The Joe Rogan Experience - #1619 - Claressa Shields

Episode Date: March 16, 2021

Claressa Shields is a two-time olympic gold medalist and holder of multiple world championship belts. She is the first fighter in boxing history to be an undisputed champion in two different weight divisions in the four-belt era.

the joe rogan experience train by day joe rogan podcast by night all day welcome what's happening how are you i'm good how are you joe wonderful it's a pleasure to get to meet you and uh have you on here i'm a big fan thank you you uh in a young life you have accomplished incredible things like for people that don't know you won the olympic gold medalist at 17 and then you won it again four years later yep two times the only american boxer ever i think like only another sport like no boxer's ever done that right in america no not from america just me another sport like no boxer's ever done that right in america no not from america just me and uh i mean you've gone multiple weight classes and now you're considering fighting in mma i mean you you kind of cleared out boxing in a lot of ways it's always something more to be accomplished

in boxing but i'm venturing off off into MMA because I really want to see am I as great as I think I am. And I think I am. So I'm excited to be fighting with the PFL later on this year. And just taking it from there and seeing what happens. Well, I think when someone is as good as you are at boxing, you can basically do anything you want in life. You just have to put the same amount of focus that you put on boxing to whatever it is that you apply yourself to yeah you know rare human beings that can do what you've been able to do it's a rare person five piece proper preparation prevents poor performance there you go so in mma i'm not coming over like hey i'm in boxing i'm

box all you girls up it's like I'm at Jackson Wing Gym you know with Coach Jackson I've seen you kick the bag I've seen you throw kicks I was very impressed I can't believe you're already that good it's real I was like well maybe she but you were throwing high kicks yeah I didn't know my leg can go up that high so they showed me the technique up and I was like whoa this is insane do you stretch all the time are you a person who like when you were boxing i mean i know most athletes stretch but having a full split is not really it's not really required to punch people but you obviously have very flexible legs i've been doing yoga for the past few months so i was able to kick high when I first went to Jackson Wing Gym in December.

I was able to kick high, but not for very long. I probably would get two or three good high kicks, and I'm like, yo, let's bring it down a level. Now from all the stretching, when they got that pad up there and they kick it, I just do the form and my leg can go up there over and over and over again just from the stretching and actually being a bit more flexible than what I was before so I stretch but I stretch more serious now what brought you into

yoga um really it was the MMA fans to be honest they're like you're gonna have to stretch and you know people are on there you know talking trash or whatever trolls but they were saying like I read a lot of comments and I'm like they're like you know she's gonna have a problem with kicking she's not flexible her legs are big blah blah so I would read some of that stuff and do my own research and I'm like damn they're right so my goal for one of my new year's resolutions was to be able to do the splits by the end of the year so I have a yoga teacher um and me and her go like up on up on zoom twice a week and she's like having me do these stretches i'm like girl you is something else her name is sakina have you done hot yoga ever no not yet i heard it's brutal though it's

more of a mental thing it is brutal for sure but one good thing about it is when you get that hot and sweaty your muscles become really pliable and you can make really good gains that way like in terms of flexibility oh wow maybe i should maybe i should try it with sakina yeah i always find that i'm way more flexible in a hot yoga class than i am anywhere else you can do the splits yeah i can do the splits damn you're ahead of me i'm old i started when i was 15 you know so you still do the splits your body is like jacked up you should not be able to do the splits oh there's a guy who fights for one fc that makes me look like a twig his name is elaine ingali he's okay super jacked

and he's one of the most flexible guys i've ever seen in my life oh insanely flexible but flexible everywhere his spine is flexible he can he can bend over backwards standing and touch the back of his like his touch his palms to the ground and then flip his feet over the top his instagram is incredible because he's built like a superhero see if you find his uh his instagram he's built like a super i mean like a freak of nature but is incredibly flexible wow yeah he just puts a lot of time and dedication to flexibility you can't it can be done it's just there he is look at him i mean come on and when you see this guy when you see this guy move and you see him fight i I mean, do the video one so you can see him. Oh, no, no.

Go to that one right there with the dude with the blue shorts right in front where he head kicks his dude. Watch this guy. I mean, you see his flexibility is incredible. But that's one thing about the kicks, though. You really have to condition those shins for that. Oh, yeah. Remember when I first started, I was probably like five kicks in. I'm like, yeah.

Just the bag, right? right yeah just the bag itself then when we went up to the pads i'm like coach do you got softer pads serious he's like champ these are my softest ones i'm like it takes a while it takes a while you see some people they start whacking their shins with like coke bottles and stuff like that just trying to toughen them up. They do all kinds of things to their shins. I can kick really hard now. Oh, there you are. Look at this. Seriously. Superman punches, everything.

Head kicks. The thing is, some of this stuff I learned. I learned Superman punch that same day. So when he showed me it one time, we just started doing it, and he was like, you're doing good. I can look at it now and tell you my mistakes right now, but I'm not going to say too much because I fixed them already. But sometimes when I throw the head kicks, my hands would go down at the same time.

How did you get to Jackson Winklejohn? Because, first of all, you couldn't have picked a better gym to train at, one of the best gyms in the world. But what brought you there? Actually, I've always had like – I believe in technique and training. People may look at me boxing and be like, oh, she's just naturally fast, she's naturally strong. It's like, no, I am strategically smart in boxing, and I have a lot of skill.

I may look like I'm a beast out there, but it have a lot of skill I may look like I'm a beast out there but it takes a lot of skill to land those punches body work defense which is I probably got hit three times my last fight well you went one of your fights what was that woman from oh god what was her name was your what your first world title fight she was a blonde lady Nikki Adler yeah she went a whole round without landing a single punch on you yeah and I and I ended that fight in the fifth round yeah

you anybody that doesn't think that you have technique just doesn't understand boxing yeah they're just like oh she's a woman you can't respond to those people

you can't yeah they're weird no you clearly have superior technique I agree no so for MMA I was just like

I already had signed a contract with the pfl and now i'm like okay how what do you have to do for the five p's to play in effect and i was like i need to get the best trainer and i just remember like in 2016 me and johnny bones we were talking at the espys and he was like yo you'd be the perfect boxer to come over to mma and i was like it's true because you're really young. You're 25 now? Yeah, I turned 26 in two days.

Oh, boy. Yeah, super... Yeah, super nice shit. Well, an early happy birthday to you. Thank you. So that's a perfect age because you still are capable of getting elite at all the arts.

You're still... You could get elite at Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. You can get elite at striking with kicking and Muay Thai. You can... I mean, you're-jitsu you can get elite at striking with kicking and muay thai you can you mean you're young enough that you could do all that shit yeah i think it's just all about like one having the right teachers and also getting in there and doing it but i mean having a having a body to do it like i'm glad that i didn't wait till i was like 35 you know 36 because then i would just be starting it It would set me back, and it would be like I'm going in here starting new,

and my body isn't even in its prime. Like right now, I don't think that my body has peaked yet, like where I've been as strong as I can be, as fast as I can be. I still think like I'm like right there. I just haven't touched where I'm like, okay, this is the best my body can be at. I haven't touched that yet. They think a pro athlete, your prime is somewhere between 28 and 32, I think they said. Because that's when your body lines up with your brain.

I was hoping it was 26. Maybe it is 26. I was hoping. Tyson won the world title at 20. Yeah, right. It's like John Jones won the world title at 22. It's like you can. Or is it 23?

Is John Jones 22 or 23? He's the world title at 22. It's like, you can. Or was it 23? Was John Jones 22 or 23? He's the youngest ever UFC champion. I feel like he was 21. Am I true? No, he wasn't 21. He was either 22 or 23. 23. 23.

Okay. Because before that, I think it was Josh Barnett. And he won the heavyweight title. I think it was 24. You know. But there's, you know But it's different for everybody. Some people peak young. Some people, as they get older, they get smarter.

So they understand their body better. So maybe their body doesn't quite work as well as it did when they were 24, but they're a better athlete at 30 or 32, just because they know what to do and how to do it better. They have a better communication with their body but that's like what you're doing by doing yoga and even by expanding into martial arts that's the key it's like keeping your body doing different things and then you understand your body more the more different stuff you do with it

so when did you start training in mma december just december and how often are you doing it um i was at jackson wing gym three weeks at a time so i'll be there three weeks go home a week come back three weeks go home a week come back three weeks um i was doing that because i really just i like to just have my time where i'm at home my family my boyfriend i don't like just training training training training like it should drive you crazy so I'm like I gotta leave hmm so now starting back and after my birthday in April I'll be up in Jackson week for three weeks but I only go home weekend so I'll be there three weeks then go home for Friday Saturday Sunday fight back Sunday be there three weeks again

until I have my actual fight so is the plan to continue boxing as well as fighting in mma yeah the overall goal for me is to be champion in boxing and be a champion in may at the same time once that's done then i don't know what else i could possibly do like that'd be like the end game for me. Like, that's it. So I know I can be champion in boxing, which is very easy to do because I already accomplished so much in boxing. And the girls just can't fuck with me in boxing. Let's keep it real. But MMA, a bit more challenging. But it's true.

You know? I mean, you've had a couple interesting moments in fights. But, you know, you've won. I've had one interesting moment moments in fights but you know you've won i've had one interesting moment when you got knocked down that's it yeah other than that i still whooped her ass 10 rounds you did whip her ass and then christina hammer was supposed to be the big tall giant from you know germany to come over here and you know slay the dragon and she got beat up pretty bad too she got overwhelmed when she started clinching you. You could tell.

Like she was just, when she got close to you, she just wanted to hold on. I thought the ref should have stopped that fight. Eighth round, she didn't respond to 10 punches in a corner. 10. It was like she was out of there. Yeah. And I think she jumped in, said that the round had ended. But it was like, no, you need to be stopping this.

Like she's done. But she was able to hold on and whatever for, you know, two more rounds. But I thought eighth round, I thought it was over. Like, I started celebrating. I was jumping up and down. Me and my coach jumped in the ring. We were hugging. And all of a sudden, they're like, no, no, no, the fight's over.

I'm like, what the hell just happened? So, yeah, it's confusing. That was a weird moment. Yeah. Was that a satisfying one for you? Because she was talking so much shit before, so? It's not even about, like, the shit talking, really. It was just about, like, how dare you guys compare her to me.

That's what it was for me. It was like I had watched film of her, and I had my eyes set on her since I was 17 before I even had turned pro. And I knew then when I was 17 I could have beat her. I even had Turn Pro, and I knew then when I was 17 I could have beat her. So now that I'm, you know, I was like 22 or whatever, 23, it's like what the hell does she do that make you guys think she can beat me? Like either I'm just a terrible boxer or you guys just, I don't know, think she's that good. I think sometimes when someone's overwhelming like you are,

people try to pump up challengers in a way that they don't even really believe you know what i mean like they kind of like i'm just gonna be honest i've had to do that before doing commentary like pretend like there were certain dudes that i knew they were gonna fight an accomplished champion and you knew they're fucked and so you have to kind of play their strong points but if you caught me alone and it was just you and me and it was like no recording equipment i would be like he's fucked but you can't necessarily say that because it's disrespectful to the opponent and because you want to kind of make it exciting yeah well i'm i'm a hype man

you know that's what I'm trying to do. If Jon Jones is fighting someone and I think Jon Jones is going to slaughter him, I'm going to point out the guy's strong points. I'll point out Jon's strong points and I'll point out the guy's strong points and what he has to do and what he can do and where he excels. But sometimes they don't really believe that shit. And with you, I think the problem is they're always trying to sell fights, right? they don't really believe that shit and with you i think the problem is they're always trying to sell fights right but it's it's hard to sell when you you here's everybody else right here's you

your way you're you're you're so advanced in comparison like technique wise ability wise accomplishments wise there's not a lot of competition for you in boxing where people are calling out for, other than occasionally people start talking about Leila Ali, right? Occasionally that comes up. Well, she's, you know. She's retired. She's retired.

And she's been retired for a long time. 43. Yeah. And this is the thing I don't respect about that, right? I hate when somebody else tries to take somebody else's shine, somebody else's attention. You know, it's like, she's, you know, nobody was trying to take her attention when it was her time. Right.

And that's what I didn't like about Hammer either. When I went in a world title fight, why are you jumping in the ring talking about some you beat us both? You say congrats and get the fuck out the ring. You know, but she's getting there being disrespectful. And then Layla gets upset because I become undisputed champion. She's been undisputed and people are comparing me to her and she gets offended when it was like to me I thought it was a good comparison because I feel like I box way better than her and for them to be saying that me and her are equal or whatever she should have been

happy because of that because they're giving her more um more props on her skills which i feel like she didn't really have that much but you know whatever it was like i never really had a problem with it and then all of a sudden it's like talking about she'll knock me out and my record and this and that and i just was like hate her that's all i kept thinking to myself hate her and i would have loved to fight her but um at the end of the day i'm an active fighter she's retired so when people bring her up like i don't want to have to keep saying that i beat her because i think it's evident but at the same time it's like look it was she had her time this is my time they don't even correlate with each other yeah when was the last time she fought it was like i don't know 2016 or something

see if you can find leila Ali's last professional boxing fight. You said 2016. You thinking real? No. She's been retired like 13, 12 years. Has it been that long? Yeah. I think her last fight was 2001.

Was it really? Probably. 2007. Wow. I was way off. It's 2012. I say, what? 2007.

I started boxing in 2006. I was like 11 years old when I started boxing. So, I mean, I was 12. So, basically, she retired when she was like 30. Yeah, which I tell people all the time. I think that that kind of eats at her. You know, she retired at 29, 30 in boxing when she was on top. You know?

And there was a lot of girls who wanted to fight her. She left without fighting Anne Wolfe, left without fighting a girl named Latisha Robinson. It was a few girls who she didn't fight. Anne Wolfe was the scariest in her day. Anne Wolfe is still scary to me now. She's so scary? Remember she was training James Kirkland,

screaming at him in the corner? She's a terrifying trainer. She's an amazing trainer. She's a terrifying trainer and terrifying boxer, too. She has, in my opinion the most spectacular one punch knockout in the history of women's boxing i said history of boxing like that punch there was like what the i mean yeah i dream to get a knockout like that like i thought my last fight i'm like that's my dream i want to knock this girl out like and wolf knocked

out bonda ward that was my whole thing but it I feel for Layla that she retired kind of early. So everybody always compared whoever was next up to her. But it was like, still, you're retired. Yeah, I understand. It's nobody's fault because you're retired. Have you ever worked with Ann Wolf? No, I would love to, though. Yeah, I would love to see that.

Yeah, I think she needs to just show me how to sleep a girl. Yeah. Because I would love that. There it is. Boom. to see that yeah i think she needs to just show me like how to sleep a girl yeah because i will here it is boom man i'm talking about this girl oh my goodness time and the power everything no and wolf was a monster and it's really interesting like when uh she was training because you know her her work ethic you could see it when she was training other fighters. Like, she demanded, like, some serious work from them. And she had so much intensity.

It was only one thing she said one time. Because I watched a few of her documentaries when she was training James Kirkland and training herself. She said, you want to break a fighter down and then build him back up. And that's something I've never been, like, a real fan of. I understand. Like, some fighters, you got to know which fighter you're training. Some fighters can deal with being broken down. But when you break a fighter down mentally, the next thing to go,

well, break their body down, the next thing to go is their mind. Some people don't have strong minds to where they can actually get built back up. And, you know, for me, I'm a fighter that i believe in hard work but also believe in like okay this is just too much i gotta take a break right you know and i've always listened to my body like i got fined at the olympic training center for telling them like look i'm not running another fucking sprint like like like my legs are tight um i'm sore i'm not running and they find me five hundred dollars they find you for not training like not listening to your body?

Yeah, but they were saying like, oh, you need to go see a doctor. You need to get a doctor's note. And I'm like, well, but the doctor couldn't get me in until three days. I'm like, well, in three days, I'm not doing anything. And they fined me for that. But when I went to see the doctor, he said, one more sprint, you would have tore something. He said, you would have tore your calf. You would have popped your calf muscle. And I'm like,

well, here go the note. Get my fucking money back. How do they, I don't understand, how can they fine you for listening to your body? Like, how do they know how you feel? It's just more athletes. You don't really find greats. You know what I mean? It's more athletes who really complain

to get out of training and fake injuries than you have those who don't fake injuries and actually take the sport serious. But is that really prevalent to the point where they have to fine people at the Olympics? I would imagine. That's crazy. But that's where I would just like, that was my Muhammad Ali moments where I'm like, I don't care what you guys do. I'm not going to injure myself because you guys don't believe what I'm saying.

I know what I feel and I couldn't run or sprint for almost like three weeks. How does it get to a point where they find you? Like, what do they tell you? Like, do they come up to you and they say, you have to do these training routines that we're asking you to do? Because they're not your trainers, right? Like, you're at the olympics no we got the olympic training center right in colorado so i was staying there and we're in preparation for a tournament coming up and they had a schedule for us we get up in the morning at six o'clock go run we get we all get on the bus to go to the track how much time are you there for? I lived in Olympic Training Center for two years. You lived there for two years? Two years.

Wow. Yeah, from 2014 to 2016. Wow. So I was there and I would rarely go home. But while I was there, so they had a schedule. We work out at 6, we train again at 1 and sparring at 7. So they had our stuff set up

and I just was like, look, I'll do the training, I'll do the training i'll do the sparring but i cannot run and they just were not listening i'm like look after we get done running i can barely walk like my legs are so tight they're so stiff and they're like well we got running around in the morning i'm like i won't be there and they were trying to get you to do sprints as well it's not just it's sprint workout exactly i'm like i'm telling you i will not be there so they find you yeah once i didn't show up that's that seems crazy to me especially someone who's as accomplished as you they must know that you know your body people like to pick on the greats i mean once we i remember do you remember that usa boxing has switched over coaches they had went from having

american coaches to having a coach from ireland his name name was Billy Walsh he came over me and my great relationship now I love Billy but when I when I first met him he was super hard on me because he just thought oh she's Olympic gold medalist she's not gonna listen she thinks you know um she knows everything and that's just what he interpreted off of wherever he did his research at and he came and he came to the U.S. with that kind of attitude toward me and um he said something to me I think we were talking he was like it's going to be harder for you to win a second olympics than it was for you to win the first time and he said um you're going to need to listen to me in order to do it and I looked at him and I said well well, one, let's get something straight. Don't ever fucking talk to me like that.

You don't know me like that. Let's get that straight. And secondly, it's not going to be harder to win a second Olympics because, one, I'm taller now. I'm faster. I'm smarter. And I've been undefeated since I was 17 years old. So just the way that I like to speak things to and to existence is I told myself all the time 2016 olympics is going to be way easier than 2012 and that was my mindset so when he came with me and

said that it was like whoa wrong wrong engine man no and I have to let him know like you don't talk to me like that you only talk positive shit because what i'm doing is already hard enough but i don't need no daughter like i don't need no daughters in my corner right and that's just how i told him and he just was like we'll see and i said we and we sure in the hell we'll see and we did yes he did so this is like what you mean when you're talking about and wolf's philosophy of breaking someone down physically you don't think it's wise to break someone down physically? No, I think it's wise to work hard and, you know, push your limits. But when somebody's breaking somebody down, like when they go home, they feel like they can't walk.

Their body is sore. You know what I mean? Like to me, that's discouraging. And like when I get too sore, I don't come back to the gym and train for two or three days. It's like I'm scared to get injured. You know, I'm scared of having to pop something, hurt something. So, it's like I believe in recovering. So, I'm going to work hard, but I'm also going to be smart about it.

But when you break down somebody's body, like, it can be discouraging for some people. For me, I learned myself, and that's discouraging. You know, if I had to go to the gym and punch the bag, but my legs is sore as hell, my legs got to hold me up. So it's like I don't even want to be here. And if I go to the gym and let's say my arms are so tired, but my legs is full of energy, it's still discouraging because it's like, okay, my legs are holding up, but my punches won't go.

So I like to feel good during training training i feel like that's when you get the best results do you think there's a fine line between pushing yourself so that your body keeps getting stronger and so your your endurance keeps increasing your capacity but knowing when you're just working too hard and breaking things down and it's not beneficial at all and you actually lose progress and that's possible yeah it's a thing that's called over over training and i think that sometimes us as athletes we push ourselves so hard and i'm one of those people like i didn't get a massage ever in my life till i was 17 and i was boxing since I was 11 years old and not boxing against girls or sparring against girls I sparred against guys grown men like I was 15 in the ring sparring

against guys who's 28 29 who done knocked out other grown men I'm in a gym knocking them out so it was like now I went all those years without ever getting a massage without really stretching just hard work dedication and like and like my boxing coach Jason Crushfield at the time I mean he was brutal he treated me like I was a guy so if if the boys sparred twice a day I sparred with them twice a day if we ran four miles I ran four it wasn't no three miles. You can be on your period, whatever. You do what they do. You don't get no slack. And also, he was the one that was like, you better come in first place.

When we're running, you better come in first place. You better whip everybody's ass in sparring. You better be here at the gym on time. I mean, he was just that hard on me. So now when I'm at the gym sometime, I'm like, yo, I'm not ever going gonna train that hard again it's like i'm gonna train but i have like i just have like that i have that cutoff switch where it's like look i know that this is too much like i tell my coaches now like see my coach have to

really set up set up sparring for me because i'm like i won won't spar. He's like, I don't care for sparring. It's like I get in there with guys, right? And they look at me and they're like, oh, she's a girl, blah, blah. And they don't respect that I have power and I got speed and I got skill. So I get in there with a guy who think he going to be all like this. And I punch him. And now he like, oh. So now he really want to fight so

now this sparring match has turned into a fight and i'm dropping dudes with body shots i mean i'm dropping them with big right hands they're throwing shots at me i gotta be on my p's and q's and it's like after the sparring match i'm like damn that was probably tougher than my fights you know so now it's like next day i come to training and coach like oh we got 10 rounds on the bag and 10 rounds on pads and i'm like coach yesterday i just sparred 12 rounds with my dude like you really won 20 rounds today like i'm sore right just like yeah that's what we got so i so i do it but i also make sure that once i leave the gym i can either go run or I can do recovery, and I always choose recovery

because I'm like, I feel like that's just best for my men to know. Like, all right, I took an ice bath. My legs feel good. I ice my shoulders and my back feel good. I like to feel good training, and that's just the main thing for me. I really don't. Like sparring, Coach John will tell you me I really don't like sparring coach like he'll coach John will tell you I don't I don't care for sparring it's not something that I need I feel

like like do you do you know how to fight yes so why do I need to spar I think once I spar and I see that I'm in shape for 10 rounds for two minutes then then that's it if I spar 10 rounds and I get tired in the eighth round, I'm like, okay, I need to maybe spar a little bit more. But sparring is like the last thing I care to do. Do you think it's because you, like for some athletes, they need people to push them in order to reach their full potential. But you obviously understand yourself.

You obviously know your body very, very well. And you've shown that you rise to the occasion in fights and that you've been in great condition in fights and that you put in the work necessary to be great so do you think that like sometimes coaches have this almost like they have like uh one size fits all philosophy like this maybe this dude doesn't work hard enough so they're gonna push him until he breaks and then they try to apply that shit to you and you're like hey hey hey i know what i'm doing is that what you feel yeah it's like people gotta realize that when you have fighters you have to learn learn them like you learn your children i was one of the kids growing up

you hit me with a belt i never talked to you again i was one of those kids you better off talking to me you you if you if you talk to me and tell my dick wrong i i won't do it again but timi with a belt i won't do it again but i'm not talking to you no more right see my sister was one of those kids you hit her with a belt she liked the attention so she'd do more bad so that was my sister people tried to apply So that was my sister. People tried to apply her to me. And then we had my little brother who I really grew up protecting.

And he didn't get whoopings or nothing, which he probably needed a few more than what he got, to be honest. But my mom noticed that. My mom noticed that. So my mom didn't whoop my sister. My mom never whooped me. And my little brother probably had, like, he was the youngest, so he probably had a few whoopings because he was the baby right but she learned all of us but my dad thought that you know he whipped my sister my dad whooped me one time and I had a whole fit I was 11 years old I told him I'll never talk to him again I don't like him I hate him and

this is with me 11 years old and for the next few months whenever I seen him we went over his house it was holidays I'm like he just seemed like it really messed up our relationship for a few months and I was 11 years old so my dad never hit me with a belt again and it's because my sister broke a broom on me me and my sister were fighting she grabbed the broom hit me with the broom it broke and of course I beat her up but my mom called my dad like they over here fighting and it's their second broom that I'm broke of the week so my dad comes over there it's actually my 11th birthday yeah and he brings me a pencil happy birthday you got a pencil and my mom says they broke another broom so my dad like y'all over here breaking rooms and

i'm explaining to him like no she broke the broom on me i didn't break the broom my dad whoops both of us and i was just highly upset and i didn't i mean for next couple months i just was like i don't fuck with you bro so he's lucky it only lasted a couple months. No, so when I'm talking about fighters, right, you have to learn the kind of fighters. Like, I'm not the fighter who you have to yell and scream at to get something done. Like, I'll get up by myself at 8 in the morning and go run.

I'll do all the work. I'll show up at the gym on time. You don't have to scream and yell at me to get your point across. Talk. Let's have some communication I always hated being yelled at but my first boxing coach Jason sometime it was so many of us at the gym he just applied the same thing to all of us but he never really yelled at me though and then when I got older he wanted to apply that kind of communication toward me. And that's why we ended up not working together no more.

Cause it was like, I'm grown. I'm 18. You know, I'm about to be yelling at me and trying to embarrass me in front of the gym and stuff like that. Like I, he was like a father to me.

So it was like, you got something to say to me, me and you can talk. Like don't air my business out in front of the whole gym. And so, but that's what he was used to doing to everybody over the years. And I just think that i don't know when i got older he just was like i'm just going to communicate with everybody

on the same level and he thought that it will it would kind of be easier for him i guess but it's like a different communication that we had between each other so i didn't like it yeah that's what i'm talking about the one size fits all philosophy and i like what you said that it is like your children every child is different. Yeah. When you set up a fight, like if a fight is set up for you and you have, you know, eight, 12 weeks, whatever you need, are you organizing your schedule? Are you doing your strength and condition? Are you organizing everything? Or do you have someone who does all that stuff for you?

I do all that myself. You do all of it? Yeah. Yeah. I've always done all of it. I think now at time my career like i really need an entourage for real i mean i need an entourage what kind of entourage you need i mean i need a person okay a person to keep me entertained you need a person

like a jester a little bit i need somebody to you know wash my clothes for me get my bag together i need somebody to make sure i got all my vitamins and water and stuff in the bag. Right. Because... You need a Bundini Brown. You need a hype person. A hype person, too. Right. Yeah.

You know, just for when I'm like... I need somebody to talk to people who are at the door. Like, I hate going to clubs and having to say, Hey, bro, I'm the champ. Clarissa Shields. Blah, blah, blah. It's like... You should know who I am.

I just get mad. So I would rather have somebody right there who's like, Hey, man, it's the champ. know who i am like i just get mad so i would rather have somebody right there who's like hey man it's the champ look at her belts just holding the belts and you know so i don't have to say the shit right just walk in with all the belts just carry them on both arms just to get the respect you know but i think i need like maybe like a five six people the problem is it's not just that it costs then you have you have psychological issues you have all these people around you and you have to manage the ecosystem of all these people so they don't they don't get along with them and one person doesn't get along with another person then they come to you clarissa this girl's fucking up and this now you know what i mean

and then you have to deal with that and that's why i only have one person with me i just got an assistant my last fight her name's leah and she was so helpful throughout my camp perfect keep her just just one like when she doesn't feel like dealing with me then what well they get a new alia get a new leah get a fine no i mean like dealing with me as far as like you know i can be like shut down when i get closer to fight right well she should understand you she's gonna learn that but it's like sometimes i want to talk sometimes i don't yeah and it's I can be pretty shut down when I get close to the fight line. Right. Well, she should understand you. She's going to learn that. But it's like sometimes I want to talk, sometimes I don't. Yeah.

And it's like she don't know which one. Like my best friend, Nene, if she was able to be in camp with me, everything would work out. What does Nene do? Nene has a, what are those things called that take care of older people? Like a rest home? Yeah. She owns one of those oh okay so she does like a lot she's busy yeah she's busy and she's pregnant right now oh she's double busy so nini can't come with you on the road i wish but it is a thing right like you need to manage to have the the least amount of stress and problems in your camp as humanly possible.

Right. Yeah. And that's what I'm doing for so many years. But then sometimes it's like, is it really just lonely at the top? Yeah. You know, and it's like,

everybody says it, right? Yeah. But do we got to be true? I think it does. Because there's, there's no one lonely Floyd. Yeah.

He got like an entourage everywhere he go. He's figured it out. And that's why I need to talk to him. Yeah., Floyd isn't lonely. Floyd? Yeah. He got like an entourage everywhere he go. He's figured it out. And that's why I need to talk to him. Yeah. And ask him like, what is the secret? He's a unique dude, though. He's figured out a lot of things in a different way. We're all unique.

I don't know about all that. That person shit. I hate it. That's not. I'm not a hater. But I'm just thinking what Floyd has done that's very. First of all, Floyd figured out a way to fight defensively but still be exciting because people want him to lose like floyd if you go back to

pretty boy floyd when he was younger it was very aggressive and knocked a lot of guys up then had a lot of hand problems then as he gets older fights far more defensively but talks way more shit and shows all his watches and shows all his money and shows all his jets and all that shit and people want him to lose because he's so flashy but people were paying money to see all these different people beat him so he made more money by fighting defensively responsibly and by fighting like you you go through the history of boxing there's never been a single human being that won as many titles as floyd in men's boxing that has been hit as few times as he has i mean 50 you know 49 and conor conor mcgregor 50 the 50th fight it's like i mean he went not around

50 it's real but conor had zero professional boxing fights it's almost almost unfair. But it was a fight, and Conor can crack. He's an MMA fighter. He's a good fighter. He's a very good fighter. But Floyd went all those fights against, I mean, the only times he ever got hit, Maidana hit him. Sugar Shane Mosley hit him. Demarcus Corley hit him.

He had a few fights. Demarcus Corley? Yeah, Chop Chop Corley. Remember him? Yeah, yeah, Chop Chop. He caught him. He caught Floyd. He had him few fights. Yeah, Chop Chop Crowley. Remember him? Yeah. He caught him. He caught Floyd. He had him in trouble.

But Floyd was so clever. He was so smart. Even when he got hit, he just knew how to protect himself. And then he slowly started putting all their moves and their distance and their timing into his computer. And next thing you know, he's shutting them down. And that's what he did with Sugar Shane. He learned his body, though. Yes.

As he got older, he seemed like, okay, I may not be as fast as I was here, but I'm still, I can still do this. I can still do that. I mean, I think his eyes is like what, his eyes is what set him apart from everybody. Like, you know, when he fought against Canelo, I'm like, Canelo's a great fighter. Even though he was younger, it's still like Canelo's a great fighter. And I thought it was too early for Canelo, but I was still excited to see the fight.

And just the way that he went out there and, you know, schooled him defensively and offensively, I was like, man. But to see like Canelo now, people say, oh, you know, he could beat Floyd. And it's like, he still can't. Because Floyd, the way that his mind works way that mind works if I get in there with you one time I learn you the next fight will be easier don't you think Canelo's way different now though he's way different but still cannot underestimate the skill of Floyd you can't I agree with you but I think Floyd did a smart thing one he made canelo cut weight so he made him i think got down

to 152 right wasn't that the the weight they agreed to yeah but it was a fight at 54 yeah right but he made him didn't he fight him make him fight to 52 i think he made him he made him drop two more pounds or some shit it was very clever caught him when he was young which is very clever he's done that with a lot of fighters. He's done smart things like Manny Pacquiao. Waits and waits and waits and waits. Doesn't set the fight up. He wouldn't beat Manny Pacquiao

like that anyway, though. Maybe he would've. Maybe he would've. But the way he did. Maybe he would've or would he have? Listen, he won. They fought.

He won. That's all we know. And Pacquiao got so many excuses after like, look, you can't have an excuse of, oh, Pacquiao's old. But then Pacquiao

comes back and beats Keith Thurman and everybody's like, oh, Pacquiao's not old no more. It's nah he's old he's still a good fighter and he beat a young fighter like Keith Thurman Floyd Mayweather is just that great well I agree listen I'm a gigantic Floyd Mayweather fan I'm just saying he's clever in when he schedules these matchups like he didn't catch Manny Pacquiao when Manny Pacquiao was in his prime he caught him after Juan Manuel Marquez knocked him out. He was smart.

Did he? He fought him after the knockout? Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Yes. Are you sure? Yeah, I'm sure. We can go look.

We'll pull it up. Yeah, look that up. So wait. 99% positive. So Floyd, so you're saying that. I'm just saying Floyd, he's the cleverest guy in boxing in terms of how to do things and when to do things i mean he's made the most he's made a billion yeah he's made a billion dollars in boxing who the fuck's ever done that i think he's the only one yeah he probably only

one yeah he's the only one did you got a schedule for some reason it doesn't have his uh fight what that's outrageous how's. How is that possible? That can't be true. Wikipedia doesn't have his? It's not listed. It's like they're not there. What? It has his election stuff. Election stuff? What are you talking about? What election stuff?

Manny Pacquiao's the president, right? Oh, oh, oh, oh. We'll go to Floyd Mayweather. It was the order of this. It would just show packing. That's right. You're right. So it doesn't,

literally doesn't have his professional boxing record? Not in the order. Like it doesn't, I don't know why. Give me a second. Yeah. If you go to BoxRec, you should have it on there.

That's the strangest shit I've ever heard. Why? How, how could they only have his, his election shit from the Philippines and not have his boxing record in his wikipedia that's crazy oh here we go okay yeah so there it is oh so they fought twice and jenny fought for mayweather yeah yeah he got knocked up on money with marquez in 2012 yeah wait they fought three times though yeah they fought three times so where's the third one at the third one is uh

So where's the third one at? The third one is... Oh, wow. Wow, I didn't know that. Yeah. Well, that was the big criticism for Floyd, was that he fought him after he was done, supposedly. And Marquez knocked him out.

But there's also a lot of shit going on with that fight. Because that was when Marquez started working out with Manny Pacquiao's old trainer who many people accused of using magical supplements and they had said that he had used them on Manny and then Manny stopped using them and then Marquez started using them. But that was another thing that they were

saying like Floyd didn't want to fight Manny Pacquiao because he didn't know if he was clean. Right. Well he won. That's a't know if he was clean. Right. That's a legitimate statement. It's legitimate. Yeah, it's legitimate. I mean, he won eight different world titles in eight different weight classes, which is kind of crazy. To carry his power all throughout all those different weight classes,

it's pretty nuts. He's got better as time went on, though. That's true, too. I mean, even his technique, he worked with Freddie Roach. I don't know. I watched Manny Pacquiao. And to me, he's just like a fighter his technique, he worked with Freddie Roach. I don't know. I watched Manny Pacquiao. And to me, he's just like a fighter who comes forward and throw a lot of punches. But, I mean, the dude got like some great footwork, though.

Oh, yeah. And like a really good jab. He's got calves that are like that big. I mean, he got calves like he plays soccer or something. Yeah, it's crazy. Well, I think that's a lot of his power, right? It's his movement and also his his ability to thrust off and drive off those calves and legs but he's a great fighter i mean there's

no doubt about it and bottom line is they fought once floyd beat him they're talking about fighting again i mean i think at this point in time floyd's just collecting checks right he's willing to fight youtube stars and anybody else entertainment he's just that for entertainment. He's just having fun. Us as fighters, we like to have that attention and spotlight, right? So after you see other fighters getting that attention that you used to get, you always feel like, you know what, maybe I should. You really want those eyeballs and you want that attention. It's kind of like how we feel about Instagram or Twitter, those endorphins. You know?

Us as fighters get that from fans. Right. And that's probably what led me to do MMA. After not fighting for 14 months and having the opportunity to come with MMA, it's like, okay, now I get double opportunities to impress my fans now to do MMA and then also do boxing. It's like double after not fighting for a long time. So I'm kind of getting all the

getting all the stuff that i need back you know all the attention and all the eyes but us as fighters sometimes we need that that's why it's hard for us to retire that's probably also why leila ali started talking about you probably probably she didn't talk to nobody else after all there's no one else that's gonna get any attention the thing is like look let's go over the history of like famous women boxers right you had uh christy martin was one of the most high profile ones because she was out there but lucia reicher was the one that she was always scared of lucia reicher was the killer she was a woman from holland who was fucking a lot of girls up and she's a beast she was a beast and uh she was also a muay thai champion yeah and uh or maybe dutch kickboxing but either way um when she went and tried to get that fight they never they never made that fight

yeah so there's always like women fighters have always up for unfortunate reasons, have had a limited number of rivals. There's not a lot of high-profile people like you out there. I feel like that's not true, though. Well, who's high-profile like you in women's boxing? I mean, we're talking about me. Right, but that's what I'm saying. Christy Martin in the day was very high-profile. They didn't put a lot of women on TV.

So the women that you see, Christy Martin came fighting on the undercard of Mike Tyson. Right. And then Laila Ali came fighting on, you know, went from her dad's name, Mahatma Ali. And Wolf, who people still don't know. Right. You know, which was like, but she was a killer.

And Lucia Ryker, who people still don't know. But I feel like if they would put the put the backing behind women's boxing to where it was a lot of good girls who were good but never got that tv exposure I mean we're talking about Kalisha West you probably never heard of her but she was a hell of a fighter um so many let me La La La Tisha Robinson right, we got Amanda Serrano, but Amanda Serrano been around for a lot of years. Just now starting to get her, you know, starting to get her popularity up. Heather Hardy, myself, Katie Taylor. Cecilia been around for a long time, Cecilia Brockes, but people still don't know her in America.

But that's what I'm saying. Right, but we weren't given an opportunity early on to where if we would have fought on tv on every man's car have a woman undercard or something women's boxing would be a lot bigger so even though people you know looking like oh you're the biggest women's boxing star that they have i had the olympics and now the professionals i had showtime i fought on the zone i fought on hbo i've had all these different opportunities to be in front of so many different eyeballs to where now and i also do other stuff outside of boxing that other women fighters just not gonna do like i go to i go to mma fights you know and i sit ringside i watch um i called out amanda nunez to a boxing match i mean shit like that that women fighters just don't feel like they need to do or that they

want to do because it's not looked at as ladylike you know talking trash is not ladylike being being confident is not ladylike that's what they say i'm one of the most known female fighters because i do that and i'm confident not on accident but on purpose like that's who I am but when other women did it they were told to oh calm down be nicer even at the beginning of my career I had an agent who told me can we find them can we find a happy medium and I'm like what the hell you talking about and it was like my opponent was disrespectful to me the girl I knocked out in the fifth round Nikki Adler she said she didn't even watch film with me before she came to America to fight me.

She said she's coming to defend her title and go back home. So it was like, hold on. Probably should have watched some film. Yeah, you should have. But she came out there, and it was like, to me, it was like, I don't want the Olympics twice. And now I'm 4-0 getting ready to fight against you for a world title, 3-0, and you telling me that you didn't watch no film.

I felt super disrespected, so they wanted me to be all nice to her and i kept telling them like no i'm fucking her up i don't like i don't care like she gotta pay for disrespecting me i agree with everything you said everything but what i'm saying though you've actually kind of proven my point they're just there's not that many high profile women fighters but maybe i was saying it's not that many high profile fighters but it was a lot of great women yes no i'm sure people don't know about well there's a lot of great fighters period that people don't know about even in boxing in male boxing and even in mma there's male boxing sure there's like there's people running around out there who uh who don't know earl spence

yeah who don't know earl spence regular people like if you think about how many people who knew sugar ray leonard when he was at the top and compare it to today i think there's almost too much shit going on today in terms of i mean too many networks and too many built organizations yeah there's so much going on out there yeah i agree there's just you know how many people know gervonta davis i mean people know him because boxing people know him yeah boxing fans know him but the average person if he was around in like the 1980s you know when uh when marvin haggler and tommy hearns and roberto duran and like when all these household names everybody would know who he is it would be like Ray Boom Boom Mancini it would be like one of those guys that everybody

it would be like you know you think of like boxers that were famous boxers back then they were household names because there was less entertainment there was less stuff going on and there was no internet so if they had someone like Alexis Arguello fight on ABC Wide World of Sports like that guy was a superstar he was a household name aaron pryor was a household name like i don't think even like big time boxers today i don't think they have the same sort of appeal in terms of like the general public as they did in the past just because the public's overwhelmed by things to pay attention to there's so much music and there's so much there's so many athletes and so many sports there's mma there's soccer there's basketball there's baseball it's constant the internet is filled with

entertainment you're just constantly getting overwhelmed with shit so for a girl my point has been for a girl to rise they have to be someone like you they have to be someone who's just undeniable two-time olympic gold medalist undefeated professional boxer dominates in multiple weight classes now is thinking about fighting mma all eyes are on you but in terms of boxing there's just no no one's like saying hey you know we got to get claressa shields to fight this girl it's not like the christy martin lucia reicher days where there was one girl who was getting all the play because she was on the mike tyson undercards which was christy martin but there was this one girl that was in the

shadows that the boxing fans knew was a killer and they was like boy I really would love to see that fight. You know what I'm saying? Like women's boxing just for whatever reason, it didn't, has not had the play. And I think you made a really good point that if they had women fight on the undercard the way the UFC has done, the UFC has done a brilliant job of it. Brilliant. Yeah. A lot of MMA cards and MMA networks have. I mean, like I like that the PFL, that I get a chance to fight for a million dollars. Like, it's equal.

Yes. You know, once you be up in the tournament. Right. But it's like, with boxing, they don't put you, they don't give women that same kind of... Promotion. Promotion or give you that same kind of chance. Like, they'll build up these guys, you know,

like, they'll put other guys on the undercard of earl spence deontay wilder um manny pacquiao but for a woman i mean i would love to fight on the undercard of canelo yeah undercard of anthony joshua of course even though you know i feel like i've accomplished more than those guys in boxing you know but it's still like being able to share our fans to show them like look this this woman possess some skills or the same amount of skills that Canelo has oh look at her compared to Anthony Joshua like they're on the same card but look at how she boxes look at how calm she is look at her pick her shots right and you know look at how dominant she is but we don't get those kind of opportunities like even i feel like

i'm at like a stuck point like i did my own pay-per-view but it's like i still like why can't i get on the undercard of one of those big names and i feel like i'm not an undercard fighter to be honest i'm not i'm a man-to-man fighter but i would take the undercard fights to build my profile more because i know that's how the other guys are building their profiles. Right, right. But I don't get those kind of opportunities. Yeah, that's a mistake, right? It's a mistake by boxing and boxing promoters that they haven't figured out a way to do it in the same way that MMA fighters have.

Because clearly there's a lot of attention paid to female MMA fighters. And Amanda Nunes is a huge star. She is. And, you know, you saw what happened when Holly Holm knocked out Ronda Rousey. of attention paid to female MMA fighters. Amanda Nunes is a huge star. And you saw what happened when Holly Holm knocked out Ronda Rousey. Ronda Rousey was a huge star. Holly Holm became a star. Misha Tate became a star. There's been a series of women's professional fighters that are stars.

You could just go down the line. Ioana Jacek. There's so many of them. There's not that kind of appeal in women's boxing, and I think you're right. I think it's purely because of the promotion. The promotion also, too, they look at us as less than. Women's boxing, I mean, I'm just being honest.

I'm a women's advocate. I don't believe that we should ask for equal pay and not fight the same amount of time. It makes no sense. They're like, me coming to your job? I'm like, hey, Joe, I i'm gonna do 20 minutes of work today you're gonna do 36 but i want them to pay me the same as they're paying you and you're like you only came here for 20 minutes and i've been here 36 but in your business yeah you get paid directly proportionate if you have a good agent a good manager directly proportionate to how much people are willing to pay to see you like and that's not true either it's not true in boxing

it's not true because if you want to look up something right now if you look up clarissa shields ratings against against uh hannah gabriel's it it will it will show you 430,000 views, 410,000 views. Adrian Broner's last fight on Showtime was 288K views, but he got paid $2 million. Well, he said on TV it was $13 million, but I looked it up and it said $2. But he got paid $2 million, and my fight against Hannah Gabriels, I got paid $150,000. Well, that's unfortunate, but I also think that the the Adrian Broner fight was a big disappointment in terms of the amount of people that watched it

when he just came back or the the most recent one that you're talking about right because I think they expected it to get more eyeballs than that because I remember reading an article about the disappointing ratings in that fight but it's also been more disappointing ratings that's not just one look at me and christina hammer ratings 375k me and ivana habazine ratings 325k you got other guys who showtime is putting on and probably paying more than me but i'm getting more eyeballs so why do you think that is i don't know hmm there's a thing we don't know when you try to talk to showtime about it do you ever have conversations with executives about it or do you leave it all the managers and the agents

managers and agents you know i've i've i've had conversations with i think i had maybe a few conversations with steven espinoza who works with showtime and i've said like you know i'll do like some commentating and stuff like that to keep my face in the public as I'm not fighting. So people can still know, okay, this is Clarissa Shields. I ain't like Sean Porter. But other than that, I just said, I noticed that you guys promoted my fight with Hannah Gabriels for four weeks, but you guys promote Danny Garcia and Earl Spence fights for eight. But you guys talk to me about the numbers.

Like, okay, well, maybe if you guys gave me eight weeks of promotion like you do the men, maybe I'd get higher numbers. And that's probably the only two conversations that I've had with him. What'd they say to you about that? They had changed it. They did? Yeah, they had put more time into uh we had a all access for hammer um was it all access or is it called 24 7 i think it's all access for showtime but like

we had did that and they were you know putting some time and money behind it and um that was cool but i didn't look at them as they were sexist at the time because i just felt like no other woman women are always yelling equal pay you know pay us equal equal opportunity and stuff but i wanted to look at the micro things and i just was like okay look at the promotion um let's look at you know the commercials let's look at the when the commercials air too right exactly they air when something big is on right so i'm like let's look at that stuff and i even talked to the wbc organization i'm like hey i was watching pbc boxing and i've seen that you guys have a full commercial of all the wbc champions but they're all men and i was like i'm a wbc champion in like three different weight classes

like where is our wbc champion right commercial at and that's not me being that's not me being a bitch that's me just saying like hey we're talking about being equal like let's let's equal it out because that'll put our face more out there and give us more recognition and i just saw that and i just reached out to them and said that do you feel like you have a responsibility as the face of women's boxing to try to amplify the amount of promotion that women get? Because you're the king or the queen, rather. You're the top of the food chain. If you're not getting attention, women's boxing is not getting attention.

Yeah, I feel like I have to do more than just fight. I can go out there and fight and look great. But they're still going to have something to say about that. Oh, she's fighting, but she's not getting knockouts so now when you talk about like i'm the only woman who i feel like will actually speak about the micro thing like i'm not just yelling equal pay i'm yelling equal fight time equal promotion um equal pay right but i'm also like just let them know i look women's boxing is here to stay we're never gonna just go go extinct so you guys might as well get behind us and pump up the whole thing and another thing is if they paid you more

people would know you're making a lot of money and they would watch more that's the reality one of the things is when you find out that floyd's making 50 million dollars for a fight or 100 million dollars for a fight people watch more because of that because they recognize that it's very high stakes exactly but in women's boxing we've never had that like i mean i was i was super pumped my pay-per-view fight no matter the amount of views that i got it was just like wow i'm in a ring i'm fighting i'm pay-per-view and people were able to bet on me it was like yo this is this is big shit like people can bet their hard-earned money on me to win a fight to get a knockout they can pick around it seemed like I became more of a superstar and I hate that I do this but with numbers Showtime when I was

fighting with Showtime when it was fight week I would gain about 25 25,000 followers on Instagram Instagram isn't everything but I just how I compare my numbers this fight without Showtime I gained 15,000 followers just off of me fighting on a network that's not super known for um women's boxing it was on FITETV you go on there and buy and buy the pay-per-view if you want to go on there 29.99 but i looked at the numbers and i'm like i was able to get 13,000 new people and eyes on me doing my own pay-per-view show compared to getting a 20 25,000 that i would get from being on showtime does it frustrate you that you have to think about all this kind of promotion shit that you can't just concentrate on the fighting? You know, sometimes, but something that somebody really important told me, his name is Andre Darrell. He

said, you are the person for the job. You know, this is not the job for nobody else. God put you here for you to fight this fight. Like not for you just to win the fights because you do that easy, but he's like an order for women's boxing to ever be equal. You to use the person to fight this fight. Like, not for you just to win the fights because you do that easy, but he's like, in order for women's boxing to ever be equal, you is the person to make it equal. So sometimes I look at it as if it's a burden, and he just said to me, there's no other person for the job than you. So you kind of just got to accept your role and just make the best out of it.

But I would love to just focus on fighting, though. But that's just not the way that the world is set up for me well you've been successful focusing on and everything so yeah see the fights are easy but i still need me some money well now you're going to the pfl and in the pfl you're in enrolled in this tournament that if you win you make a million dollars next year next year and and so talk me through how when did you decide to make a transition and try to fight an MMA and why did you decide to sign with the PFL well we had I had been out the ring from last year January and I was supposed to fight May May got pushed back all the way till August then August to October and then after that we didn't hear nothing else from Showtime

um MMA organization had already reached out to me prior like you know Dana he wanted me to do something with Amanda which I was like um not that I wouldn't but it was like I need to give myself a fair chance like this girl has been doing MMA for I don't know how long and you know six weeks I mean six six months to a year it's just not enough time like I'll go on there and you know I'm gonna fight with my fight with my heart but it's still like technique and everything is needed so i didn't look at that we we left that um bellator i don't know like we were actually close with them but they said something about after watching me box that i was too clean of a boxer for them which i was like i don't know what the fuck that mean too clean yeah like i don't want to go in there and just take risk and

get punched in my face or something i don't know really go in there and just take risk and get punched in my face or something i don't know really i never even asked about it once my manager told me that i said cool like all right like nothing i can do about that too clean of a boxer might be one of the dumbest things a person's ever said it was the dumbest thing i've ever heard so i just was like too skillful too sharp yeah stuff like that you need to leave with your face you want to make some money like shots that's right we were just in the talks with them so after we got that word I was like okay whatever and but it seemed like when I talked with the PFL it was more of a

serious offer it wasn't like hey come over here fight our best girl Kelly Harrison didn't just go back to boxing right it was a really a serious offer. It wasn't like, hey, come over here, fight our best girl, Kelly Harrison, and then just go back to boxing. Right. It was really a lucrative deal. It was a three-year deal. And I just had a chance to talk with the CEOs and the owners. And, I mean, it was really a great conversation. And I'm a person, like, when it comes to business,

I just get on the phone and I listen. I don't say much. I'm like, hey, Clarissa, I'm here. You guys go ahead. Take over the floor. And I just get on the phone and I listen. I don't say much. I'm like, hey, Clarissa, I'm here. You guys go ahead. Take over the floor. And I just listen. And to hear what they were saying, you know, just about, like, me coming to the PFL, you know,

me having an option if I wanted to fight in the tournament next year or if I didn't, you know, helping me find trainers, making a three-year contract, what I would get paid this year versus next year it's a big jump you know just somebody who's also putting money behind me you know um every month like looking out for me like if rather i'm doing mma this month or next month i still get paid every month you know so that was very oh so you get so they pay you like a salary? Like a stipend. Yeah, so to me that was like alright because I had been

without boxing for a year so I hadn't made any money in over a year. So all I've been doing is spending. They've made some big moves this year. They signed Anthony Showtime Pettis who's a former UFC champion. They have Rory McDonald who's a former champion as well. They're doing a lot of very smart

things in terms of acquiring big talent. But having you on, I think, is huge because they have Kayla Harrison, but, you know, there's not a lot of competition for her, especially in that 145-pound weight class. That's a tricky weight class in MMA. Is it 155 she at? She's at 155, I think. Is she?

Yeah. I think her last fight was at 145, but she fought tournament at 155 last think is she yeah her last i think her last fight was at 145 but she fought tournament at 155 oh i see um the ufc has like no one at 45 i mean amanda nunez just dominated megan anderson and they don't even have ratings like if you look at the ufc's ratings at 145 there's no rankings it's not listed it's just you just have amanda i mean, there's no one there. It's such a shallow weight class, unfortunately. But Kayla Harrison, coming from that, you know, judo background, I mean, this is, I mean, she's a beast of a judoka. She's really, really talented with that. I agree.

And with you, with this incredible record in boxing and such accolades in boxing, the two of you together, that's a legitimate super fight down the road. It'd be the first time that two two-time Olympic gold medalists ever fought against each other. Yes, yes. If the fight was to happen. But, I mean, I look at it as, you know, she was two-time Olympic gold medalist at the same time. We went to the Olympics together,

so I already knew Kayla before I had joined the PFL. We both went to the Olympics at the same weight class both years, 75 kilos, 165 pounds and uh we were we were cool and we and we still are cool technically but we both understand like the big picture right is us fighting against each other yeah that's the big money fight in in women's mma right now in terms of like something that people get hyped up about it i mean the credentials two olympic gold medals on each side and the two of you guys a striker versus a grappler competing in mma that's a big fight if pfl can promote it correctly if they can get the eyeballs on it it would it would be a big moment for women's MMA. I think that they will. I just have to do my job.

Like, I like when people compare the fight and say, oh, like, people think right now that if me and her got, like, if we was to fight that I would win. And people think that some people think that she would win. But it's like for me, being super honest with myself, it's like, would I go in there and just try to wrestle with her? No. And would she come in there trying to try to wrestle with her? No. And would she come in there trying to just fight me with our hands and do only striking?

No. So me being smart is like I need to learn all of that stuff so that no matter what happens in the fight, I can make sure that I'm doing what I'm supposed to do to get the win. And that's how I feel about all the opponents. There's girls who are on a lower on a lower scale right now um who are looking at me to be their big opportunity right you know mma like they they like they don't have a chance to beat me in boxing let's just put that out there that's not it but mma is their chance to use a whole bunch of different stuff like jujitsu and wrestling and kicking to try to get the

victory so for me right now um it's just learning and training and getting ready, preparing for whoever I get in there with. And then just learning and getting as much experience as I can. Because once 2022 come, that's when me and my team will decide if we're ready for the PFL League tournament or not. And I'm going to be honest, you know, with myself. If I feel like, all right, I'm ready, I feel like I've learned enough, cool. But if my team feel the same way that I feel or if they feel opposite, we're just going to have a conversation. If they feel like, look, you're ready, you know,

and I've already looked up all the girls who are in the PFL league this year and I was happy to say at least five of them I would beat up and it's only eight so i'm like all right that's a good number it's a good number out of eight but it's still this was like for me you'd like it i would like it to be all eight yeah and that's kind of person i am so i'm gonna train as hard as i can this year and get my and get my feet wet and train and get the experience and then we'll and we'll see what our what our decision is next year. Are you going to continue boxing while this is all happening? How are you going to divide up your training?

Are you just going to, like, when you have a boxing match, set aside whatever amount of time you need, six, eight weeks, whatever you decide for training, just only box, and then as soon as that's over, then you get back to your MMA training? I did that for this fight I took just five weeks to just focus on Marie Eve to care but but before then I was at Jackson Lee gym for like a month two months uh leading up to that um now how my schedule looks is after I celebrate my birthday which is March 17th, two days, cash at me. But once April gets here, I am going to be in full camp mode.

So I'll only do MMA until I have my first MMA fight in the middle of June. So middle of June this year? Uh-huh. Is this going to be on the PFL? Yes. Oh, okay. So it's not the tournament. You're just just gonna do this just to have a fight yeah you gotta you gotta hear the news joe i can't tell you everything okay and date and everything is it a secret we releasing secrets

right now is that what's happening no i've already been saying that like i tell the middle of june i don't give everybody like the date or nothing but that's what i'm supposed to be fighting do you have an opponent scheduled no so So around when would they tell you? I don't know. That's why it's just like for me, it's like it don't matter who the opponent is. My job is to get ready. So I'm not taking anybody lightly, you know, any other girl. So I start back training in April.

I'll be there three weeks and go home on weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Come back three weeks again. Go home Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Three weeks again weeks again, go home Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Three weeks again because I have a dorm at the Jackson Wink Academy. Train, drill, learn. And then once I get inside the cage, just go in there and perform and do what I always do, dominate. And that's just what it is.

So tell me what the training's been like. What was the first day you started MMA training? I would tell you, like, I was having anxiety for about a week. I couldn't sleep. Really? I couldn't really eat. Because I had signed a contract with the PFL, but I didn't have a plan. And it was bothering me.

It was like, what the fuck? You know, so i'm like okay where i'm gonna train at who i'm gonna train when do i start getting ready like was it a conversation with john jones that brought you to jackson wickle john um i was actually gonna reach out to them but thank god they reached out to me oh perfect oh thank you jesus because it was like i was gonna i already had hit up John up on um on Instagram and he was being all busy and stuff and he didn't get back with me until I landed in Albuquerque he was like yo you're coming to Albuquerque he's like yeah I'm pushing up in a hotel I'm gonna let you drive my

car and I'm like dude thanks but it would have been great to hear from you like last week you know but he ended up helping me out with that and um I trained for about like a good two or three weeks and and Johnny Bones did a first week like watching uh kind of scoping a little bit and it was like we just figured out that we were twins and that was the best thing ever because he's a hard worker he's smart he's strategic and we believe in hard work and he started drilling me like like like the coaches would just sit on the side and just watch us for three, four hours. And they would see, like, I'm full of energy.

I'm like, let's go. What else you got? And, you know, he was teaching me stuff. And Coach Wink would come in a little bit. Sometimes Coach Jackson would come in. But sometimes it was just me and Johnny, and they would be just kind of just looking at greatness from the outside. And they would never give me any, you know, crap after.

But like my first day going to Jackson Wing Gym, I looked at the cages and stuff. And I was walking to the gym, to the cage, and I thought to myself, I was like, what the fuck am I doing here? When was the first day you grappled? First day. Firstled? First day. First day. First day. And that's the thing. I thought I said that in my head.

I'm like, Jesus, what am I doing here? And I said it out loud. And then Misha, who works with Jackson when you jump, he looked at me. He's like, Clarissa, it's going to be okay. And I was like, what? He was like, you just said, Jesus, what are you doing here? I'm like, oh, I'm so out of my mind. I thought I said it in my head.

I said it out loud. I'm so out of my mind. I thought I said it in my head. I'm not even, I'm not even, I'm not even saying right now. So that's hilarious. I'm like, I'm like, I'm sorry.

I'm just so like, right. You know, just nervous. And they're like, um, I think coach Jackson asked me, he said,

uh, what are you most worried about? And I'm like, I'm not worried about the striking, the punching or the kicking. are you most worried about? And I'm like, I'm not worried about the striking, the punching, or the kicking. I'm not worried about that. I'm like, I'm just worried about being on the ground and not knowing how to get up. Like, I've been having nightmares about this shit.

And all of a sudden, he just was like, all right, get on your back. I'm like, what? That sounds like Greg. He's like, that's what we're going to start with. And he's like, we're going to strengthen your weaknesses and also make it to where you can put everything together to where it's you. And ever since that day, I've just been super comfortable.

I think I had one training injury just where I was like, man, this is so hard today. But we did the same thing the next day, and I was way better and comfortable at it. It's just like being on my back and having to fight off my back, it's just not what boxers do. Right. You know, so it was like it was uncomfortable. But we had been doing different stuff on our back, but then just this one drill was like, oh, man, this is stressful.

You know, I didn't feel like I was. What was it like defending against ground strikes, like when you're on your back and someone's hitting you well that's the thing is that weird we had he taught me what the defense was and he said you're worried about somebody hitting you in the face but you got to realize that they got to they got to make it past your feet to then get you to the face so it's like a lot of leg action really is a lot of uh shrimps a lot of just keeping your feet there, keeping your hands up, being defensive, and knowing what to do when they do get past your feet or, like, what to do. So that's my thing of, like, I'm not worried about it happening.

I just want to know what to do when it does happen. Right. Like, I want to have a game plan for everything. And when they understood that, they were like, you know, you're a very smart fighter. And they started teaching me, and I learned stuff really, really fast. I don't know if it's because I'm younger or because I'm smart, but I learned stuff fast. Well, you're an elite athlete.

You understand your body at a very, very high level. I think, like I said earlier about whatever you want to do in life. Like, if you become an elite boxer like you have, two-time Olympic gold medalist, I think you could do anything. It's just a matter of if you put the same drive and focus and dedication that you've done to boxing, you could apply that to anything. Whether it's you want to become a dedicated grappler,

I think you could be a world-class grappler, 100%. You just have to dedicate yourself. Just take the time. Yeah, exactly. And that's what I'm going to do. I think I'm supposed to fight in boxing again like september maybe december so this time i have here from april to september december is really going to be focused on mma so i'm putting in a putting a putting in a time for it but then it's still just like

just got to see how much i can consume. Because some days they teach me so much. And when I'm like, oh my God, like my brain is tired from thinking about all this. But I learn it. And once I learn it, I get it. And I take so many notes in my phone. Yeah. And I got videos of stuff that I have on my phone.

So when I'm at home, I can do some of the training and do some of the techniques just so I can just keep it in my mind and keep it refreshed because I understand how important repetitiveness is. Like, it's super important. Yeah, it is. It's everything. And when you're training for ground fighting, do you ever think of yourself as maybe competing in a wrestling tournament or a jiu-jitsu tournament or something like that someday? Nope.

No? in a wrestling tournament or a jiu-jitsu tournament or something like that someday? Nope. I don't look at that because Coach Tusa, who's my MMA coach, MMA jiu-jitsu coach, and Coach Jackson, the coach, they said the best MMA fighters are the ones who know how to mix everything up together. So sometimes you go into just wrestling, then you start getting into wrestling mode, and then you do jiu-jitsu, and you start doing jiu-jitsu, and he's like, you want to know how to punch and throw your kicks and punch and be defensive and everything together. And do jiu-jitsu stuff all with the MMA style, which I feel like was super smart. And I only can say this stuff because I asked them the same thing.

Like, I think I'm so competitive that when I found out about, like, the color of the belts in jiu-jitsu, I'm like, oh, I got to be black belt. Right. and they're like um not so fast like we want to teach you jiu jitsu and you to learn it but you're not going to learn like the regular person will learn it you're learning strictly for mma and so just learning that it's like once you get more profound in in MMA and you learn how to mix stuff up and you have enough jiu-jitsu to get you to high – when you're against high-level fighters who know this, then we can start getting you more experience in jiu-jitsu.

But right now, we want you just to do it, just to learn it with MMA style. Do you remember the first time you tapped somebody out? Me? Yeah. I haven't. You've never tapped anybody out? No. No?

No. So do you do just plain jujitsu sparring do you roll yeah i i do rolling with coach tusa which some days is fun and some days it is not because he's you know he's a black belt i think with like stripes and stuff and i mean he doesn't take it easy you know he's super like I hate being grabbed so my main thing is like oh you grabbed me get off me right he's like no you want to do stuff that can advance your movement how could you get in a position to where you're winning and at first my mind was completely defensive which I'm super super relaxed at getting people off me like you grab me okay he touched me here oh you touched me here okay let me get back here I'm on the ground he showed me this let's work on that

but um oh I see an arm bar let me try to grab it you know just being like that but at first I was super defensive now I'm like kind of offensive with it and when we're trying to do the whole jujitsu thing I I'm like, man, it's still hard. It's a whole different level of breathing. It's five minutes compared to the two minutes that I do in boxing. Right. Even though I sparred three minutes, but still,

three minutes compared to five. It's way different. But just getting that cardio up there and just having to do, like, the wrestling stuff, it's not easy by far, but it's fun. Some days it's fun, and some days I'm like, man, I can't wait until this hour and two hours that I'm going to get the hell out of here. So are you doing any live jiu-jitsu roles with other people other than the coach, or are you just doing it only with the coach right now?

I've done some kickboxing sparring with other fighters i haven't done anything jujitsu yet um but that's because of the timing too like once we were really starting to get into it i had my boxing match get scheduled and that was to me i had to make that be more important than me at the time i saw you throwing some kicks and i saw you moving around does it does it feel weird to you to be sparring at a distance with kicks like you know the difference of distance between boxing kicks is a couple of feet is it feel weird to you to like know that you could hit someone like much further away or they could hit you much further away than they normally you would have to think of in a boxing

situation oh no it's not it's not difficult you got accustomed to think of in a boxing situation? No, it's not difficult. You got accustomed to it quickly? Yeah, I got accustomed to it quickly and just learned the distance. And my main thing was defense. Okay, I understand I can do all the kicking, I can do all the wrestling, I can punch people, but what about when they do it to me? Right. And that was my main thing.

What is the defense to a head kick? What's the defense to a body kick? What's the defense to somebody doing a spinning back kick trying to hit me in my stomach like what's the defense i saw you throw that too i was impressed you got a good sidekick too they taught me and i just did it well it seems like you're picking it up very quickly yeah so your timeline is june june will be your first fight and that will be your introduction do you think that you're going to are you going to do some live situations before then like make it seem like it's a fight yeah we're having doing like simulations to where like I'm in there I'm shadowboxing in a in a

stance and throwing kicks and stuff and then coaches they sprawl or coaches say you know go to the cage and work your way up from the cage. Or, like, he'll tackle me, and I got to figure out how to get him off me and get up. So it's been – we've been gradually, you know, getting better and gradually doing more live stuff. I think that he wanted me to get – all of them wanted me to be comfortable. So I think when I get back, I have like a week of just refreshing my mind of everything.

And then I believe like the next week will be going into the live stuff. But I'm going to let the coaches figure that stuff out on what they want me to do, how they want me to do it, and let them game plan because I don't know MMA better than them. I just know boxing. If boxing had the same amount of attention for women fighters as mma do you think you would do this uh no i wouldn't so if you had your options if you had a magic wand and you could wave it you would just rather have boxing get the female boxing get the attention that deserves absolutely you know boxing is my first love before i had a boyfriend before i even knew

what anything in life really was boxing is the first thing that i that i ever really truly loved that loved me back you know so boxing was my first love you know mma um it's kind of adding to my greatest woman of all time statement the quote but at the same time it's like it's a weird word right i mean it's like oh we're going you know gotta know how to sound like your letters yeah quote red one of all time but i just um if boxing gave me the recognition that i that i get doing mma i would just do boxing you know it really wouldn't matter what they say about MMA fighters, but it kind of irks me a little bit that, you know, girls, like Amanda Nunes has great, you know, she's a great fighter and everything, but she couldn't come over to boxing and do nothing with me. Zero.

Even if we fought at her weight class, 145, 155, she would never be able to beat me in a boxing match. Well, her real weight class is 135. She fights at 145 just because she could. Okay. Yeah. Good. But that's what I'm saying, though. Like, one, no girl like that 135 in boxing could do

anything with me. 140, 147. What do you think you could make if you had a cut? 47 is the lowest I'm going. That's it? That's it. And that's for you got to pay me some money, too. Because my legs are going to get a little smaller and my booty going that's for, you got to pay me some money too because my legs are going to get a little smaller, my booty going to go away.

Y'all pay me for that. I don't play that. Like, I'm a woman first, boxer second. You know, so, I always say that.

Like, I'm a woman, so I don't want to lose all my shape. Right. You know, they already said that women boxers are ugly.

Now you're going to tell me I'm not going to have no shape either? Like, fuck that. I'm going to keep my shape and get a nice face. No, so, that's what I'm saying. Like, ugly now you tell me i'm gonna shape either like fuck that i'm keeping my shape nice face no so

that's what i'm saying like when she goes in there and she knocks out a girl like the whole world just started like they all started tweeting me for no certain reason oh man nunez will beat you in the boxing match and it's like look i got two olympic gold medals in boxing please stop don't even mention her and me in the boxing ring to me to me it's like it's a little embarrassing it's like look she's knocking on girls who don't even have no kind of boxing experience that i have and even though she's doing what she's doing it with her hands she has some helps some kicks some chokes and all that other stuff yeah it's like i have just my left and my right hand and got to go in here and do it for one minute less than the men got to do it,

two rounds shorter, and then I get paid way less money. So we got kind of aggravated to be hearing that another woman can box better than me, and she's in a whole other sport. Do you look forward to the day where you can crack someone with those little gloves too? Yeah, I look forward to that in June. What do you mean? It's a big difference. No, it's a big difference. difference i mean i just fought in 10 ounces last week wow now i'll be fighting in two ounces is it two or four well four ounces i mean my i feel like my hands are already pretty

quick yeah oh they're gonna be like lightning lightning and i'm i'm stronger you know like the bands was popping out when i was punching his last fight. I bench 185 now. 185? Yeah. Really? Yeah. Holy shit. I know.

That's what I said. That's impressive. Yeah, it's impressive for a woman. Yeah. Don't fuck your shoulders up. Benching's rough. No, I just wanted to see what was my max. I wanted to test my strength.

I'm not like a person that bench weight every day. Like my boyfriend can do like 365 and all that shit i'm not i'm not doing that do you when you do uh conditioning do you do lifting weights do you lift weights at all yeah what kind of stuff do you do um i do the benching i do like building my triceps but i don't do like really really heavy weight like when i do like i do like the light stuff i build like i'm told you like uh on a on a micro scale i build the small muscles so they can make the bigger muscles do more. Do you have a strength and conditioning coach? Not really.

Like, my boyfriend's a fitness trainer up at the gym up in, like, Beecher Flint area up at App Fitness Gym. And that's where I first started doing, like, my strength training. And at first it was like, I just was like, you know, to punch harder, you got to have stronger triceps, because I was, after not boxing for a year, it was like, once I come out of this whole weighting thing, I want to come back out with some steam, you know, I want to come back out with some power, and so he started building up, like you said, my shoulders, my triceps, my biceps, even just my forearm, you know, just building up that stuff

but I will also do like a lot of HIIT cardio too but when it came to strength some days I'm like today we're gonna do I do everything even so the calves the squats for the thighs and all that stuff but exercises um core core is something I've really gotten super strong at over this past and then and then and then a benching but i do benching maybe every two weeks or something because at first i was struggling with 135 in june i was really struggling just to get 135 up and then all of a sudden when i started getting 135 up it went to 155 165 and like, you know what? How about 185 be my goal for next year? But I was able to bench that up in, like, December. Do you notice any difference in your punching power from all this weightlifting?

Yeah. A lot of difference. Yeah. I noticed that I load up more, which I don't like. That's why I'm cutting back from it. But also, too, in my last last fight the punch we focused on all throughout camp was the overhand right so it was supposed to you know land and it landed a couple times but i mean this girl was a professional survivor so i would hit her with it and she

would grab me yeah so i would just say like i did notice how much stronger i was and how much weaker my opponent felt like it was some time in the fight but like she would throw like a jab and she would wanted to do something all i had to do was just swat it away and like she can put some force on like a like a power jab i just boom and you you think that's because of the weight lifting yeah i think because of the weight lifting just when i when i hit it with the first right hand up in the first round. After that, she was on her wheels. She was running. Like, she wouldn't stand there and fight me. And, you know, usually some girls would. But for her, I thought she was physically stronger and she was bigger than me. But when I hit her with that first right hand first round,

she was gone from every fight. And I wobbled her at least five, six times in the fight. Almost finished her. But once again, ref was from canada she's from canada she was holding he didn't really call her for it and he kept allowing her to hold throughout the whole fight so every time i rocked her there she was holding me and i was trying to figure out how not to get held and how to land more shots but i mean really she was just a professional survivor so that's what i have to deal with for the fight do you think you're gonna have to do

anything different in terms of strength and conditioning for mma when you consider all the grappling the five minute rounds are you going to have to adjust what do you think you're going to do differently um i've already been doing some stuff differently like i said tightening up my core was one of the main things for me um you know people do like those burpees it's more of like full body cardio instead of of like focusing on like the glutes or the squats or the calves. Like focusing on everything about one time. Because one minute you can be standing up fighting. And the next minute you got to be getting yourself off the ground.

So I do like a lot of burpees. A lot of get ups. Do you do any kettlebell work? Yep. A lot of kettlebellups. Did you do any kettlebell work? Yep. A lot of kettlebell work. Just super core, really, and I always run. I feel like running is great for conditioning. So I just run and still jump rope.

And just also, I think simulation is super important. Like when I said sparring, I won't be able to get out of MMA sparring. I definitely need that, and I'm going to do that. So when it comes to five minutes of MMA sparring. Like, I definitely need that, and I'm going to do that. So when it comes to five minutes of MMA sparring or whatever, I'm going to get in a cage. I'm going to do it. I'm going to get frustrated. I'm going to have some success.

But I have to get that experience before I get in a cage in June. Now, when you go – you'll go through your camp at Jackson Winklejohn. Did they set up strength and conditioning for you when you were there? Are you going to do it with their coaches? They haven't yet. But I also haven't asked either. Like I have my own. Like I said, I know my body better than anybody else.

So when it comes to strength and conditioning and stuff, I always trust my own judgment for the past however many years that i've been been boxing so um i will i will hear their advice on it and hear what they have to say holly invited me to come work out with her doing some of her strength training but i haven't went with her yet so maybe i can go with her when i get back but we will see what happens and do you do you set up your diet as well do you set up everything yeah do you prep your meals or do you just do you cook for yourself like how do you decide what to eat i'm an athlete who signed with perfecting athletes there's also amanda nunez nutritionist they're the same people that works with her they've been with me for the past

two three years so that's how i make weight for my fights with perfecting athletes and um sometimes i have them send me food throughout the whole camp and sometimes i do my own food but they come with me fight week so it really depends on what upon how much i weigh um if i feel like i'm disciplined enough to do the food myself and actually do it right so I can actually lose the weight. But a lot of times, me just working out, I lose weight and eating healthy. I kind of just reach out to them like, hey, I got a headache today. You guys know anything I can eat to make my headache go away or stuff like that. But I've always controlled all that stuff myself until, like I said, a few years ago.

And so do you supplement? Do you take vitamins? Yeah. Do you do all that yourself as well? Yeah. You never consult with a nutritionist or anything? No, not really. You just know what to do and what's worked for you in the past?

I think I've tested things on me to see, like okay, like something that's big for me is just sleep. I have like big insomnia. So I take melatonin at night, majority every night, because I'll stay up to 3, 4 o'clock in the morning just kind of on my phone, restless, thinking. So melatonin is something I take. Why can't I think of the other stuff? I got Expedite, which is with the snack, S-N-A-C.

And that's sometimes like a pre-workout, before-workout. But I don't take it every day, not even every other day. Some days when I just don't feel like working out, I'm like, I got to go to the gym. So I'll take it to get me going. But they also have some melatonin stuff that they have. And then what is that one thing? Glutamine. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Glutamine. And there's one more. Damn, I can't think of it. No worries. Yeah, but I definitely like take stuff to where like I can have good recovery. Like I said, i really focus on that um and i take supplements but i can't say i take them all the time i take b12 when i get up in the

morning like a little b12 tablet but and also have like a sleep ring it's in my purse but yeah or or a sleep ring and it lets me know hey today is the day you can break records or today is the day you need to get more sleep or whatever do you ever try to leave your phone alone at night because like they say that that's one of the things that keeps people awake is uh staring at screens they say that like it gets to a certain point in the night like when if you know you're going to go to bed in two hours or so you really shouldn't look at any screens i never heard that yeah no that's no that's why people wear like blue light blocking lenses and it's the kind of light that comes from

screens it fucks with you because your body thinks it's night it's daytime your body thinks it's the sun it's real weird because your brain produces melatonin like um matt frazier was here the other day who is um five world CrossFit champion. And one of the things that he said he has, he has like an artificial sun by his bed. It's like like a sunset machine. And like this ball gets dimmer and dimmer and dimmer as as the night goes on. And then when you know, if he's lying in bed reading a book, it starts getting dimmer and dimmer, and it stimulates your brain's own production of melatonin.

And you can supplement with melatonin. There's nothing wrong with that. But the thing about looking at screens, we're all addicted to looking at phones like, what's that? You know, like that screen screen that brightly lit thing actually stimulates the part of your brain that keeps you awake sometimes my mind just have too much on it yeah like i just i'm just thinking about everything you know you got relationships you got family you got boxing you got mma you got this training that training thing motion like the next day

you know if you can drink today you can have drink today, or you need to do all water. It's like how much do you weigh? How much do you have to lose for this fight? My mind is always ongoing. Then I have just certain life goals, so my mind is always thinking. So even though I do put the phone down, I'm still up just thinking. So melatonin, I'm like, you know what, just forget it. Just take some melatonin and get sleeping.

No, I'm sure. Look, I don't doubt that you have a lot of things in your mind i mean you you have an incredibly intense life what's that you probably write about that phone thing yeah no it's it's been scientifically proven there's some something about staring at screens that keeps people awake it's just not good for you it's not good for your brain's own natural production of melatonin. Do you do anything else for recovery? Like do you do ice baths or sauna or anything like that? Ice baths. I do not do saunas.

They're just too hot. It's not my thing. So ice baths, I'll do a hot tub. The whole thing about sauna is that it's too hot. When you say it's not your thing, that's the whole purpose. It's like dry. And also, too like it has a door that shuts and i think i'm like super claustrophobic yeah but i can't like the whole little what's the epsom salt thing where you get in there with the blue sensory deprivation tank can't get in there can't do it with all for it and i've seen it i'm like

can i leave the door open and like No to get the full effect You gotta shut the door And I'm like Yeah No I do I do Cryotherapy

I'm okay with that door shutting Because you can see through it Right You can see through the sauna door But it's still just too hot and dry It's too small in there I'm good So I do like the sauna room No not the sauna but it's still just too hot and dry. It's too small in there. I'm good.

So I do like the sauna room. No, not the sauna, but I do a steam room before I do a sauna. So steam room, hot tub, cryo, ice baths, and massages. When I'm in camp, it's like heaven for me. I get three, four massages a week. Oh, that's nice. Yeah, because I got it set up like that okay

but after a hard sparring session i go home for a couple hours and i hit up my masseuse brenda like hey brenda can you come over and massage me for an hour like this is hurting that's hurting and she comes over and get the knots out of my traps knots out my legs and everything and just i can go to sleep and have a good a good night but i hate going to bed feeling like i'm sore i'm hurting i'm sure yeah no it sounds like you you have a great understanding of your body like you're you're in tune with everything like you know you're working hard enough you know i'm not in tune with my heart but i hear you you're not in tune with your heart no in what way because there's just too many emotions like i think that God blesses us women to care about stuff. And it's like, why do I care?

Like, fuck that shit. For real. You're a human being. I mean, that's why. Whatever. Guys don't care about shit majority. Oh, that's not true. What?

Different guys. Different guys care about different things. No. I think that a lot of people, to me, I feel like I care. I'm not going to say guys, but just people, period. I feel like I've always seemed to care more about things than other people. I'm big on loyalty and trust and respect. And then you got people who pretend to be about that stuff and they're not.

And I actually care. And I'm more emotional than what people see. I'm super sensitive. And I've always had a thing with people say people can hit me all day like I don't even feel that like that's nothing I don't I don't I don't I'd rather somebody hit me than say something terrible to me because you say something to me like that would piss me off more than you hitting me like you said the wrong thing to me and it hits me the wrong way. I'm ready to really hurt somebody. So it's like, I wish that, you know,

God just blessed me with the sense of just don't care. Like, I'm getting better at it. I don't think you want that. I'm telling you. I don't think you want that. I think you're better off handling it but keeping these emotions. No, fuck emotions.

Dude, this is hilarious. No, not it. I think this is just my take. I might be wrong. You're wrong. There's a, there's a, hear me out though. Okay. There's a, there's a statement.

The way you do anything is the way you do everything. And I think the problem is when there's a person like you who's a champion, the way you dedicate yourself to fighting, you expect this kind of dedication in life. That's why you're so big on loyalty life that's why you're so big on loyalty that's why you're so big on trust and i think this loyalty and trust you extend to other people and you have these feelings and they're powerful feelings but that's the same thing that leads you to be a great fighter these emotions this it's intensity i think there's you don't want to be numb i know what you're saying because it's easier sometimes. I want to feel passionate about boxing and MMA, but all the other stuff.

Relationship stuff. Just gets in the way. Friendships. Friendships. Because my relationship is great. Friendship stuff. Friendships, family ships, all that. But if you were friends with people like you, then you wouldn't have to fuck with that.

You wouldn't have to worry about it do you know what i'm saying like the the issue is oftentimes is that the issues that you're having are with people that aren't of the same caliber as you you think well that's the thing when you are great like i am i don't really meet a lot of people who's on my same caliber like honestly me me and Holly Holm vibe on a different level. Like, that's my girl. Johnny Bones, same thing. Right. He's a great person.

What do they have in common? They're great. Champions. They're champions. Right. That's what I'm saying. So it's like everybody is not champions. Clarissa, it's lonely at the top. I wish you would stop saying that.

I'm getting the entourage. I'm getting the entourage. Like, I don't care. It's lonely at the top I wish you would stop saying I'm getting entourage I'm getting entourage like I don't care it's lonely at the top you're gonna have to deal with that that some people they half ass things some people they half ass

yeah and that's a problem for me yes that's what I'm saying that's what I'm saying how you do anything is how you do everything how you have your friendships is how you're gonna run your training camps

is how you're gonna be a friend is how you're gonna be a mother it's how you're gonna be a lover it's how you're gonna be anything no matter what you do you're a champion you're going to be a friend is how you're going to be a mother it's how you're going to be a lover it's how you're going to be anything no matter what you do you're a champion that you're a rare person rare people need to find other rare people because if you're around other people they're going to get mad at your rarity they're going to get mad at your strengths they're going to get petty they get weird they get jealous oh my god deal with that all the time i'm just like what the heck you do of course i'm like Of course. I'm like, why aren't you normal?

Like, what is wrong with you? It bothers them that you're so strong. Well, I can't deal with that shit. That's what I'm saying. I wish I didn't care. But you don't have to be numb, right? Because you don't have to be numb around Holly Holm. You don't have to be numb around Jon Jones.

Nope. Because they're champions. You just need to find a lot of champions to be friends with. Or people in that camera. But they all have their own thing that they're doing. They can't be with me all the time. can be with you sometimes yeah sometimes but still i need my family and my friends start being champions figure it out well for sure having a friendship or a family relationship with someone you raises people's expectations of themselves

and that's one of the things that people don't like what people love to think they're a badass right everybody wants to think oh i got my shit together i'm different i get i get things done i'm this i'm that and then they're around somebody they're around someone who actually does like you and they're like fuck that's sick because when i'm around somebody who got more than me i'm like i'm a student of the game yes like how did you get that right shit you got you made a made 15 million how you do that you know that's why you're a champion like you got a nice car how you get a nice car without having to pay full on like i'm like a student of the game right i've never been envious of anybody in my life that's a champion's mentality though

well that's that's all positive right all right like when you see someone who's doing well that's beneficial because it's inspiration that's that's a winner's way of looking at things but some people they don't want to do that work and so they see someone like you who works so hard but is also so successful they try to find holes they try to pick at you they try to talk shit they try to find something that that you're doing wrong because if they can find something that you're doing wrong or something that you're failing at or something that you're gonna make them feel better oh poor thing yeah crabs in a bucket you know that expression yeah i have heard of that yeah that's what it is well maybe since you said that maybe i'll be less listening to it but i'll be reading everything but i've actually stopped i read everything but

it'd be like you know what let me skip about eight comments because some stuff like all right this is good stuff here but it's again you're just dealing with the opinions of losers yeah do you think you're like i always just say you think michael jordan's leaving youtube comments no he's busy he's busy he's busy being michael jordan right lebron james doesn't leave youtube comments, right? No. That's not what champions do. I overlook so much stuff, though. I just be like, some people you gotta put in a place. You don't, though. This is sick. Just let them be petty on their own. Just disconnect

yourself from the communication line. I'm working on it. Maybe I'll stop at 26. Maybe. A couple days from now, just... You be like, you know what? Turn a new leaf. Not even respond to none of you losers on social social media the problem is it does affect the way people think that's the problem it affects people's minds and people are addicted to their phone like look at you what i got text my luck is urgent i'm sure it's urgent people get addicted to those things

and you get addicted to like reading responses People get addicted to those things. And you get addicted to, like, reading responses. You get addicted to, like, you say something to them, and then they say something back to you, and you think about, what the fuck did they say? And then you have to check it. No, I just feel like sometimes I need the doubters. You know, I need to hear what they're saying so I can prove them wrong.

I'm sure you're going to hear them no matter what. Yeah, but it's still, like, some of them, especially, like, let's say Eddie Hearnarn he just said he said he said some girl who beat me in the amateurs only one girl that beat me but he said that you were 80 and one right 77 and one 77 and one people keep putting 80 and one on my wikipedia but why do they do that i don't know but i but i kept great count of my fights so why they had three fights i don't know, but I kept great count of my fights. So why'd they add three fights? I don't know. I'm just doing stuff, I think.

How weird. I don't know. But seven is my number. Eddie Hearn is a promoter, though. Yeah, but he said that this girl not... Not that the girl would just beat me. He said she would stop me or KO me. Do you know why he said that?

That shit pissed me off so bad. Do you know why he said that? I wanted to jump through the phone and smack him. So you would talk about it right now. So you would talk about it when you get an opportunity. And that's how he's going to make money. Well, I want him to know, just pay me the money and I'll come over there and whip her ass. That's it.

And that's what he wants. That's what he wants. He wants you to do. What's her name? He don't want to pay me. He wants me to come fight her. Oh, he wants you to fight her for like a hundred grand. Come on now.

Come on now. Like, I told him how much it was. What if you were on the Anthonyony joshua joshua tyson fury undercard like that's going to be a very high profile undercard still gotta pay me though still gotta pay you but still there'll be a lot of eyeballs on that it'd be worth it it'd be worth it but not still not worth a hundred thousand i fought for more than 200 304 well what is he made an offer? It was trash. Really?

I'm not even going to say it. It was so trash. That's unfortunate. But that's what he's doing. I mean, he's trying to make money. He's just being a promoter. He's trying to make money or trying to use people to make money? I don't know. Trying to use people to make money.

Well, that's just sad. That's what promoters do. I mean, what has the worst reputation in sports worse than a boxing promoter? I mean, they're like the sleaziest. Oh, I don't think it's none. I think Don King was like the king of that. He is. Like, it's scary reading about what he did to Mike Tyson.

Oh, my God. It's crazy. Like, that was 300 million or something? Some insane amount of money. And look, that's scary. Like, whenever somebody gave me a contract from hearing that story i flip it over and back with like hold on make sure nothing on the back of here yeah make sure it's one page because it was like the story that you heard about

that was kind of kind of scary well that's don king's whole world you know his whole world has been ripping off fighters and promoting big events and making shit loads of money you know it's like the the boxing promoter reputation is it's one of the worst reputations in all sports who are you going back and forth with over there you think so yeah what's worse what's what what in sports has a worse reputation than boxing promoters in terms of like the you know look it goes all the way back to on the Waterfront with Marlon Brando. I mean, that was about a boxing promoter

that did him dirty. I don't think there's nothing worse than that. I'm trying to think like... Nothing. I mean, people can talk all the shit they want about MMA promoters,

but MMA promoters, there's no way they have a worse reputation than boxing promoters. It's not even close. No, I don't think Dana has a worse reputation than Don King. it's not even close no i don't think dana has a worse reputation than don king no no chance so have you thought about fighting the fc do you think that's a possibility i'm gonna say i just three years ago with the pfl right

yeah like i like to look at the bigger picture of things because that's what keeps me motivated like i can't think of like i'm gonna fight the worst girl in MMA, and it gets me going. It's like I got to look at, like, what's the big picture? Like, what are we leading toward? And we're leading toward a big super fight, you know, with me and Kayla Harrison, me winning a million dollars, me fighting against the other girls who she's competing against. Like, I'm looking at that, you know.

So it's like I can't even think about ufc like what i love i think in three years i would have a better chance at beating emily nunez than beating her than i do right now definitely with what i know and what and what and what she knows you know but like i said the more experience i get the more comfortable i get the more i learn all different disciplines it'd be a stronger argument within the next couple of years. I think you could be a huge superstar in the sport. And I think if you get into the UFC, that's the best chance for becoming a huge superstar.

I think the PFL is making some good moves. And I think Bellator is making some good moves too. But at the end of the day, the UFC is the biggest organization in the world, you know? And I like that you're with the PFL for now. I think it's a great move. And they do have good fighters over there think it's a great move and they do have good fighters over there it is it's a very good organization I'd like the idea of you getting some fights in there but I would really love to see you in the UFC someday I think it'd be pretty

amazing have to see with these three years hope and then after that but you know like I actually respect Amanda Nunes a whole lot and I tell people that all the time I respect what she does in MMA and that's why I wouldn't just go over there and just fight her you're not going to give me six months to a year to get ready for a fight like that that's like a super fighter did that what they offered you? six months? that's kind of crazy right?

you should have another UFC fight before you fight yeah but it was like it was the Conor McGregor thing where he went in and he fought against the best in boxing so they really wanted to get that win back in the may and that's what i think because i was like what definitely that's funny the only other high profile boxer was james tony james to him but james tony went in pretty far yeah i was way past his prime and I don't think he even prepared, to be honest. Right, and that's why when I first started training for MMA,

they're like, oh, she's another James Toney. I'm like, you guys, wait a minute. I'm 20 years younger, and I'm still boxing. And, like, dude. Big difference. It's a big difference. Like, he was 45, and he didn't, like, I'm actually respecting the sport. And that's something that I give myself props about.

Because I can be egotistical, know and be cocky like oh forget that jiu-jitsu forget all that wrestling shit forget those kicks too like I'm gonna go over there my strength in boxing and just whoop these girls ass like that's cocky that's dumb that's arrogant and I get and I get called those words often in boxing when it was like, I've never been arrogant. You're just confident. I'm confident. That's it. You're confident in your ability.

But you should be confident in your ability as a boxer. Got to. The cocky and arrogant thing would be if you just threw yourself into the UFC without understanding all those other aspects of fighting. Exactly. Yeah, but you're smart. You're doing it the right way. Right. And that's what I commend myself on.

But I was going to do that anyway. Like, i believe in always setting myself up to win i hate losing of course hate losing it's not how you do anything is how you do everything right i'm sure you're gonna compete as a ufc fighter or as an mma fighter rather the same way you competed as a boxer you'll you i have the same attitude about it like i'm not i'm not fearful now i know you did some sparring with Cyborg. What did you think about her and when she wound up and fought Amanda Nunes? Well, that's the thing people get confused, too.

Me and Chris Cyborg did our sparring a year prior to that fight. We sparred one time. It was off of, like, we had been kind of messaging back and forth a little bit but i think it was kind of like a wonder of hers if she could you know if she can hang yeah if she can beat the best woman in boxing in like a sparring match so um i went to vegas for some fights i went to vegas for some fights fights And she was in LA And she was like hey I see you're in Vegas I see you just fought like would you mind coming down to LA

To you know To spar with me and I was by myself And I'm like well I ain't got my boxing gear I ain't got my head gear I ain't got my mouthpiece I ain't got nothing She was like just come to LA so she flew me to LA Her and Ray And we went to the gym And at first they were kind of like

On the edge about sparring they didn't know they should ask and i just threw it out there because they were like oh you know we can do some boxing drills and we can do that and i was just like all right whatever and i was like um we sparring and they were like oh well did you want to spar and i'm like shit why not you know i'm here so uh had like a little chatty mouthpiece in uh had gear some gloves from her and uh the coach asked like how many rounds it is edited great it's edited yeah this isn't the full rounds or is it wait a minute i don't know jamie just found something I'm looking at this Is that the first time You sparred with

An MMA fighter Yeah Well I sparred with Guy MMA fighters Who were like From like the Michigan area But not like On a whole

Up on a profile Of Chris Cyborg Right But Did you feel like There was a lot of tension In the room When that was happening

Cause she was trying To test herself Against the best female boxer I didn't I don't i don't feel tension or feel pressure but did you feel like it from them that this was like a big moment no no you're so relaxed look at you i was like we're sparring you know a lot of times that's championship mentality right there when we sparred i think after sparring ray was was like, yo, I've never seen that before. And I was like, what? And he was like, I've never seen anybody get their respect from Chris Cyborg in a sparring match in boxing.

I've never seen it. And I was like, oh. It wasn't a big deal to me. I just was like, I was happy to spar against her. I've never questioned my boxing abilities. And I knew that, you know, I heard a little bit that she kind of wanted to spar against her. I've never questioned my boxing abilities. And I knew that, you know, she was, I heard a little bit that she kind of wanted to get into boxing. She wanted to fight against Cecilia Brockes.

And from my sparring, I would say that Chris Cyborg definitely could do great in boxing. All she needs is a few months to actually focus on just boxing. And she would go out there and kick some ass because she was just, I don't know how to put it like her her arms was just strong i don't know how to put it like i don't feel like she really punched her but i mean okay maybe she's physically strong that's what it was yeah like when you get in you get in the clinch with her you you you you can't move chris right he was like oh you either get out the clinch or she gonna try to throw you this way and play you that way well she's a legit grappler she's strong as fuck yeah you know she actually uh had a muay thai fight against this woman there's a woman named jorina barge and she's probably the most ducked female fighter that's currently active like women don't want to fight her she's a beast

and cyborg fought her and they i think it was five rounds but uh it's either three or five but in muay thai you know uh cyborg does not have a lot of experience in this and this woman is uh undefeated and she cyborg came after her and she got dropped a couple times in the fight but get up and still charge forward. I mean, it was impressive. Just on sheer toughness and her willingness to take this fight. Like, I don't know if Cyborg has any pro Muay Thai fights. If she does, it's a relatively small number. And Jarena Barge, like I said, she went for almost two years where she couldn't get a fight.

Like, nobody wanted to fight her. She's a big, long, tall girl, and she's super technical. I've actually seen that fight on the web. She's a big, long, tall girl, and she's super technical. I've actually seen that fight on the line. She's super technical. So I was impressed with Cyborg just because of that, that she was willing to do that. And now she's over in Bellator. She became the Bellator champion.

So when they were talking with you, were they talking with you about trying to set something up with her? No. A boxing match? No, an MMA fight. When Bellator was talking to you about fighting, is something up with her no tomorrow a boxing match no an mma fight when bellator was talking to you about fighting is that what they were considering um i don't know what they were considering honestly but i know like one you know 145 is not a weight class that i would want to go to right 155 has been my low for 154 in boxing so 155 was it for me but i think

that they kind of wanted me to get the 145 and and I just was like, hmm. So the PFL is really the only option right now in terms of that weight class, right? No, because I could have got to 45, but I just don't want to. That's the thing. I feel like I have a bigger body. I walk around at 70, 75. That's not something that I personally want, and I haven't been at 140 anything since I was 16 years old. So it's not something that I want to do. Yeah, you feel like you'll be weakened?

Probably. I just. It doesn't sound like fun. I hate going to 154. Really? You know, so it's like going to 45 is like shit. So you would prefer 68 if they gave that as an option? Nah, I would prefer 55.

55 is good. But I think that's the only place, I think PFL is the only place that has a 55 right now. I don't think any other organization has put that. Probably, but Dana was talking about creating a 155 if I wanted to do U.S. Really, just for you? Yeah. That must be nice. But also, too, it was like, still, now we're going to have the smaller girls coming up 145, coming up to 155, 135 coming up. And, I mean, let's be honest.

A lot of girls kill themselves to make those weights. A lot of girls are not 45 or 35. True. They're actually bigger. But they kill themselves to make that weight. So there is a weight class for 155 in other organizations. They kill themselves to make that weight. So there is a weight class for 155 in other organizations. But for right now, 35 in a smaller weight class, you just get more notoriety for some reason.

But it's even like that in boxing. You know, I feel like 60 has some of the most skilled girls in boxing. But the weight class 135 and 140, 147, they kind of said that the girls have better skill. And I feel like they're just looking at, like, smaller women, and they feel like it's more attractive or something. I don't know. But for me, what was I saying? Yeah, 45, just not it.

Well, listen, Clarissa, you're a champion in life, and you're just, in my opinion, one of the most exciting entrants into MMA. I'm excited that you're doing it because I've always liked to see elite athletes that are at the top of the food chain in their sports come over. And, you know, we really haven't had anybody like you that was that good at boxing and that dominant as a professional enter into MMA. So it's exciting. I had thought Flo was going to come over and fight against Conor connor i really did i never thought he was gonna do that no chance

i thought it'd be like you know kind of like some written rule like he can't kick me or he can't elbow me or something well that wouldn't be mma then well you're doing his real mma if floyd came over they would destroy his legs they would just kick his legs out from under him it'll be terrible i thought it would be rules though that's why I thought he would come over. Just like a boxing match outside a cage, I thought. You can't have that. Well, unless you allow clinching and striking from the clinch. But even then, he'd get fucked up. Elbows and shit from the clinch.

It'd be terrible. Agreed. Yeah, you don't want that. He's a brilliant boxer. He's brilliant. No, but that's what I'm saying. I thought he would have been over. He's too smart for that.

He made them fight his game. Too smart? No, that's's what I'm saying. I thought he would have been over. He's too smart for that. He made them fight his game. Too smart? No. No, that's not what you say. What is it? It's not he's too smart. It's just that he's not that driven to do it. Like, I'm driven to do it.

It takes a lot of heart to come with something that you don't know and do it. Oh, I know. A lot of heart. Listen, nothing but respect. I'm excited that you're doing it. There's a lot of boxers who would not. Like Canelo, he's not coming in. No. Well, he doesn't have respect. I'm excited that you're doing it. There's a lot of boxers who would not, like Canelo, he's not coming in.

No. Well, he doesn't have to though. It's all the money he's making. Yeah. Well, I hope you make that money. I really do.

Same. Thank you. And if anybody has a chance, you are the, in my opinion, you're the front runner for a woman that can enter into boxing or enter into MMA from boxing

and really elevate the sport. You know what 50 Cent said? What did he say? If I can't do it, it can't be done. Well, there you go. That's his song. Well, good luck to you, and thank you very much for being here. I appreciate you.

Of course. Thanks, Joe. Thank you, and good luck in June. Yeah. All right. I'll be watching for sure. I might literally kick ass. Yes, literally kick ass. That's going to be fun. All right. Bye, everybody. like kick ass like yes literally it's gonna be fun all right bye everybody