could i have beat him if if that didn't happen but you know i don't know maybe not maybe he would have just like i said beat my ass

rest of the fight so there's those little things, and it's like it splits the road. And if I went left, I would have been a champ. I ended up going right, and I wasn't. If something would have changed, would I be the champion? So you sit there, and you start beating yourself up, and you start really thinking about these things. And like I said, if you do, it eats you alive, man. You got to just move on with it become

one with it and just realize everything happens for a reason hey it still ain't over buddy it ain't you're throwing your hat back in the game it's fascinating like to have you know a match against Conor McGregor he's like so iconic regardless of what you

do from here on out, that might always be the stamp on your career. It's just that you fought him, period. People years down the road, your kids, when they have kids, they'll be like your grandpa. You fought Conor McGregor. That was a bloody fight.

It'll always be a thing. Even if you were to come back and win a title or something like that, which would be amazing, I still think that that would be the focus for a lot of people. In the UFC, he fought Conor McGregor. It is, for sure. I mean, a lot of people, like casual fans,

are like, oh, you fought Conor McGregor? And it's like, yeah, yeah. I took it on 10 days notice, and I have to explain the whole situation. Well, did you win? No. I beat him up, though, but no, I lost the fight. I have to like explain the whole situation. Well, did you win? No. I beat him up though, but no, I lost the fight. I used to go to powerlifting meets and then I'd come back and you know, it was after I

didn't do well. I missed my squats or something and people are like, what happened? I'm like, it was a thousand fucking pounds. That's what happened. You're like, did you mess up your timing or? I was like, no no I was just too weak I just wasn't strong enough

for that day it's like you gotta be real sharp to lift some of these weights you know god damn cut me some cut me some slack I'm sure people are probably

asking you all the time they probably still think you're in UFC like oh man you still fight and then you gotta probably explain I'm doing this other fight

bare knuckle fight and then they probably think you're a lunatic yeah oh yeah. Most people that I tell that, they're just like, oh, okay, cool, good luck. Family members are probably like,

what is he doing? Everyone thinks I'm nuts, but it is what it is. I'm going to go out there. I'm going to have fun with this. I'm excited to compete still. Like I said, I still feel like I'm in my prime,

and this is, like I said, the biggest payday, so why not take advantage of the opportunity while I still can. And it makes sense to go out there, make money for my family, have fun competing, you know, maybe one, two, three more times if at the most. And just get back to all my other businesses, the hunting, the fishing, and doing all that. Have you always been athletic? Because I remember like at the old gym, you know, watching you at Midtown. And Amadeo would have you do some drills and stuff all that. Have you always been athletic? Because I remember at the old gym, watching you at Midtown,

and Amadeo would have you do some drills and stuff like that. I was always like, everybody went through the drills and everybody looked like they knew what they were doing, but when you went, I was always like, oh, fuck. Have you always been explosive and athletic?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I started, I was actually a swimmer at about four years old. That was the first sport I ever did, competitive swimming. And then my dad was like, this isn't burning enough calories. We need to get this guy on something else. So he started me off in wrestling at five. And I wrestled every single, I didn't take a year off,

from five all the way up through college. That's scary. He's one of those guys. Going to hang on to your leg for six hours not gonna give up and there was a few times i want i i wanted to play other sports like i did some other sports i played water polo for four years which was like uh right before wrestling season so i used it to like get in shape and then jumped into that but you know i wanted to play baseball i wanted to do uh you know some more team sports and my dad always said baseball's for pussies.

I couldn't play baseball. Wrestling was it. That's kind of right. That's the way it was in my house too. Anything I wanted to do, my brothers were like, that's stupid. They wanted me to play football or whatever. My ass kicked a ball around.

Anytime I played soccer, all my uncles would be like, that's a pussy sport. You gotta to play football or whatever and my ass kicked a ball around yeah anytime I played soccer all my uncles would be like that's a pussy sport you gotta go play football all Americans always said that shit to me why don't you play football because my mom doesn't want me getting a fucking concussion nobody wants to run either everybody wants to avoid running

I know Amadeo thinks I'm a pussy too because you play football I'm curious man cause Mark mentioned something about how like everyone's like oh he fought Conor but for you personally

what do you think so far in your career what was your personal favorite fight cause oh man people think that Aldo 2 fight

was fucking amazing and it was that was my hardest fight hands down my hardest fight I always say that that fight probably took about 10 years off of my life whoa seriously probably like that was i got back so you know

fought five hard rounds with him uh we went from the fight did all all the media the press conference and stuff and i hobbled up to my hotel room it it was like 6 a.m the sun we looked out the window and the sun was already coming up because we fought because of the time change we fought at like 10 or 11 p.m at night there in brazil and so it dude it was just crazy man i remember hobbling up and just laying in bed and like propping my feet up my legs were just all swollen i peed blood that night and just like head was just going whoa whoa hands hurt like it was the most pain i've ever been in from any fight and um i just remember taking some like

ibuprofen or whatever and we ordered a pizza and uh just sat in the room me and my wife and uh just ate pizza and just like fuck that's over man that's we didn't get it but holy shit what a night you know and uh so i i'd say it's definitely not my favorite fight but that's definitely one of the fights that stand out the most to me in my career um i'd say my favorite fight and it sucks because it was a really good buddy of mine but i feel like my best performance, and I felt just good all around, was Guida. You know, and the preparation for that fight was really good. Leading up to that camp, I felt good and just was able to really implement the game plan

that we had in place and ended up getting the knockout. Guida was the first person I needed to knock him out. And, you know, as far as performance wise, that was my favorite fight. But like I said, it sucks because we're good buddies. We're actually business partners now. Oh, shit. He does gills and thrills and we do fins and feathers. Does he ever bring that shit up? No.

Nope. We don't talk about that. You guys occasionally trying to kill each other too. You have a disagreement and you're just like hey hold on pull up that tape real quick clay's like the nicest guy in the world man that guy's got a heart of gold and he's just he'd give you the shirt off his back if you needed it anytime so uh he's a good guy and it it was it was sad man he that night he came back into our locker room after the fight and brought us you know all of us uh his walkout shirts and when like had tears in his

eyes and was like it was tough man it was it was emotionally probably the toughest fight that i had um but like i said it just made us uh i think better friends here now so do you think at uh it would be wise for like a lot of people to explore like a like a combat sport in some way like even just the preparation for it the training the sparring like not going not trying to go ufc or not trying to like uh which you wouldn't be able to anyway but not trying to you know push into like the actual sport of it but do you think it'd be a good idea i mean it must uh must turn you inside out in some, some ways. Oh, I think it's great. And I, I tried to encourage people to do it.

It's, I mean, it's a great workout, you know, punching a bag, even taking a kickboxing class, you know, how much stress relief that is just punching something, especially something that's not going to punch you back, you know? And, um, it's a insane workout. I mean, anyone that's actually done it afterwards, like, holy hell, I was so tired, you know, or grappling, jujitsu classes, wrestling, you know, stuff that it's different than your standard, just go to the gym, run on the treadmill, lift some weights and go home. You know, it's, it's different. It's completely different. So, um, you know, I, I encourage people to get in there and try it. Most people that do it fall in love with it. Um, and it's into a fight, like facing a confrontation or

trying to figure out how to like wiggle your way out of one or to maneuver your way around one, whether it's like a physical confrontation or it's just in like everyday life of, of not wanting to like take on a confrontation. Have you kind of found that it's assisted you and just being like, maybe just super straightforward with people? A hundred percent this is uh talking about this reminds me of uh dan gable's quote once you've wrestled everything in life is easy and i've heard that quote since i was young in this sport and at obviously at the time it doesn't make sense because you know you're a kid there your your life is easy you know but you like, wrestling's easy and fun. What's he talking about?

Going through college after graduating, jumping in the fight game, having to figure out bills and car payments and cell phone bills. And making sure, basically being an adult and having responsibilities and starting a family and going through all that. You look back at that quote and you're like, damn, like he's right. Like I getting in a lot of these tough situations where I've been in them and I've had other friends and like family members that get in those same positions and crack and crumble and fall apart. And it's like, yeah, it's not fun. It's difficult, but it's not something that I would feel like I'd break over. And I feel like it helps push through those hard times. Um, so I think, and that could be anything from jujitsu, kickboxing, boxing, doesn't have to be wrestling, but I think pushing yourself to those

mental and physical limits and really testing yourself and like teaching your body and your mind that, God, I can actually go a little bit further than I thought and go through these tough times and still survive and live, it transfers over into life too. And it's, I think it's good. I think it's good for anybody to go through that stuff. You know, Chad, I'm a day. I'm curious about you guys' thoughts on this. Do you have kids? I'm a day. Do you have kids? Yeah, I have one. You have one. Okay, perfect. I started jiu-jitsu six years ago. And, I mean, before that, I didn't really get into fights because people look at me.

I'm a big black dude, so I'm not really going to try anything. But it's not like I knew how to defend myself. So if somebody did try to fight me, I'd be like, I'd probably sprint away. But I'm not even looking for fights these days either. But jiu-jitsu has been a super, I'm fucking addicted to it. And just also knowing that I could defend myself in a confrontation, I feel confident in that. Now, for people who have kids, right, what would you guys suggest would be the martial art that maybe they should start their kids in if they did? Like where would you maybe have them start? Go ahead.

Yeah, I mean, I think wrestling for me. I'd like to get my daughters into wrestling or jits. I think anything grappling, body awareness, being able to understand body movement is going to be key, especially with defending themselves against somebody that's trying to attack them or whatever. But I definitely want my daughters to get in some type of martial arts um i'll probably let them choose if it's something that they feel like they can make that decision on if not i'll probably at least start them off in wrestling okay what do you think uh

sorry to cut you off like injury wise which one do you think is less injury wrestling or jujitsu probably jujitsu i think jujitsu is typically a little bit slower paced um a little bit more um i guess like a chess i guess more of like a chess match you know depending i mean i don't i don't grapple like that but most people would you say it's kind of a slower pace you're thinking you're you're you know methodical methodical that's the way i'm trying to maybe work with each other yeah we're wrestling a lot of the times it's like boom boom boom just and then when wrestlers do nogi they're nightmarish yeah that's all i do is nogi that's what i'm talking about like i when i grapple i'm trying to go balls to the wall yeah i would imagine it's

probably easier to make a wrestler jujitsu oh yeah than it is to make a jujitsu grappler yeah when a wrestler comes to jujitsu you can tell it is to make a jujitsu grappler yeah when a wrestler comes to jujitsu you can tell like you can just tell by the way they move i've i aspire with a lot of guys who are former wrestlers or who wrestle and do jujitsu like our boy josh sedledge when josh was a white belt and he came into doing jujitsu he already was fucking people up um like he was fucking blue belts up because of just his wrestling background and then because he's a grappler picks it up so quick but I mean I think as an adult

to pick up wrestling is much harder than knowing wrestling as a kid like jiu jitsu people can't pick up wrestling like wrestlers can pick up jiu jitsu and some people might not just understand aggression you know a lot of times they do a lot of times they have a decent understanding of and being like overly aggressive is not going to help you necessarily in wrestling.

And it's not necessarily going to help. It's probably going to hurt you somewhat in jiu-jitsu. But you do need to be ready to go. It is a fight, right? And so people with a wrestling background, they at least have that coming in, right? Yeah, and I think wrestling, at least for me, I was taught, you know when it's go time. You know when it's time to save energy. you know when it's time to save energy you know when it's time to um kind of be a little bit more relaxed and then you know when it's like

balls to the wall um and i think wrestling teaches you that body awareness of knowing like in certain instances like you have to go 100 because if you half-ass it you're going to get pinned or you're going to get caught um so i think yeah I think it definitely trains you in that sense. I think one thing that I really do like about jiu-jitsu or martial arts is that they have a belt system for young kids. And it's like there's always a next level, like that process that they have to go through to keep getting better. That's a good thing that a lot of other sports don't have. Wrestling doesn't have anything like rankings in any sense, right? No, it's all weight classes.

So, you know, you might get, and this was always a benefit for me, is I was always small for my age. And so I would be usually wrestling guys that were a year or two younger than me because I was just, or sorry, would that make sense? Yeah. Yeah, so, you know, I was just small for my weight. I was 80 pounds my freshman year in high school. Whoa.

I was a tiny little guy. Yeah. Yeah. So I was actually JV. I didn't even, because 103s was the smallest weight class. And we had, I think, a senior on our team that was cutting down to 103. So, yeah, I put in so much time in the gym between for freshman year and sophomore year. You know, that's when I

really started taking supplements. I think I started taking creatine and, uh, really focusing on protein and, you know, your carbohydrates and, and, and that's where it all kind of began for me. And then I actually became obsessed with lifting weights and fell in love with it. Oh yeah. That was me back in the day. 42 pounds right there. Oh yeah. Five years old. The other kids in like jean shorts. Stone washed. That is dope. Oh yeah. Yeah, man. Has that ever been a detriment? Because sometimes we hear that.

We sometimes hear like guys that are holding on to extra muscle. They might be more winded. Have you ever found or lose flexibility or anything like that? I've never been flexible, so that's out the window from day one. Has that ever been a limiting factor for you, you think? Not in wrestling. Maybe in fighting, yeah, because of kicking and stuff like that. It's hard for me to get anything up high. But, yeah, in wrestling, I always felt good being stiff and strong as hell. I could just muscle people and quick, too.

Just staying quick, stiff, and strong. Yeah, wrestlers are interesting because you watch them sometimes walk around, and they might walk around all weird. Dan Hindo just— Yeah, and then they'll just totally destroy people. You're like, how is this guy able to move like that? And the way that they move. You think that because they're so stiff—

Feet are pointed out, and they kind of waddle around and bam like holy fuck. Yeah it's weird like because the way they walk you're like oh he's going to be stiff and then they fucking do circles around you and shit. They have that tenacity it's crazy. Yeah I think everything's just so tight from you know grappling, wrestling

you're basically it's the same as lifting you know everything's squeezing and tight always so it's like that builds that strength and i think everything just gets so tight that it doesn't want to move you know it's like but it works i mean you get in there and you can just muscle a dude around and yeah i've always liked being strong uh that was something i always focused on even through college just you know trying to hit the weights as much as i could uh you know get as strong as i possibly can for my weight and uh i i felt good my senior year actually jumped up uh because i did way too

much weight cutting uh down to 125s my first couple years and just about killed myself i ended up becoming an all-american for the first time at 125s but man i cutting that weight weighing in once a week sometimes twice a week and having to wrestle an hour after making weight dude it was like brutal um and so the next year my coaches wanted me to just go up to 130 133s and 132s and 133s and uh so beginning here i started cutting and i was still gonna have to cut like 20 pounds. And I was like, you know what? I went in. I had a meeting with them. It's my senior year.

I was like, I would really like to go up to 141s, especially if I'm going to be fighting after this. And the lowest weight class at that time was 145s. So I'm going to be fighting 145s. I might as well get used to dealing with people a little bit bigger than me. So my coaches were like, Sammy Henson and John Azevedo and they're like look we we don't advise this like we think you'll do better at 33s but you know if it's something we saw how bad you killed yourself the last two years um trying to cut to 25s and you know it as long as they're like just so you know if you start losing the guys that are bigger than you

later in the season just because they're bigger not that they're better you're not you're not going to cut back down and so I'm like fine and I ended up going undefeated the entire season my only loss was in the NCAA finals um and so it was the best best season I ever had in my whole life and looking back I'm like I wish I would I would have known that. I would have not cut so much weight my entire high school career and college career. But that's one of those things. That Dan Gable quote makes a lot of sense now because now I think of like I played soccer for 16 years. But that shit, you just go on a field and you run. You don't have to worry about cutting weight.

But the process of weight cutting and feeling like shit as a young athlete, the grit aspect of things, you don't get that in other sports. And the fact that you're, the rest of the toughest part is that you have an hour. So like for dual meets, you cut all that weight. You weigh in and you're like, I feel like shit, but I have to figure it out in my mind and push through that because my components sit next to me in one hour and I'm and the whistle's blowing and I'm going. So, you know, you got to push through that shitty feeling, push through that pain and just figure out how to win, you know. Yeah, wrestling might be almost a little bit like bodybuilding where you have to think about it even when you go home. You got to think about it afterwards.

And you got to think about like recovery and stuff too. I mean, not that other sports don't have a physical demand but it's your it's mainly just your own body you know football you're making a lot of contact so that's another tough one to recover from but some things like basketball and soccer it there's more running like you do make contact with other people but wrestling i mean you see it in the muscle mass that a lot of the grapplers have they have it even without lifting weights so obviously there's there's uh some muscle breakdown that's going on during those sessions yeah 100 um yeah and it's it's a grind i remember in high school just and i don't know looking back on this i don't know i'm sure most high school uh wrestling teams still

do this but it was a we have a small wrestling room and a big heater up on the on the ceiling and it was always like 90 plus degrees 100 degrees in there and that's how we practiced every day and kids be fainting um very rarely but it did happen sometimes very rarely but dude like at the end of practice it would be like somebody dumped buckets of water on the mats like everybody's sweating so much i would lose like six the end of practice, it would be like somebody dumped buckets of water on the mat. It's like everybody's sweating so much. I would lose like six, seven pounds of water weight in an hour practice. And I don't know. I remember our coaches doing it and telling us at the time because it helps you cut weight.

So it's just going to help you lose more weight during that practice. But it's like, is that something they also did to make us mentally tough? I'm guessing that's probably something like pushing through, uncomfortable did you guys know about electrolytes back then i'm just curious like it's like these kids are sweating nutrition like did you guys do fuck with that no i didn't not in high school god damn there was a lot of stuff looking back now i wish i wish i knew more about you know like cutting weight in general, I knew nothing, you know, I would just starve myself, not drink and just eat something that sounded good that I knew didn't weigh very much.

So the, the nutrition factor of it was garbage, you know? And it's like, God, I, I feel like I could have done so much better with somebody in my ear that actually knew what they were doing and what they were talking about and teaching me that stuff. I didn't have, you know, my dad didn't know anything about nutrition or dieting or cutting weight or, you know, it's just something that was so new to all of us. And I didn't start cutting weight till my sophomore year in high school. So, you know, from five all the way up to sophomore year, I year, whatever I weighed is what I wrestled. Then that's where it all started.

What you got, Amadeo? I'm just thinking, nobody really knew about this stuff when we were in high school. This is so new. It's like the last decade. Nutrition, sports nutrition specifically, like the electrolytes. Nobody knew about this 10 years ago. But now kids nowadays, they're not

allowed to cut weight like that. I don't think in California they have to weigh. Percentages and stuff. They have to weigh like that weight right before the match. Sissies. Come on. Come on with all these rules. Toughen them up.

Toughen them up. You can't soccer kick the guy that's on the ground. I mean, what are all these rules you got going on here? In the head. Yeah, right? Ridiculous. How do you eat currently? I know you will get. Ridiculous. How do you, uh, eat currently? I know you will get into the carnivore stuff in a little bit, but, uh, what do you guys got going

on now for nutrition? So for this training camp, I'm, I've been doing a pretty strict diet. Um, it's, it's basically all whole foods. Um, and just really had a team of nutritionists to kind of put all this together based on my weight, my size, my activity that I'm pumping out per day. And basically just in goal, goal in goal, you know. And so for me, it's mostly wild game. I'm doing some beef and chicken that's mixed in there too. I have a beef company, American Almond Beef. So I get to use a lot of my own beef. some beef and chicken that's mixed in there too. I have a beef company, American Almond Beef, so I

get to use a lot of my own beef. And then lots of fruits, some veggies. And the veggies that I'm typically sticking to are like your cucumbers. I do a little bit of broccoli. I'm not really a broccoli fan, but I eat it just kind of to fill my gut a bit. Sometimes green beans. And then I also do potatoes, throwing in some potatoes, sweet potatoes in there. Had some white rice post-workout type stuff for spike in insulin and then also brown rice mixed in as well. So it's all very bland, very clean type stuff, but it's helping me. I'm leaning out, just trying to get my weight down and feel good doing it,

not so much of a starve all at the end and then really have to cut a ton of water weight. I'll probably still have to cut about 10 pounds of water weight that last week, I'm guessing. But yeah, I do. And then fats also, I miss the fats there too. So fats are avocado. I'm using olive oil and animal fats. So whatever the beef has, most wild game doesn't have a ton. So I usually mix in the avocados or the olive oil with the wild game stuff. What's this beef company about? So American Almond Beef.

So you guys know I hunt a ton. Yeah. You know, and I get hit up over the last probably eight years of people like, hey, I love your hunting stuff. Can you sell me some of that wild game? I want to try some elk. I want to try some venison. And legally you can't.

You can't sell wild game. I could give it out but you know i'm going to be like a a distributor or something right no you just can't legally sell wild game so like any elk that you see is all farm raised it's still elk but it's not wild so like anything you order on the internet it's not wild no oh okay i understand now so what I was like, okay, I can't sell wild game, but what can I do that kind of is the closest thing to it? I want to create a healthy beef company that there's no corn, no soy that we feed, no antibiotics, no hormones. They're pasture raised. And then the last 100 to 150 days, we feed them a very high octane blend of almonds, like almond byproducts. So like the whole, we grind that up.

The bran off of brown rice. These are some fancy cows. Oh, yeah. Oh, this is super. The marbling is unbelievable on this stuff. The fat is like a real buttery, like nutty flavor. But we got prunes. We got, we do like an alfalfa hay we do um it's just this blend

and it's on that website if you pull it up there's a picture of uh one of our hands holding the actual feed if you go to shit they eat better than america that's the mix right there that's what they're eating and it's all just super high high in fat high in protein high in fiber high in carbohydrates so you know these cows are just getting tons of nutrients good healthy nutrients They're all just super high in fat, high in protein, high in fiber, high in carbohydrates. So, you know, these cows are just getting tons of nutrients, good, healthy nutrients for the last 100 to 150 days of their life. After being pasture raised. I've never had an almond before. I've had beef. That's the feed.

I had beef that was fed olives. Yeah. And that was really good. So this is probably amazing. Yeah. And like I said, they're mostly pasture raised their whole life but we just finish them off where most like you think you like harris ranch where they finish them off on just corn you know corn and soy right um and so this is just the finish off process so it's healthy from start to finish yeah um and so we created

this company me and uh some of my buddies that launched this. This is our first year, actually. We just launched this at the beginning of the year. But, yeah, we wanted something as healthy and as close to wild game as possible without it being wild game because now we can sell it. It was kind of the thought behind it. So you can't – can you purchase elk or anything, or are you just purchasing beef? On our website, it's just beef. Gotcha.

Just beef. Gotcha. Just beef. And it's, like I said, our angle on that is just that it's finished off on a really high-octane, healthy blend. No hormones, no antibiotics, no soy, no corn. And it's direct-to-consumer. So if people don't want to go to the grocery store, they just go on our website. They can go to the shopping cart, put in whatever steaks, cuts, ground, whatever they want, roast, and it'll show up frozen on their doorstep. Did you know much about farming beforehand? I obviously know a lot about hunting and animals and stuff.

Yeah. Farming is a completely different venture, right? It is, yeah. I did grow up in a small farming town, Hanford, in the valley here in California. grew up in a small farming town, Hanford in the Valley here in California. Um, so yeah, I've been around it my whole life, but it's never been anything like I've been hands-on with, um, which is good. My, a couple of my business partners have done that their whole life. So, um, we got, we got that side of it. Um, me and my buddy, Chad Belding, who has a hunting show on the, on outdoor channel, the foul life. Um, we we're kind of i guess the spokesmen of it

um we have the social media presence that we're trying to just get it out there and then we have the two guys that have uh done all the farming and and all that type of stuff so we got we got the a team or i guess i already mentioned them we got merlot who owns the almond he's like one of the biggest almond growers here in northern californ. So we get a lot of the almonds from his farms. So it all works, man. We got a team together and we created this company. Did you learn some of this or

maybe just pick some of this up by watching Uriah Faber and what he's created with his businesses and stuff? Because it seems like a lot of you guys that have been around him are very business minded. Yeah. A hundred percent,

man. That favor has always been a huge inspiration for me. Uh, as far as business goes, um, he's always got his hands in a million things. And I feel like lately that's kind of how I've been. We also started a, a wild game cookbook and rub company.

We have 10 different rubs, like seasonings, uh, plug it. Where can people get it? Uh, the provider life.com and it's called the people get it? Theproviderlife.com and it's called The Provider.

So we just launched the book. We teamed up with... Damn, send some rub here, bud. Yeah, I'll send you guys. I'll send you some cookbooks too. Jesus. Hey, I need that shit. I'm a day.

Don't bring these things up to me. I mean, you know how much meat I eat. You can't bring up the rub. I'll get you guys, I'll get you a package. Yeah, I tagged you in the post. I'll send you a package of beef Yeah, I tagged you in the post.

I'll send you a package of beef, the rubs, and some cookbooks. That'd be great. That'd be great. Just let me know what you think. But yeah, we launched that. We teamed up with Ben Bella. It's a national publishing company, and they helped us put this whole thing together. Holy crap, was that a lot of work, man. I never would have thought that I'd be doing any type of book, uh, especially, you know, cookbook, but you're going to be a star on Pinterest.

We, I, we did like nine days straight of 10 hour days of cooking photos, cleaning, eating, and like repeat just all that. You're like, I'll take a fight any day over this. Yeah. It was so much work, but I think it turned out well. I like it. There's a lot of hunting stories from over the years of my life. Same with Chad Belding. Tips and tricks in the field. There's even some training stuff that I put in there.

Training techniques and tips and stuff like that. How long have you been into hunting, by the way? Has it been something you've done all your life? Yeah, my dad got me into it when I was little. I remember following him around through the woods when I was a little kid. But yeah, we've always been into living off the land. And, you know, wild game's always been probably

the majority of the meat we've consumed in our house growing up. And then now, even with my family, I'd say it's probably 80% percent of what we eat 80 85 percent i enjoy it and i think i enjoy obviously i enjoy the health aspects to it but uh the whole process like i enjoy hunting i love fishing um putting in the work the skill sets to learn how to use my my bow my you know my rifles and and then having to get out there and put game plans together on finding a target animal and like sneaking in on it, using the wind and like

not being seen and, and then actually making it happen. And then once that happens, you have all this fresh free range organic meat to live off for, you know, however long months. Could you imagine like you, you're on a hunt and you blow it and the animal gets away? Yeah, well, nowadays it happens where you're like, oh, fuck it, let's go home and maybe drink some beer in the truck on the way home and go have a fucking cheeseburger from In-N-Out or something on your drive home. But years and years ago, you wouldn't have that. You would have had to have gotten the shot. Otherwise, you'd be really hungry.

Oh, yeah. Yep. All right. So probably an ignorant question, but for someone who's never hunted before, let's say someone wants to get into doing some hunting, maybe hunting an elk. I don't know what the basic thing someone would hunt is, but what are the financials on hunting? Because I feel like you need some shit.

Yeah, it can be expensive. And so going back to the first business, I started fins and feathers. Yeah. That's kind of what our business model is. We take a lot of first time hunters, people that have never done it before. They'll email us like, Hey, what do I need to do to get started? And we steer them in the direction of getting their hunter safety course done. Once they get a license and their hunter safety course done, then we can book them on a trip. We have a bunch of different types of trips that range in price from, you know, wild pig hunt that, you know, 1400 bucks. And it's, you know, obviously it's a little bit more expensive than just going up, buying a pig from the farm, but it's an experience we're teaching you how to do

it. And it's all free range organic. so that obviously makes it a little bit more expensive too but you know you're looking at killing a 200 to 300 pound pig um and that's a lot of pork to load the freezer up with so um but yeah all the way up to elk you know we have elk hunts that you know some of that stuff can be pretty pricey but um fins and feathers fins and feathers uh fins and feathers spelt with z's ah okay five nz pat roger family how's it going we talk about sleep all the time on this podcast that's why we partnered with eight sleep mattresses now this mattress is the tesla of sleep it's tesla of beds its technology tracks your heart rate your heart rate variability it changes its own temperature based off the way you sleep so that you get better sleep every single night it is quite literally

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combo links to them down in the description, as well as the podcast show notes. Let's get back to the podcast. What was the carnivore diet like for you? Because you mentioned earlier, I think that you did it for like three or four months straight. Yeah, I did four months straight and it was basically the reason, I mean, you were a big motivator for that, honestly. Oh, cool. Yeah, you were. I follow you on Instagram. I see all your meals and I see when you go through the diet and there's so many times I'm like, fuck, good I wouldn't mind this diet you know and so uh but I have psoriasis I've had psoriasis hey we talked about it last time on the podcast and um it's been something I've struggled with my whole life there it is so this is a psoriasis like a virus no it's autoimmune disease it's um basically

what happens is that part of the skin like we all have skin cells that die and just shut off. And those skin cells there just reproduce so fast that it doesn't have time to like shut off like normal. So it just builds up plaques is what they call it, just dead skin. And so it just gets super dry, super itchy, cracks, it bleeds. And I've struggled with this my whole life. It's a hereditary thing. My uncle has it. You know, as an adult and as somebody who's well accomplished, you know, it's like, all

right, well, my fucking legs are red. What was it like as a kid? Oh, man, I'd always be itching them. And I didn't know what it was. Real embarrassing, right? Yeah, I didn't know what it was. Did it get on your face and stuff too? No, not on my face.

It started off on my shins as a kid and that's the only place that i had it for a long time but it just like over the years just kind of got bigger and bigger and bigger so at first it started off it was only like a little patch like that on one shin and then it started going ended up going from ankle like that all the way up to my knee and it switched over to the other side and started going ankle to knee on that side and then in college i started getting on my scalp, my ears. And then just over the years, it's just kind of starting to spread all over. Got my elbows now. And so it's just something that I was like, at this point, I'm like, I got to figure out something new. I've taken different medications, basically over-the-counter like creams or even uh prescription type creams

and yeah they help but it's never been anything that's like really taking it away and what is this i'm putting on myself i don't even know how this shit is so so i'm like there's got to be something else so seeing you you know listening to rogan um you know talking to dr sean baker Um, you know, talking to Dr. Sean Baker and, uh, and just, and Paul, uh, Saladino, Dr. Saladino and just getting their perspective on the thing on, on the situation. I ended up saying, okay, I'm going to do this for four months and basically it's going to be an elimination diet. What is causing, is there something that I'm eating that's screwing up my gut that's inflaming this?

Um, because they say a lot of autoimmune diseases come from the gut bacteria and all that so I'm like all right you know what screw it I'm gonna try this so jumped right into a full bore like after after that trip that was a hunt I got back from the hunt and I looked at myself and I was just like are you kidding me that's crazy for people who don't have a visual it kind of looks like poison ivy or something like that. Like there's some swelling and a lot of dry skin and it looks like a blistery. So, and then does it hurt? Yeah. Yeah. It's like irritating. It looks like, it looks like it would be like irritated. Yeah. So I jumped right in and about two weeks, I think, I think it was two weeks. I did a, uh, like basically a before and after of being on the diet. And I don't know if you can

see it. I think it's on this one. And I don't know if you can see it. I think it's on this one. Yeah. So that's already like two weeks, I think, is what I said on there. I can't remember. But it wasn't very long into it. And then we got to also say that some of that probably has to do with you're off your feet a little bit more. You weren't still on the hunt.

The hunt might have aggravated it, right? Yeah. And that's what I was telling you earlier. I think one of the main things I've noticed that inflames it the most is lack of sleep. So, you know, eight hour, like less than eight hours, like six hours, four to six hours, which I typically get on these hunts, you know, because you're getting up before the sun comes up. And, you know, sometimes, you know, you go to bed late after harvesting something in the evening, whatever. So, you know, you're getting four hours of sleep. You go four or five days of that and I come home from a hunt and it's really inflamed yeah it's a huge difference though i mean it's

incredible the difference i mean it looks like after two weeks it looks like it's gone yeah it helped and so so my my thought was this like i'm gonna try this for you know a month and if nothing's changing with my psoriasis i'll probably just go back to eating how I did before. But like two weeks in, I was like, oh, this is obviously doing something. And so I stuck with it. I did it for four months straight and I felt really good. You know, the first week I felt crappy.

I think they call it the keto flu is what it is. Not crappy, just feel, for me, I just felt unmotivated i just felt lazy and tired did you have electrolytes at that time because for a lot of people that makes a difference it dumps water out of your system the first couple days maybe yeah and you lose like five you know anywhere between four or five pounds which people are used to having that extra like little fluff on them yeah and when it's gone it just kind of does make you feel drained you go to like lift or something and you notice that you shake with weights that are a lot lighter than normal. And you're like, I don't understand what's going on.

And then you kind of just feel like shit for a little bit. Yep, yep. So that was exactly what he's talking about. A week and a half. I didn't know that. And see, I probably should have done a little bit more research on that. I went on Rogan's podcast and he was saying there's supplements that will help with that that I didn't know about. And looking back, if I do that hardcore again like that that i didn't know about and i i looking back

or if i do that hardcore again like that i probably would look into that maybe i can just hit you up and see what you think but absolutely yeah just salting your food or like we have a new hydration product that we that just came out and we've been working on that for a long time but a lot of these hydration products can help uh we've been with a company called element for quite some time they have a great product and it's. And it's just a way to add some salt, potassium, magnesium, calcium to your diet where otherwise you're kind of losing it. When you don't have carbs in your system, the carbohydrates can really help hydrate the muscles. And when that's absent, you get rid of that. Or even just getting rid of junk in general that you're eating, your body's not going to hold as much water so you'll feel fatigued yeah and i did notice that for like i said a week

and a half and then but i leaned out big time like it's crazy how much i leaned out in just like a month i was like man this is good i feel good now my body's obviously responding well to it my psoriasis is doing better so i was like like, I'm just going to do it for four months. I did it for four months. And then after that, uh, Dr. Sean was saying basically like, Hey, just start adding stuff in, um, and just see, he's like, you don't need to stay on that strict of it, a carnivore diet for the rest of your life. You don't, you know, it's not, you're not doing it for health reasons. You're doing it for, uh, psoriasis basically to see what, what inflames it. So I started adding things back in i tried um you know some rice i had some rice back in with some sushi and that didn't seem to do much

um and i did a little bit of potatoes the night shades can be tricky there like i noticed peppers like peppers and tomatoes really uh bug it but for whatever what. What a great thing to know, though, right? Yeah. Like now you know. And you can be like, I don't mind paying the price of eating some pizza tonight or whatever. Yeah. Uh-huh. Yeah, and that's the thing.

It's not like I'm going to be on the toilet crapping my brains out. I just have to deal with a little bit of a skin irritation. So right here, you're saying it's three months into the diet. Yeah. Fucking hands are so fast. That was right. Yeah, bro. I fast that was right yeah bro i think that was right at the beginning of us starting the train again huh

for the at least when it was supposed to be in october it just looks like just a little jab you know but that would hurt so bad but yeah man i was feeling good uh like i said i. Felt light and fast, and it was good. I'm normally having to eat like every hour to two hours. Shit, let's watch that. Play that back. Yeah, it's just a long loop. Yeah, I want you guys to pay attention to his feet.

It's crazy. Like the arms are flying, and that's the thing everyone looks at, but the balance that it takes to throw bombs like that and to throw shots like that real quickly is, it's unbelievable the amount of athleticism. Like you wouldn't, I don't know, you just, you don't think about it. The feet, yeah.

I notice it big time when my legs are not in condition. There we go. Shape. Yeah, watch this. Jesus. If you were to slow that down, you wouldn't really find him on the ground that much. And that was Tyson.

When Tyson was in his prime, he was just leaping across the ring zigzagging on people like i don't i just i think it's a shame that tyson never get the credit as the athlete that he was he's one of the greatest athletes of all time but because he had that kind of stocky build and he just knocked people out i think everyone just thought he was like explosive, but it's like, he was super athletic. You see those shadow boxing videos with him? Like even now he can still move. Yeah. It wasn't,

it wasn't even steps. It was like literally his feet, like hopping from around. Yeah. Like little floating things. You're like, what the hell? How is he doing that?

I think they did a video of it. That last fight he did on the, you know, a couple of a year ago or whatever. With that. Oh, were you about with him no no okay i'm just i'm just here with that being said uh when we were talking out there uh i was asking you about if you still like do grappling you're like yeah you've been doing grappling all your life but boxing uh apparently like that's what you really really like now so as far as boxers are concerned do you are there any boxers that you look at and you watch you're like man i love watching i've been for the last

year like when i run i'll do a five mile run i'll just put uh canelo videos on on the treadmill and i just zone out and i'm just like watching non-stop studying that's i mean his style to me is like it's it's beautiful his power his speed his defense his offense like everything about it is like that's that's that obsession we were talking about and it's i had that with wrestling uh i got that about sophomore year and in high school up until that i did it it was fun but it was like my dad, I just did it because my dad wanted me to do it. And I just, that was normal. But I got that obsession sophomore year in high school.

And I made, like I was doing so much extra stuff on my own. And I made huge gains and ended up being a state placer that year from 80 pounds on JV to a state placer the next year. And just that obsession stayed with me through high school, jumped into college. And then, you know, you start winding down from your wrestling career to now mixed martial arts. I jumped right in the next day after I graduated.

And you get that new obsession. And it's like MMA is the new thing. And it's like you start watching all these different fighters. I used to watch Faber all the time, you know, Anderson Silva, like all these guys and you, you see their techniques and you like pick and choose and you just like add it to the repertory, you know, and just study it and love it. Um, and you make huge gains. And for me now I finished that MMA obsession, and now boxing for me right now is that new, just, it's new. It's, you know, I love watching Canelo. I love his movements.

I try to emulate that. Tyson, too. I absolutely love Tyson's stuff. Oh, God, yeah. Yeah. Did you, Anderson Silva, he did a couple boxing matches more recently, right? And he did really well, right? Yeah, who did he fight? Chavez? Was it Chavez? I think he, I think he did. Yeah. I think recently, right? And he did really well, right? Yeah, who did he fight?

Chavez? Was it Chavez? Yeah, I think he, I think he did. Yeah, Chavez. I think he won. He did, yeah. He knocked him out, I think.

I've never seen anything like Anderson Silva. As long as the UFC's been around, I've never seen anyone. I guess, I guess the biggest, it wasn't even a change because it happened so early, but Hoyce being in,

like that was the, watching Hoyce Gracie, what he was able to do to people because they just never seen anything like it before. And then watching Anderson decades later just doing weird stuff. You're like, I don't understand what this guy's doing to people. He did fight Chavez Jr. Yeah.

What? That's a legit boxer, too. That's not a fucking, that's not a celebrity. Anderson Silva's like 42 years old or something like that, or 44. Holy shit, dude. I didn't know he fought him. Yeah, this was recent. I don't think it was that long ago. that's not a celebrity Anderson Silva's like 42 years old or something like that or 44 shit dude I didn't know he fought him yeah this was recent I don't think it was that long ago I gotta start paying attention to stuff the spider I feel like it kind of went under the radar like I I didn't see a lot of build up yeah to it and had I known he was gonna because you know like you see

like the stuff on uh like with Jake Paul and stuff he's kind of doing like celebrity type stuff yeah that's a legit boxer. Yeah. Holy shit. That's fucking awesome. Let's fast forward this. I want to say it was on the same night as like another one of those celebrity boxers. Yeah.

Look at Anderson, how smooth he is. Yeah. He looks like a good boxer. Yeah. I'm going to go back and watch this whole fight. I think Anderson Silva or maybe some other people were talking about like the Paul brothers. And they're like, I don't hear anybody mentioning Anderson Silva's name. No.

I know. There's probably a reason. Yeah. Or even Mike Rashid. Mike Rashid has a long history of boxing. He's been boxing since he was a kid. Yeah. And he got back into it more recently.

And he's been looking unreal. But you don't hear the YouTubers talking about Mike Rashid. They don't want to mess with that. I doubt you think too much about it, but what do you even think about that? The Jake Pauls and that type of boxing. I mean, they're making money. Good for them. You know, I do think Jake's the younger one, right?

Jake's the younger one. He's an athlete, you know. Bottom line,'s the younger one yeah he's he's an athlete you know bottom line you know yeah he's a youtube guy but that's what made him well that's what made his name famous but i mean they used to wrestle i mean they've been boxing and doing athletic stuff most of their life it's not like he was just some like youtube nerd that just jumped right into it he he knows what he's doing i i watched his training i see him hit mitts i watched him fight now a couple times and he he knows what he's doing he's athletic he's explosive he has you know some you know good good technique um but you know i think i think the question is what's going to happen when he gets in there with an actual boxer?

And that's the thing. He hasn't fought any good boxers. Yeah, Tyrone Woodley was a UFC champ, but he was a wrestler. He was never known for his – I mean, I guess he did have big power. He would knock people out with overhands and stuff. But it's not like he's a technical boxer. Gotcha. What weight class are they?

They're big. I think they're like's a technical boxer. Gotcha. What weight class are they? They're big. I think they're like 200 pounds or so. Yeah. Who knows if they even bother. Yeah, right. I have no idea. I don't know. I don't know.

So fast forward, and you do really well in this fight, and you get a call from Dana White. Now what are we talking about? Now what will happen? I think my wife will cut my nuts off at that point she'll be like who the fuck's on the phone yeah i don't know if i would push it anymore we'll see though uh yeah it ultimately it would have to be but then we know that we know that our boy josh emmett's gonna have a belt you're gonna want to match that you're gonna want to

have a shiny belt too. Yeah. Because we need a couple belts here in Sacramento, right? The tricky thing is me and Josh are in the same weight class. I don't know how that dude makes 45s, but he does. He is a beast. He's amazing, yeah. We had him on the podcast a couple weeks back. He is a beast.

I don't like getting hit by that guy. So you might do boxing for a while, you think? Maybe, yeah, we'll see. I mean, we talked about this. I've never done this, especially bare knuckle. I've never fought in a boxing fight. Yeah, I've fought MMA, but this is going to be the first time boxing competitively.

And then throw in the mix of it being bare knuckle. So I'm either going to love this or I'm going to hate it. So this is kind of the test run here we'll see like i said i'm obsessed with the sport right now i love learning i love the the gains we're making and it's been fun so i might go in there and kale this dude and just be like dude this is awesome or i still could go out there and kale this dude and be like this was stupid i'm not doing it ever again so i don't know we just gotta we gotta see when i get out there and KO this dude and be like, this was stupid. I'm not doing it ever again. So I don't know. We just gotta, we gotta see when I get in there and fight on February 19th and just kind of see what, what happens. And who are you fighting? I don't think I'm supposed to say

it actually. I think there's some leakage. It got out a little bit, but, uh, until they officially announced it, but we do have an opponent. Cool. Your, um, energy output on the carnivore diet looked like it was really good when you were training there. Was it consistently pretty good or did you have a little bit of highs and lows? You know, and that's one of the reasons I started implementing more carbohydrates back in. I would fill like that big explosive combo that I threw right there. I could maybe throw two or three of those and then I would start filling yeah that explosiveness start to dwindle away um and and I didn't like that so I started that's why I started throwing in the potatoes and a little bit of the rice and even oats whole oats

and just kind of adding that stuff back in um and once I did that I it leveled everything back out again um but I think after, after my fight, I'll probably drop a lot of that stuff again and just get back to, go back to it just for overall like health purposes and not necessarily to be like ripped or anything. Yeah. I think for me, the hardest thing is as much as I travel, um, and, and then being on these hunts, um, it's because, like, we cook these big dinners for clients where it's, like, big pasta dinners, spaghetti and, you know, elk meat sauce and, you know, garlic bread. And so we're, like, serving them. And then I sit down and I have, like, a ribeye.

And they're just like, what the hell? You know? And so it's almost like I got to, like, go sneak and eat away from them. But, yeah, I just sometimes feel bad and it's tough to do, to stick to. But I think all in all, I'm going to try to implement this into my life as much as possible. Do you have to mess with much running? Or you've been in pretty good shape, and there's not a lot of reason to run? No, I've actually implemented more running in this in this training for boxing

than any of my mma stuff um mainly because i only have one discipline to train now it's like i can focus everything on boxing instead of boxing kickboxing wrestling jujitsu strength and conditioning you know we're doing strength and conditioning which we implement the running a lot of times in that also, but then also at home, you know, doing that on my own and then just boxing. So mitt work, sparring. Mainly on a treadmill? Mainly. I'll mix it up though.

The tough thing for me is I live up in Auburn, so it's a lot of big hills. Oh shit, yeah. And so it's for me to get like a five-mile run where I'm like sweating enough and like feeling like I burned enough calories to like call it a good workout, it's so much harder. So I don't want to like completely crush my legs on those. So a lot of the times I'll mix in the treadmill and then throw in some of those hill-type runs too here and there.

Yeah, treadmills are probably a little safer too. Yeah. And with all these years of like you've been wrestling since you were five, you did UFC, now you're doing this. How have you managed to keep your body from, like, feeling run down? Like, how do you feel right now compared to, like, maybe when you were 29, 30? Do you feel comparable? And if you do, how are you doing that? I think I'd feel, I feel comparable. I mean, I think for me, I,

I retired at the end of 2018. So I took, you know, good two years off before I really started doing anything like, like high intensity again. So I think taking that time off really allowed my body to heal up um and just kind of regroup I think mentally and physically um but you just you still did some training right like you're still lifting and I did a couple uh grappling competitions too so I would you know four or five six weeks of training for that and then go do it but you know it still wasn't anything as high intensity like uh MMA fight but was still getting in there and doing stuff. And another thing that I really started focusing, I got back to my basics, my core of running and lifting. God, I love lifting weights.

I love – I don't know what it is. I just feel so damn good getting in there and doing a hard, heavy lift. I feel like my testosterone just goes through the roof. I feel good. testosterone just goes through the roof. I feel good. My energy is good. My body just reacts really well to heavy lifting. So I was doing a lot of that, running, trying to stay somewhat in shape, keep the health benefits going, and then also just tearing it up in the weight room. Do you get any time to yourself to just kind of grow mentally,

whether it be listening to a podcast? I mean, it sounds like you have a very consumed day by all this training. When you go for a run, maybe, do you have headphones on? Or when you're lifting, do you kind of get in a zone? And it's just these things that just help you with mindfulness and just help you feel good each day? Yeah. I think for me, you know, I try to do a lot of, I try to do the podcast. It's tough because, you know, two, two kids at home, right. You know, wife, I got three businesses and training. Um, and then I'm also, you know,

I work with 10 different outdoor companies as an influencer. So I'm like having to create content for that on top of all that stuff nonstop. So really my only time would be driving. Like I have an hour drive down to the gym, but that's typically the time I used to catch up on phone calls and do all the work stuff on the phone. So there isn't a ton of like extra time where I can just go and like sit and listen to a podcast like I'd like to. When I run, typically it's whatever music that's motivating to me, but I'm watching Canelo videos. So it's like I'm studying.

That's kind of my time to like zone in on that. And that's that feel good for me, I think. It's just, you know, learning. I'm learning. I'm watching and soaking that in like a spline so yeah well let me ask both you guys this first like someone who wants to let's say they're looking to get into fighting boxing or something like that right um if they have no experience because you mean before you got into boxing you didn't have any experience with it before you started ma how would you suggest that they do it if they want to actually be effective?

Be a beginner. White belt. Start at the bottom and just like you said, you know, footwork. When I started boxing, I boxed when I was younger, but when I started again, it was just like line drills. Pushing off your back foot, stepping with your front foot. It's boring, but that's how

you get good. The basics. Get good at the basics. Yeah. Fundamentals. I think with anything. I mean, I remember teaching kids wrestling and that was always the first thing I would tell them. Cause you get, you get these kids, you know, they see all the flashy stuff and they want to start off with that right off the bat. And it's like, no, you got to get good at the basics before you can start doing that. And that's the case with MMA. That's the case with boxing. That's the case with boxing.

That's the case with, I feel like, any sport, really. And you got your freak athletes every once in a while that can just basically jump in there and start off doing pretty much anything. But that's extremely rare. So I'd say, you know, master the basics, get as good as you possibly can with that, and then start growing off of that. I would even say that to somebody who's going to be a black belt. Go back to your fundamentals. They're always going to need to be a priority. Yeah, we see that a lot with lifting. Somebody will have an error that happens when they do a lift.

And then we'll say, okay, we'll go back and use a lighter weight. Use a weight that's so light that you can actually think about it so you can actually practice it. I'm not really sure why in powerlifting in particular people don't practice it. When it comes to Olympic lifting, Olympic lifters will practice the exercise. Bodybuilders will practice because they kind of the nature of the sport, you got to use a lighter weight to concentrate on the bice bicep and kind of get that mind muscle connection type of deal but in powerlifting people don't think about it as much and in mma and boxing i think people are

mindful of it i think in wrestling you're pretty mindful of it jujitsu there's a lot of drills and you can say hey that was fucking sloppy like let's go back and and correct that the interesting thing is in powerlifting when you when you correct something and you go back and, and correct that. The interesting thing is in powerlifting, when you, when you correct something and you go back to the basics and you go back to using 225 on something like a deadlift, that same error will probably still occur for a long time, but it'll just happen with heavier and heavier weights, you know, because it's really rare for somebody to really truly like solve an issue for themselves. In your career, what has been some feedback that you either gotten from just getting your ass kicked or

having your team say, Hey man, like your left hook is awful. That's why you're getting hit by this or that, or your, your team giving you like some real straightforward team and your friends giving you straightforward criticism. What has been something you've been able to maybe say, okay, I need to go back to the basics and drill that more because I'm just not that good at that particular thing. I mean, for me, it was being a wrestler my whole life. The boxing, the standup part of it was so new. Like I'd been bent over my whole life in a wrestling stance and now I'm standing straight up, you know, with my hands up here and punches are getting whizzed past my face. So it was it wasn't that I couldn't throw the punches. It was being confident and comfortable in an actual fight to get out there and throw the punches.

Yeah, not going like this. Yeah. Or just freaking out. Yeah, exactly. And so, you know, I think that was the biggest thing for me was just, and Faber did a good job of trying to put things into perspective for me and just, you know, making me realize, you know, it's not every single punch is going to knock you out. Because I think the biggest fear is if I throw, if I open up to throw something, I might get caught. And it's like, well, yeah, but, you know, you're tough. You got no neck. This is what Faber used to tell me. You're tough. You have no neck.

It's going to be pretty tough to knock you out. So, you know, it took, it took a while for me to learn that part of it. But once I got that confidence and realized, okay, I can start knocking people out. You know, I have the power, I have the speed, I have the explosivity to get in there and, and put people to sleep. I need to get out there and actually do it um you know once i i figured that out that's what happened i got out there and i think it went on like a four or five fight streak where i knocked knocked the guy out in a row um and that was mainly because faber just being in my ear you know telling me like dude you have to let your hands go. Can punching power be trained? It's always kind of a topic of controversy. To an extent.

I believe to an extent. You can give people, especially if you have somebody who's got it kind of naturally. I think there's like somebody who can throw or hit or, you know, they probably picked it up from genetics when they were a kid. But just getting them stronger you know teaching them how to rotate technical stuff I think you can to an extent

yeah some people are just heavy handed though too right yeah body mechanics I think is a big part of it being explosive

and strong I think a mixture of strength being explosive and then having the right body mechanics to throw these punches correctly I think it all comes together.

And that's really what makes the heaviest of hitters, I think. When you see new UFC stuff nowadays, you know, when like as sports evolve, people start doing it when they're younger and younger and younger and maybe concentrating on it. So I'm curious, have you seen anything where like, well, if I was, if I started my UFC career now, let's say if you're younger right now, do you think there'd be a difference in terms of the way you'd be, you'd perform? Probably. And that's, I mean, me and Faber used to talk about this six years ago, seven years ago. Remember Bopo and, and Andrew, and we had these, these young kids that were in there when they were what, eight years old. They've been there when they were, what, eight years old?

They've been there since they were about eight. Eight years old and training full MMA, though, not just like us, like, oh, I'm a wrestler or, oh, I'm a boxer. It's full MMA. And it's like that's the new breed. At that time, like, there wasn't any of us that had ever done that. And so they're training with us on the daily. And, I mean, these kids are both animals now. But it's like I remember me and Faber used to joke, like, let's get in and get out of this sport before that generation gets in, because it's going to be next level. I try to move out of the way. We talked a little bit about recovery, but

Amadeo, do you believe in like, you know, cold therapy, sauna? Like, are you a fan of some of that? Yeah. all that stuff. Just stay up on the mic. Some of it's much better than the other stuff, like sleep, nutrition. Like, those are going to be, like, the big rocks. The real basics. Drill those all the time. And then, like, I'm actually a fan of ice baths.

So, like, just getting into an old school tub of ice. And then the cryotherapy stuff, the infrared saunas, all that stuff's great. I don't like it. Some guys can take it, like they think that they're automatically recovered because they did 30 seconds in the 200 degrees or whatever it is,

but I think it's good supplemental stuff, but it's not a foundation. Or they take it the other way and they're like, I did 30 minutes, and you're like, that's probably a little severe with how hard you're training all the time. How does it make you feel when you do stuff like that?

Do you like it? Does it help? I do, yeah. I've been doing cryo the last few years. I absolutely hate ice baths. Why? Oh, my God. It's tough.

It's the worst. It's tough. But, I mean, I notice I get, at least for me, when I would do ice baths in college, and then I do the cryo now, which is only three minutes, I feel like I get the same results. So I'm like, I cut out the ice bath. I don't know. There's probably scientific studies say that maybe the ice bath's better, but I feel good, and that's all I need. There we go.

But I do sauna too. I've been doing, you know, after one of our long workouts, I'll finish off in the sauna for, you know, 20, 30 minutes and just sweat it out, feel good, get out. Yeah. I like them. I feel like that type of stuff for recovery is good. Whether it's physically good, at least it's mentally good.

So if that's the case, then it's good. How old are your kids? I have a seven-week-old and a two-and-a-half-year-old. You're going to teach them to hunt? You're going to teach them to fight? Oh, yeah. Hunt, for sure. Self-defense.

I'd probably rather not see them compete in fighting, but if it's something they wanted to do, then I'd be all for it. But the hunting is pretty cool. My youngest daughter this year in the fall, our California turkey season, she sat in the blind with me, and I harvested a turkey with her right there, and she got to see the whole thing go down. We plucked it all together, and we cooked it. I showed her from start to finish of uh how our thanksgiving turkey right to the table so that's great you got to see it all

and loved it and it was pretty cool that's really great because like someone who's 25 that's never seen that before they they see something like that and they think it's gross yeah it's like no this is this is life yeah this is the process yeah that is it is life. This is what we all, I mean, if you're eating a turkey at the table, this happened somewhere, just somebody else did it for you. And I'd rather be the one in charge and know exactly who's touched this and how it's been processed and put on our table. So it was pretty cool. She sat there.

She had a little chair next to me, and she's got a little yogurt pouch. And it was first thing in the morning, so she woke up up she's got a little beanie on and all bundled up and she's just sitting there and they come walking in and i'm like all right they're coming in get ready as soon as one comes into 20 yards i'm papa's gonna get them and she's just sitting there sucking on a yogurt pouch and like she's watching a movie you know feet straight out and uh ended up pulling back shot one and they gobbled when I shot, cause it like startled them. And she's like, Oh, they go, they gobbled. She got all excited and, and you know, it's flopping around and we went out there and she got to see it up close and, you know, wanted

to touch it. And, you know, I think it's, I think it's crucial to, at least, at least for me wanting to show my family the start to finish where where our food comes from having the respect for nature and understanding that you know for us to eat meat something's got to die and we do it with respect and we do it with honor i'm not you know driving around in the back of a truck with a machine gun just mowing shit down and laughing and driving off you know that's not what hunting is about so um you know i want her to understand that. I want both of my daughters to understand that, you know, my wife came from Missouri, so her dad hunted a little bit, but she didn't really know much about it. But, um, I got her into hunting a bit. She's killed a wild boar, a couple of turkeys with her bow and arrow.

And, um, she, she lives off the wild game that we eat or that we harvest and loves it. And it's, it's kind of cool. Hey, it's very, um, I guess this day and age is very different, but, uh, that's one of the reasons why we started the provider and that brand is just spreading that knowledge and trying to keep that tradition alive for this next generation and, and let people know that leaving off the land is okay. You know, I feel like a lot of people in this day and age look at it like they demonize it and it's, you're, you're evil and you're, you're a horrible person if you hunt. And it's like, we're not, you're just bloodthirsty and it's, that's not the case, you know? And that's what we want to spread that there, there is respect. I respect these

animals. I'm not going out there to kill just because I feel like killing something. Like I'd rather go out and harvest that meat and put it in my freezer and live off it and know that, you know, no other human has ever touched that. You know, there's no antibiotics. There was no hormones. There's nothing crazy that's pumped into it. You know, who knows it's created in the lab. I don't know what the hell they put in them, but, um, you know, it's, it's something that I've done. I've put in the time and the energy and the effort, and now we get to reap the rewards and live off this healthy meat and feel good and, and know exactly where everything came from. So what would you like your kids to learn?

What would you like to pass on from like yourself and your wife to your kids? Um, I mean, if anything that, are you just talking about just in life in general? Yeah. Just in general. Yeah. Oh man. That as far, I mean,

you obviously see the passion that I have for the outdoors and, and what hunting and fishing and, and that lifestyle means to me, I think being able to pass that passion on to them would be like the ultimate goal for me, you know, and, and having my daughters, whether they want to hunt or not, when they get older, just understanding why it's done and why we do it. because we're becoming so disconnected from everything food-wise. Being able to walk into a grocery store and buy a slab of meat that's just an old styrofoam container with plastic over the top, there's no face to it. There was no death associated with it.

And you'd be surprised how many people, when I post to hunting people, say, why don't you just go to the grocery store and buy your meat like everybody else and stop killing these animals? No joke, I get that so many times a year. And it's like, it blows my mind. I don't understand how you can become so disconnected from reality with things like that. But that's the case. And if I could pass anything along, it's just knowing what our existence here on earth is all about.

And for us to eat meat, something has to die, and that's the circle of life. As far as hunting's concerned, man, because what you're talking about is hunting and then harvesting it for food, whether it's your family or other families. What are your thoughts on people who just hunt for sport, sport hunting where it's not used for food or anything.

I don't, I know that some animals, people hunt them because they're actually too many of them in certain areas. So there's that. But what do you think about that side of hunting? Do you do any of that? Like, is there,

so that's a very big, I guess fallacy is what I can say here. There is no such thing as, I mean, I guess there is no such thing as, um, I mean, I guess there is a such thing, but sport hunting, when you say you kill it, not for food.

Um, I guess the only type of hunting that I can think of is probably predator hunting like coyotes, you know, to control population. But, um, like say you go to Africa, these guys that spend these hundreds of thousands of dollars on hunts over in Africa, that money goes back into conservation and goes back into paying security guards to monitor the poachers that go out and just kill a rhino, cut its horn off, and leave the body there.

You know, African poachers. So that money is used for conservation for those animals. Um, it gets put back into the economy there. Um, and then anything that is killed, all the tribes eat like that is. So you got a guy that goes, I mean, this is always a very, um, unsettling topic. A lot of people debate on this. So, and I'm kind of like, I'm almost in the middle here because I get, these guys spend this big money to go over there. That money gets put back into conservation, which helps all the animals. They know that. Their goal is to go over there. They just want to kill a rhino or whatever it is, you know, a giraffe or whatever. But they know that that food's going to be created for all

these tribes. So when, say they kill, you know, whatever it is over there, the tribesmen come in and they process and take everything from that animal. And now that gets spread out through all the tribes and that's food and hides and whatever else they make from the animals, the bones, the, you know what I mean? They use everything, the organs. And so that's all a usable source. But the main reason that guy went over there was to harvest a trophy. Whether what he's doing is, you know, a positive or not, that's the argument there. He just wants to go over there to kill a trophy. So I see both sides there in that sense. That's kind of a touchy subject but coming back over here to the states like there isn't any source of trophy hunting legally whatever you go out and hunt you have to take and you know whatever you do with it after that who knows you know but you

have to legally take it home so if i go kill a elk or a deer or a bear or a turkey whatever I can't just come up take a picture and walk off you know like I have to harvest that animal break it all down take it home with me and have the meat there which I eat all of it anyways but and I think most hunters do I've personally never met anybody that just goes and kills something and like takes it and throws it in the trash or anything like that so yeah um so yeah the sport hunting i guess it would just have to be associated with africa is that kind of what you're talking about yeah yeah some of that stuff because like i'm happy you explained that because i've never looked into any of this but you just see random pictures of people standing by an animal

on social media and then all the comments are like yeah and then you're like oh that kind of sucks right where they don't understand everything that you just mentioned. That's actually helping the people that's helping the economy over there. There's a lot of actual potential benefits to this. And it's not just some evil guy going out to kill an animal and leave it there to rot. Yeah. Or people just see like the, uh, like the stuffed elk on the wall and think like, Oh, that's really why you killed an animal just to put it on your wall. But it's like, no, it's like the whole other side of that wall too yeah yeah and it's like the the the taxidermy work i have taxidermy work i you know there's a lot of hunts that were

super memorable to me you know my dad and my wife and i before our kids we did a backcountry oregon hunt where we had a company you know pack us pack us in on horses and, and set up a, we set up a wall tent, wood burning stove. And we lived out of that for a week, you know, and I harvested this elk with my wife right by my side and it's on my YouTube. I actually have a YouTube channel. Um, and I self film most of my hunts and edit them myself and put them up there. So if anyone wants to watch, but this hunt is on there. And what's so special about this was it was the first time my wife had ever been right there for me with an elk. You know, I harvested this elk, but the goal, it was a public land hunt. If I got a bull, we were going to use the back straps and a lot of that meat. We were going to get married. Uh, I think it was that

a few months away. So we needed to get an elk there. I got an elk in Utah and I got a bull moose in Alaska. We took all that meat and that's what fed our entire wedding, our whole wedding. So yeah, we did so many cool different appetizers and all the, you know, main courses and everything. So what was super special about that hunt was that my wife was right there.

She was filming me and we ended up getting it. And so now we had enough meat to that. That was the last animal of the three that we needed. And so it was just super memorable. So I got that, that bull is, you know, the skull with the antlers are up on my wall. And that's what I look at. And that's what reminds me of that hunt and all those memories. Is that the bull moose or elk?

That's the bull moose. That's the bull moose. That's the bull moose. Yep. Shit. Me and my buddy went up about 150 miles up the Yukon and the Koyukuk River on his little boat. You could see it back there. What's that thing, like a thousand pounds?

Oh, two, two thousand pounds. Wow. Biggest animal I've ever walked up on right there. Oh, shit. I drew that tag and it took us over 10 hours to get that thing cut up and on the boat and back to our camp that day. Wow. Damn. Yeah, and now you shot it and now you got to try to figure out who's going to carry this fucking thing.

No, it was a ton of work. We had to just break it all down. You're basically butchering a whole cow, like a beef cow. Right. Two of us. Wow. Yeah, how do you get the 2,000 pounds out of there? beef cow. Two of us. How do you get the 2,000 pounds out of there? That's 2,000 pounds on the hoof.

Really take the guts out and hide. The rack itself. You end up with a couple hundred pounds of good meat. It's probably, I think after everything was about 400 pounds. 400 or 500 pounds of meat.

That's a lot of work to haul that out of there. Oh, yeah. And you can't leave anything behind? No. I mean, you leave like the bones and stuff. Got it. But like, you know, all the meat. I took the heart, the liver, the tongue.

We did, you know, the head, the cape, cape the hide like all that stuff you ever eat any brain? I haven't man that's no I'm a I'm a little bit weird there I don't know

I might it looks gnarly yeah it looks gnarly it's got a weird look to it I just know that there's a lot of at least like in some animals

you carry a lot of disease in the brain you know chronic wasting disease trigonosis trigonosis a lot of disease in the brain, chronic wasting disease. Trigonosis. Trigonosis in the spine and the brain. But I think trigonosis is basically through the meat too.

Really? A lot of bears have trigonosis. Wild pigs, basically any animal that eats meat. That's the brain from the raw meat experiment eating that raw brain. Yeah, that's a little bit too much for me. It's average. I don't think I would do it. No.

You mentioned earlier in having some losses in your career, and then you mentioned it when you talked about hunting. I don't know if you recognize that you mentioned it, but I'm into like philosophical shit and i think you basically said you got to be one with it and then you talked about kind of the circle of life at the end is that sort of a philosophy that you that carries through for you and with you on just about everything that you do is to kind of be one with like the earth and be one with uh kind of all of us really i mean i i guess yeah it's not ever anything that i'm like really deeply focused on like becoming one with the earth but i feel like my lifestyle if i were to step back and look at it yeah i am i feel like i'm at one

you know i'm very close with my surroundings when i get out there in the field, you know, with whatever athletic event that I'm competing for and training for, you know, it's, you have to, you have to become one with it. Yeah. You have to become focused. You have to understand, uh, you know, the, I guess the ins and outs on anything you're doing, whether it's a hunt or training for a boxing fight or a UFC world title, uh, trying to start a business or running a family, like, you know, whatever it is, if, if you're not a hundred percent connected mentally and physically, uh, shit's going to fall through the cracks and things are going to, bad things will probably start to happen or at least pile up and, uh, go south. So yeah, I, I think that's definitely something I live my life by without, I guess, really thinking about it. No, I'm curious about this, man. And I guess this is going to come out of kind of left field,

but we talk a lot about topics like this on the podcast. So, I mean, you're a top-tier athlete, right? Extremely popular. I don't know. How long have you been with your wife? Oh, man, why would you ask me that? popular i don't know how long you've been with your wife oh man why would you ask me that okay don't worry but you've been with your wife a long time i think i think it's been like seven years we were just talking about this the other day but yeah it's seven or eight years i think we've been together seven or eight years right um she's gonna hate me

well we'll edit yeah. You're good. No, I think you'll bring it around right now. Yeah. Well, within social media, YouTube, there are all these people talking about relationships and how guys should handle things. There's this like red pill sort of thing where a lot of guys are telling men, when you get to a certain point, don't really ever settle down with one woman. It's not a great idea, especially as you become a more high value man, et cetera, right? But you have settled down with your wife, you have a family, two kids, and obviously you're extremely popular. So there's probably a lot of people who would desire to be with you,

but you're sticking and you're staying with a family, even though you have so many options. but you're sticking and you're staying with a family, even though you have so many options. Why did you choose to go to that route? And even though you, you don't, you mean you have plenty of options, but why did you choose to go down the route of settling down with one woman, having a family, et cetera? Oh man, this is a very off the wall question, but I like it. Yeah, I like it. Man, I think for me, so my, my mom and my dad split up when I was a baby. So I never remember them being together. And my dad remarried and was with this woman for 15, 20 years. Had my other half brothers and sister.

brothers and sister. Um, and I, I remember going through that life and just being, seeing, seeing all of the like turmoil and the ups and downs and the uncomfortable times and, um, a lot of the fighting and, and they ended up splitting up again. And my dad never got remarried. He's dated and stuff like that. And I don't know. I just, I've always wanted, and it's probably because of that, I've always craved like a good solid family maybe and a good foundation. You know, and I mean, I actually messed up in the short run on this right out of college, got married, and ended up getting a divorce. And I think it was because of searching for that maybe and just wanting to have that right person to settle down with and understand that, okay, this is the person for me, and I want to start a family. And, but as the fight career started ramping up and things, you know, started going in different directions all the time, just quickly realized this wasn't the person that I was wanting to do that with and ended up ending that relationship. So, um, you know,

I met my wife and I guess it was a different feeling. It was a little bit more mature from the beginning of that last relationship. And I just decided that this is the one. I think this is the person that I could call my best friend and spend the rest of my life with and create a family with and feel good about doing this with and understand that she's a good person. feel good about doing this with and understand that she's a good person. And I don't see the things happening that my dad went through with this human being. So, you know, it was a decision that ultimately came from the heart. Like it wasn't something I had to like, really think too much about. It just was what felt right. And, uh, we jumped right in and did it.

And we have a family now and things have been really good. So, you know, she was at my side with every fight after, you know, once we got together, she was there at every single one of my fights. And she's not able to come to this boxing fight, which is, she was actually just saying this the other day, how she's upset that this is going to be the first one that she doesn't make. But you know, life is different now with two kids and, uh, her mother's having some health issues and there's just a lot of stuff going on at home. So it's just one of those things we're going to go out there and we're going to, we're

going to wreck shop and then we'll come back and get, get back to family life for sure. Yeah. Yeah. Kind of, I think, uh, having a good partner helps amplify just about everything. The holidays, um, event, you know, stuff with your kids. Um, it just makes everything like fairly smooth, you know, and maybe it's not for everybody. Like maybe people have, people can have different types of relationships. Some people, they enjoy being single. I got many friends that enjoy being single, and they're older, and they've tried to have relationships, but they didn't like that. They liked being more on their own.

And so I guess it's like to each their own. But for me personally, I've found it just makes things more. I love getting home to my family and having dinner with my family at night yeah going on vacation and like experiencing stuff that's cool like it's fun for me but it's so much more fun with when I'm with my kids or going to like an event yeah like I like wrestling and I like going to different events and concerts and things like that but it's way more fun if you go with someone that like really digs it. Or if you go with like a little kid, you know, I got nephews too that I

like to have tag along for stuff like this. And they're like so pumped, you know, and it's like that just, it makes it more enjoyable. 100%. And I, you're right. I mean, having a good partner makes life so much easier. You know, someone that's in your corner and you're not having to fight and bicker and argue and, and, you know, someone that, that makes your life better in a positive way. And, you know, it's, it's so much easier. And I feel like that's why I can have so many different irons in the fire. You know, like I said, I have all these businesses that we're trying to maintain and oversee and run and make sure everything's going smooth and, you know, working with the 10 companies and, you know, trying to train for a fight and, um, and trying to be a good husband and a father at the same time, mixing all that stuff in there. Um, it's tough, man. It really is my, I have my aunts and uncles texting me all the time. Like

you need to slow down. You need to stop, like spend some more time for yourself and your family. And it's like, I know I will. I'm we're almost to for yourself and your family. And it's like, I know I will. We're almost to that point. But my thought is it's like, I want to grind. I want to hustle now while I'm young and I'm full of energy and I can actually meet these opportunities and have success with them to where, you know, 10, 15, 20 years down the road, we're set. And I don't have to stress so much when I can just spend more time with my family and do all that fun stuff, you know? And I, and I get the argument too, which I get this from my wife is, you know, you're not,

you're not guaranteed tomorrow, which I understand that too. So it's a fine balancing act, man. It's like, how do you grind and do what you need, uh, to make all the best opportunities come true, but also spend that quality family time and make sure you're there enough to, uh, you know, to make it all worthwhile. So it's a, it's a balancing act for sure. And it's sometimes tough, man. I break down sometimes I can't, I can't handle it, but my wife does a good job. Slap me around a little bit. No, she doesn't, but, you know. Which she did, right?

Yeah, sometimes I wish. I deserved it, I promise. Yeah. Yeah, it is a tough juggling act, but I'd also say, like, I don't think it's great to be there for them all the time. You know, I just, you want your kids, you want them to, like, kind of, I mean, your kids are really, really young. But, like, a couple years from now, it's good for them to find out shit on their own. It's good for them to fall on their bike.

It's good for them to, unfortunately, get hurt. You know, I used to, like, be sick to my stomach watching my kid just run across the room. I was like, he's going to kill himself on something. He's going to totally wipe out and he's going to smash his head on something. Or my daughter. And I was always just like, but you learn after a while. You know, it's good for them to fall. It's good for them to get hurt.

Then they recognize, okay, that door pinched my finger last time I tried to push on it. That's the craziest scream you'll ever hear. You'll look forward to that one, Andrew. Nope, nope. He's already testing out his vocal cords, and he's fucking loud. The worst is when you hurt them. When you did it, and you're like, oh, fuck.

You pinched their hand. I think I went to close a door one time, like a car door, and I slammed it on Jake's hand or something. It was the loudest scream. Obviously, I wasn't trying to, but I was getting him out of the car, and we were getting stuff, and I didn't slam the door or slam the door. I just closed it.

But the door will go, and it'll go, and it will slam kind of shut right on his finger. It's just like the loudest scream you've ever heard in your life. It breaks my heart. Yeah, the other day, I just picked him up as I was leaving to come here and I was like, ah, I love you. And I picked him up and I just wasn't paying attention.

Bunk right on the fucking light. I'm like, Oh, luckily he, he was like, he thought it was funny, but I just, in that moment I'm like,

I killed him. That's it. I'm dead. He's done, but he was good. So yeah, I'm definitely that person right now. You start getting real big.

Like when you, when they fall asleep and you scoop them up and you're trying to figure out how to like move them around and like put them in their bed or whatever and you like bonk their head and their feet

and you're like well now he's strong enough to like if I'm holding him and he wants to get down he'll just like hyper extend his back and he just like wiggles out of my arms

like alright fuck it dude here's the floor and let's go play but it's kind of frustrating because I can't I can't even hold them back already they're so strong yeah

alright Andrew you want to take us out of here buddy sure thing thank you everybody for checking out today's episode and go play, but it's kind of frustrating because I can't even hold them back already. They're so strong. Alright, Andrew, want to take us out of here, buddy? Sure thing. Thank you, everybody, for checking out today's episode. Please make sure you guys like today's episode on YouTube and drop us a review on iTunes. We sincerely appreciate it. Go ahead and leave us a comment on anything that you guys liked about today's episode and ring that bell notification so you guys don't miss any more dope episodes

like today's. And please follow the podcast at MarkBell's Power Project on Instagram, at MB Power Project on TikTok and Twitter. My Instagram and Twitter is at IamAndrewZ. And Sima, where can people find you? And Sima Enya on Instagram and YouTube. And Sima Yin Yang on TikTok and Twitter. Chad, Amadeo, where can people find y'all and all your stuff?

Just at ChadMendez is pretty much the same handle I use for Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, I guess. And then Instagram, or sorry, YouTube, just Chad Mendes. Yeah. Sick. Have a day. At Capital Strength Performance on Instagram. There you go. You know, if you ever need to have someone have your back, make sure it's not this guy.

Andrew, you mind bringing up the 1085 squad? Ah, yes. Yes, yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yeah. So. This is great. I tried to find the biggest, strongest person.

I'm like, this guy is my boy. He'll have my back. But you'll see in this video, you can't really. You just can't count anybody. This is how Slingshot began. I started the company. He is pretty responsible. He's definitely responsible for me being leaner nowadays.

Look at that. 1,085 squat. I'm going down. Oh, Amadeo's got me he's got me he's got me oh wait just a little late there on the help don't mind me i'll just be messed up for the next couple months oh dude i couldn't have felt good holy no no it didn't feel great oh an instant replay okay i do blame amadeo not the two side spotters that weigh 135 pounds. Oh, man.

He's supposed to stand up. That wasn't what I was trying to do. That's how we practiced it the whole three months before. I'm going to lay this giant weight down on these straps back here. It's going to be epic. You were just doing knees over toes before anybody. Yeah. Try to do it

on one leg. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. I'm at Mark Smiley Bell. Catch you guys later.

Bye.