The Joe Rogan Experience - #864 - Kevin Ross & Gaston Bolanos

Episode Date: October 24, 2016

Kevin "The Soul Assassin" Ross is an American Muay Thai kickboxer and former mixed martial artist. Gaston "The Dreamkiller" Bolanos is a professional Muay Thai fighter, recently signed to Bellator.

We're live. What's up? What's up, boys? What's up, man? So nice to have you guys on, man. It's nice, first of all, to... It's nice to have you guys in studio, but it's nice to have Muay Thai, which I've been a giant fan of for so long. I feel like it's starting to get more ground in America, and we've done our best to try to promote it as much as possible in here. And it's been frustrating for the longest time for me watching what I think is like one of the most exciting combat sports in the world and sort of kind of slip under the radar.

Uh-huh. Yeah, man. When golf is taking off. Fucking golf's everywhere. They had Scrabble on ESPN one time and that was just gut-wrenching. They had Scrabble? Yeah.

Well, it is a sport. It's a lot of training involved. Hey, man. It's brutal. But to see that and then to see us just with nothing, no coverage whatsoever for so long, and, you know, finally on TV but still relatively under the radar, it's tough to watch. But knowing that it's going to be there eventually, it's just a matter of time, you know. So it's nice.

Every time we take another step, like when it got on AXIS TV tv it was such a giant leap compared to where it was prior to that so then what's coming next what's coming next it's just a matter of time and the right people coming along doing the right things one can only hope it's when we talked about this today but uh that dana white had a point that i think he's probably right about is that in a lot of people's eyes in America, kickboxing got kind of poisoned with that whole PKA karate stuff that was on in like the 80s or the 90s. Yeah, it put a bad taste in people's mouths. So it's hard to break free from that mentality of you think kickboxing, you think Muay Thai, you think pants fighting.

Yes. Yeah. I remember. And the shoes and everything. The shoes, the booties. Everybody thinks, oh, you do that thing with the pants and the shoes, you know? I took a buddy of mine who was a, he's a producer at Fear Factor, actually, my friend David. I took him to some Muay Thai fights in Burbank.

This is a local show that was at some hotel. You know, they just had a ballroom. And this was back when, God, who the fuck was fighting on that card? I'll remember. I'll remember. I'll remember. But some good names, some really good fighters. This was, like, back in 2001, 2002. Yeah, yeah.

And he had never seen, like, Muay Thai before. He really had no idea what to expect. And he was like, oh, when they kick the legs, it makes a big difference. Yeah. I was like, yeah, it makes a fucking huge difference. Well, every time you have to, somebody you so what's muay thai every i feel so i i really dislike when i have to say it's like kickboxing with elbows and knees like i died a little bit inside every time i have to say that it's a matter of how long you want to sit there and talk to this person because you can be

like no it's actually this this that and so sometimes it's like is it like kickboxing like yeah see you later with elbows and knees you're like dude it like kickboxing? Yeah, see you later. With elbows and knees. You're like, it's hard to explain it. Well, kickboxing looks the same when you're looking at it. Like if you're watching Glory, it looks the same. And then when people talk about it, like I've had people over watching the fights, they go, wait a minute, this isn't Muay Thai? Well, it's real close.

It's like on the door. It's like the difference between American football and rugby. Like they're similar. They're running. There's a ball. Yeah. But they're not the same whatsoever. They're two different sports.

Is it that dissimilar? I think it is, yeah. Really? Completely. Because it's a completely different pace. It's a completely different mentality. Yeah, you're limited on just a few weapons, which seems very minor. But unless you fight it, unless you do it, it's night and day.

It's night and day. Well, I would imagine that it would make, there would be a big adjustment. For people that are listening that don't know what we're talking about, kickboxing, if you watch like Glory or now Bellator is having kickboxing as well. And of course, K-1 was really the first one to start it on a global scale and make these big gigantic events over in Japan. Kickboxing does not allow the use of elbows or knees and a very limited amount of clenching. Whereas in Muay Thai, especially in Thailand, you see a tremendous amount of clenching and it's very technical. There's a lot going on in that clenching.

And I've always maintained, I've been a big fan of Lion Fight because what Lion Fight is doing is giving you the actual pure Muay Thai, you know, other than the dancing and the music and all the stuff that happens before, you know, in a traditional Muay Thai fight. Yeah, they're doing a really good job. And as you said, they've had to limit a few of the things in order to get it out there to the general public, which it's unfortunate. You can't just like throw it out there in people's faces with all the culture and the traditions, particularly here in America.

People would turn away from it so fast. So I think at some point we'll be able to build up to that. You start slowly educating people on what that is and the history and everything. And hopefully eventually we won't get so far away from that that Muay Thai does become kickboxing because we've taken so much from it. that Muay Thai does become kickboxing because we've taken so much from it, you know. And for people who don't know what we're talking about, again, the dance that you do, the warm-up dance before a Muay Thai match called the Y Crew, right? And how long does that usually take? It depends, really.

You know, different gyms, different people do longer and shorter ones. You know, I do a very limited, shorter one when I fight. Well, I haven't done it in forever, but because of that, you know, and knowing that people don't really want to see it, you know, you kind of Americanize it and shorten it, where some of them, I've seen some longer wide cruises than fights in the past. What's a long one? Five minutes.

Five minutes? Really? I don. Well, what's a long one? Ah, five minutes. Five minutes? Really? I don't know if it's that long. I mean, Borkow has like, one of the longest ones I've seen. Like,

he takes his sweet time, you know, goes down, does everything like perfectly. It's like a, it's like a whole routine. But then, in those situations,

like people are very educated and they want to see that. They want to see the beauty of it. It almost becomes part of the entertainment, part of the fight, besides the fight itself. But when you go see a professional Muay Thai match,

I would estimate that like 50% of the crowd trains. They're very educated in what it is. It's like baseball here in America where you don't have to play baseball in order to appreciate and love it because it's our pastime. And that's what it is in Thailand. Not everyone there is actively training or fighting or has fought,

but it's so embedded in their culture that they just love it and they appreciate it. Right. Everything about it. So to go to a live Muay Thai fight in Thailand is just, you can't even describe it. I can only imagine. It's on my bucket list for sure. But in America, if you go to see a live event in America, half of the audience at least is either people from the gym or people that know people from the gym yeah and

it's sort of almost an incestuous kind of an environment yeah especially like like when i was coming up the only people that were there trained were family or friends of the people fighting you know so that you weren't hitting this wider audience, you know, where now it is getting on TV and there are people seeing it who don't know anything about it. And it's slowly building momentum and getting out there and getting a little more popular. But it's just one of those sports where, you know, it's not for everybody and you've got to find the way to bring it to everyone.

You know, it doesn't have this mass appeal. The fight in itself does. But everything that goes with it is very different. It's very traditional. The Thai style and then the music is very traditional. And it's for a lot of people, for whatever reason, they just don't have an open mind. They don't want to accept that.

It's strange. And like we were saying, watching it live compared to watching it on TV is like two different things. Yeah, there's nothing like it. Even for me, I'll watch it on TV, and then I'll be there in person. I'm like, geez, man, why do people do this? Oh, yeah, yeah, I do this too. But it's with any combat sport.

When you're there live, you can feel it. You feel the energy in the air. You feel the impact as opposed to watching it on TV, which is still great great but nothing compares to being there in person particularly muay thai it's just brutal yeah i agree and it's there's something about it when you're not hearing any commentary you're just literally feeling the slap of the shins yeah yeah bone to bone yeah it just makes me cringe i was in la a couple years back when they had that big pro muay thai event they had that big pro Muay Thai event they had a lot of big name fighters fight

and Buakaw fought and he apparently had some beef with some dude that he was going to fight and there was a lot of shit talk back and forth so he had this long Y crew where he was shooting arrows at him do you remember that? that was the NPL right? yes

what happened to that organization? same thing that happens to a lot of organizations. They try to go too hard out the gate. They pay all this money for all these super high-level fighters, which, you know, your Muay Thai fans are going to know who they are, but your general public has no idea. And that's who we're trying to reach is the people that don't know anything about it. So those people aren't going to come out just because there's this high-level Muay Thai guy. They don't know who this is. They don't know anything about it. So those people aren't going to come out just because there's this high-level Muay Thai guy.

They don't know who this is. They don't know anything about him. They'd be more likely to come out to a local person because at least, like, hey, that guy fights out of California or whatever. And that's been the biggest thing that's slowed Muay Thai down is these promotions try to go too hard out the gate as opposed to building it up, which, you know, you've got to lose a lot of money and build these people. With anything, you've got to start slow and build people gradually, build the promotion, build the fighters, build your audience, and eventually you can get to that level where everyone on the card is, like, top ten people.

But you can't do that from the beginning when you were just trying to grow and build. Yeah, I remember I went to the event and Larry Merchant was there. Remember the boxing guy, Larry Merchant was there. A lot of people were there. Ernesto Hoost was doing commentary. And I was like, wow, maybe this is going to work. It seems like these guys have got it. Too big, too fast, too many big names right away.

I'm pretty sure they ran out of money by the second or third show. It just didn't work out. And that's where Lion Fight has been doing a really good job at growing their talent and trying to get better. And they're putting really good fights and really good matchups with guys from around here. Well, the matchups and the talent level is very high. It's way higher than the credit it's getting.

It's like I have DVR at my gym. I've got, I mean, what number are they up to now? Like 30-something? 32. 32? I've got way back to like 21 or something, just saved up. And I can watch them all while I train. And it's, there's such high level.

There's so much good fights. You know, there's so many good guys. It's so exciting. And it's such a dynamic technical sport and that's one of the things i think is probably it's probably it probably slips by some people when the casual observer is watching it just some of the stuff that we were doing today when you were showing me just a little little shifts and variations and stances and and little things like that and that's you know that i think that's that's when you train in it when you try it it makes the experience of watching

people compete in it richer yeah because you you kind of understand you're like wow this is like very complex there's a lot going on here it's not just guys going and just trying to fucking kick each other yeah and there's some there's so many levels to this, and your casual fan isn't going to know that. And a big problem a lot of promotions make is they try to cut corners and put guys out there who aren't very good, but both those guys are at the same level. So if you're an average person, like, well, they're kicking and punching each other. But they might be very, very low level,

but they just wanted to get some cheap people they could put on the air. It might be very, very low level, but they just wanted to get some cheap people they could put on the air, you know. So they'll cut all these corners just to save some money, but in the end it hurts everybody because you're putting crappy fights out there. Yeah. You know what I mean? Not good matchups, not very talented guys because you want to save some money, or they'll spend so much money on, like, the main event and the co-main event that they have to cut those corners with everybody else. And so you're putting these crappy fights out there and you're trying to bring this new audience in

so people come and are like, this is terrible. Why would I want to come to this? Because they're bad matchups. And as we were talking about Line Fight, what they did from the beginning was they had quality matchups throughout the entire card, whether it was the main event, whether it was the undercard, whether it was the amateurs.

They were good, exciting matchups regardless regardless of the level, and that's what really helped build them up. Now, how long have you been fighting in Muay Thai now? I started when I was 10, back in Lima, Peru. And how old are you now? 24. I think it was really interesting, you were telling me today, we were talking about your training partner

Mazetti, what's his first name again? Gabriel. Gabriel, who just fought this past weekend in Lion Fight. Fucking sensational. Tell me, today we were talking about your training partner, Mazetti. What's his first name again? Gabriel. Gabriel. Yeah. Who just fought this past weekend in a lion fight. You watch him. Fucking sensational. Holy shit, is that kid dynamic. And his brother is, like, bigger, older, and, like, even more aggressive. That's incredible.

He's a lot bigger. He's a lot bigger, yeah. What's going on in Peru? what's going on in Peru? Man, my first coach, Rodrigo, he had a vision of the sport. When he first started, he came here to train with Alex Gong at Fairtex San Francisco.

It was very small, but he went back, and I remember I started training with him, and everything was so small back then. The amount of talent there is now. I mean, Kevin and Kieran saw it when we went to Peru last November. Kieran's hiding in the corner over there he's here but he's not here yeah i mean there's supposed to be on cameras there was 150 fighters in the national tournament last november when me

and kevin were we're fighting and it's crazy like the amount of talent and how much is growing i mean peru is definitely going to be a powerhouse in the future is it because of one coach is it just has the country embraced it is it taken off in popularity it's getting a little more popular but like i said rodrigo really helped you know help he he got together with the government you know so they they could start helping out and bringing guys out to ifma and everything and it's just crazy like all these kids are really like 16 17 18 19 years old really good And it's just crazy. Like all these kids are really like 16, 17, 18, 19 years old, really good kids. It's just fascinating that that one part of the world is starting to produce a lot of like really high level talent. And then talking to you about it, you know, you were saying

that it's like soccer and then Muay Thai is like really like coming up in popularity behind soccer, which sounds crazy to me. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and then our soccer team sucks, so everybody's trying to turn to Muay Thai. So it's really cool to see. It's really cool to watch. That is really fascinating. You know, Muay Thai is the predominant striking art in MMA. You know, it's the most, I would say, probably the most successful striking art in MMA because it has all the elements of boxing and

you know a lot of the elements of a lot of the other traditional martial arts but there's something about the combination of kicks and elbows and the technical style of Muay Thai that really lends itself to MMA and I think when Maurice Smith came along like Maurice Smith was probably the first guy who was like a really high-level technical striker who gave MMA a try and was showing everybody the effectiveness of Muay Thai in MMA. But

for whatever reason, it translated to Muay Thai getting more popular in MMA, but it didn't necessarily translate to Muay Thai getting that much more popular. Yeah, it's one of those things that with MMA, it kind of helps and it hurts. It helps in the sense that it gets it out there, but it can hurt as well when you're getting a bad representation of the sport you do. So for a good stand-up striker in MMA, they might not be that great when it comes to real Muay Thai.

So you're saying, hey, this guy's got really great stand it comes to real Muay Thai, you know. So you're saying, hey, this guy's got really great stand-up. Well, he has really great stand-up for MMA. So people assume that's what good stand-up looks like in Muay Thai or traditional stand-up art, you know. So it's the pros and cons of it getting out there. So it's tough, you know. Everything kind of helps as well as takes away from the sport too. Well,

I think all martial arts make an adjustment. They have to make a technical adjustment when they're being applied to MMA because you have to deal with the takedowns. You have to deal with all the, and even wrestling and judo had to make adjustments for Muay Thai because as soon as you involve leg kicks and then knees, you know, a lot of guys were shooting for takedowns

And he's getting needed they're getting in the face. Yeah like that cyborg Michael page fight. Yeah, crazy knockout where his whole head got crushed from that knee surgery and everything Yeah, I mean he's got literally had to have his skull put back together again It was the most brutal injury is I've ever have you ever seen one of those before? Have you ever seen a skull get crushed? No, I actually had my skull fractured, but not like that. That was one of the worst things I've ever seen. How did your skull get,

I got kicked in the back of the head and the guy had a steel plate in his shin guard in China. What? Yeah. In his shin guard? Yeah. So he had a shin guard on with a steel plate in it. Yeah.

I mean, I didn't really think anything of it at the time. You know, this was like 10 years ago. You know, we would just fight everywhere, anywhere, whatever, you know, and not really think twice about it. And I, so I fought. He kicked me in the back of the head. I got dropped, got up, ended up knocking him out. Fought again the very next day. What?

Yeah. Knocked this guy out too and then uh when we got back to the states like i was having headaches all the time and i just thought i had a bad concussion you know but like up to like almost like a month later i kept seeing these like flashes of light anytime someone would ever touch me you know i'd be working with like little kids or girls and smaller people and just them touching me i'd get this like jolt and it you know it's kind of freaking me out and i i was getting ready for another fight and i had to get my mri or a cat scan i remember what it was and they're like yeah you got an inch and a half

crack in the back of your skull and they're like i don't know why you're not a vegetable right now you should be they're like if you even hit that again you it would probably kill you doctors always say that though yeah of course when was the last time you heard if i get knocked out one more time i'm dead yeah you know if it was one inch closer to my spine i'd be dead it was it was it was it was pretty uh rough thing to happen and i couldn't do anything other than hit the bag by myself for i don't remember how long it was till like it let it heal but but it was a so it just essentially had to close yeah on its own you know there's like don't get hit you know don't get hit and i was getting ready for a fight and i actually still tried to fight anyway but uh the the doctor who the doctor who diagnosed it was the doctor for the fights oh that's hilarious he's like dude you can't fight get out of here how long after that was the fight after the diagnosis uh like a week

why did you try to fight with a fucking injury you told you you could die that's that's just kind of the mentality i had coming up you know and how old were you at the time 25 so you just felt invulnerable? No, not really. I mean, my mentality from the beginning has always been I'm going to fight as long as I'm breathing. And, you know, I've gone into fights with some of the worst injuries ever, broken hands, broken skulls, broken faces. And that's just the way I came up. You know, like you're going to fight no matter what. You're going to fight anyone, anywhere, anytime, any weight class.

And that's how I was able to get as much experience as I did. Kieran's nodding back there. gonna fight no matter what you're gonna fight anyone anywhere anytime any weight class um and that's how i was able to get as much experience as i did karen's nodding back there so yeah fight you know fight good it's just it was the mentality we had coming up you know this was that time when you know youtube wasn't even out yet like nobody knew what muay thai was it's like you got to be ready to fight all the time or else you're never going to get any fights. Right. You know, where now it's like everyone's kind of like looking for the big show or, oh, picking their fights. Like a month is short notice

for people. Where us, it was like an hour. It was like, yeah, we're ready. We're here. Fight. Let's go. You know, and it's just the time I came up was a different mindset than it is today. And that's kind of the pros and cons of it getting bigger is the bigger things get, you got to take the kind of like faker people with it where where when when i started and i was at fights is like you knew every person that was at that fight was a diehard

muay thai fan there's no other reason to do this other than the fact that you loved it you're losing money there was no there was no show to get on. There was no television to get on. There was no reason to do this sport except for the fact that you loved it. It wasn't a question. Like there's no reason to do this except for you love it with everything that's in you. So everyone you met, everyone you talked to, every gym you went to, every fight you went to, you were surrounded by people that had the same heart and mentality as you whereas now you know people are doing it for different reasons you know that they maybe they want to get famous or they want to get instagram followers or you know they want to look cool doing

pad work and that's kind of the good and the bad of of things getting bigger so you think that by the sport getting more popular by more people paying attention to it it opens up the door to more people doing it but they just don't have the the pure intention of course and that kind of waters down the sport at the end so it's interesting because there's got to be like there's a there's a line right between like where it's intelligent to fight injured yeah like like with your broken head oh yeah i would never tell anyone to do what I did. Would you do it today? Would you think you would be in the same situation today? Or would you go well with weight, age, and wisdom? I'm not going to fight with a broken head.

Me personally, but fortunately I have good people around me who would be like, that's not smart. And I'm like, yeah, yeah, you're right. And again, it was in a time where if I don't take this fight, who knows when another fight's going to come along. You got to take what you can get when you can get it and that's why I'm like fighting people who outweigh me by 30 pounds and you know just just taking a fight on a couple hours notice because you got it there was there wasn't opportunities so you got to do what you had to do to get in there and you had to get experience and that was the only way you were

going to get fights you know was it difficult to motivate yourself during those times because for a lot of people motivation requires some sort of an end goal um or at least not so much about it was more about getting fights than it was about what am i getting out of this fight so it wasn't about making money it wasn't about getting on tv but but there was a long period of time when i just couldn't get a fight to save my life and that's's when I was highly considering switching over to MMA because everyone I trained was fighting. They're fighting in the UFC. They're getting fights all the time. They're fighting every month. And I'm sitting here busting my ass and I can only get a fight or two a year. You know, I, there was a time I had over 30 fights fall through that I was training for and preparing myself for, and then they'd fall through and they'd fall through and they'd fall through. And that's

why I started just taking a boxing fight even though I'd never trained boxing in my life or taking a sanshao fight that that one in China was a sanshao fight because I just had to do what I had to do to stay busy or taking a fight on a day's notice or fighting with a cracked skull because I knew I had to stay in there and stay active and stay busy or else I'm never going to get better especially if I want to compete with guys who have like 400 fights and been fighting since they were eight years old you know how are you going to get better especially if i want to compete with guys who have like 400 fights and been fighting since they were eight years old you know how are you going to fight against the guy like that if you don't get the experience you have so much to make up for anyway i didn't start till i was 23 you know what i mean i'm so late to the game my mentality was always i'm always going

to be playing catch-up no matter how good i get i'm playing catch-up and so i gotta do everything i can every way i can maybe it wasn't the smartest thing but i wouldn't be where i am today if i didn't take those risks and maybe take those not so smart fights but yeah there is a fine line between putting yourself out there and being dangerous but i don't know where that line is yeah i don't think anybody does right so that for me it was up for everybody so i was always on the i'm like i'm just gonna do no matter what because where do you draw the line you stub your toe toe and you're limping a little bit? Should you not fight? I don't know.

Maybe. But I'm going to do it. Yeah. When you say you started at 23, was that when you started competing? That was the first time I stepped foot in the gym. You were 23. No training at all in martial arts before that? Zero.

What motivated you to get in there? Well, the first time I ever saw muay thai was like 94 90 94 96 i they went back when espn used to play them late at night like the old school fights and i was i'd always thought about boxing and doing some kind of fighting and but i always loved martial arts you know and when i saw muay thai i was like that it, man. Because every other kind of thing with like kicking and knees was like taekwondo or point fighting and not that real boxing style of hardcore fighting, you know. So when I saw Muay Thai, I was like, if I'm going to do anything, that's going to be it. But unfortunately, at that time, I was too busy living in Vegas and drinking myself to death every day and partying you know and um it was never one of those serious things so i never i never told anybody about it i

was never because i didn't even know how serious i was because i obviously i couldn't do what live the way i was living and compete so i knew that if i was ever going to do this i would have to completely stop drinking party and living the lifestyle i was living uh and i wasn't ready to give that up. You know, I wasn't ready to give up my friends and lose all these people, not to say that I would, but I knew that was a possibility. And I only ever told one of my friends about it. His name was Mo. And, you know, I always figured people would laugh at me if I told him I want to be a fighter one day. If you knew me back then, you probably would have laughed at me too. What are you talking about, man? Like you drink every single day.

All you do is party. And I told him, and to my surprise, he didn't laugh at me at all. He's like, I don't know. Why don't you? Why don't you go after it? And I was like, well, I'm like, I was only like 18 at the time. And at that point, I thought it was way too old to start. I'm like, I can't start now. I can't start now and make it anywhere.

You know what I mean? These people start when they're like 10. It's too late for me. He's like, you should do it anyway. You know, like if you want to do something, you can do it. And he, he was born with a bad heart and he ended up passing away. And I promised myself when he died that I would do it. I was like, I'm going to go after this dream. If not for myself, then for him, because he was never able to live. And unfortunately, his death sent me just in a really bad downward spiral, even more so than I was already in drinking and partying and all that stuff. And this continued on for years and years and through a month long series of really horrible things happening, like friends dying or almost killing people, drunk driving, and myself getting pulled over,

doing like 120 on the 215 in Vegas. And for whatever reason, the cop let me go. And that was just, all these things happening, it was this huge wake-up call for me. And I realized that if my friend was still alive, he would beat the shit out of me. You know, he's like, well, you're wasting your life. You're wasting this dream you have because you're too scared to do it.

But this dream, I mean, you would never even step foot in a gym. So this is like a dream of you one day attempting to learn something. Right, yeah. That's a very crazy thing because it was always hanging over your head then. Yeah, and again, it was that thing where, I'm not going to be able to get anywhere in this, but I finally realized that where I get to isn't what matters. How good I can get doesn't matter.

Me giving myself, all of myself to this sport and dedicating myself to this is what really matters. Where I make it to, I don't know where I could make it to. I could be the best in the world or the worst in the world but as long as i'm putting myself out there why is that more important why is it why is the most thing important to put everything you have into it i've just always believed if you're gonna do something it's all or nothing you know um i i never wanted to half-ass it and that's why i I knew if I was going to do this, I'd have to give up partying and drinking and hanging out with my friends and going out all the time. And I wasn't ready to do that. You know, I've always been in that mentality of if you're going to do something, do it. You do it all the way. You don't do it at all because you're sabotaging yourself. And then you can just say, oh, I didn't make it because of this, that and the other. And then you can just say, oh, I didn't make it because of this, that, and the other.

Right, but why was it so, what were you getting out of it when you realized that it wasn't really about how good you get or how far you go. It was about giving it everything you have. A lot of it had to do with seeing my friend pass away at 18. I'm like, there's no reason to ever halfway do something. Because there's people who don't get the opportunity to even attempt to go after these things because of whatever reason. They might die. They might have a disease. They might, you know, not have all their legs, you know, and you can do this. Maybe you can't be the great, but you can do this.

You can at least attempt this and you owe it to yourself and you owe it to them to give it everything that you have. And you owe it to yourself and you owe it to them to give it everything that you have. I've always felt like I owed him everything to go after my life with everything I had, all my dreams. I need to go after 100% because there's people I don't get to. I'm asking this because I think this is a common theme with people is that when they're pursuing a dream or when they're attempting to do something, they realize somewhere along the line that you're doing something more than just trying to get really good at Muay Thai or fill in the blank with whatever sport it is. The expression I always use is that martial arts are a vehicle for developing your human potential.

And I think that until you have a really difficult task in front of you, like becoming a professional Muay Thai fighter, which is one of the most difficult tasks in all combat sports, until you have that task in front of you, until you go down that road and realize how much is actually required of you, you don't know how much you can give to something. And once you do realize how much you're capable of giving you something, and then you can give a little more, and then you give a little more, and then you realize, like more and then you realize like did i give my all did i did i watch what i ate did i sleep enough did i do did i think about things the right way did i get anxious when i shouldn't have did i did i keep my mind clean you know what what was i doing wrong what was i doing right how can i

improve and then it's sort of it trickles over into your life yeah yeah well in the beginning as i said for me it's always been all or nothing. You know, I didn't realize that at the time, but, but looking back, I can kind of, um, understand the mentality behind it is there's so many things that are going to come up that will deter you from going after it. Maybe you get injured or maybe you're not getting the opportunities. And if you're not in it a hundred percent% those things are going to steer you away those things are going to make you quit it's that people kind of look at people who have made it as if they just had this easy path

and all of a sudden they're in the spotlight and they're a world champion and doing these things but it's like any person who's made it to a high level whether it's an athlete or a business person if you go back in their life and see the things they've had to do and overcome and the obstacles in their way, you have no idea.

And that's why everyone's like, well, they didn't have to deal with this, or they didn't have to deal with this. You don't know what they had to deal with. You don't see the obstacles. Isn't that always a problem when you're watching something kind of condensed to one performance? Of course. You know, like if you watch, like, Gabriel go out the other night, you look at him, he's 19 years old, he destroys that guy, what was the guy's name?

Josh Shepard. Josh Shepard yeah who was a really talented fighter himself goes out and destroys this guy in the first round like well how hard could he have worked he's fucking 19 he's a young kid i was training that i mean karen and i were training that kid and i was like running him to the ground every single day i mean he's really good he's really talented already but i was like you're you're in this position right now. This is what you're going to do. And we're going to work really hard. And I dedicated myself to him throughout his camp too. I mean, we were training together when I was fighting for my world title fight.

And then he just kept training and going. He's trained like three months for that fight. And that's why he looks so good. He dedicated everything to that. Also, he's super talented. talented also there's something about being 19 right right isn't there something about being like really what is it is it a physical thing or is it a mental thing is it that you don't have as much responsibility i think it's a combination of a lot of those things yeah yeah without a doubt but it's it's super rare that a guy is like 35 and then like how long has uh gabriel been training for

he's he wasn't even like he wasn't even that good before like he was okay like he was good but like his he didn't get that good until he went to thailand he started taking like really tough fights he's been training for like since he was like 13 i think so think of that that's only six years yeah so it's very rare that a guy would be like 34 and then when he's 39, he's this motherfucker of motherfuckers like he is. You know what I mean? Like, what is it? Is it, I've always wondered, like, is it that life just, you burden yourself down with responsibility

and information and just life itself, relationships, bills, bullshit, stress, existential angst, the fucking grave calling. You know, all these different things. There's so many variables. You can't really pinpoint it on one specific thing. You know, and everybody's variables are going to be different. You know, we all have different things to overcome and deal with. Just because I view yours as maybe they're not that difficult. Like, you don't know. I don't know everything he's dealing with. He doesn't know everything I'm dealing with or have had to overcome and deal with just because i view yours as maybe they're not that difficult like you don't know i don't know everything he's dealing with he doesn't know

everything i'm dealing with or have had to overcome but but if i sat there and listened to his story i'm like geez like i wouldn't want to do that i'm sure it's a crazy story but like when you go back and watch mike tyson when he was 19 you go see mike tyson like hitting the bag with teddy atlas when he's 19 you just go jesus fucking Christ how does anybody get that good like what what happens from 13 to 19 like what how is it possible that someone can just reach that insane level and it seems that it happens primarily when someone's really young yeah I mean I started when I was 10 and when I was 16 you can ask Karen like I felt invincible man like I will I will take much like Kevin I would take any fight any way it doesn't didn't matter you know I was 16 I couldn't fight

as an adult yet because I was in 18 but we lied and said that I was 18 and so I because I ran out of people to fight I ran out of juniors to fight so from 16 to 18 i was technically an adult and i was just taking as many fights that you know anywhere from 132 pounds to 147 any fight that i could possibly take as i needed to get the experience and that's what i wanted to do i wanted to dedicate my life to it do you think that that's possible for an older person like so like kevin you uh you obviously you were still young you're 23 you know that mean you you're saying you're you're older but a lot of people listen like god 23 you're still like a baby you can still learn a lot i mean relatively though for the sport kevin was old yeah and i'll have people come up to me like wow i'm too old i'm like how old are you like 19 i'm

like dude i'm like i didn't even start till i was 23 what are you talking about because people just i think people just like to view things as an excuse like oh i can't do it because x but we all have something that we can point to and be like well i can't make it because of this of course but there's people who have had that and worse and have made it so what excuse could you possibly have you're a very technical fighter you're very technical guy do you think that maybe there is some benefit in having started a little bit later, being a little wiser? A hundred percent. I think that's a huge thing that just because you start, you know, when you start when you're a kid, there's so much of it. Like, you're just doing it for whatever.

But once you've matured in a certain way, like I started to, for only one reason, I want to be the best I can be. I'm developed enough physically and mentally to apply these things to what I'm trying to apply them to, to be the best fighter I can. Whereas, yeah, when you're younger, you're still growing and learning and developing physically as well as mentally. Yeah, like when my first fight, I was 11, 10. Like, I didn't know why, what I was doing there. I just knew, like, I kind of liked it, but I, like, I didn't have, like, a purpose to it.

Like, I just really enjoyed training at the time. It was exciting. It was exciting. Right. And you had skills. You wanted to try them out. Yeah. But I wasn't like, oh, I want to be the best in the world right now.

Like, that didn't come until, like, 14, 15 when I was like, I really want to dedicate my life to this. Now, were you living in America at the time? No, I was in Peru. When did you come to America? When I was 13. When you were 13. And did you go straight to CSA? Was that the first gym you trained at?

No, I started at Vertex. And then when I was 16, 2008, I met Kieran. And ever since, we've been inseparable. Well, you guys have a very unique gym and, um, it's one of the most important things for a young fighter is to find the right environment to develop. And we were talking about that earlier today.

Like you can get unlucky and find a bad coach in a bad gym and you get all tangled up with that person psychologically and they become family. And then, you know, you're, you're kind of fucked. Yeah. It's a very difficult

break for a lot of fighters to make yeah man and i mean like i've honestly i i've been truly blessed since i started all the way to now because i started with rodrigo then fair text you know i was with johnson uh somebody who kevin still trains with this day to this day a little bit but you know i've always had really good coaching since i started yeah i think another another unfortunate thing is just because somebody's a great coach doesn't mean they're great for you you know so so sometimes you'll see these people like leave their camps and go to this really high level coach who's had a lot of success with certain individuals but that doesn't mean they're going to be great for you so i try to always tell people you have to find what works

best for you whether it's a coach whether's your diet, whether it's your training schedule, what works for me won't always work for you. You got to find what's best for you. And that doesn't always necessarily mean I need this great coach because you guys might just clash. You know what I'm saying? Like coaches and fighting, it's very much about, it's like having a relationship with somebody, with another another person like you just might clash together not work and it's also what you just said is super important about finding that winning formula whether it's training whether it's diet whether it's coaching and then gym partners like I know you guys are fantastic partners you guys work

together really well I've watched a lot of videos you guys train together I mean how critical is that to have someone who's an elite fighter that trains with you on a daily basis? It's one of the most important things. There's so many factors that go into building a fighter. It's not just one thing, you know what I mean? And that one thing needs to constantly be adjusted because the way I train today isn't how i trained even a year ago you know i'm you continually need to be hopping back and forth on this line of too much and too little of one what's the difference between how you train today versus how you train a year ago uh i'd say the older i get the the more it's a a mental approach kind of thing you know like

like my technique in the because cause it isn't going to be altered that much at this stage, but the way that I apply them, the way I go about them, the way I think about them, um, it very much is going to change, you know, at a certain stage, it's like you have all these weapons to use. It's just a matter of which ones you use at which time at which speed, um, and the way that you apply them where in the beginning, you're just trying to do things well. And you're trying to almost put all. Where in the beginning, you're just trying to do things well. And you're trying to almost put all these tools in the toolbox, you know, as your career develops. But at a certain stage, not to say I'm not adding more, is that I have all these tools,

I need to figure out which ones work best for me and which ones work for me at which time against which opponent, which venue, which sport, you what i mean there's there's so many things that you can play with and adjust and good and bad i that was a huge thing i struggled with after my knee surgery was like i almost forgot how to fight as myself you know what i mean because it was like okay here's all your weapons pick up which ones you want to use i'm like i don't know i don't remember which ones i used and how i put them together and it took me a series of fights to find myself again as a fighter in the ring. How much time did you take off because of your knee surgery? Nine weeks.

Nine months and one week. That was between fights? That was between the day I blew my knee out and the day I got back in the ring. You had ACL reconstruction? Yeah, I completely threw my ACL. Which way did they do it? Cadaver. Yeah, I had that way.

I just talked to a friend of mine. She had it done. They took a, she was in Austria in a skiing accident, and they took some meat out of her calf, which I've never even heard of before, and reconstructed it. Well, like, you know, there was those options, but I was like, I don't want to take anything else out of myself that might weaken that thing. Like, I got enough to deal with now. I can't weaken something else. of myself that might weaken that thing like i got enough to deal with now i can't weaken something else so for me it was and and talking to other athletes that have had it it just it seemed like that the better approach for me and and it has worked best for me it worked best for me too i

had both knees reconstructed i had my left one done with a patella tendon graft where they take a big chunk out of your patella tendon with a piece of bone from your shin and a piece of bone from your knee and it's fine but that was like a year before it felt good again but the right knee like i have zero problems with it and i was training i was doing jujitsu again in six months so it was it it ended with no pain like it never really like there was no consequences for the injury whereas the left one still like where they cut the bone out like if i like kneel down on a hardwood floor i could still feel it yeah it's um there's a lot of people that are scared of cadavers though they're just scared for yeah it was it was a weird

like for me it was more of a mentally a strange thing you know to to have something of someone else's who passed away and you know that was was just a weird, very weird thing mentally to kind of deal with. You know how it works, right? It's just a scaffolding. No, no, not really, no. What it is is they take, usually they use an Achilles tendon because it's much stronger. It's actually 150%, I believe, stronger than the original ACL. They take that Achilles tendon, they put it in place, and then your body re-proliferates

that tendon with its own tissue. Right. So that tendon is not there anymore. Your body fills it up with cells because they reattach the blood supply. And as your body starts, it starts using that to regenerate tissue. Right. So it puts your own cells, but in the form of a much larger tendon. It's really kind of interesting.

Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. Yeah, my right leg, which is the one I blew out, feels so much better than my left one does. Like stronger. Well, it's thick, man. They use a thick-ass fucking tendon. I mean, we have a shitty design.

Yeah. The human body. The ACL in particular. I'm just going to get everything replaced. Well, as soon as you figure out heel hooks, as soon as people figure out heel hooks, you just realize like, oh my God, my knee is like so stupid. Who designed this? Because all you have to do is get that heel here and like pop, it just pops off.

It's terrible. You know? I mean, and it happens all the time in jujitsu. Guys get their knees blown apart. That gives me nightmares, man, just watching that. Yeah, well, it's, I mean, some guys get nightmares. They watch you guys kick each other. I know.

You know? I've blown up a couple ACLs kicking people. Yeah, I'm sure. Yeah, it didn't feel good, man. But I was like, God, did I do that? Was it a planted leg? Is that what it is most of the time? Yeah, I just, yeah, a couple tough guys that try to come in the gym, go hard, you know,

and I'm like, all right, man, let's go. That's why I tell a lot of people, like, learning how to absorb and take a punch or a kick is just as if not more important than throwing it because you're going to get hit. Sure. No matter how good you are, you're going to get hit. And if you don't know how to take that and absorb it and minimize the damage, you're going to have a lot of really serious injuries.

And, unfortunately, so much of what we do is applied to the offensive side of it, hitting people, you know, and those kinds of things. But if you don't know how to take a punch, and obviously you don't want to just be like, all right, I want to learn how to take punches really good. But that's a skill that you need to have. Yeah, there's a subtlety to it that I think is lost on a lot of people, the ability to just move with something. Yeah.

And the way I always try to tell people, like, have someone hold their hand up, and you punch it. Then have them move their hand just a little bit. Yeah. And you still try to punch it, but it doesn't feel good. Yeah.

You know, like, it feels good when they meet you. Right. It's like people hold pads, and they, like, slap you with the, you know, it feels good. You hit it. But if someone just kind of pulls away a little bit, so much of the punch is diminished. It really just drains the life out of you because you feel like you're giving someone all you have.

And in your mind, you're hitting them. Right. But nothing is happening. It's like the worst thing. We have that winning, that big shield. And Kieran uses it sometimes to train us towards the end of camp. And it's awful because you're like giving everything you got to this thing and it's just so fat yeah it's like

yeah there's nothing coming back at you so there's no there's no uh reverb off your head it's like you're punching into a cloud and like oh my gosh well i've seen some gyms that have that crazy 300 pound bag that just sits on the ground it doesn't even swing it just sits there and you wind up kicking that thing and i'm always like man i don't know like that i don't is that good is it good to kick something that doesn't move it's another one of those things where where it's just a piece of the puzzle like it's good to to uh develop your power and stuff but yeah if that's all you're doing when something's moving around on you it's giving you very different looks it's kind of like

we do a lot of technical sparring with no gear on and stuff if you have all these pads on and you have this false sense of security and then you get in there with someone who's got nothing on and it's just like you're kicking things wrong you're catching elbows and you're messing your feet up because you haven't

learned how to place things correctly and where they need to go and where you maximize their damage and minimize yours. Is there a point of diminishing returns, though, with a heavy bag where, like, at a 300-pound bag and you're kicking it, it's probably not developing your power as much as even maybe a 150-pound bag would? Does that make sense? I guess it just depends on what it is you're trying to do and work on and improve. You know what I mean? When you're hitting one of those immobile bags, what would you concentrate on primarily? Power. Power, yeah.

Just dig in. Just dig in as hard as you can. Because I know that's going to be right there. I can close my eyes and hit this as hard as I want to. And I don't have to worry so much about my balance and my speed. I can just blindly do this kind of thing. So just dig in, work on just the explosion. Yeah.

But isn't there some benefit in the bag having some sort of a give so that your shin is pushing? Without a doubt. A lot of times when I'm working on speed and movement and stuff, I don't really just try to crack the bag. I'm just touching it. So I'll work on a much lighter bag and I'm just trying to work on my angles and in the bag moving and targeting and those kinds of things. But, but again, it's very specific in what I'm trying to do. And there's not just one way to do this.

And then I think that's another thing that not a lot of people think about or, or apply is just like, Oh, I'm just going to hit pads. I'm just going to hit the bag. But why are you doing it? What is it that you're working on? What are you trying to develop? Cause there's so many aspects to this, I'm just going to hit pads. I'm just going to hit the bag. But why are you doing it? What is it that you're working on? What are you trying to develop? Because there's so many aspects to this. You know what I mean?

Yeah. But it's another thing that you just figure out over time. Do you remember when the water bags were a big deal? Yeah. It was like a big thing. There was a thick foam outer layer. Then there was water in it. That didn't really catch on, did it?

We have an aqua bag. It's a little different. It's a little thicker, like rubber. It's good for power punching. I like it. I in it. That didn't really catch on, did it? We have an aqua bag. It's a little different. It's a little thicker, like rubber. It's good for power punching. I like it. I like it. I like it to throw elbows at it, too. Because it gives in on you a little bit?

I mean, not that. It's very well put together. So it doesn't give in as much as you think it would. Yeah. What are the misconceptions that you think maybe even traditional martial artists might have when they're looking at Muay Thai? Maybe that it's really one-dimensional. I think we have this kind of – we think about it almost like the – who's in Street Fighter? Ryu?

Ryu? No, Saget. Oh, yeah. So we think about that. one is old school the the old school uh yeah yeah when you think about muay thai fighters just being this mindless like we're just gonna throw power at each other and and just stand there and we have no thought or process behind anything and yeah there's definitely fighters who do that. And maybe to an outside observer, they might not see all the small details and the complexity of the things they're doing. Just because I'm standing in front of you not moving doesn't mean there's no thought behind it.

Right. You know what I mean? It's like I've learned how to use those head movement and footwork things on a very, very small scale. very small scale you know so to me i am i am doing a lot of movement and footwork but but to an outside person i'm just standing there mindlessly just winging shots at each other you know so you don't see you don't see the all the complexity that goes into it where i can watch it and view those things very well is it one of those things where you're you're watching like say um if you're watching an mma fight for example where a lot of times when you're watching mma you're watching someone who's pretty good at a bunch of different things, but not maybe technically

proficient at any of those things. And you're seeing a lot of that where guys are just kind of standing in front of each other and almost playing Muay Thai. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Definitely.

And as a high level fighter, do you guys watch MMA and go, oh, this is all. Oh my God. a high level fighter do you guys watch mma and go oh this is fucking this is all oh my god i mean honestly like especially the it hits me really hard sometimes like when we're like friday night lion fights you're there live and then you're like watching whatever ufc or whatever whatever other car there is on and you're like on tv and he's like oh my god you know so yeah but there is there is some good strikers in mma Sure. There's guys like Barboza. There's some pretty high-level guys. Yeah. Joanna.

Joanna's really good. Sure. Valentino. Shevchenko, yeah. But there's also a lot of different elements they have to think about. Right, right. Take downs. It's definitely like we were talking about earlier.

You got to implement what works for you in MMA. So what works for you might not work for somebody else either so it's it's it's really it's really tough it's different now you at 24 years old you already have a very successful muay thai career have you thought about doing an mma so actually i just signed a deal with bellator. So I am making the transition, not only with MMA. I wanted to do Muay Thai, keep doing Muay Thai with Lion Fight, but that hasn't worked out so good. So I'm going to be doing Bellator, kickboxing, and MMA. Why hasn't that worked out?

They're going a different route, so it's not going to work to promote an MMA fighter with Lion Fight. Scott Coker has signed me, and he's going to be able to work both angles with me. So that's going to be really good. Now, you're a guy who clinches a lot, and that would be a great thing for MMA. But what about for kickboxing? Are you going to do Bellator kickboxing as well? Because I know Bellator is doing a really interesting thing right now.

They're kind of combining kickboxing and MMA on the same card. Has anybody talked to them about abandoning the kickboxing aspect and just doing Muay Thai? I don't know. I've said some things to Scott about it. And I think they're just trying to establish that kickboxing side of their cards. Hopefully, one day, he might bring in some Muay Thai fights. Maybe once the Bellator kickboxing can be more of a standalone promotion, I think they might be able to venture out into mixing the cards,

maybe have some Muay Thai fights on the undercard or in between fights as well so but but for now i think you know they're just trying to to to start out and do things right and build up that portion of it and having those mixed cards where it's the uh bellator mma and the bellator kickboxing which has worked out very well and i think people really enjoy it because we're we're having both both fights on the card but eventually it'd be nice if uh the kickboxing can stand alone and then kind of develop from there. Yeah, it just seems to me that it doesn't make any sense to eliminate elbows and knees. Yeah.

It seemed kind of crazy. Yeah. But again, it's a different sport. You know what I mean? It is, but it's striking. Yeah. You know what I mean? I mean, if you're kicking, like, why aren't you elbowing?

Like, why aren't you kneeing? Yeah, I agree with you. It's beautiful. striking, like, why aren't you elbowing? Like, why aren't you kneeing? Like, it's a beautiful, I mean, I think the more complex striking gets, the more beautiful it is. I mean, the more variables that exist. Like, when I watch a guy like Sanjay is a perfect example, because he's such a wild guy to watch. He's so, he fights in his own very particular style. And he's very light on his feet. There's a lot of switching of the feet,

a lot of kicks that you don't know where they're going. You think they're going low, and they kind of come straight up and go high. Kevin fought Sanjay. Did you? When did you fight Sanjay? When was that? 11?

2012? Yeah, 11 or 12. I forget. August 2012. It was right before he moved to CSA. No, I fought Sagada before he moved to csa how was that how was fighting sensh i like i'll watch it man it was it was amazing it was it was a great fight yeah it's hard to describe what it was like man it was i was so dialed in physically and mentally that I look back and I'm like, geez, dude, I can't believe that was me in there doing that.

It was just so like I was in another mental plane. You know what I mean? Like just everything was just firing the way. Is this it right here? Okay, we'll watch a little bit of this while we're talking. As long as we have it in the background. I want you to see how Sanjay looks after the fight. Cecil Peoples is a referee.

Yeah, he kind of screwed me. Oh, yeah. Who saw that coming? Did he do that thing where he lifts his knee up and does the karate thing at the beginning? I got to watch that. That shit's hilarious. Yeah, how did he become the person to referee this fight?

Cecil Peoples is a very nice guy. I will say that. I want to be a nice, I want to see this. Hi-yah! There it goes. He did that thing that he does that weird knee thing that he does but yeah sanchez one of those guys like you he doesn't fight like a traditional muay thai fighter he's the best muay thai fighter of all

time arguably you know he's certainly one of them he's he uses so many things from different different arts and uh you know taekwwondo and Muay Thai and kickboxing. Yeah, he's got that really sneaky left leg too, man. That left leg literally comes straight up. And it's one of the, you have no idea where it's going. It might be a front kick, leg kick, body kick, head kick. Like I knew he was going to kick me. I just didn't know where the hell it was going.

Yeah. Well, he's really good. Have you ever seen Lawrence Kenshin's breakdowns of Muay Thai fights? What is it? What is it the name he does them on YouTube? Do you know I think it's I don't know what to see if you can find I've seen one guys do with a lot of breakdowns And they're really well. I don't know if it's a I think Lawrence just does them under his name but he's a he's a really really smart guy and really really aware of Of Muay Thai and really aware of the complexities. And he did a breakdown on San Chai.

And one of the things, San Chai setting up high kicks and the way he'll sort of test you with some other kicks. And then he's got that really unusual way of throwing his kicks too where they literally come straight up. Yeah, there it is. But let's go back to that fight. I want to go back to that fight. I don't want you to change.

Oh, yeah, I've seen some of that, guys. And's kind of um what we were speaking of earlier in the gym is it's just that one thing he's kicked but but he has so many ways and variables to set that up as far as speed and so he uses all these things to test you and once he figures that out you're done and that's how he's able to destroy basically everyone at every level of the sport because he has so many answers to that one question you beat him didn't you no it was a split decision split decision why did i feel it why kieran saying you won some people think if i didn't get dropped but not really dropped one oh cecil people's got you with a bad count? Yeah. It was a split, right? Yeah, it was a split.

It's kind of ironic having Cecil Peoples be the referee in a fight that's a Muay Thai fight because Cecil Peoples is one of those guys that says that you can't stop people with leg kicks. That was like one of his quotes. It was one of the bad decisions that went down where he's like, leg kicks don't stop fights. I'm like, oh my God. How are you allowed to even say that? decisions that went down where he's like leg kicks don't stop fights i'm like oh my god like yeah and that's the unfortunate thing about fighting is you have people regulating these arts who have no idea about them whatsoever well that's a giant issue with uh the ufc yeah it's a giant issue with judging and i would imagine with muay thai it's even more difficult to find

competent judges and referees you can't you're. You're getting boxing judges doing Muay Thai. You're getting karate guys doing Muay Thai. And these are the people who are basically controlling the outcomes of these fights if there's no stoppage. Right. And it's crazy. It's crazy. Now, in Thailand, wow, that fucking sneaky left leg

he's got, man. In Thailand, how do they approach the clinch? Because you're seeing in this fight like cecil is breaking you guys up almost immediately as soon as you tie up it's it's it's such a complex thing too you know it's not just the fact are these guys working well what are they doing if you don't have a deep understanding of it you're not going to be able to to uh judge it or ref it accurately you know what i mean so it's not just a matter of time is it's not a matter of people moving around it's what are they doing

are they affecting each other are they hurting each other right are they just mindlessly lifting their legs up to appear to stay busy where if somebody doesn't know that me just lifting my leg up be like oh well he's staying busy he's active why are they breaking him up but i wasn't really doing anything right i was just screwing around like a lot of times they're like, oh, well, he's staying busy. He's active. Why are they breaking him up? But I wasn't really doing anything. Right, right. I was just screwing around. Yeah, like a lot of times they're like, oh, I'm going to let you guys work in the clinch. But they just let, like, you're not doing anything and they just let it go. And not knowing when people are stalling out or trying to buy time or just moving their legs for the sake of looking like they're actually kneeing each other. And these judges and these refs don't have an understanding of that.

That's an issue with ground fighting as well. It's an issue with the UFC when certain fights go to the ground, whether it's judging or whether it's even refereeing, like some guys are setting up certain positions and then the referee will come up and stand them up. That is crazy. These guys, they're working, they're fighting. But I think

that in the clinch as well, there's a lot of times they separate guys from the clinch when two guys, if they're clinching up and they're both working to try to establish dominant positions one is eventually maybe going to win that dominant position battle yeah and that's part of the grind and part of the grind is a guy imposing his skill set his will his conditioning all the above on his opponent and if you just get in and separate that because you want to watch a knockout yeah you're kind of diluting the sport. And it's like I don't care how many fights you've watched or how many courses you've taken. If you haven't done this before, if you've never fought before, you don't know what's going on in there.

And that's the problem. You have people, even if they've been in the sport for a very long time and may have been around it for a very long time, if you've never fought at least at some level, you't know what's going on and right yeah you're you're seeing it like you're seeing it but you really don't know what you're seeing right and you don't know how much of it is actually effective and how much of it the guy's actually just absorbing things and blocking things it's very it's it's so complex and i think that's one of the things that gets lost about fighting arts in general but Muay Thai in particular is all of the complexity that goes on like what you were saying that a lot of people

the misconception is that they look at it two guys that are just bruisers I'm watching here, I'm watching all this complex interactions of footwork and kicks and elbows and knees and clenching and knowing when to time things and dealing with a really high level opponent who's very crafty,

and he's sort of calculating all this stuff in his head as well. Yeah. Well, that's kind of the problem with there's only so much you can learn from a book. There's only so much you can learn from watching videos. Until you apply those things, it's like street smart and book smart. If you don't have that street knowledge, your knowledge is very limited. So I don't care how much you think you know. If you've never applied it, you're very limited.

Even just like sparring. I don't care how much you spar. Until you get in there, you don't know what it's like. Right. I can only imagine. I think that's the case with a lot of things. until you get in there you don't know what it's like you know right i can only imagine yeah you know i think that's the case with a lot of things it's like i mean i even joke about golf because i think golf is stupid but i i get the people that do it a lot yeah to them it must be complex like

they must understand all the different aspects of it and i i say that about playing pool too that it's an art form that's only interesting for people to do it yeah and i think that's one of the things that's cool about going to like what i'm seeing here this is a small arena or small crowd super small i mean it looks like there's only like four or five hundred people in that whole place if that and so that kind of shit i mean you look here here's you world championship caliber fighter fighting another world championship caliber fighter both guys in their prime and you're fighting in front of 50 people. You know, and making a couple books. And it's super complex.

I mean, what's going on is, you know, this exchange, the interactions. And I think one of the things about having guys like Lawrence Kenshin putting out these videos and a lot of other people that have done these tremendous breakdown videos of Muay Thai is that people that are fans, even if they don't train themselves, even if they just watch it, they can see things now that maybe perhaps they wouldn't have seen before

and then appreciate what these athletes are doing. There's a lot of people that watch football that can't fucking play football at all, but they can enjoy it. And I think that you're seeing that in this and watching the... Whoa, there's a... Is that where you call the knockdown? Yeah. but they can enjoy it. And I think that you're seeing that in this, you know, and watching the, whoa, there's a, is that where he called a knockdown?

Yeah. But he got right back up. I mean, why was that a knockdown? Because he got kicked in the head. He got kicked in the shoulder. One piece of music. Karrion, if you want to talk, you got to talk on the mic, okay? Look, motherfucker, I told you you were going to be on the show.

Why didn't you get a goddamn chair and Jamie will pull up a microphone? No, this is the one thing. This one thing that's lost that hasn't been discussed is because Kevin doesn't talk about it. Is to this day, and how long ago was this fight? Four years. Four years ago. To this day, this is the only time that the WBC has ever sanctioned a diamond belt fight for a Muay Thai fight. What does that mean?

What it means is that in boxing, when you have two great fighters from two different weight classes that meet at a catchweight, they make it a diamond belt fight, and they put real diamonds on the belt, and it's the epitome of the WBC title. Okay. It's the only time in the history of the sport that the WBC made a diamond belt for a Muay Thai fight. That's what a watershed moment this fight was for Muay Thai in America. Okay. Go sit down.

I get it. No, for real. I mean, and also just important because it's rare that you see guys of this caliber going at it like this. I mean, it's a super exciting fight. Great fight. Where's San Chai fighting now? He's starting to do MMA, isn't he? No, he was calling out Conor McGregor for a second.

Was he? Probably just to get a little attention. Yeah, I don't know. They're always talking about stuff and doing stuff, but will it actually happen? I mean, they talked about Bukow doing MMA for a long time because he was training a little bit, but is he going to actually do it?

I don't know. Well, what's interesting about Thai fighters is that they're really good in the clinch and taking people down. Yeah. And really good at avoiding being taken down. Yeah, well, a lot of people don't understand how much similarities there are when it comes to the clinch and wrestling and judo. I went and trained with the black belt judo team in San Jose before I had a shoeboxing fight, and they just could not believe that I could hang with their high-level black belts. And I'm like, well, it's all this kind of similar stuff. Like, yeah, your setups might be a little bit different,

but all the fundamentals that go in a Muay Thai clinch are very similar to judo. It's just a difference of things you can and cannot do, but the base and the fundamentals of it go across the board. Yeah, you see that a lot with sweeps and trips, and you see some really interesting trips and sweeps in Muay Thai that are very, very technical, about manipulating guys, setting them up in one direction, then changing direction on them and throwing them to the ground.

It's really cool stuff to see. A lot of the stuff in the Muay Thai clinch is very similar similar to uh greco wrestling you know a lot all upper body uh throws and stuff because we can't shoot in but everything we can do is above the waist and in those kind of manipulations and off balancing and that's why like like if i just do greco wrestling i i do pretty well you know and people are always often surprised by by how well my wrestling or jujitsu is if I'm just messing around and doing it because there's so many similarities. Right. That makes sense. Now, when you're watching fights in Thailand, they judge the clinch is a very important part of the fight.

Whereas a lot of times in America, when you're looking at the clinch, we think of it the same way we look at a clinch in boxing. Like the guys are just stalling. Yeah, it's a way to dominate and show your strength and ability over your opponent. And if you can control someone and damage them and land these clean knees on someone, it's showing your superiority over them. But again, like you said, um we don't have a as good understanding of it so yeah we just view it as oh they're just they're just they're just resting or they're just you know they're not doing anything in there right you know what i'm saying now when

guys take guys down in muay thai like how much does that count like how are they scoring fights obviously knockdowns are critical but like if you dump a guy a bunch of times meaning you sweep them and trip them and slam them on his back how much of a factor is that in a fight? It should be a huge factor if they're scoring these correctly. Because, again, showing your balance, your dominance, and your control is one of the most important things. So being able to throw someone on the ground and you're still just standing there is a huge scoring thing. Is how you're doing it important? Because like,

what if you just get double under hooks and just crush them towards you and just bend them over? Um, you know, it's, it's, there's so many factors, man, that go into it. And again, if, if you have a, a judge or a ref that basically has, has a very elementary understanding of this sport, they can't give you an accurate judge of this or an accurate reffing of this because their knowledge isn't so deep. Right. You know what I'm saying?

It's like me watching a jujitsu match and trying to score it. I mean, I can kind of score it, but I wouldn't be able to if I spent my life in the sport. Right. You know what I'm saying? What I'm kind of getting at is there are style the sport. Right. You know what I'm saying? What I'm kind of getting at is there are style points. Style points? You know what I'm saying? Looking cool?

Something that's dope. You know, you hit a guy with a beautiful sweep and dump him on his back. It's like if you sweep somebody and seamlessly do it and make it look like nothing as opposed to sweeping them and falling on top of them and you both lose your balance, of course. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, without a doubt. That's a weird thing to objectively call, though, isn't it?

Yeah. Yeah. Judging is such a strange thing, isn't it? It's course, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, without a doubt. That's a weird thing to, like, objectively call, though, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. Judging is such a strange thing, isn't it? It's tough, man. And I'll be the first one to admit that it's a very complicated thing. You know, I've judged fights. I'm like, I don't know, man. Like, you know.

And then I'm trying to think of it from the mentality of someone that's never done this before or only taken, like, a course. I'm like, how can you do that? I have a hard time doing it. And I've spent 15 years doing this sport. You had a controversial loss in Lion Fight. Yeah, earlier this year. I fought Crumpet, tied with over a couple hundred fights. That was your first loss.

That was my first loss. Yeah, I didn't think you lost that fight. I watched that fight twice. They overturned it. They did? Yeah, after. That fucking never happens. 18 judges from all around the world or something like that. They overturned it. They did. Yeah, after, yeah. That fucking never happens.

18 judges from all around the world or something like that. They can do that? I guess. Holy shit. Honestly, I didn't care. I still don't because I had a great fight and I put everything on the line. I thought I did the best that I could. You know, I mean, there's some things that I think I could have done better.

It was a great fight, no doubt about it. It was a close fight, no doubt about it. But I thought you won. And I watched it and I was like, hmm. And then I remember Pat Miletic and Michael Chiavello were both saying they thought it was a bad decision. And so then I watched it again. I said, well, I'm going to watch it one more time. And I was like, man,

I think that was a bad decision. And I remember now that you're saying that, I remember hearing that it was overturned. I think maybe they brought it up on a broadcast afterwards during your next fight. Is that what happened? Is that when they brought it up again, maybe? Am it up on a broadcast afterwards during your next fight. Is that what happened? Is that when they brought it up again, maybe? Am I making this up?

It was the next event. I wasn't fighting on it, but they brought it up. Oh, it was the next event. And that was on the broadcast. Is that rare that they overturn a fight? Yeah, I mean, yeah, I'm pretty sure it's rare. Yeah, I've never seen it. It's such a tough thing, especially in a fight

that wasn't so lopsided, relatively close. it's just a matter of how how you're viewing it what you're what you're giving more or less credit to and it seems like a simple thing to do on the outside well he hit him more or well he rocked him more but but there's so many levels to this it's kind of like we were talking about earlier it's not it's not an on or off thing it's a dial you know i mean and and unless you're in there you can't even tell how much impact this is doing on how much it's really hurting you right you know from the outside and that's why it's very important especially like for the ties to have that stone cold face where nothing is affecting them because you don't really know this person could just get crushed with it with a right hand and they didn't even move or show anything.

It makes it very difficult for a judge to say, well, this punch should get this amount of credit or this much credit, as opposed to just that pitter-pat stuff. So, you know, it's a very difficult thing to do and to do correctly and accurately. Because there's so many variables and so many things you're seeing or not seeing depending on where you're sitting how you're viewing it if you're in there if you're out there if you're on the left side of the ring the right side of the ring there's there's it's too complex a thing to that's why i could never say anything about a decision it's like well it's such a difficult thing to do you know unless it was so one-sided like how in any way could you view this but if if any fight is relatively close i don't see how you can complain really about the decision because no matter what sometimes you're

going to be on one side of it and sometimes you're going to be on the other side of it where maybe you didn't win and they gave it to you you know one of the things i love about talking to fighters and especially about putting on a podcast is i think it gives people the impression of fighters the like a similar impression to what i have I think a lot of people have The wrong impression they have this impression that fighters are all hey. I'm a bad motherfucker I'm out there to fuck the world and kick ass and but really the very best fighters are almost all very intelligent and very complex people and what what you do when you fight, when you compete,

is like a representative of your focus. It's like all the stuff that you had to do to get to that moment, especially after you've done it a few times and you're aware of all the demands and you've risen to the occasion on more than one time and you realize all the variables that are involved in it. It's cool talking to you guys and and going over that stuff and it's sort of i think there's a lot of people that are listening right now like these fucking guys are sharp like this there's a lot going on to this that i didn't think is it's a thing that you don't you don't see the

whole thing sometimes yeah ever ever it's we see and then like when it comes to fighting you're viewing 15 minutes of something someone put their entire life into and you're gonna you judge them on this very small fraction of a moment in their life and and that that's why fighting is one of the i think more stressful sporting things you can do because we put so much into such a little thing that is viewed and this is the only thing we're judged on we're not judged by how hard we train or how much we kill ourselves or the things we've had to overcome in the gym it's like what you did on that day in that moment how how you came across is means everything you know what i mean whereas other things there's other other ways around it and you're like yeah you could have a bad day

but tomorrow you're gonna have a better day it's like this is the day this is the only day and not the only day 15 minutes or half an hour whatever it might be

it's not like football where there's a season and okay we'll make it up the next game you know people don't really truly understand how much goes into this and how much we put

into our camps and everything and that's why bad judges and bad refs is like it's life and death like you are literally have my life in your hands and you are incompetent i mean even the ufc you lose three times you get cut so sometimes twice yeah exactly so yeah i mean depending upon there's a lot of

variables that that are involved in that but what what fighting is to me the way i always like to describe it is high level problem solving with dire physical consequences. And so when you watch someone who's absolutely sensational at it, you know, like when you watch an Anderson Silva in his prime, you see some guy who's just figured out a way through this puzzle in this really extraordinary way. And there's a beauty to that that I think the people that really love and appreciate fighting can understand it and can feel it and see it. And I always want to try to find a way to express that to other people. Like, do you see what I'm seeing? Because if you saw what I'm seeing, you'd be fucking freaking out just like I am. Yeah, it's tough, man.

Especially, like you said, if you don't have experience in that sport or have trained or fought yourself, you can't appreciate it as much as someone who hasn't and is just viewing it from the outside. You know what goes into this. You know how hard it is. You know what it feels like to get hit. You know what it feels like to have to come these obstacles in training and preparing yourself for a fight.

It's not just this surface thing like two guys in the ring and they're fighting and it's over and it's done. When you saw there was some recent event that, what was it, NBC or whoever was putting it into, they spent like hundreds of millions of dollars on boxing. They had a few events. They lost a shitload of money. Yeah.

And then it's done. It's out and it falls apart. I watched something like that i'm like god damn they put so much effort into this if they just put together a fucking stacked muay thai card just a stacked one and just let people know and put it on prime time tv just like they do with fox with the ufc i feel like you can't miss i really do i just i feel like it's one of those things where the product is there, the talent is there, the fighters are established.

There's so much high-level talent. I mean, when anybody watches Muay Thai, even on TV, live especially, they just fall in love with it. It's like, oh, my God. Where's this been? Yeah. Where's this been? If you're a fan of exciting shit, you should be a fan of Muay Thai.

Definitely. Yeah. As we said earlier, there's so many variables that go into it, and it's just a matter of all those right pieces coming together at the right time. Just like when the UFC really started blowing up with the Stephen Bonner and Forrest Griffin fight, like how long it had been around, how many amazing fights had been going on, and it was just that, the right time, the right people, the right thing blew it up.

Yeah, it was 12 years old. A lot of people forget. The UFC was 12 years old when that happened. How long did they struggle? How much money did they lose? Like how many promotions came and went? It's the same thing with Muay Thai. It's just you don't know what the right combination

and the right time is and hopefully one day those all those pieces will come together uh if if not we're just doing the best we can with what we have now you as a fighter and you're 34 now 36 36 this is you know when you're an athlete this is the you know there's, there's a window. I think Sanchez is 36 too. Yeah, we're the same age. Where there's a window. There's where your body is going to function at the level that it's at right now for a certain amount of time and not much more. Yeah. Does that fuck with you?

When you think about it? You know, after I had two really bad losses, I lost my world title by stoppage, and then I got knocked out the next fight. I was really struggling mentally with a lot of things. Like, I don't know, can I still do this? You know, I'm too old to do this. And I had all these questions in my head, and what I realized, what Kieran helped me realize right before I won that WMC title in Peru, was I've had all these questions from day one.

I'm too old to do this. I don't know if I'm good enough, you know, but my answer has always been the same. Do I love to do this? Yes. Can I physically still do this? Yes. Well, then I'm going to do the best that I can and give this everything that I have. And that's not going to change.

I don't know if that's going to be over today, tomorrow, 10 years from now. You know what I mean? So as long as I'm physically able to do this and as long as I still have a love and a passion for this, I'm going to keep doing it. People have been asking me how long I'm going to keep doing this for over 10 years. There's an old expression that a fighter lives and dies in their own mind. And when you're at your best, like you were telling me when you were 16, you felt invincible. When you're confident, you can pull the trigger faster. You have more belief in yourself. When you're saying, I'm just going to do my best. Is there a thing in your head that says, man, I wish I was in that state where I felt

invincible or does that not matter? Yes and no. It definitely um there there's a point where thinking you're invincible it can backfire sure you know like you think about like tyson of course he was invincible but as soon as he lost that it was he couldn't overcome it have you ever heard tyson talk about what was going through his mind when he was walking to the ring. Yeah. Have you ever heard him do that thing? Have you heard him do it? Yeah. I fucking love that recording.

I've played that like 30 or you got it. Cue that shit up. Yeah. Cause there's something about that where it's so raw and it's honest. It's after he had been retired and, you know, and he had just was kind of reflecting about all the nerves that would go through his mind and all the echoes.

Most guys were pretty much intimidated. They lost the fight before they even got hit. Most guys. I knew the art of scuduggery. I knew how to beat these guys psychologically before I even got in the ring with them. As soon as I come into the ring, I'm gloved. No, stop it. That's not true. While I'm in the dressing room,

five minutes before I come out, my gloves are laced up. I'm breaking my gloves down. I'm pushing the leather on the back of my gloves. I'm breaking the middle of the gloves so my knuckle could pierce through the leather. I feel my knuckle piercing against the tight leather gloves on the Everlast boxing gloves.

When I come out, I have supreme confidence, but I'm scared to death. I'm totally afraid. I'm afraid of everything. I'm afraid of losing. I'm afraid of being humiliated. But I'm totally confident. The closer I get to the ring, the more confidence I get. The closer, the more confidence I get. The closer, the more confidence I get. All during my training, I've been afraid of this man.

I thought this man might be capable of beating me. I've dreamed of him beating me. But I always stayed afraid of him. But the closer I get to the ring, I'm more confident. Once I'm in the ring, I'm a god. No one can beat me. Gives me chills, man. If that shit doesn't give you goosebumps.

When I came to the ring, I'm a god. Oh my god. I fucking love God. When I came to that ring, I'm a god. Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah. I fucking love that. I love that. Because what you were saying about all that work for that one moment, there's so much mind fucking going on. And so mental. And that's the thing. People don't understand how mental fighting is.

And they can't really appreciate it. And the hardest part is after you have been broken to still get that back and that's a very tough thing to do so if you've gone undefeated for so long you finally lose a lot a lot of people come back from that or not a lot of people get back to the level they were like i was very fortunate i lost i got crushed my first fight and and i was able to to overcome that and to build myself up and help it motivate me and then i went on to win like 18 fights in a row after that but i saw a lot of people go undefeated for 10 15 fights and they just had this amazing confidence they were just crushing

everybody but they were also not learning a lot of very important lessons that they needed to learn and so once they finally lost they almost destroyed them and it's very tough to get so far in a game and miss all these lessons you need to learn until you're forced to learn them. You know what I mean? So if you can find a way to learn them as well, but nothing teaches as good as losing. There's also losing, I mean, you see it in MMA,

like fighters from different disciplines, maybe grapplers or something like that, that lose by KO for the first time. It's a completely different animal. Yeah. And that's what happened with me when I was saying my two losses. Like I'd never been stopped. Well, I've been stopped, but not really hurt or really knocked out before.

And that happened twice in a row. And it was really devastating for me mentally to have that happen and to try to get back to where i was prior to that and not just skill like skills skill skill but there's so many other factors that go into this you know the way the way that you think about things it's like being confident but not overconfident being confident but and and understanding the danger and then things that'll keep you sharp without without affecting you it's like it's like finding that balance between being too nervous and too calm like i've always been more way way too calm like for my own good and i always you're kind of a calm dude yeah most of the time you're very mellow you know and in the beginning i thought everybody was like that and

then and then i would see people getting ready for fights and they're freaking out like they can't walk and like i can't do this i can't do this i can't do this and these like high level people who i've been watching like geez man like what's wrong with you like i don't understand like what are you so nervous about you're amazing you know what i mean but but i i've one day i realized like being too calm isn't so great either because i went into a fight once and like i had no adrenaline going i'm like half asleep like all right man you know about the fight and this guy's coming around across the ring for me i'm like all right all right this's going to try to kill you. You better, like, get going.

And it took me a whole round to get back into that mental zone. You ever seen that Cowboy Cerrone video of his breakdown walking to the cage? No. It's similar. It's just like that where he's talking about his mental process and everything. It's really good. It's really good. It's really good. He's changed a lot of stuff in his game,

and he's a guy that has survived some pretty devastating losses and come back even better. Yeah, and that is really the key because eventually, if you do this long enough, those things are going to happen. And how you overcome them is really what shows you what a great fighter is. Because anybody that goes around winning and just crushing people, yeah, that's great and all. But if you have never come back from total destruction, you're not a complete fighter, I don't feel. Yeah, Cowboy, since the Dos Anjos fight, is the best version of Cowboy ever.

And before that, it was the Pettis fight. The Pettis fight, he got stopped in the Pettis fight, came back back better than that he's a guy that is like the adversity builds him yeah it makes him stronger have you ever worked with a psychological coach or uh yeah a little bit uh back when i was in vegas um you know i originally started doing it because i broke my hand three times in a year and i was always so hesitant to throw it and I'm like I you know it's always painful and stuff and I just like mentally couldn't get over it and I started uh um that was how I originally started working with a mental coach with like a sort of hypnosis but but more just getting uh getting to that right mind frame like going into the ring and then I started going

from there as like very specific things I wanted to work on. Cause it's all about having that right mentality when you get in there or, or when you're getting into training, as opposed to just going through the motions and you can get very, especially when you've been doing this for so long, you can get very comfortable and too comfortable. And then that's one of the problems I've had,

especially being so calm as I am. It's very easy for me to just be like oh this is whatever you know like we're just so so you're I'm sorry I'll get to you it's your mental coach would help you with your mindset for training to prepare training training as well as fighting um you know like what kind of stuff did you work on like well like for training just just having that that that that um like I'm here for a purpose. I'm here to very specifically build myself up, get ready for this fight. I'm not just here to work out.

It's the difference between working out and training. That's something like you're very focused on the task at hand. Why are you doing this? You're doing this to be the best. You're getting ready for this day. You need to give it all you have at this very specific moment instead of just casually getting through the training you know you're doing everything you're supposed to do but if you're not mentally doing that as well when you get into the ring you're going to fight in that kind of laid-back casual way as opposed to this being this very um you know dangerous thing you're doing

so you're training you're you're specifically gearing up to an event yeah like just dialing dialing everything in you know what i mean and and you know some people have more of that automatic thing they're like when i'm in the gym i'm very focused very determined i'm doing this for this specific goal um but but after you've been doing this for so long it just becomes like I'll just get through it and do it. And you kind of almost get lazy mentally, not fit. I've never been lazy physically. Um, you know, I've always pushed myself almost too much, but, uh, mentally, uh, uh, there's been times when I'm, when I've had those, those bad fights is when I've allowed myself to slip, whether that's because, you know, know i just the person i was fighting didn't didn't uh give me enough uh threat in my mind or or there was things going on outside the gym with family and then you know pets dying and things like that that kind of broke certain things to me down where i was still doing the work but mentally i was just broken yeah relationships

are a big one with fighters right yeah you know. You know, when you see fighters, they get in a broken up relationship or they have a crazy girlfriend or something. Like there's a lot of fighters. Like there's a buddy of mine who used to work with fighters and it would seem like every time his fighter was getting to get ready to compete, his girlfriend would have some fucking major drama and she'd be waking him up in the middle of the night and screaming at him. be waking him up in the middle of the night screaming at him and she just wanted to fight like as he was gearing up to a fight because he was pulling away from her and concentrating more on what this event was going to be so she didn't like the fact that he was spending less time paying attention to her so she started getting super needy yeah and it would fuck him up every time it's tough man that's why you'll see a lot of fighters leave and go away to camps you know

things like boxers and stuff they'll totally totally leave town and, you know, set up shop somewhere else because you have to be so focused on this one thing. I mean, your life is on the line. Even just in the gym, your life is on the line, and we don't really think about it or, you know, put that much emphasis on it. But every day we get in there, we risk injury and death, which is obviously a severe case, but it happens definitely. And if you're not taking the necessary precautions and going into it with that right mentality, then you can get hurt really bad.

What were you going to say? I've been really lucky. You know, I've been with Karen since I was 16, so he's not only been my coach, but he's also been my mind coach. He knows me so well. You know, he knows as soon as we're going to hit pads, if something's going on, you know, or I'm in my mic my mind coach he knows me so well you know he knows as soon as we're gonna hit pads if something's going on you know i'm in my head or anything he knows by just my my body movement uh he's like hey what's up what's going on right let's get out of your head come on right are we gonna work what's the deal you know he he knows me so well that he knows he he can see it a mile away even you know just by my texting or whatever and

you know i'm really lucky and that's why it's important to have and it's like not just a great coach or a great team it's having people around you who know you right you know and they can see these elements that maybe someone who you haven't been around long enough wouldn't see before they might not pick up on just that very subtle vibe you have like dude like what the hell is going on with you even though you're doing everything correctly you're training really hard but like you can see that that thing that's off in their head and like that's what's great to have people who you're friends with and have been around for a long time it's like i can see that in him he can see that in me and be like dude like you know like we need to talk about something like what's going on with you like maybe you just ease back a little bit and you need to like fix that thing whatever i mean there's so

many things that could be you know i mean whether it's you overthinking the fight or whether there's something going on with someone outside the gym or you just have you just got a bad vibe or it's and it's knowing when sometimes you got to take a little step back and maybe not push yourself so hard but like hey man just ease back a little bit you know it's all about finding that winning combination whether it's you know and obviously your mindset what you need to think about is probably going to be different than gaston's and probably going to be different than you know fill in the blank joe shilling's mindset everybody's got their own little weird yeah tweaky shit that you have that's why i can't just tell him oh just do this right i don't know dude yeah so like people ask me well what should, oh, just do this. I'm like, I don't know, dude.

So people ask me, well, what should I do mentally to prepare myself? I'm like, I have no idea. I don't even know for myself what that is because it's a constant learning and adjusting thing. It can change every camp. People don't like that. People like to be able to show up at work at 9 o'clock. There's a coffee break at 10.30. At noon, they go to lunch.

At 5 p.m., they go home. I wish it was that easy. But you don't. You don't. You'd hate it. You'd hate it. I would hate it. I'm like, why?

This is stupid. Everybody can do this. Well, when you've experienced life at 10, like you guys are living, you're living this extremely dangerous, difficult, incredibly complex life. I mean, the task of being a professional combat sports athlete is one of the most difficult jobs that is available to a person. It really is. It's incredibly difficult.

And it's incredibly difficult psychologically. It's not just difficult physically. It's difficult across the board. There's not a single fucking thing that's easy about it. And to find the right formula to make that thing work for you it's it's so it's it's there's so much involved yeah and you really have to pay attention to it because the the longer you let things slide and don't realize like hey you're letting this slip over here the harder it is to make those adjustments that's what i was saying like every day it's you're on both sides of too much or too little of of one thing or another whether it's

training whether it's your mental approach whether it's your diet whether it's how much or how little you're running there's so many variables that go into everything what about strength and conditioning you guys do follow a strength conditioning routine tons tons what kind of stuff do you do i don't know i can't even like begin to yeah we do we do some divided stuff you know a lot of sprints uh it just really depends it switches every day really yeah and again it's that thing where you have to find what works best for you on that day in that moment in that in that certain fight it's like how how much is too much, how little is too little. And you're dialing that in constantly.

And because sometimes you go to bed, okay, this is what I'm going to do tomorrow. But then you wake up and you're like, this is not going to work for me today, man. Right. You're sore. And so like sometimes just doing it for the sake of like, yeah, I'm going to do it because I don't feel like I'm doing it. I need to push myself. Sometimes that's not the wisest thing. Just pushing yourself for the sake of pushing yourself isn't always the right answer.

You know what I mean? And trying to find that is very difficult. It's like I was saying before about like what injury is too bad to where you should take this fight off. And what's an owie? I don't know, dude. What's that? What's an owie? What's an owie and what's an injury?

Yeah, like I stubbed my toe. Like going into my world title fight, I busted my rib like nine days prior to. I couldn't even breathe. I couldn't even move for two days. I'm like, hey, maybe you should not fight. And yeah, that went through my head, of course, because I couldn't do anything. I couldn't even touch it. But I'm always somebody, like I said, I'm going to do it no matter what.

How bad was it broken? What was it? Intercostal tear? Oh, okay. So it's the tear of the tissue in between the ribs? Yeah. That's very painful. So it was, when it happened, my rib was sticking out like that. Pop it back into place and like duct tape it down. And I literally couldn't take a breath.

And I was like, how am I going to fight? I can't even train. I still got like over a week to go. You know, I got to make weight. I got to do? I can't even train. I still got, like, over a week to go. You know, I got to make weight. I got to do all these things. And so I'm laying in bed for two days just taking these short breaths. I couldn't lay down.

I couldn't sit up. And I'm just like, I've been working so long to get to this point. And this happens to me right before. It's like it was brutal. So what did you wind up doing? I fought and crushed him. I fought that same night, too. Yeah. Did you get a cortisone shot or anything in it uh no no i i got i got a lot of body work done um um i worked with my uh mind coach a lot like because i was just like literally

if somebody touches me there i'm done like my body's gonna fall like even if i'm mentally strong like that's what i was so worried about i was like i'm gonna go out there and this guy's gonna touch me i'm gonna fall i'm like oh he knocked me out you know what i mean i was really worried about that but i was like well you know what he still has to do it he might go the whole fight and not even touch me you know i mean i can't be so concerned about this one thing that I'm not going to allow this to break me. You know, it's like, at what point do you do allow things to break you? And I'm like, there's nothing that's going to break me. There's nothing going to stop me.

If I can physically get in there, I'm going to do it. There's a fine line that people make when they're training and they're putting together a schedule. When they're training and they're putting together a schedule, there's a big debate, especially in MMA, over how much strength and conditioning you should do versus how much fight-specific skill training you should do. Where do you guys fit in on that and how do you make the distinction? I feel like there should be a balance between both. You've got to know what you're— So you think you have to do strength and conditioning? Definitely. Definitely.

Definitely, absolutely. And then you should run. There's a lot of fighters out there, MMA fighters that don't run at all. Running, sprinting, strength and conditioning. But again, it's different for every person. Now, when you say running, do you run distances? Do you run hills? I run miles at a time.

We do a lot. Yeah. The shortest run that I do is four miles a night. Most of the times I do that twice a day. So you run eight miles in a day. I mean, it just really depends how I'm feeling that day. So I go either four or whatever. But every day I have to get my run in.

Otherwise, I feel like I'm not training. Really? Yeah. So you do the run in the morning and then you train at night? Is that how you were doing it? So I run. So Monday is kind of like a – it's not as long of a day for me. Like I have like a long training session in the afternoon, but then Tuesday I run,

then we do strength and conditioning, then I come back in the afternoon, I hit pads, then we all spar together, you know. So that's kind of like a longer day for me. So you have a couple days where it's just a big, brutal, crazy day. So that's like four workouts you're doing. Yeah. You know, I mean you're running. Running, conditioning, run again. Pat work., brutal, crazy day. So that's like four workouts you're doing. I mean, you're running. Running, conditioning, run again, pat work.

Sparring. Sparring, then pull-ups, neck exercises. Jesus. I did CrossFit in there. I try to put everything that I can into my training. So fight day comes, I'm like, there's nothing else I could have done. This is it but you also have to find that balance between those things too so it's it's not like i can't 100 crush every single thing i'm doing i can't sprint for six miles yeah crush the pads as hard as i can spar

as hard as i can kill the bag as hard as i can you know what I mean it's right what is it that you're working on in that moment you know and am I just working on my technique and my things and my footwork and my movement and as well as that so it's not it's not like every time we do strength and conditioning it's this full-on kill yourself sprint you know or it might be and then but later on maybe we're doing a little more technical stuff so we definitely switch it up at the gym yeah and how do you man i mean that that balance which is what's interesting about it is like how do you know the right way to go about it like fedor towards the end of his career i mean he's obviously back now but towards the end of his mma career he abandoned all strength conditioning and he's just doing fight training he would just Well, again, it's what works for the individual. You know what I mean?

Like, what I do, it's not like I'm going to tell everyone, you need to do this because then you're going to be like me. We don't have the same schedules. Yeah, we're very different. We do a lot of stuff together, but there's a lot of stuff we don't do the same at all. What's the differences between you two in terms of training? I probably don't run as much as he does anymore. I used to. like the older i get the less i'm running like i hate it man i hate i'm like i've done i've done the running but is there benefit to you do i mean is there anything wrong with you not doing it i don't feel so no but but you have to find a way to make up for that

you know like i know people who hardly run at all but they also find a way to supplement that right you know what i mean they might do a lot harder uh bag rounds or a lot more rounds you know when it comes to that where you know there's not just one thing like you have to do this this many rounds this this many miles you have to do you have to eat exactly like this you have to do it exactly like this it changes and it changes for me daily weekly uh fight every fight's different you know i might do more do less you know i've had fights where i couldn't run because i've snapped all the tendons in my ankle and i had to swim instead you know and i still felt great in that fight and i felt like i had just as much cardio and but i had to i had to make up for it somehow in other aspects of what I was doing. And you're making up for this. You're the one who's got this schedule in your head.

So there's that mind fuck of am I slacking off? Am I pushing myself hard enough? And how do you know? That kind of comes from the way I came up. You know, I came up with Thai trainers who didn't speak English. You know, I had to learn everything very much so by doing it myself and figuring it out myself. I never had people telling me what to do or what I should eat, what I shouldn't eat. Everything I've done and learned, most of what I've done and learned has been by application.

I find it's hilarious and fun to watch when you see Thai guys training with American people. And the American people don't speak Thai. And the Thai guy doesn't speak English. and they're trying to teach them a technique. And, you know, they're just kind of like doing it with their hip. And, you know, it's this weird thing where you're looking at each other and they're trying to figure out what the other guy's saying. Well, it's interesting because I didn't really start thinking of how complex what I was doing was until I started teaching people. Because I'd been doing this for almost 10 years before I actually started trying to train people. And I remember the first time I taught somebody or maybe it was a seminar or something.

I'm like, well, just kick, you know, just do it, do it. And then I'm like, oh, well, you got to do this. You got to do this. I'm like, geez, there's like 15 steps involved in just a kick. Well, that's funny you said that because we worked out today and you're very complex i mean you got i mean we were talking just about the switch kick and i think you went on this 10 minute rant of just all the different variables that are involved in it was very illuminating it was it was awesome i it again it was it was i learned it by doing it but it wasn't teaching it that i had to figure out what all those steps were

and which has helped me um in what i do and and helped me improve a lot of the techniques i have is realizing all the the complexity of every technique of every movement in it and when i explain it to people and then i train people a lot of it is just me like telling them how you do it you know where where how i learned was like just just do it like go run go kick the bag like yeah you gotta fix this and like by watching and studying and and that's how really how i learned well what's interesting and maybe unfortunate is that you could train with a lot of people and they would never point out some of the stuff that you guys pointed out today yeah it's it's finding someone who's technically proficient and understands how to,

how to relay that information. It's one of the harder parts of being a martial artist, unless you're a self starter and you just do a lot of, well now today, obviously when you're a day, you couldn't do YouTube, but now you can just get online and you can watch a million. Yeah.

But you might find some shitty ones too. I've found some shitty ones on all sorts of things where they don't know what the fuck they're talking about on all sorts of different martial arts techniques yeah well it's a thing that kind of it's like the unfortunate part of a lot of times high level people didn't really have to learn things because it came so naturally right they didn't have to learn all the fundamental aspects that go into this technique whereas somebody that might not be as good they've studied it a lot more and that's why a lot of times you'll see not the highest level of fighters be the better coaches because they've had to study it so much more and they've had to really look

into it and dissect it that much more because they weren't able to or for whatever reason do it so naturally like freddieach. Yeah, without a doubt. I mean, he was an amazing fighter. He was a good fighter, really good fighter. Really good fighter. But, you know, he wasn't Mayweather. Right. You know what I mean? Right.

Where, you know, Mayweather's probably not the best coach in the world. I don't know. But a guy like Freddie Roach has really had to develop that and figure those things out. And he can tell somebody else, how do you do this? This is how you do it because I've had to figure it out. You know what I mean? And that's something like I've kind of gone out of my way to do. Like it was much more natural for me to do, but, but throughout the years I've, I've realized that, you know, and how do I tell someone how to do this? I've had to

figure out what those things are and how do I, how do I tell someone how to do this? Where, cause I can just do it just by doing it. I somebody do something i'm like i'm gonna do it but but how do i explain this to somebody and i've had to dissect my my own self and realize all these things and all these um aspects of the technique and it allows me to uh translate that to somebody else as well as fine-tune it in myself now when you guys you guys watch MMA and you see someone like Stephen Thompson that has a few elements of Muay Thai he uses, but he uses a lot of sport karate, which is a completely different stance,

a completely different style. What's your take on that when you watch that? What, his style? His style? Or when they say that it's Muay Thai? Well, they definitely don't really. I mean, he uses some leg kicks and some techniques, but essentially he's doing a sport karate style.

Right. Well, it was kind of the same thing with Anderson Silva. It's like just because someone's throwing an elbow, just because somebody has a clinch doesn't necessarily make it Muay Thai. There's a lot of arts that have those things. You know what I mean? And I'm not going to view him as a Muay Thai fighter. You didn't think of anderson as a muay thai fighter not at all he thought of himself as a muay thai fighter well that's okay but but i wouldn't view him as a muay thai fighter at all i don't think anything he did was very muay thai even his clinch was i mean that's such a

fundamental basic clinch you know i mean that's just because everyone else was so terrible at it right it's like grab the neck like you don't See that in high-level Muay Thai guys going up and grabbing each other by the neck It's in transition and when they hurt people when they get tired very it's very much us of Struggling for dominance over under those kind of things so it's like a big sloppy ridiculous armbar. Yeah, dude I mean like yeah, it's like that's like day one Muay Thai so when you saw the like

the rich franklin fight were you going what in the fuck like how did he not learn this his first day in training and what was even worse was um i had a friend that i trained with that went out to help him for the second one and he just didn't want to hear it like they did not want to hear that like dude you don't know what you're doing at all because as of what we talked about earlier these guys get to a high level and think that they're um maybe muay thai technique is good and i'm like dude you are like a kindergartner like you don't know what you're doing at all whatsoever he didn't want to listen so wow that's crazy after losing that look so who was it that went out with him? Anthony Brown, the train partner of mine. And he was specifically brought there because of his Muay Thai?

Yeah, without a doubt. I'm like, why would you bring me in if you're not going to use me? I mean, I've been brought in for people too. And I'm like, why wouldn't you use what you've brought me in here to do? You know what I mean? Like, you brought me in for my Muay Thai, for my knowledge in this thing, and you just want to keep doing what you're good at like why am i here this is stupid that's unfortunate he's such a nice guy and such a smart guy yeah he was a math teacher without doubt how does he not

see the math of that it's when people aren't people have a false sense of where they're at in the sport and what they can do and like you literally know nothing but you have this mentality that you're decent at stand-up you're decent at muay thai and you're terrible compared to someone that really does know what they're doing right you know what i mean most people's understanding is very elementary if that you know you take another person and i'm gonna i could beat you without even like touching you. You know what I mean? And just let you mess yourself up because you don't really know what you're doing.

It's crazy to think that someone could reach a world championship level in something that involves Muay Thai. But there's so many variables that go into it. There's wrestling. There's jiu-jitsu. There's all these things. You can get away with a lot more like the striking in MMA. You can get away with because of those variables because of the smaller gloves, because of the

takedowns, you know, you put that person in the ring with even a moderately good Muay Thai person, a moderately good boxer, they're going to get murdered you know what I mean? just like you can bring a really good Muay Thai fighter in but they don't have any wrestling defense

or no jiu-jitsu. They're not going to be able to do anything. Exactly. They're going to look like an idiot. Yeah. Well, that's one of the appeals of MMA, is that the guy who wins is most likely the best fighter. Because if it was just Muay Thai, or if it was just wrestling,

or if it was just jiu-jitsu, you would see someone who's the best at that. But when you throw everything in, it's the kitchen sink, get in there. Yeah. And that's when, you know, you get to see like who's been, I mean, it's even more complex puzzle. Yeah. Well, that's why like I've never really understood the argument of like pitting this person against that person or like who's got the best Muay Thai and MMA. Well, nobody because they're not doing Muay Thai. They're doing MMA.

Right. So that argument, that conversation is completely invalid like oh if you put this boxer in against this Muay Thai fighter who's gonna win I don't know what rules are they fighting under they're fighting under Muay Thai rules he's probably gonna get crushed right you know what I mean well it's interesting that uh Wonderboy Thompson is gonna fight Tyron Woodley who's the UFC welterweight champion and who's this uh powerful wrestler, but who's also training with Duke Rufus, who's obviously very talented, knows a lot about Muay Thai. Great coach.

When you see a guy like that, the reason why I keep bringing up Wonderboy's style is because it's so unique. We brought up Raymond Daniels in Glory, who's one of the only guys that has that similar background. And then Michael Page, of course, in MMA, who fights for Bellator, has a very similar style, too. That sport karate style. What are the holes in that style? What's the pros and cons that you see as a Muay Thai fighter?

What we were speaking of earlier, it's if you've never applied that in a fight, a real fight, notarring not not not not that kind of thing There's certain techniques and things that are completely worthless and unfortunately in a lot of those Sports you're not you don't get exposed by that until it's way too late So you're trying these techniques that you know a decent person just gonna walk right through because they look good And they're flashy and they're great on the pads and and all that but but when you have to damage someone right well obviously thompson knows how to do that though obviously he knows how to fight and it's and it's using those techniques but applying them in a more fight uh centric way and it's a completely different thing but when you see what i was trying to get at is that such a weird style where he

stands sideways and he leaps in and out and he moves back and forth from the waist like a snake. I mean, he's got a lot of, there's a lot of weirdness to the way he moves. And it's very difficult to find anybody that has that level skill with sport karate, kickboxing, but also has a really good wrestling base too. yeah and i think that's one of the biggest things and why he's able to apply those things because because he can deal with the wrestling and everything else that goes in so so that's why you'll see him throw those techniques because he's not as worried about it as someone who might be just as good as him with those things and has zero ground or wrestling where they're not going to throw because they're going to get

taken down and crushed yeah it's like we were talking about your experience in a taekwondo school that you went there The first day start doing sparring you threw a low kick and they're like get out of here get out of here time to go Yeah, do it something too effective Yeah, so being able to apply things in a real fight and being able to apply them in the air is very different, right? Obviously we see Thompson can apply them in a real fight. Yeah. What is he doing that you see that's different? Like, I mean, obviously, he's not a Muay Thai fighter.

He's a kickboxer. But, like, when you see that stance, that weird stance, that sideways stance, what do you think about that? Oh, I don't think much about it because I don't watch a lot of MMA. You don't? I mean, I do a little bit. A little bit? I wouldn't say I follow it because I don't watch a lot of MMA. You don't? I mean, I do a little bit. I wouldn't say I follow it.

You know what I mean? I watch it when it's on, but I'm not paying attention to the fighters or tracking them throughout the years that much. I'm just so curious because you're so Muay Thai. You know, your style is so Muay Thai, and you're obviously an expert at it. I'm always curious as to how a person like you observes an expert striker in sort of another realm. Well, I think he's an expert, and he's become an expert striker in MMA. So he's applying all the techniques that he knows and have worked for him in MMA.

So it's different than if he would get in the ring and do Muay Thai. Yeah. How many fighters like him have done Muay Thai? Obviously, Raymond Daniels has done kickboxing. Some, you know, but it's another one of those things where being able to apply the things from your other sport into that. So, like we were

talking about with Raymond Daniels and Nikki Holtzkin, like, he just walked him down and was like, bop, bop, crushing the legs. And Valtellini, too. So, at a certain level it kind of you lose that like where you're spinning flashy techniques are going to work against

you know those mid level guys but you put them in there with the best in the world and a lot of that stuff gets exposed and is not working out so well you think that essentially demonstrates the effectiveness of Muay Thai at the highest levels you think it's the best effectiveness of muay thai at the highest levels you think it's the best it demonstrates the the holes and some of the stances and techniques

um if i'm not flinching on the things you do and don't really care so much about you hopping around and spinning around i'm just walking down crushing you um you know that that's where uh that kind of gets exposed so it's like it's like putting a boxer into a Muay Thai fight. All I'm going to do is kick your legs and you can't punch me. Right. You know what I mean? But you take a boxer and teach them how to defend those kicks and stand in a little bit more of a squared up way where I can't use your weakness against you as much. You're going to have much better success.

Even if you never throw a kick, now you just can take those kicks better and just kill me with your your high level hands well you you said that you had uh taken some boxing matches i had four boxing fights yeah and you just did it to stay active yeah i mean they were all on like a week's notice yeah one of them was like the day i got there like well this was when i was saying i was out on all those fights fall through and uh i uh, I went to this fight. It was supposed to be a multi fight. And I told the promoter way ahead of time, like, look, I've had all these fights fall through.

I'm not coming out there unless you have a fight for me. I'm like, not only do you need to have a fight for me, I need you to have a backup guy for me as well. He's like, don't worry. Don't worry. We got it.

We got it. I'm like, I'll call them before I went out there and be like, so the guy's still going to find me. Right. Yeah. Yeah. You got the backup guy too,

right? Yeah. Yeah. All right. Get out there. Well, uh, yeah, they both backed out so um i don't know what we're gonna do i'm like look man day of day does that much of an issue oh yeah and i was like look if you don't get me a fighter you need to drag your ass into the ring we're gonna fight because i killed myself and you promised me we had a fight he's like oh man i'm gonna get you something get somebody i'm like all right so i weighed in left came back he's like well

we got somebody but uh he's a boxer it's it's a do you want to do a boxing fight and i used to carry my boxing shoes with me just in case and i would bring my mouthpiece and my cup to fights even if i wasn't fighting just in case you know because that's ridiculous that's just how we came up you know what I mean? And he's like, well, you can box. I was like, all right. All right, let's do it. And this guy's standing right there.

He was freaking out because one, he was like 20 pounds bigger than me. I've never boxed a day in my life before. And he's like, what is wrong with this guy? I was like, yeah, let's go, man. He's like, well, he's 20 pounds heavier than me. I don't care. I'm like, let's go. I got some shoes.

Like, I got some gloves. Let's fight. And I went out there and knocked him out. And that was my first time boxing everybody. It was always like that, like a last-minute thing where I'm like, I can punch, man. I'm going to do whatever I can do. Now, you're preparing for MMA. Yeah.

So how much different is your training now? Are you still taking Muay Thai fights as well? Well, right now we're in the transition. I just signed with Bellator. I don't know what's coming next if it's going to be kickboxing or mma but i'm definitely preparing for both and they haven't told you i i don't know yet because i don't know what card i mean i'm gonna be on but i mean my my mma training even when we hit the pats is i stand differently i'm different i move differently when i'm training for mma you know i'm doing a lot of m rounds, actually, with the guys from Team Cejudo.

Well, the good thing about MMA is it'll still allow you to do spinning elbows. The bad thing about kickboxing is you can't do spinning elbows. People don't know. That's one of your signature techniques, probably your signature technique. I mean, you had some spectacular knockouts in Lion Fight with spinning elbows. Thank you, man, yeah. How the fuck could they take that away? That's ridiculous.

Yeah. Well, you know, I'm really looking forward to doing both, to be honest. I'm looking forward to improving on my boxing and really having to exercise that style of fighting. And I'm really looking forward to doing MMA as well, you know. And you were fighting 145 in Lion Fight? 140. 140.

So MMA, I don't know yet. I'll probably start at 145, then going down to 135. You think you can make 135? Yeah. You're a big guy. Yeah. I made 139 last time. How much do you weigh right now?

Probably like 160, 158. What the fuck? Yeah. God, everybody's just killing themselves. That, to me, is one of the most unfortunate aspects of fighting, is the drastic weight cuts. I just think the juice is not worth the squeeze. I just feel like fighting itself is so goddamn difficult.

Like, why complicate it even further by dehydrating your brain 24 hours before the fight? Yeah, and that's why I cut down so much, and I've been working with Mike Dolce for my last three camps, and it's been great. What has Dolce got you doing differently? Just, like, the fact that he sends me all my diets, like, you know, before I – I have, like, an off-season diet as well, you know, so I'm just getting ready all year round.

So do you have, like have pre-prepped meals? Are they in the little containers and you open them up and they're all portioned out? Out of the Cave is a meal prep company that we have out there in Dublin. And Kevin's sponsored by them too. So it's really easy. So I get my diet from Dolce. I give Out of the Cave my diet and I just get my meal prep every week. Oh, that's nice.

Yeah. That's gigantic. It definitely makes it a lot easier to not have to worry about cooking, not have to worry about any of that and just training, you know, eating and you're good. That's, that is gigantic. Yeah. Now what is, uh, primarily what kind of foods are you eating and do you vary that? And do you have different results with different diets? I, my last diet was pretty good. I will have like oats in the morning, um, oats in the morning with, uh, chia seeds and hemp seeds and that kind of stuff. Then I would have my first workout.

My second meal would be eggs. And then at night I would have fish or chicken or anything like that with asparagus or broccoli. I found that to be really successful. So if you do vary it, what do you vary as far as like the fat content versus the carbohydrate content versus the protein content i mean do you uh do you mess around with that at all i used i used to do mostly a paleo diet it was you know 90 paleo except for a little bit of milk in my coffee but now i i actually added all these grains like oats and brown rice at night and and I feel great.

You feel better with that? I feel better with that. What is the difference between adding the grains and the extra carbs? I have way more energy. Interesting. I have a lot more energy, and my weight is even lower than it was when I was just trying to do all fruits and meats. Yeah, there's a certain amount of carbohydrates that a lot of people that are involved in very strenuous shit, whether it's triathletes or somewhere along those lines. There's a lot of people that try maybe to go with a ketogenic diet. I tried that a little bit, and I just had no energy.

It did not work for me. I've heard that. I felt like I was brain dead. How long did you do it for? It was about a couple weeks. Oh, yeah. See, that's the problem. You're supposed to wait. You're supposed to not even do anything strenuous for the first three or four weeks until your body transitions over.

But in my case, I'm always trying to get ready for fights. Right. I was just like, dude, I have no energy. I don't know what to do. They call it the keto flu. Yeah. Oh, my God. I know some guys have made the transition successfully, and then they compete and they do a lot of things, burning off fats. But I'm always curious about extreme people, like people that are doing ultramarathons, people that are doing things that are extreme energy requirements.

Yeah, well, I was living with a carry-on at the time, and he was like like a little bit he's like dude what the fuck are you doing man this shit's not working for you you you need carbs you need grains you need you need that stuff otherwise you're not gonna have any juice man well if you talk to mark sisson who uh he calls his diet the primal blueprint the whole problem with the term paleo is that the paleolithic era they ate a lot of grains yeah i mean that's it's just not historically accurate it's not a good word for it yeah The whole problem with the term paleo is that the Paleolithic era, they ate a lot of grains. Yeah. I mean, it's just not historically accurate. It's not a good word for it. Yeah.

But the people that are successful with it, apparently there's a curve where you go through that keto flu stage for a few weeks and then you get better. But I've talked to people that never get better. weeks and then you get better and then you but i've talked to people that never get better i mean i know some friends jujitsu friends that went through the whole process and didn't train hard for three or four weeks and got themselves to a state of ketosis but just did not feel right yeah i mean i know it works for like power lifters and stuff like that and people like that but it me as a fighter personally experienced it for a little bit i just would not do it again well your description shows me that you didn't really get through it yeah that that that's you can't do it for two weeks i mean yeah he told me like mark system when i did it he told me don't do anything

hard for three weeks don't do anything he's like even if you like on the treadmill for 45 minutes just at a slow pace that's probably too much i think that was my mistake you know i was training just as hard as i always do but trying to eat like that i was like yeah it takes your body it takes your body a while apparently to make that adaptation but it is controversial i mean it works for me and it works for some people but obviously my lifestyle doesn't have the same energy requirements that your lifestyle does when you're training for fights yeah i mean like all things you got to find what works out best for you that's why like you know i'll make the adjustments i feel like i need if i if i feel like i need some more carbs some more grains on a certain day or going into a certain workout i'm gonna have them that's why i wouldn't say i have a specific diet i because it varies you know

varies how i'm feeling what's working what's not working you know do you guys get blood work done do you get your blood work checked out i actually have uh i've got a buddy in in Vegas who does that. And years back, I had my blood looked out. It was messed up, man. I had a lot of plaque in my blood and stuff. And I was really surprised. It looked like it was really unhealthy. And I never would have known that if I never had gotten it done. And what were you eating at the time?

Same stuff I'm eating. I think it was more of a hereditary thing than as far as my diet. Really? Yeah. And what got me on a lot of like the red algae and I don't remember everything, but it got it completely clear. It was just crazy to see it. Like, I could see the blood and, like, it showed me, like, you know, how it's moving around.

So, like, yeah, there's a big chunk of crystals right there. It's like, that's not good, man. If this gets any worse, he was, like, really surprised by how bad it was. Was this guy a doctor or is he like a healer no no he was a he was a phd he's legit yeah yeah yeah healer and then a lot of fucking people you'd be amazed like world class athletes that go to quacks uh-huh and you know they'll come back and tell you something well i'm balancing out my alkaline and my energy and my chakras. What? Huh? What's going on? Yeah, it was nice to visibly be able to see it, like him take the blood, put it on things.

So you could see it in the microscope? Looking at yourself. Yeah, yeah. Wow. So we had a projection up on the wall, and I cleared it up within a month or two. What about vitamin supplementation or things along those lines? Well, now I'm hooked up with Onnit and all their amazing stuff. So I've been hooked up taking all their multivitamins and things like that,

which I think all their stuff is really amazing. Yeah, we try. We try to get the best shit. Yeah, their stuff is awesome. I mean, like I have days, you know, towards the end of camp that I'm like, dude, like I cannot, like even with my diet and everything like you're so sore you you busted your ass for so long you know you're like i just can't and i've taken that alpha brain stuff and like that stuff puts you on for sure like it's a great thing to take before

workouts yeah and a lot of people don't think of it as that because it's you think of it as something for for mental energy or for your memory or for no clarity Yeah, I take it during sparring and I feel like I'm on, like 100%. Well, I feel like mental fatigue is a huge factor in physical fatigue. Enormous. Yeah, which is one of the next questions I want to talk to you guys about. Sources of inspiration. Do you actively seek out inspiration? You know, personally, when I was, when was it when I got knocked out?

18, 17? When I got knocked out, you know, I had a really bad time after that. You know, like I said, I was invincible, and then I had a really bad weight cut. That happened. And then Kieran brought out Kevin to help me out. So Kevin's been my inspiration for for the last you know since he moved out and every day just seeing this guy you know how hard he works and how everything he puts on the line every day like that's been my my inspiration since then you know I mean I knew

Kevin before that uh the first the first time I ever saw Kevin I thought I saw Kevin fight I thought he was gonna lose but he he fought coke I was supposed to be in that car. The fight fell through, and then I watch him, and then I'm talking to Karen on the side. He's like... He was betting against me, man. I was like, dude, why... Who did you fight? Coke.

I was like, dude, what... What's his full name? Chonawat. Yeah. And he... That was when I was like, damn, who's that? Because at first I was like, dude, white boy's about to get smashed.

And Karen's like, you don't know Kevin Ross, dude. I know Kevin Ross. He's about to smash this guy. And I was like, dude, that's my new favorite fighter. Yeah, that's funny. And you get to train with him. Yeah. What I meant was do you seek inspiration?

Like do you read books about inspiration? Or do you read anything about mindset or psychology or anything along those lines? I read a lot. It's more along the lines of biographies and stuff. Like I read Mickey Ward's book,

which is amazing. It's that Unbroken book, which is unbelievable. What's Unbroken? They made a movie. Angelina Jolie made that movie what's unbroken it's the they made a angelina jolie made that movie about it but it's about uh uh what's that freaking guy's name so the runner guy yeah he was a runner and then it was a world war that was a great movie i thought it was really good and like oh that was the japanese people torturing him and he wouldn't yeah dude but like

read that book man like like the movie is like such a small fraction of what this dude went through and like seeing how much stuff he overcome. Not once, not twice. Like every time you think there's no way this guy can overcome this, did it again, did it again, did it again, did it again. Like unbelievable stuff, man. It's one of my more favorite books. unbelievable stuff man it's one of my more favorite books um but like like people like that i'd say i'd seek that out and like look through uh look for stories of inspiration you know not just fighters but uh in any in any art or aspect of life in general um seeing the things that people overcome is as i said earlier you you if you go and look at anyone's story who's ever made it like you can take inspiration for them like Seeing the struggles they went through, it's unbelievable. And when we don't know these things, we think of ourselves as the only ones that have to overcome stuff

or are dealing with things that might have slowed us down. But you're like, well, that guy had way worse than I ever did. You know what I mean? And that's why I've always tried to be very vocal about the things I've struggled with and overcome. And like the first highlight video I ever had done for me, it was very important for me to show myself getting knocked out and dropped and all these things. I'm like, everyone just shows these highlights of their life. It gives you a very skewed perception of what it is we have to deal with and go through, especially to reach a certain level. Like, it's terrible, man.

We go through a lot and people don't know it because you just see the the end result of all this hard work and you see the glamour and the lights and the highlights and stuff but but you don't know what people have over had come with and dealt with things that would crush most people i think that's uh really important about um inspirational videos and books and uh biographies and things along those lines is it gives you an insight into someone's perspective that you You you can find parallels you find parallels to your own life And it normalizes some things that might just seem incredibly confusing because maybe to you it's the first time you've had to overcome something

That's so difficult, but then you find out that other people have done it as well. And it kind of, you can take a lot of comfort in people that have gone before you. Yeah. Like we've all had to overcome something. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like just sitting down and talking to somebody, like hearing their story, you know, it can be very inspirational and really help you overcome anything you might be facing. And, again, that's why I've always tried to be very vocal about my story and share some of my fight experiences or training experiences or life experiences. Because most people, they don't ever hear that side of fame, if you want to call it that. They don't see that. It doesn't get put out there like the successes do. We see everyone's success like they don't see that we don't it doesn't get put out there like like like the successes

Do you know I see everyone success? We don't see their failures. Well, that's one of the things that I think is interesting about you You're obviously a very intelligent guy and you're a guy who's gone through a lot of things But you're also a guy who wants other people to know that you've gone through all these things You're a guy who wants you you you you're assuming not just this role of a fighter, but you're also assuming the role as a mentor and of an example to those that are coming up. Well, it's something that's been very important to me because as I was coming up before YouTube and everything, I didn't really have anyone to look at and be like, well, he did it. I can do it too. So it was very, it still is very important to me one of the most important things to me to show people that they can do it you know and to to show people um when i how late i started and where i

was and the things i've overcome because when you've once you've seen that someone's done it before you or similar and overcome these things it makes it that much easier um for the next person there's a really amazing book called the rise of superman and i don't know if you've read it they talk about um like like the the leaps we've made in in athletics um you know they're more talking about like extreme sports and um one of the things they were talking about was the uh you know the four minute mile and's like, that used to be physically thought of as impossible. Whereas now it becomes a requirement for people to do. And like kids in high school are doing it where, where, where they used to think of it as like, there's no way you can physically do this. Uh, and there, uh, there,

they brought up, uh, I think it was like the 900, uh, on a skateboard. Like it was impossible to do. It's like, there's no way you can do this. And then Tony Hawk or whoever did it. And now like eight year old kids can pull this off because you, that thing that's viewed as impossible becomes the norm. And as soon as that happens, you can get to the next level and the next level and next level. And the only way to do that is for someone to break through whatever that impossible thing is.

And if, and if these things aren't put out there and people don't know about them, you're still always viewing that, that, that, that barrier as, as this is as high as we can go. In that, in that sense, do you think you're, do you think of yourself or view yourself as a part of this process? A hundred percent. Yeah. A hundred percent. Um, I've always felt like, I've always known where, uh, speaking about Muay Thai, where, where the sport could go. Um, you know, coming up, I never thought I'd still be actively doing it while it got out there and got the exposure it's been getting recently. Um, but I always knew I would be a person that helped it go along. And that was a huge thing that kept me from ever venturing full time into MMA or into boxing. Cause I was like, there's only a handful of us doing this.

Me and Joe Schilling and Tiffany and Kai and a lot of other people. I was like, if there's only a handful of us doing this at this level and going out there and taking these almost impossible fights, and I leave, who's there to do this? Who's going to do this? Somebody's got to go through the gate and get bloodied up. That first person has to do it. And I can't pass this off on somebody else.

I can't give up. That's going to make it that much harder for them. So yeah, I've always felt like I needed to be the inspiration I wanted to see in the world. Do you find a great benefit in being able to train with him because of that?

I mean, before, when we first started training together, dude, I would get this adrenaline dumps when I able to train with him because of that? I mean, before when we first started training together, dude, I would get this, like, adrenaline dumps when I was sparring with him. I was like, oh, my God, like, I'm sparring with Kevin Ross, and then, like, slowly it would get better, and, like, now we've become great training partners, and he's been a huge part of my career, obviously. I mean, yeah, definitely.

Well, you're the up-and-comer you know i mean and then of course you've got guys that are coming up that are are in the same place that you were a few years ago and you get to see it now that it is this sort of long crazy chain of events in this process that really essentially you only get a couple decades out of it if you're lucky if you're super super lucky and it's um it's such an unbelievably difficult endeavor to do what you guys are doing and i'm a fucking huge fan so to me this podcast was awesome i'm like a kid in a candy store i hope people got a lot lot out of it. Hey, we feel the same way, man. We're really happy to be here and, you know, been wanting to do this for a really long time.

This is awesome. Let's do it again sometime, man. Maybe when you guys aren't fighting, we'll do a fight companion. Have some fights on and come out and we'll talk some shit. That'd be fun. All right. Your Twitter is BalanosGuestOn, but your... Instagram, DreamKiller underscore bolanos.

And you are? Dust Soul Assassin with a D-A Soul Assassin. That's my Twitter as well as my Instagram. Beautiful. And Combat Sports Academy, how do they get a hold of your gym, Kieran? CSA Gym, everything. CSA Gym, everywhere. Find it, Google it.

You'll get there. All right, folks. Thank you you so much we'll be back later tonight with uh wim hof the ice man returns tonight at eight o'clock bye