The Joe Rogan Experience - JRE MMA Show #124 with Khalil Rountree

Episode Date: May 3, 2022

Joe is joined by UFC Light Heavyweight fighter Khalil Rountree Jr.

The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day. So just tell me that again. So you were doing, what were you doing in Finland in the first place? I was there, I was there with an ex training, but aside from that I was just there visiting. I was just visiting finland and so you decided to do a sauna in the motherland because that's like the home of yeah it's the home of it so um yeah the people that were hosting us they were like hey have you guys ever done sauna and ice lake like yeah but never like in the ice lake after and so they have

like a shack that's the sauna. It's a shack to the, yeah, it almost looks like a locker room. Right. Like, and you just see a bunch of people, like all age groups. Um, there's a locker room where you get undressed and there's this huge box. Like I said, it fits like easily 50 to like, I mean, 50 to a hundred people and everyone's in there just packed. There was actually a line to get in. So when somebody steps out, you step in and kind of replace them. Oh, wow. It's like bleacher seating. So you're in there like packed tight in maybe three or four rows,

and it's hot as shit. How hot? I don't remember the exact temperature, but it was the hottest sauna that I've ever been in. Like my skin was on fire. After maybe a minute, two minutes of being in there, I was like, this is probably the moisture. They probably threw a lot of water on a lot of water. And then right after fucking difference, right after you just walk downstairs or you walk

outside and there's a set of stairs where you walk literally right into the ice. Like at night we did it. It was like nine or 10 PM. Yeah. And so they just cut a hole in the lake and you just walk there's like a metal like a walkway that you can't see so it looks like you're just walking into the water when at night but there's like a little walkway like a railway underwater and you can hold on to the rail and oh wow you know and do your lap and um yeah i think i did it like maybe four times like four sessions and it was the best like one of the best things at the end of the night. I slept like a baby. Oh, you definitely do that.

When I do it at night, when I do the cold plunge and the sauna, like back-to-back at night, oh, my God, you sleep so good. It just drains you. I love to do it before a podcast because it empties my brain. Because the sauna, I put it at 189 degrees, and today I did 15 minutes on, and then I did three minutes in the ice bath and then I had a run here. And that's so that's all I did today. But most days I do 20 and then I do the ice bath and then I'll do another 15.

Got you. Yeah. But in the morning is good, man. I feel like if I do that in the morning, I feel like alive. Yeah. Like I don't have to do this crazy hard workout. Just like sauna and ice tub in the morning. I feel like really revitalized, regenerated.

Well, that's something that I think more athletes and more fighters in particular need to concentrate on is the recovery stuff. There's a lot of guys who just train like animals and just hope their body is going to recover just naturally, just from hard work and eating well. But I think things like hardcore stretching, yoga, if you can get it in, hot yoga, and particularly sauna and ice bath, they're so beneficial. Yeah. My conditioning coach, who's like a gigantic fan of you, he – What's his name? His name is Lorenzo Pavlich.

Shout out to Lorenzo. Shout out, Lorenzo. Shout out Lorenzo. No, it's, it's something that he has me do almost, I'd say like three to four times a week is that's a part of our, our training is sauna and ice and stretching and breathing. What kind of breathing? It's, I mean, I think what he calls it, tumo breathing. Tumo. Tumo. I don't, I don't remember. I, that might be, I might be saying it what he calls it, tumo breathing? Tumo. Tumo. I don't remember.

That might be, I might be saying it wrong. But- How's it go? It's short inhale, long exhale, short inhale, long exhale, like a lot, pretty rapidly. And then- Here it is. How to do Wim Hof tumo breathing, fire pranayama. Oh, activate yourayama. Oh.

Activate your inner fire. Ooh. Okay. So one of the cool things, too, is, like, doing sauna, ice bath, or, you know, like cold plunge. you know, like cold plunge, but also, um, with this tummo breathing, I feel like something that really helped, uh, elevate and like activate everything in my body was I took a small little, like a chocolate microdose mushroom, ate a little piece of chocolate and then like kind of let that settle in. We were like calming down and then got into this breathing exercise. And when I tell you just, I just felt so full. Like my brain was firing differently.

Just so many sensations that I felt that were just like, they felt like they were very healthy and very powerful. I needed those things. It was a really cool experience to mix it with the mushrooms a little bit. I think microdosing mushrooms is the future. I think if people did that, first of all, it doesn't affect your cognitive function in a negative way, like your ability to think or talk or do work or anything like that, but it puts you in such a good place.

It's like this elevated place, but it's not medicated. You don't feel bad when it's over exactly i love microdosing yeah you don't really like trip out into this like crazy headspace right it's yeah you're functional yeah very functional if yeah if anything clarity i feel like a bit more clarity in a different realm like not so much clarity like if i have caffeine and i'm like focused on my project it kind of takes me away from a certain like aspect of my thinking and I'm more like in a little bit more in line with my with my body mm-hmm clarity with like my body and my body better yeah yeah stretching is amazing yes you

know like stretching and breathing into stretches and yeah you know if you were to micro dose and do a yoga or something like that, I'm sure it would be something that's. I haven't done that. I've done a lot of weed and do yoga, and it's kind of the same thing. I'm sure. It gives you almost like feel the fibers stretching out. That's how I feel. I think that's one thing for me.

I'm not like a heavy weed smoker, but I love to smoke before I train before I do any type of running or stretching or because I feel the fibers it might sound weird but I feel like I feel more of my muscle fibers and I'm able to pay attention to those little things and I don't think it's weird at all I think I think the whole thing is like that it's dose dependent like if you get too high you're like oh I can't even function like I've overdosed before and then tried to go to do jiu-jitsu. I was trying to explain an omoplata to someone, like this variation on an omoplata,

and I couldn't figure out how to set up the omoplata. I was like so high. I was like, what am I doing? Your leg went, huh? I was just too gone. That was too much. You want to just a touch. Wait. That was just too much. That was too much. You want to just just just just touch. Yeah.

Just separate you from normal consciousness. I totally agree. I totally agree. It's been. Yeah, it's been. It's been cool to be able to. Yeah, just kind of bring new new instruments and techniques and and techniques and into training and and make it more exciting and more about fighting and you know focusing more on just like my overall health and

yeah ability you know just like ability mentally physically emotionally right like yeah for sure that's one of the things that mushrooms and and and low dose psychedelics and low dose marijuana can do for you it's just like it makes you you you concentrate on like your overall being when you're training like you feel things that you don't normally feel and i sometimes i dismiss it when i train sober for a long time yeah i'm like this is all who gives a fuck just go get the work done but then i'll get high I'll go oh yeah yeah I forgot about this like it's like you just it makes you realize that like there's levels of sensitivity 100 have you ever uh uh tried doing like cardio or airdyne bike yes yeah I like it yeah same thing yeah it's it's great for a lot of things. You know, I think it's not the best for learning for whatever reason.

Like I don't like it before learning techniques. I think it's way better for me when I'm rolling. Got you. You know, or like hitting the bag is the best. Getting high and hitting the bag is amazing. I just put on some good tunes. That's all you need. Yeah.

That's all you need. And just feel it. Yeah, you don't need a partner. You don't need yeah that's all you need and just feel it yeah you don't need a partner you don't need anybody like yelling at you just put on some music and and let it flow i bet usually i have i use my round timer and i have a wu-tang playlist and i put wu-tang clan on and just fucking gravel pit get into that you know i that that makes that it actually brings me into that i feel like i totally connect with you because there's a whole another level of training to wu-tang like if you specifically put wu-tang on to train yeah like i kind of get your mentality and that that that internal yeah you know feeling that you get

because yeah that's one of my not my last fight but the fight before i walked out to protect your neck yes and like that just that mentality like the beat and the drums oh yeah you just feel like this this I don't know like a badass martial artist like a street martial artist when we drive to shows like when we leave the hotel and then we go to the arena when whenever I'm doing comedy we listen to protect your neck that's the first thing we listen to we get in the car either Either Gravel Pit or Protect Your Neck. Gravel Pit's crazy, right? It's great.

They're like, ding, ding. Check out my Gravel Pit. I get it. Man, that era of hip hop to me is just like, I mean, obviously I'm old. So that era was when I was young and it was when I was really getting into hip hop. So that era was when I was young and it was when I was really getting into hip hop. But there's something about that era of hip hop because hip hop was only a couple of decades old then. Sugar Hill Gang was like what, 1979, 78?

When was Rapper's Delight? I mean way before my time. I was born in 90. I think it was like 78 or 79. It could have been. I don't remember. It could have been. Do you know? 1980.

1980. Okay, so yeah. So that's when rap was essentially, modern rap was essentially born. And then 10 years later, 15 years later, you got Cool G rap and DJ Polo. You got all those 90s hip hop guys. Yep. Correct. That's officially released on September 16th, 1979.

Wow. There you go. Did you get to see the Wu-Tang Saga at all on Hulu? No. Joe Rogan, you got to watch it. Oh, my God. Yeah. Okay.

I hadn't been excited about a show in a long time. I saw the Wu-Tang Saga and some people have certain, you know, whatever their opinions on it. But I think to be able to see the background of every single member of Wu-Tang, right? So it follows like each character individually and how they all came together.

And Ashton Sanders, Saunders who plays the the rizza and just there is a scene in season two where he's sampling the music and it takes him into this like all black room where the i I can't even remember the, uh, the group that it, that, that he was sampling, but they pop up and they're each playing their instruments. And then like,

as he turns it down on the keyboard or on, you know, as he turns it down on the board, then like the guy's still singing, but like you can't hear him anymore. Oh, this is here. This scene,

this is like one of the best scenes in, in, in film history wow oh wow that makes me crazy don't take it away no no Turn the voice up.

Oh, wow. Let me hear the drums. Oh, the guitar. Yeah, right there. That's probably the way a person sampling and creating music like that would see things, right? You think about pulling. You separate it. Yeah.

Absolutely. Riz is a fascinating guy oh my god apparently he was on set for for a lot of the like scenes and stuff just kind of overseeing everything or giving his input on like you know this is how it is but yeah being someone who loves to make music and produce beats and stuff it when i saw that scene like i had to rewind it i had to replay it because i'm like yeah exactly you when you're listening when you're trying to create music and maybe if you're sampling you might just hear the guitar and you don't want the drums or you don't want the sing so you like turn that down and you're like ah that's the feeling that I want to sample so when I saw that

I mean that was season two but I was already sold on the show before you know how many seasons are there I think only two and the third is coming yeah the third one's coming out the interesting thing about hip-hop is that it was the first musical genre at least a popular musical genre that sampled stuff like in that they and they it what you know it made the songs more interesting because you heard a little bit of an old song in there and you're like oh I remember that beat but then it's all these new lyrics over that beat that changes what that beat is and it's like there was this you know there was like a lot of debate in the early days of sampling like is this stealing like what is this it's like no because the other song still exists and

it's obvious that this is a piece of that other song But it you know like but it enhances New music. Yeah, it's a totally different thing like taking little pieces of stuff and combining it together as a nice You know of itself personally as it's a it's a it's an appreciation. Yeah, right It's like someone created this masterpiece already and I took my favorite part from it and maybe just looped it or sped it up and then kind of made a version of it. Not to compete with

this other song but it's like an appreciation. Like thank you. You've just made this amazing piece of music that I can now listen to on repeat or listen to in a way that translates to me in a certain way and to millions more i don't know i don't see a problem with it i think it's cool yeah it's not

like they're pretending they didn't do that you know what i mean like stealing is like there's there's been bands that have gotten in trouble because they have a riff that sounds exactly like an old riff that's on a record and they don't give the other band credit. It's not a sample. They're just trying to copy it, and then they wind up losing all the royalties. Do you remember that song, Bittersweet Symphony? Yeah. Yeah, that song, I believe they had to give all their money to the Rolling Stones. Oh, no way.

Yeah. See if that's true. I'm pretty sure that's true, because I remember that song being like really interesting but i but the the beginning of it was too close to a rolling stone song and they lost in court like the like orchestra sound like that that melody yeah yeah the you know but the lyrics obviously were totally different yeah a different vibe to the song i forget which song it was uh stones but but they took them to court and but the thing about music is like I can't read music but can you read music no not read just listen like

I can play by ear hmm yeah when you read it like if you write the music out they can see like oh this is the same fucking song yeah like you could see like and then if you listen if someone listens to it that really has an ear for it they can tell you well this is clearly this is clearly the same breaks, the same, it's basically the same music. Yeah. It's just they added different lyrics to it, but they weren't trying to pretend they were sampling.

They were just copying it. Yeah, I think there's definitely two different. This is a very confusing story. It's almost too long to get into. Oh, yeah? This is a very confusing story It's almost too long to get into Oh yeah As of 2019 the Rolling Stones

Gave money back to the Verve What? Oh really? Oh let me see that article Oh not bitter just sweet The Rolling Stones give royalties to the Verve Shout out Rolling Stones They had originally had permission from The original orchestral recording of those strings,

apparently, or something. It's right here. Received permission from Decca, who released the album. Okay, so the Verve received permission from Decca, the record label that had released the orchestral album, to use a few notes of the string melody from the Andrew Oldham Orchestra instrumentals in exchange for half of the Verve's royalties on Bittersweet Symphony. What was the song that was the Rolling Stones song that was?

Probably. The Last Time? Is that it? Let me hear that. I don't remember what it sounds like. We're on Spotify. See what happens. We're on Spotify.

See what happens. Oh, rainbow. Oh, yeah, I get it. Yeah, I hear it. It's a beautiful night. Oh, that. That's definitely it. Oh, my gosh, it's the same song. Yeah.

It's the same song. Well, that's sort of the issue, I think, is if they had permission, they had an agreement already in place, and then something in that agreement changed. I was going to give you a better example before you brought that up. Is the I'll Be Missing You, when Puff Daddy took that from the police. Oh, yeah, that's right. He's never, apparently, Puff Daddy's never gotten any money from that.

Interesting. It's all 100% gone to Sting. Not even the police. Sting specifically. Wow. Wow. Look at that. $730,000 a year.

What? What? Click on that so I can see it. It says click in the bank account of Mr. Who. Of Sting probably, yeah. Mr. Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner. That's Sting's real name. Is that real? That's his real name? What a goofy name. I wonder why he changed his name to Sting, probably. Mr. Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner. That's Sting's real name. Is that real?

That's his real name? What a goofy name. No wonder why I changed the name to Sting. There's too many words in that. Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner? Come on, bro. It's two full names mixed into one. Gordon Matthew and Thomas Sumner.

You can't have four words in your name? That's ridiculous. Sting is living in a mansion in Benz's, but he isn't giving ends to his friends, yet he undoubtedly feels dependent. What is this? It's just someone's like sort of adding their opinion. Oh, I get it. Oh, someone bitching about Sting not giving money. Sumner's had quoted, having said the song is the major ripoff of all time.

He, Sting, sampled my guitar. That's what he based his whole track on. Stewart's not on it, said Sumner's. Sting's not on it. I'll be walking around. No, that's not Sting, then. That's not correct. Yeah, hold on.

So it's a different person. Oh, according to Celebrity Network, Sting and Stingalo fattened his pockets with a cool $2,000 a day. In fact, every penny of royalties that are generated by both Every Breath You Take and I'll Be Missing You. Okay, so he gets $730,000 a year in that. From both songs. Yeah. Nice. But who the fuck is Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner?

Does that sting? I think this article was just written poorly. It's a shitty article. Come on, XXL. Yeah, it stings. I read this even through a different article where he was being interviewed with one of his bandmates from the police, and that guy was bitching about how he's not getting any money from it. It's one of those deals. It stings taking all of it.

And the way he's complaining about not having a chateau in Italy or something. He's like, we don't have chateaus in Italy. We have them in France. That's the wrong word, bro. He's using French words for an Italian country. Oh, man. Yeah, like, we don't have chateaus in Italy, we have them in France. Yeah, it's the wrong word, bro. He's using French words for an Italian country. Oh, man.

Yeah, well, you know, that's the business of business. Yeah, you gotta get your cut too, though, right?

You can't be mad at the other guy. The music business is a weird business. You know, like guys who are in a band together, the band can be massive, but two guys are like the head guys in the band

and they make all the money. Yeah. And then the other guys get pissed, you know? Yeah kind of going back to wu-tang i feel like that there was a little a bit a little bit of that wasn't you know yeah so many members in wu-tang at one point in time right yeah absolutely but i think one of the things was um the guys didn't really understand the music business rizza was like the brains behind it he was the one who like you know had all of the kind of like business decisions and like hey I need you guys to sign this I need you guys to sign these contracts so we can get this money to make this music and

um you know they kind of trusted him and and did it and uh I guess it just it didn't end up really being like a good deal for everybody um they go over it a little bit in the show but i think there's another documentary that kind of goes a little bit more in depth you know with all that stuff but yeah man business is dirty business is dirty it's a dirty game business uh yes it is with so many people and so many different you know yeah man we all gotta get paid yeah that's just the fact that they brought those dudes together, though, is so interesting. That the Wu-Tang Clan existed at all. And it's so iconic. You know, like, Wu-Tang is probably the most iconic hip-hop band of all time.

Yeah, I mean, off the top of my head, I really can't think of someone else to compare. No one compares. It's a different thing. Wu-Tang is like a mindset. When Dave Chappelle says Wu-Tang is a punchline sometimes, he'll say something and just go, Wu-Tang. You can't use any other band for that. You really can't.

You really can't. And their logo, their symbol, they're known everywhere. You can go to Jakarta, Indonesia, and they know who Wu-Tang is or they've seen the symbol or something. And the people in it vary so wildly. You got old dirty bastard who was just fucking crazy. And then you got the GZA who's like, he's an elite chess player. And I think he's done like TED Talks and shit. No, the guy's a genius. Yeah, like a legit genius. GZA's a genius. He's a genius, yeah. And I think he's done like TED Talks and shit. No, the guy's a genius.

Yeah, like a legit genius. Like, he's just a genius. He's a genius. Yeah, I think he actually, he studied and has a degree in something like very like- Like physics or something. Yeah, like physics. I think he has like a physics degree or something like that. Yeah.

Like the guy's a genius. What was his TED Talk? See if you can find out what the GZA's TED Talk is. Because I guarantee he did a TED talk. Yeah, look at that. The genius of science. The GZA and the science genius at TEDxTeen. I mean, what the fuck, man?

That's incredible. Yeah, I mean, when you listen to some of his bars, you're like, wow. Exactly. How do you put those things together? That's the other thing about 90s hip hop and that era and era and wu-tang clan in particular like the lyrics were so good there was you would hear lyrics and you would just go oh shit like how did you put those together yeah make to make that yeah you know scenario happen and yeah lyrics to me are everything i mean the beat is everything too i mean it's all together obviously but it's like man just something about

like sharp lyrics it's it's exciting yeah there's there's still uh there's still a good number of um of hip-hop artists nowadays that still kind of produce the same type of stuff um one like one of my favorite um artists right now his name he goes by navy blue and he's kind of like an underground guy but he's just got lyrics and like poetry and you just kind of you can get lost and just listening to him speak because you have to kind of put together the things that he's saying so you listen to the song a couple times you're like oh wow okay like that makes sense have you ever seen there's a video from like the 1930s and it's like it says the it's the, I saw it on YouTube, it was a question mark, like, is this the first ever rap? And it's these dudes rhyming to music on some television show.

And like, yeah. Would you folks like to learn everything in five easy lessons? Yes! Well, send for our free booklet. This isn't what I saw. This is what I saw was a video. Well, that's it. That's it.

Click on that. Watch this. This is 1940s. the way brother noah my god's talking right on the way said he would ride on the wind and time hey children stop steal and listen to me god walked down to the brandy sea he declared that the aim of the center man and then he decided to destroy the land he spoke to noah no stop i won't do the bill it three cubits long. I want you to build it big and strong. I want it 30 high and 50 wide so it will stand the wind and tide. This is kind of hip-hop.

Yeah, I mean, it's hip-hop with like a back melody going on. Right, with a back melody and dudes with nice suits on, on television in 1940 and acapella and they're singing about the bible you know but it's a completely different kind of music than what you think about from that era yeah 100 like 1940s that's that's not what was happening. What happened there? Were they adding the music?

Yeah, you wanna hear it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good. You said, now Noah, let me tell you what to do. Calling the animals two by two. So he called them in an ox, a two by two. He called the birds, the ox with the cane and the roost. And he called in Jeff back to Hammond and Shampan.

Locke began to fillet the land. He raised his hands to the whole hive. Shook the stars and the moon from the sky. Wild, right? You got to think about people back then. I mean, television was only like 10 years old, right? Yeah. Like when did they, was it even? Yeah, maybe. About, I think in the 30s.

I think, I'm pretty sure. I mean, they came up with that. Right. You know what I mean? Like they weren't getting inspiration from anything. They weren't like, yeah, let's try to make something like this guy. They were like, let's just make authentic music, and that's what happened. They just created something.

That's something I would sample. Yeah. Right? Like, I'd put this into my MPC, and I'd try to make a cool beat out of it, just like the people did in this video. People should definitely sample it. I hope they do. Yeah. Make different versions of it. like the people did in this video because you definitely sample I hope they do yeah that's make different versions of yeah I

want to hear it I mean and then you think about it you go 50 years later then you have 90s hip-hop which is that that whole era 90s hip-hop was you know like NWA popped in the 90s ice-t I mean there was so many so many artists became prominent in the 90s. It became like a whole different thing. And then gangster rap became like a whole different thing. It was like this whole, if you look at from the beginning of these guys in 1940 to today, you're still only looking at 80 years.

Yeah. It's such a small, if you look at every other genre of music, it's had a longer span of time. Time moves fast. Yeah. Technology advances. Mm-hmm. I mean, yeah, man. It's a beautiful thing to see.

I've been, yeah, very inspired by a lot of just evolution of music, of like finance, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah, man. man what do you in terms of finance so i've been really really focused and like intrigued in this whole bitcoin thing lately i've been doing a lot of research and just like trying to get my own understanding i went to the bitcoin conference in miami this year and just got to see and hear some really, really cool things. And the people who are like pioneering this and really believing in Bitcoin specifically, not just like the whole world of cryptocurrency, but Bitcoin itself. I haven't been excited about something like this in a really long time. And I'm not a finance guy.

I haven't been excited about something like this in a really long time. And I'm not a finance guy. I'm not a guy who grew up knowing about, you know, financial systems and networks and stock markets or anything. And now I'm finally at a point where I'm starting to be able to like see a future for myself and also a way to like people like me don't really have like generational wealth. Right. like me don't really have like generational wealth right and i don't understand i don't see how you know i can really create that through fighting alone so lately i've just been trying to understand more of like the the advancement of technology and kind of where we're headed right like for instance you know when i was a kid in the 1990s and in early 2000s when the internet came versus now like in that jump in my lifetime it's night and day difference like i'm living in the sci-fi compared to what was in the

90s you know so now just you know listening to people um really like really smart people even like uh yonmi park who you had here yeah and hearing her and how um she spoke about how like bitcoin is actually helping save uh some children from like so in north korea this is what she said in north korea when women are are are taken as sex slaves and shipped over to northern china where these guys are buying them because China has this one child rule in certain areas, right? So if the woman, if the sex slave has a child, then that child is half North Korean and half Chinese and the Chinese won't accept them. And they can't go back to North Korea because the women kind of like escaped. Right. So because of that, there's actually what she said are pretty much millions of stateless children who can't get birth certificates, who can't get schooling, who can't get anything. And they're either like sent to prison camps as children or killed

because they're the, what are they going to do with them? China doesn't accept them and they can't go back to North Korea. So what happens, right? So there's like underground church groups that are actually taking these kids in and because they can't use Chinese money and they, you know, because it's happening in China because they can't use Chinese money the only currency that they can use right now is Bitcoin and so people are able to fund them too so that they can at least school these kids and feed them and things like that so from like a from like a currency and like money standpoint there's like a small fraction where I'm like okay I see how this works but then trying to uncover and like dive more into the whole system of how this can be

implemented into just like daily society i'm seeing more and more possibility and it's making me more and more secure on hey man i can actually finally have something that i own that's mine like whatever i earn is going to be mine and you can't touch it no one can touch it every from and there's a guy uh adam curry who's a good buddy of mine yeah yeah you know like uh uh podcast index like his now they've created this thing where um if you want to have your own platform and not worry about being taken down or censored or whatever and you can also get paid in satoshis which are fractions of a bitcoin from the supporters so you can stream your stats you don't have to buy bitcoin you can create a platform where hey i'm speaking if i wanted

to start one and I'm like, you know what? I don't have the money to actually buy Bitcoin, but I do have a lot of stuff that I want to talk about. Subscribe to my podcast. And then my fans and my followers are streaming to me Satoshis just like they would on Instagram, like likes. You get what I'm saying? So likes and replays and all that stuff is also a currency. People don't really look at it that way. But a lot of these companies that want to do business with me, it's like, oh, how many followers do you have? What's your Twitter engagement? What's your Instagram engagement?

Oh, this video only got 70,000 plays. That's a form of currency because that's looked at as my value or my worth on whether or not you're going to work with me or not. Well, that's why shadow banning is so sneaky. Yeah, man. Shadow banning is so insidious because you're limiting a person's ability to grow. Exactly. And they do that all the time with people. Exactly.

I think of Bitcoin the same way I think about the early internet. I think they didn't see it coming and now it's a viable form of currency. You can actually buy things with it. And I think the government is freaking out. I think what they're going to try to do is they tried to do some shit with the Internet during the Obama administration where they were going to try to censor the Internet. And it fell apart because people were furious in the uproar and they thought the political repercussions of it were not worth it. Like the juice wasn't worth the squeeze, so they backed off of it. like the juice wasn't worth the squeeze so they backed off of it but I feel that there's gonna come a time where some government whether it's the United

States or another government might try it first they're gonna try to implement I know they already do it in China but they're trying to gonna try to implement a digital currency a centralized digital currency that they can control yeah what's scary about that is they could say, Khalil, we've looked at your behavior online, and you have some marks against you. And so you're not going to be able to buy this. Or you can only buy staples. You can buy food and shelter, but we're not going to allow you to travel. Because that could be a real thing where they they literally limit what you spend your money on

one thousand percent joe and like that's the things that like the more that i the more that i hear and the more that i see just the world evolving and you know governments you know getting more strict or people getting censored and you know the more that i see like parts of freedoms getting stripped away the more that i'm like okay how what can I do to kind of get a little bit more control over what's mine for the sake of my own future? you're a millionaire or billionaire or if you have zero money in your account starting you know next week turn in your money and get exchange for you know for what for our currency right which you know me also says like you know when that happened if you were a millionaire then you had to trade in your money for the amount of two bags of kilos of or two kilos of rice is what the money that the government gave you that's

that's the amount that you could buy no matter how much you had to start with right you know what i mean when that currency exchange happened you know so i speak of that too because like north korea is like it's a it's a it's just an idea of like how far a government can go not saying that america is that way or anybody is that way. I'm not pointing fingers, but it just shows you how far a government can go. In 2022. Yeah. You can still have a military dictatorship that has full domination over its people,

and they're starving to death. Yeah, 100%. And so, yeah, man, I've been just trying to find different ways to secure myself outside of fighting, you know? And so, yeah, I went to the Bitcoin conference and I met a lot of amazing people. A lot of people who kind of saw and hear my vision and where I want to go. and hear my vision and where I want to go. Trade Station. I don't know if you saw the crypto bull that they built. No. The new version.

So there's a company called Trade Station that wants to make Miami the new finance hub. And their whole thing is they built the brand new Wall Street bull. You got to pull this up. Oh, wow. And it's like robotic futuristic like transform look at that thing oh that's dope that's like things like showing like hey dude like we're like you know so oh wow i love that what is that made out of i don't even know but i think the same guys that did like transformers and stuff like they made it how big is that thing it's pretty big you see the guys like oh wow it's about the same size as the the wall street bull that's pretty sick so like i'd

never been interested in anything like that before you know and like like i think this was one of the biggest things that that really just kind of like helped me just pivot in my thinking and like really wanting to like secure a future for myself moving forward. You know what I mean? Well, you're an interesting guy, man. You're a great fighter, but if someone didn't know you were a fighter and they just talked to you, they'd be like, oh, he's probably an artist or something. You don't seem aggressive. You don't seem like – but you fight like you've got rabies.

It's crazy. It's crazy. It's interesting. Your last fight in particular, I felt it was really fascinating because against Roberson, you were fighting with a low stance. That was a totally different thing. When you fought Eric Anders, you're standing up straight, and you were very Thai style, light on the front leg. And in this fight, you're hunkered down low and almost like a wrestler.

Yeah. But still firing off strikes from that stance. Yeah. What were you doing? What was the game plan there? I don't know if there's ever really a game plan, Joe. Really? There has been in the past.

ever really a game plan joe like really like there has been in the past and i think just game plans for me sometimes require a bit too much thinking when in reality like yeah there's some thinking and fighting but i don't want to like i think it's it's good to have an idea of you know where i can finish the fight and where i want the fight to go and kind of stick to that. But if I get too attached to a game plan, then I might miss opportunities to do, you know, certain things in the moment. Right. So is the game, is there a game plan involved in training, like training for it? Well, Carl is very well-rounded. I knew that he was going to be a great striker.

Yeah. Well, he fought in glory, right? He fought in glory, but I also knew that he was training at Glory Kickboxing with James Krause, and for me, I think that was my biggest

concern, is that he had Krause in his corner, if I'm being honest. Krause is a wizard. Yeah, I know. And so I wasn't necessarily... I respected that he had Kraus in his corner if I'm being honest Kraus is a wizard yeah I know and so like I wasn't necessarily I I respected that I had to fight Carl and and he was a great fighter um but I was really if I'm being honest I was nervous more about him having Kraus and I was like Kraus is gonna do his homework and he's going to you know he's gonna find out any and all ways that you know any type of possibilities on how to beat me um i think the lower stance was just um it was more like instinctual really so that wasn't something you

prepared for no i didn't prepare for it at all it was just it was really a mood i've been training a lot differently lately man like yeah yeah i i have a different approach right now to fighting. I think it feels more like my duty as if I'm in the military, you know. Really? As if, like, as if when I'm not fighting, I'm enjoying my family and I'm figuring out new ways to, you know, create a future for myself and invest money and, you know, get into, you know, get into more of a security mindset because I want how old do you know i'm 32 so when you in your 30s as a professional athlete you start thinking okay this is my last decade

yeah yeah yeah and i don't see any fighters that are like i don't have any really like role models to look up to as far as like how do i model my myself after this? And like, I think I want I want to be wealthy, man. You know, like if I'm out here fighting and putting my life on the line and like like for what we do. I mean, we all know it's no shot at the UFC. I'm very grateful for my what I get paid. But man, it's not enough. Right. And so I have to figure out like ways.

It's not enough for the rest of your life and you can't do it forever. No, man. right and so i have to figure out like ways it's not enough for the rest of your life and you can't do it forever no man and so like i have to figure out ways to to you know have security for myself but also to preserve my own life and my own body because i'm going in there with another guy who's a trained beast right you know and like my face could get broken and you know so many different things can end my career at you know i don't know what the other guy's thinking so i've got to do what i've got to do so that's why i feel like lately um i'm fighting for more my life than i am for a sport you know like when i go in there when i fight you're facing me

like the man the the the person who like you you kind of have to kill me to beat me in a way. When did that shift for you? I think before the Bukakis fight, the oblique kick before that one. I lost, and my UFC contract was pretty much on the line. Like, I had lost in Abu Dhabi. Wasn't that a side kick to the knee? Yeah. Why call it oblique i don't know that's what people call it oblique isn't oblique kick the one where you're uh your big toes up and you shoot it to the body or to the legs i have no idea you know who's the shit at that lorenz larkin yeah i trained with him for this last camp. He's sick. He throws that thing to the body like a front kick. He's made me like a lot of times.

When he fought Neil Magny, see if you can find that fight. Find Lorenz Larkin versus Neil Magny. He's a wicked striker. Very interesting striker. That's a guy, Lorenz Larkin's a guy who didn't get the credit he deserved. Yeah, man. But he's still doing his thing. He is still doing his thing.

But I felt like he went over to Bellator, and I wish he kind of didn't. Because I think he was in the hunt at 170 in the UFC. I mean, I think he was one of the elite of the elite, and he was still improving and growing. And the problem with going over to Bellator is, I'm sure you're getting good money. I'm sure everything's great over there, but you got way eyeballs yeah it's just that's just how it is yeah yeah I mean it's uh watch how he throws this to the body look at that shit man that is why who fucking does that watch that yeah who does that it's like your whole foot to the midsection dude I wound up practicing that

on the bag afterwards and I was like that is so interesting because it really does work. Is that considered an oblique kick? That's an oblique kick. Okay. I don't know why they call it – I mean, I guess you're hitting him in the obliques right there. Yeah, I guess you're right. Yeah. I mean, that is the part of the body.

But when people call it the oblique kick all the time when you're doing it to the thigh. To the thigh. Yeah, which I don't know why they would call it the oblique kick. I mean, it doesn't have another name. Yeah, that's the name that I see, so that's kind of why I repeated it that way. It's in Jeet Kune Do. You know, like Bruce Lee used that shit.

Bruce Lee threw that kick a lot. Really? Yeah, yeah, and some of his Jeet Kune Do texts. I think it might actually. The side kick? Yeah, it's not a side kick really because it's utilized in a way. See, like John Jones, they call it the oblique kick. But it's not really.

I guess because the foot's pointed outside, you know, like versus John Jones. Well, John is doing an oblique kick right there where it says in text the oblique kick on the screen. That is the oblique kick. Got you. But when you throw it sideways, like when you have a sideways stance like when you threw it it was essentially like a front leg side kick to the knee yeah right yeah it's a different technique like right there like that dude knee stomps where it says knee stomps mma uncensored yeah that's a fight that's a sidekick got but where john's throwing it you see the

difference his big toe is up that guy's big toe is down got Got you. Well, there. It's a weird. Look, why can't you do it? I mean, this is the thing. And to Dukakis' credit, when you stopped him with that, he was like, look, that's a legal kick. That's legit as fuck. Which, like, respect on his behalf. And, like, I definitely, like, even now to this day, like, it's hard to watch. I understand. Like, you know, even for me.

I mean, Dukus is an insane pain. Yeah. And the knee twists. See if you can find that. We'll watch that again. Oh, come on, dude. I just said it's hard to watch, and you're like, let's pull it up. Okay, let's not watch it.

Let's not watch it. People at home, if you want to see something sick. No, but I think that's kind of one of the things, and that's also when I kind of put the target on my back as well, right? Do you think by doing that, you put a target on my back as well, right? Do you think by doing that you put a target on your back? Yeah, yeah, for sure. Because I think that when people now go to fight me, it's kind of like, okay, we're going to fight. However, it's not necessarily going to be this like what everybody considers this like good, clean fight.

Although it's legal. Everybody's been doing that. Yoel Romero did it to Robert Whitaker. It happened to me. Whitaker did it to him. Who did you? Marcin Prakneo. The fight that I lost in Abu Dhabi.

He kept doing it to my knee. And in between rounds, I'm like, dude, my leg is fucked. I cannot walk. I don't know how I'm going to get to the second and third round. But I did. And it was because of that kick. So that's kind of another thing where I'm like, this is a useful tool. Did I think I'm going to snap this guy's like no absolutely not but if in if it's in a fight i'm gonna do it yeah you

know i'm gonna do it with with my full strength because no no different than kicking the shit out of someone's calf right exactly you eliminate their ability to move yes did you have long-term damage from that kick from getting kicked like that in that fight in Abu Dhabi I'd say like not long term because nothing was like torn or anything but um it was like there was like a stiffness for a good like two months yeah because it was like right on the top of my knee right you know like right above the patella and it was just like it just for me to bend it all the way or stretch I had to do a lot of you know stretching and things icing stuff to really fix it yeah i mean i talked to a lot of guys about this and their thought is like why is it okay to do an

inside heel hook and you can't stomp the knee like of course like heel hooks are fucking devastating maybe man i mean remember the paul horace days yeah exactly he would hang on the guy's knees and not let go and rip their shit apart exactly so i mean that was like the the mentality switch kind of happened knowing that i was on my last ufc you know fight on the contract and i knew that i just i'm not done i still want to continue to um make the best run that i can knowing internally that i gave my best efforts You were thinking about being done at one time Yeah, fairly recently, right? Yeah, like I think the Cuda labra fight the After that fight was it after that fight? Yeah, I think it was after that fight

It was before the prac neo fight the one that was in Abu Dhabi. Why were you thinking about ending? Uh, Because after I had spoken to you from being in Thailand and having that performance with Eric Anders, all that, I had reached a place where I felt like I was just happy with my life. And I was in Thailand and I saw just the quality of life there. And I had, you know, I had this idea that I was going to live there forever. And I would have been happy just like serving coffee at a, you know, at a cool spot in, you know, in Sukhumvit, Bangkok, you know, because like just the people there are so cool. And I just, I love Thai people. And I feel like there's

a part of inside of me that's Thai, you know? And I'm like, I belong here. Wow. And so, um, I just, I came to a point where I'm like i think i'm striving for too much like in america like just i want to have all of these things i want to have a big house and i want to have a lot of money when in reality like i don't absolutely need it all because i'm i'm my heart is full right now right you know so i just and i wanted to fight muay thai and the ufc were like no you can't do that i want i wanted to fight in the stadium at And the UFC were like, no, you can't do that. I wanted to fight in the stadium, you know, at Rajadamnern Stadium. And my friend, who's like one of the biggest promoters in Thailand, was like, yeah, I can do it.

And we can make it for the WBC heavyweight belt. And I was like, you mean the green one? He's like, yeah, we can make it at the stadium. And I was like, OK. But I had to get the clearance from UFCfc and obviously that's a hard no yeah and so i was so passionate about wanting to stay in thailand and wanting to fight muay thai that i was willing to give up my my i was willing to fight my last fight on in the ufc and kind of become like a sensation in thailand wow yeah man i man. And like, even to this day, there's a part of me that still wants to do it.

But now, like I said, I'm worried. I'm not worried, but I'm focused on like, just creating something out of all of this, you know, for myself and my family, you know, something like some type of generational wealth. But what made you make that adjustment and instead of saying i'm gonna live in thailand live a simple life amongst these happy smiling friendly people to i'm back in the hunt uh so during the pandemic uh i was in thailand so i was locked down there um for

yeah for all of 2021 or 2020 and um my fiance and i were there and we decided like we have to come back because at that time it was very hard to get any type of paperwork from the embassy and um and debit card my debit card got lost and it couldn't like the height of the pandemic phone lines were tied up embassy was not taking anybody to get like visa renewals. It was just such a pain in the ass process for me to still be there because of the pandemic. And I just, we decided like I have to go back to America for a little bit. And then once I came back here, I got booked a fight and it all kind of unraveled from there. So why did you choose New York city? Uh, well, my girlfriend lived there and my fiance now she lived there before

and we were just in Thailand together, um, during the lockdown. So we both went back to New York city. And that was the first time that I'd spent like a good amount of time in New York City. And I was like, oh, I like it here a lot. It's chaotic. You know, people are loud. I'm more chill. So every day is like an exciting experience for me. And so, yeah, we just kind of did our thing to be able to have a place there together. But I also have a spot in Vegas like a training camp oh really yeah one bedroom apartment right by the by the PI so so is that where you do your camps yeah so like if the UFC were to call me and say hey we want you to fight in August then I would go back to Vegas pretty shortly and everything all like I have a place there that I just one bedroom super simple it's got all my

belongings all my training camp supplies stuff like that and does your girl go with you or do you do like the monastic thing like it's like she'll come from like from time to time she'll come out for a couple weeks but if she has work she'll come back uh to new york um last camp i did it solo she was like I think you should just focus, and so I'll let you go and be alone. And we just did FaceTime movie dates every night, which worked. That's the thing about camps and fighting. It's like there's two different schools of thought.

Some guys are more comfortable with their family, and they sleep better, they can just deal, and then they can just turn it on can just deal. And then they could just turn it on when they train. And then there's guys like Marvin Hagler who used to go to Cape Cod in the winter time and just be, he would, he didn't see some of his kids getting born. He was just over there just training. He wouldn't talk to anybody. You know, he put a hat on that said war and he would just train like a fucking wild man. I mean, that's me, man. I mean, like, I'd love to have it that way. That's why a lot of the – that's where I plan to also spend a good portion of my money to moving forward is being able to, you know, fund a trip to the mountains or Big Bear or something where, like, hey.

the mountains or a big bear or something where like, hey, or even build something like, you know, Cowboys Ranch, something very small that, hey, we're in camp. And for the next eight weeks, we're in camp. And if you're my coach, you're here. And if you're my training partner, you're here. Right. And the world doesn't exist. Yeah. Cowboy set up is beautiful.

Yeah. That's such a smart thing. Oh my God, man. Such a smart thing he did in putting that together. Legend. Yeah. He's got a crazy sauna that he built himself. Yeah, with firewood.

Yeah. Old school. There's no hot stones in there. That's like straight firewood. Yeah. Barber shop. My friends were just there posting stories. I was like, wow, he's got a setup.

That dude needs his mind. Now Joe Rogan's got the new setup, guys. Just wanted to tell you. Be on the lookout for those videos. I think he's got a number one training facility. It's a spot right that's amazing i can't wait i gotta come back and try oh for sure yeah definitely i'd love to see some of the shit you learned in thailand because you were telling me that they taught you to kick differently kick differently what was the there's different, like, um, they added the, how do I put this? Balance is something that's very focused on in, in real Muay Thai. Like you get judged on your

balance. If you have shit balance, when you throw a kick, when you, you should be able to throw a kick when you you should be able to throw a kick check a kick and land back in your stance and fire another kick knee and elbow seamlessly you get what i'm saying like that's real muay thai like being in full control being able to throw a full body kick check mid-air you know so just it shaped my perspective um kicking, something that, yeah, I feel like I'd have to show you it versus, like, explain it to you. Also, I know how to clinch. I know how to properly clinch now. And if you talk to anybody who's trained with me, you know,

over the past year, I love my clinch game i'm so like confident in in my clinch and it's not just grabbing behind the head and throwing knees like i feel like i have some techniques that if you can get out of it like like i'll give you like a lot of props if you can get out of my clinch and so you mean like just a straight plum or are you talking about just any kind of clinch like my my thai clinch like yeah so like um like if i were to tie up with you and not even go for a body just we're just playing a stand-up clinch game and i'm controlling your entire body by just like from the shoulders up and arms up. I'm very confident in that, and I feel good about it, and I owe it to being able to clinch for 45 minutes a day in Thailand for a couple of years.

It's a real underrated aspect of Muay Thai, the clinch game and then the trip game. Yeah, sweeps. Like trips and sweeps are some of my favorite things to do now. And it all comes from being able to be a student of the game and see like one of the one of the guys um one of the trainers he didn't even really talk to me much but one day i was training and he was like if you don't have defense you don't you're like you're not a fighter like you don't like you yeah you can have all the offense in the world but like your defense sucks so like work on your defense and that's like checking kicks blocking kicks being able to identify you know you know offense and defense yes like

deliver full strikes and then defend fully right um so they have a very like simple way of putting things but it's all for like a reason and yeah so now i i think yeah i can i can show it more than i can explain it like from across the table you know what i mean but i'd love to be able to show you a few things i would love to learn some stuff um defense is it in almost every elite martial artist if you talk to them about like the cornerstones one of the big ones is defense. And people don't think of that when they think a good offense is the best defense. A good example of that, they were talking about that this weekend when Chito Vera fought Rob Font.

Incredible, right? Bro, Chito's on fire. Rob's on fire too, dude. I know, which is crazy. I was rooting for Rob that whole entire fight. The fact that Chito did that to Rob, that shows how good that motherfucker is getting. He's obsessed. He texted me afterwards.

I congratulated him. He texted me afterwards. He goes, I'm obsessed. He goes, all I want to do is train constantly. I just want to train and constantly grow. And he's like, and Jason Perillo has to kick me out of the gym. Like, bro, get out of here. That's good.

I mean, it's nice to kind of catch that bug for a bit you know what i mean and like capitalize on like hey when you have that emotion when you have that feeling take it yeah you know and run with it because a lot of us don't really have that we gotta like we gotta grind for it but he's finally there so yeah like yeah just shout out to cheeto keep keep doing it. I'm so impressed with him, man. I'd love to see what comes out of that obsession. You know what I mean? But his offense, he blocks a lot of shit with his hands, too. You know, he's really good at, like, the punches are coming in, and some of them are landing, but a lot of them are getting blocked,

and then he's firing back. That standing knee that he landed to the chin, holy shit, man. How about the hook kick? The he landed to the chin. Holy shit, man. How about the- The hook kick? The side kick to the orbital. Yeah. The one that actually made Rob Font's face. He's like, ah.

I think it was a hook kick. Was it a hook kick? I think so. It might have been a side kick, but it was like a high in that regard. Yeah. No, amazing, man. What a beast, though, man. Shout out Rob Font.

Yeah, he's incredible. Wow, man. Rob's got one of the best jabs in the sport. Yeah, his boxing was on point. It's always on point. I mean, he's in that same camp as Calvin Cater, who also has some sick boxing. Got you. But I'm just so impressed with Chito.

I mean, Chito is now one of the top guys in that. What a fucking shark tank of a division, too. Yeah. That division is filled with animals. Yeah, man. And Cejudo's talking about coming back. Cejudo. Who we got?

Cejudo, Peter Yan. Yeah. Sugar Sean O'Malley. Sugar Sean O'Malley. Peter Yan, Aljamain Sterling. Yeah. I mean, fucking Cody Sanhagen. Yeah, there's going to be a lot of-

Cody Sanhagen, and then TJ Dillshaw. And Sanhagen's a fucking killer too, man. That fight with Jan. Yeah. I mean, it's definitely an exciting time for that division. Yeah. Yeah, it's a very exciting time, especially if it was like all of those guys want that top spot. Mm-hmm.

Right? Yeah. What's just so talent rich? It's fun when these divisions get to this boiling point of like talent rich divisions where someone's got a breakthrough and rises and you see everybody get better like Clear difference between Aljamain the second fight with Jan than the first fire the first clear difference, you know And you know, he said something that was probably accurate. He said the first fight he didn't eat

He was all freaked out and just fired up and just couldn't wait to get in there. And he didn't fuel his body. And he started fatiguing in the fight. And then he got hit with that illegal knee. But in this fight, he made the proper adjustments. And damn, his back taking is off the charts. Absolutely. His back control and ability to take the back is crazy.

Yeah. And once you're there, if you got somebody who has you know good back control it's not fun it's not fun yeah it's frustrating you know what i mean yeah tiring did you see the shakur stevenson fight i didn't holy shit no holy shit good fuck he's good he's on another level right now man He's on another level I mean He is so smooth And his movement His ability to like

Punches were coming at him And he just lets them get right there Oh yeah like Just right to there They touch him and then Fires back His accuracy His technique

His efficiency Yeah I gotta watch it. We were watching it in between shows when I was in Colorado this weekend doing comedy. We were watching it in between shows. And I was like, God damn, he's good. He's so smooth. He's so efficient and technical. Like everything was on point.

Yeah, I'm going to watch it for sure. It was awesome. Dude, what do you think? There's him. Yeah. And Valdez is it for sure. It was awesome. Dude, what do you think? There's him. Yeah. And Valdez is undefeated in this fight, too. I mean, Shakur basically won, if not all rounds, most rounds. Wait, where was this?

This is the way he did it. This was at MGM. Oh, okay. This was in Vegas. But this was like a big coming out party for Shakur because a lot of people were aware of it. Look at that. It's on ESPN. Yeah.

Oh, bro. I'm telling you. It was on ESPN. Yeah. Oh, bro. I'm telling you. He was on fire. And it was just the smoothness. And a lot of people were saying it's like Floyd Mayweather-esque. And you could say that. You could say that. It was just so – but it was, you know, it's Stevenson-esque.

It's just Stevenson coming into his prime and letting everybody know because it's such a high-profile venue. I mean, he's at the MGM and he's fighting on ESPN. Yeah. Also, yeah, let the man have his own name. This is the end of the fight. He ran around with his biceps up. Yeah, smooth.

It was amazing. It was a very, very, very good fight. Joe, let me ask you this. I've never asked anybody this in my whole entire life. Who would you like to see me fight? What would be a matchup that you'd be like, wow, that's one that I really want to see? I want to see you fight who you want to fight. I got you.

I'd like to see you fight anybody in the division. I was so impressed with the fight with Carl, but I've been impressed with a lot of your fights. It just, I feel like there's two yous. Yeah. There's you motivated and prepared and then there's you who's like not really sure if you should be doing this anymore. Yeah. And I've seen a couple of those fights too. Yeah.

But the motivated, prepared Khalil is a scary motherfucker. Absolutely. You're a scary motherfucker. Absolutely. When you were coming after Carl with that low stance and I didn't call that fight.

I was at home watching. I was like, holy shit, man. He looks fucking lethal. Yeah lethal yeah absolutely and I think I'm at a point right now that like the motivated and prepared is is here to stay until it's over yeah you know like I'm not one foot in one foot out right now I know exactly what I'm here to do and like I said when I go fight now it's more like it's my duty it's active duty man so in between i get to like you know i'm enjoying my life i'm in new york city i'm i'm learning i'm doing this and and then when i get that phone call it's like it's just like i'm going overseas like vegas going to the desert you know i'm going i'm going to war like let's let's

lock down let's what's the mission okay this is You know, I have somewhere that I look back and say, like, okay, I got to get back to my girl. I got to get back to my home, you know, and I'm here to do it. Where are you training in New York City? Recently, I've just been doing jujitsu at Marcelo Garcia. That's it? Yeah. Really? No striking at all?

I do, like, fitness stuff at, like, stuff at Chelsea Piers, just fitness gym. But no striking? Wow. No. That seems kind of crazy. Why? Well, because I would think you would want to constantly be tuning up your striking. I mean... You don't do any of it?

No. You don't even hit the bag? I hit the bag a little bit. A little bit the bag? I hit the bag a little bit. A little bit? Yeah. I hit the bag a little bit. It's hard to believe for anybody who watches you fight because you're so heavy on strikes. Yeah.

You know, your strikes are so devastating, you would assume that you're constantly working on them. Nah. I mean, not like that. Wow. Like, I think what's going to help me stay motivated and stay passionate about being here in the UFC and kind of going into this new run is having an equal balance in my life. And when I'm training, I'm training. And I give myself enough time to, you know.

Live life. To live life. And I don't fuck around. I don't drink. I don't party. I don't, you know. Like, I literally am serious when I say that I'm focused on just like making something out of my life. You know, like I acted in my first movie.

I don't know if you saw it. Oh, yeah. Me, Anderson, Rampage, Tretch from Naughty by Nature. Oh, no shit. Yeah, we're all in a movie together, a crime drama called Lord of the Streets. Is it good? Okay. I was going to ask you, is it terrible? It's not was gonna ask you is it terrible it's not terrible here how here

the movie's not terrible it's definitely like it's watchable and it's enjoyable there's some parts in there that's like holy shit that's cool i didn't hate it i haven't gotten any lord of the streets lord of the i haven't gotten anyone that's like yo dude that movie fucking sucked like no one said that i was gonna say that to you i haven't even heard it like through the grapevine like through the grapevine i'm sure people think it but they might say it on the internet they're not gonna say it in front of you nah it's it's definitely something that i watched and like there's some cheesy parts but overall like the storyline and the fact that all of us really did go in there and like give our best i think it shows you know what i mean i think

it shows and if you're a mean? I think it shows. And if you're a fan of, oh, yeah, here's the trailer. Can you rewind it really quick with the sound? Is that possible? Yeah. Oh, okay. And this is out on Tubi? Yeah, stream it through Tubi.

They want you to throw the fight. Trey goes down, no later than two, and you go down for good. Baby girl. Dad! I told you to throw the fight. What do I gotta do to walk out of here with my daughter? I'm no hose bar fighter. I gotta fight him. He an inmate. He's gonna have to fight five fights in a row. That's suicide.

Good to see you on the outside, convict. Thank God for corruption. You don't know how good you had it, man. Wife, daughter, championship belt. I'm washed up. I'm going to win these fights. Spend my life on it. And Stacey coming home. I didn't even know Treads trained.

See what he's done? He's turned us into monsters. Father, Dad. You choose. It was so fun to make, man. How long has Tretch been training? So he didn't train, like, MMA. He was just training to, like, stay in shape.

Right. He obviously had, like, a double. Oh, so he had a double do the fight scenes and shit? Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. But all the other guys, like, Czech Congo, me. Oh, Czech Congo's there, too? That's who I was, like, breaking the stool over his back. Oh, wow.

Yeah, we shot it, you know, we shot it in 12 days. Yeah, we did it you know we shot it in 12 days um yeah we did it had fun and so like but now i'm already working on uh my second film where it's like it's it's actually like it's more serious and there's like more there's more funding behind it. Is it a fighting movie as well? Yes, partially. I can't say too much, but it has a lot to do with how athletes and fighters and celebrities are always like we are often looked at in this light where people see us as like stars and like larger than life, but don't really realize and remember that we're human beings and that we have the same struggles and things as any other person.

We have families. We have worries. We have bills, just like everybody else. And oftentimes when we hear about drugs and sports we think peds right we don't really think about drugs that uh like uh painkillers you know stuff like that so there's a big element of that um also uh sexual abuse in men and men who are athletes you, so it's very heavy. It's very real. Um, I would say, uh, that I'm the, uh, well, I'm, I'm the lead role in it, but, um, yeah, I'm, I'm very excited about it. And I'm serious about acting. Yeah, man. I think,

I think it's something that I've found love for, and I'm just like fighting. I didn't have a plan to be a fighter. I never had a plan to be an actor, but when I went into fighting, I went in with an open heart and a willingness to go to the top, and I feel like it's the same with acting. I have the same dedication and whatever it takes, same with acting. I have the same like dedication and whatever it takes. Um, but all in all, it all kind of goes back to, um, being able to make something out of my life that's long lasting. And I don't necessarily see fighting being that. Yeah, it's certainly not. It's not something to

your eggs in one basket. I'm sorry. BJ Penn said it best. He was on the podcast last week. He said, uh, fighting's an opportunity. It's not a career. Yeah. And then he said, but don't tell that to Andre Orlovsky. Yeah, he's made a career. Yeah, crazy. Wait, did he win? He won. I thought Jay Collier won. Nope. Oh, wow. Andre won. Oh, man. Okay.

I was doing Andre during that fight. Yeah. It was a close fight. It was a split decision. Yeah, that guy's wild. What is he? How old is he? He's a thousand years old. Yeah, he's a million and five. I don't know, man. It was a split decision. Yeah, that guy's wild. What is he? How old is he? He's 1,000 years old. Yeah, he's a million and five. I don't know, man. He was the champ in like 2002 or some shit. Huh.

43. That's amazing. He's only 43. 6'3", 246, 43. That's crazy that he's only 43. I mean, what year was Andre the UFC champion? Click on that because I want to say it was like 2002 or 2003. 2005?

Does it say 2005? Okay. He went on to defend his interim title in 2005. So, okay, four motorcycle injury, Frank Mir, Tim Sylvia. So somewhere 2004, 2005. Yeah. Hold on. Yeah.

So he made his debut at UFC 28. Wow, that's crazy. Yeah. So, I mean, that's almost 20 fucking years ago. Still kicking, dude. Still kicking. And still fighting with heart. Yeah.

You know, like he goes in there, like he's still determined. He's trying to get better. He's still trying to get better. He's still in it. Yeah. That's crazy. It is crazy. Respect.

But there's only a handful of guys that, you know, that can do it and that love it. Like those are the guys that are going to go down in history for like being fighters. Being fighters. He's so adorable. Andre Arlovsky is a fighter. He's that guy. There's a handful of those. Unfortunately, I'm just not that guy that wants to continue to go in there and go to war with people to hopefully win and hopefully make a living out of it. Well, you have a lot of potential to do a lot of different things.

And one of the things that I think you could do and you could be really successful at that would leave you independent is being a podcaster. I really think you could do that. I thought that from the first time we did it together. And I was like, yeah, 100%. Because you have an interesting take on things. And you're a very smart guy.

And you've been around the world. You've seen a lot of things. You've had a lot of wildlife experiences. And you have your own individual, unique take on things. You talk to some people, and you're like, oh, I've heard these kind of opinions before. But you have a very specifically Khalil viewpoint on things. Wow. I guess I've never looked at it that way.

Specifically Khalil viewpoint on things. Wow. I guess I've never looked at it that way. And it feels like I'm almost like mind blown because like coming from the fucking podcast God. He's like for you to see that. Like that means a lot. That's cool. Being who I am, I can tell you how easy it is.

Yeah, that's cool, man. It's not hard to do in terms. I mean, it's brain surgery is hard to do. This just requires effort. There's a difference, right? Like, you don't, you're already a good conversationalist. You're already, you're very good at talking to people. You listen. You know, you're attentive.

You're curious. You're perfect for it. And I've always wondered why more fighters don't have them while they're fighting. You know, like some fighters have podcasts afterwards, like Michael Bisping has a successful podcast. Josh Thompson and Big John McCarthy do one together, and that's successful. But, like, while they're fighting, it seems like it doesn't take up a lot of time, and you really don't need much. I mean, fuck, you could do it on an iPhone.

It doesn't require much. Damn, that's actually, I'd never really, like, it's probably crossed my mind before, but to look at it after you've kind of described me in a certain way, I'm like, oh, okay, yeah, that kind of makes sense. Totally makes sense. Yeah, maybe I'll do it, and that'll be one of the things

that I use to earn Satoshi's, man. Yeah, well, next time you come here, I want to promote youroshi's, man. Yeah, well, next time you come here, I want to promote your new podcast. Yeah. I got to talk to Adam Curry. Next time we come here, even better. Let's promote a podcast that's up and running and has been going for a while and doing well.

And that accepts Bitcoin. Yeah, well, Adam Curry, if you want to talk to him, I could arrange that. He's the shit. I love that. He's the original. That's the pod father. The podcast was created by Adam Curry. And every time he comes on, I want to let everybody know that. Really? He's the pod father the the podcast was created by adam curry and every time he comes

on i want to let everybody know that really he's the guy that's that's patient zero in the podcast epidemic okay yeah i'm gonna have to uh i'm gonna have to talk to him man yeah he created it i mean when steve jobs went on stage to demonstrate podcasts on Apple Music, I think it was at the time. It was on iTunes. The podcast he pulled up was No Agenda. He pulled up Adam Curry's podcast. It might have been a different podcast at the time. Was it No Agenda back then?

Do you remember? Because it was like he gave this speech, a conference, And when Steve jobs was talking about Apple podcasts, like how to get podcasts, he pulled up Adam Curry's podcast. Wow. It was, that's the original man. He,

he 100% is the original. Yeah. Interesting guy. Super cool. Like just listening to him speak. Yeah. Yeah. Just listening to him speak and talking about,

you know, how the future of podcasting, pretty much. I was like, wow, like, this guy's awesome. I want to know more about him. Yeah, he's several steps ahead of everybody else, including me. He's also several steps ahead of, like, Internet censorship and government surveillance. So that's it. Wow, look at the throwback 90s photo.

So what was it called? The Daily Source Code. Oh, okay. So that was his original podcast. Yeah, that's a 90s photo, but you've got to remember, he was like 80s pretty because he was on MTV in the 80s. Yeah, I didn't know that, but wow. So they're on old school iMac,

and they're pulling up his podcast early, early in the day. This was 2005. So he had a podcast four years before I had one. Wow. At least four years because he might have had one even before that. Well, damn. Yeah. Well, that might be one of the things, Joe.

You could totally do it. Yeah? Yeah, I think it would be great. And now that I think about it, I'm like, oh, cool. That means that I could the things, Joe. You could totally do it. Yeah? Yeah, I think it would be great. And now that I think about it, I'm like, oh, cool. That means that I could have guests on and I don't have to be the guest. Because that's why I don't do many podcasts is because I kind of don't like being the guest. I have a lot of questions.

I'm the guy with the questions. But if you have questions and you're a guest, you can always ask questions. I don't give a shit. We're just talking. I don't think of this as an interview. I just think of us as talking yeah I have questions for you but I mean if you have questions too I don't give a shit but like you could like sit down with a notepad and just any subject that you would like to discuss like Bitcoin because you went to that Bitcoin conference yeah and just write out some stuff about Bitcoin and maybe have

someone on that's a Bitcoin expert. And you could ask them about, you know, like, how did this get started? Are there other crypto coins that you're interested in? Like, there's so many different angles you could take. And then you could take that with music. You could take that with, I mean, you could have all kinds of different people on your podcast. You have all kinds of different interests, right? You have different interests in art and interest in culture, interest in, yeah. Yeah. I mean, there's so many different things you could talk about. Well, I see it as an extension because so many people are so concerned about social media, right? And like social media,

like we're talking about like likes and engagement and everything like that. That's a big thing with people. Well, what is a podcast other than like the ultimate form of social media? It's that's what it is, is the ultimate form of social media. It's like I have social media. I have Facebook. I have Twitter. I have Instagram. But this is my real social media. You want to know who I am. You listen to me talk. That's this is and people engage with that. And then they get to know you, the real you, not just the you that's fighting, the you that lands brutal leg kicks and ko somebody but the you that you know talks about fucking gardening or whatever on a day-to-day basis yeah whatever you're into food whatever you're into wow you know i mean and people love to hear people that are engaged in things with people that are curious

about things whether it's uh your engagement about music or your engagement about, you know, New York City or Thailand or anything. People like when people are passionate about stuff. And that's clearly an element of your life. You're a passionate person. Yeah. And very curious. Yeah. Yeah. I know. I know you are. Yeah. And I mean, just your journey in going to Thailand and training over there and the big adjustments and leaps that you've made. I mean, if you watch some of your early fights to post Thailand training, you changed, you know, change your mindset. That's interesting to people. People like when people do things and talk about them and get excited because we all feed off of each other's energy and passion

and we all gather inspiration from other people you know and that's one of the things that makes podcasts interesting it's like i get to listen to the way another person thinks and it can flavor the way i think and maybe enhance the way i think maybe giving me a different perspective that I maybe didn't have before I love it that's very very inspirational and you've just thrown like yeah you've thrown more inspiration at me because you're always fucking around with audio anyway right you're always fucking around with music music or like yeah just trying to do my own like video editing and layering music over video yeah just a lot a lot of just you 100% can do that like that and you don't even have to have somebody visit you you can start off doing zoom calls which are not as good you know it's like there's an element that's missing when two people aren't in the room together yeah but it's not hard to set something up man you know

it's not hard i think i'm gonna do it i mean i think it's definitely gonna be on the list of things to uh to start to build yeah and again you can do that forever and you could do that completely independent you don't need anybody's help you don't need anything you know you could do it all by yourself and you can have it where it becomes a successful career and it's one of those things if you just it's like a plant just keep watering it and feeding it and it'll grow yeah and the episodes stay yes yeah and you just keep adding to them you know and then each one you learn a little bit more like you go over that

one like well i was a little clunky on that one or that was good because I did this. I'm going to do that more often and then just keep building on it. That's I wish more fighters did that because there's a lot of interesting guys that are fighters. You know, San Hagen's another guy. I think he could have a really good podcast, too. He's an interesting guy. But there's I mean, he's just a name I threw out there. There's a lot of names you could bring up guys who would be really good at podcasts. Joseph Benavides. Sure. Benavides could totally do a podcast.

Maybe he will. Maybe next time I see him, I'll bring it up. He's retired now. The life of a fighter is a life of extreme, intense action in brief moments in time and arduous training and discipline and drive for months on end for one intense moment in time one intense either 15 or 25 minutes or one minute yeah it's so crazy right yeah it's so crazy yeah it's a crazy way to live i think that's one of the things that um my last fight the reason why i kind of just like just had all this emotion and just kind of burst it out like i don't want to wait until i'm champion and tell my story is because it's like

man when we go in there and we fight we're both equally putting in the same amount of time and energy in camp and in theory in theory you know and it's just it kind of sucks sometimes at least from my perspective it kind of sucks that the only way to really move forward is to win you know what i mean or for anybody to really want to talk or offer this type of sponsorship or something you got to win and sometimes like that's out of our hands right like sometimes something just might happen and it's like damn right no matter how prepared i was tonight just wasn't my night and now i gotta go back right five six steps and i gotta put in the same amount of work if not more to then create the result but by then kind of like things have already moved forward for you know so you kind of get left behind right there's so many fighters

yeah and it almost it's it it sucks because when we're champions is kind of when all of the opportunities and things like that present themselves and people want to, oh, tell me about your backstory. Tell me about the things you've overcome to get you to be where you are today, a champion. But it's like, nah, man. There's a lot of fighters in here right now. We're busting our asses and we've been through crazy shit.

And we're not champion yet, but we can help millions of people just based off of our own stories you get me and like there's different ways like there's there's a lot of people that can be impacted by these fighters that are going out and putting everything on the line to become the champion there's a there's there's a lot of work that can be done now and a lot of people that can be helped now through listening to kind of like maybe what we have to say or what we've been through or you know some type of inspiration to help the people who are struggling because i mean we're all struggling but like yeah to just be of some type of like light to a lot of people well you got real emotional um in your post-fight speech where you were talking about how at

one point in time you were suicidal and you feel like you have a message that you could reach out to someone that might be in that same sort of position. Yeah, man. I mean, like I've sensed that I've gotten so many messages and I didn't know that it would bring this amount of energy and attention. And I didn't know what type of energy and attention it would bring. I just know that like I wanted to be able to use my victory to maybe inspire someone to stick around another day and not give up and maybe find some type of something to hold on to, to just keep you from making a decision to like take your life right because i know that that's what it was for me is having someone like my

family or a coach that's like hey man come back to the gym tomorrow like you're doing good you know um but the message is a little bit of encouragement yeah just a little bit can go a long way. It could actually save someone's life. But since saying that, I think for the first month my inboxes were flooded to where it became almost like uncomfortable because everyone was reaching out to me as if I was going to help them. You get me? So I'm getting messages like, dude, I'm going to take my life tomorrow. I'm'm like how do i read this and just let it pass man right you know like how do i read this and just ignore it right so like there was there was one guy specifically that it was like he's like yeah man like thanks for the message and all that stuff but like you know this my birthday is on this date and like this is when i plan to make it happen but like i respect what you're doing and i respect everything he's like but like on the day that

i was born is the day that i plan to do it and it was only in like three days joe and i was like dude and i fucking i picked up the phone and i just started sending voice messages out of nowhere just like just talking you know and i'm like i don't know this guy but like I can't just let this pass and then yeah so there's just messages and and and a lot of people that are reaching out yeah and it didn't sound too good he's like I think actually the last message I sent a voice message but I never got one back and I've just been on my own life journey to where i never reached back out but i'm now reminded and i'll probably reach back out

today but like it's not just that one there's a lot and it's like and if i don't get back to a certain message it's almost like well yeah you don't really care you know and i have to ignore these things too but so the attention that i've gotten now has been more like people have been reaching out to me specifically to help them. And me being who I am, I'm just trying to find different ways that I can. And I've got some things in play for sure. Um, but where were you at in your life when you were thinking about taking your own life? It was shortly before I started fighting. Could have been like a year before I started fighting. I was going on tour with my friends who were musicians.

At that time, I was living in a two-bedroom apartment but excuse me it was almost like a one-bedroom apartment because there was four or five of us in there and we had to use one of them as like storage right four or five people two-bedroom we had to use one room was kind of a storage for all of our stuff plus we had downsized from a home because in my life, we moved a lot just from my mom kind of struggling to make ends meet for all of her kids. I'm a single mother trying to raise four kids. So we had a larger place, but then we had to downsize. So one of the rooms, like I said, was a storage. I think rent was about 750 bucks

and between the four of us we could barely even make that every month um and just really had no hope and no kind of like vision i was already overweight i'd been overweight my whole life. I had friends who played music, so I joined them on tour. But even then, I'm like this big black dude, overweight, touring with heavy metal bands across the world, like across the country. So I already fell out of place in a way. I connected to the music and I connected to my friends. But when we start going places and when we start going to you know Alabama and the heart you know just we start going to places around the country I'm like okay I really feel out of place here um and not only that is like I almost felt

like worthless because these guys were playing on stage and I'm sitting here like just selling the merchandise and I'm almost envious of them because they're following their passion and their dream and they're excited every night to go on stage and I'm just kind of an extra well they they treated me well my friends always treated me well but just kind of comparing where I where am I in my life what do I have versus the things that they're receiving so I was about like 19 18 19 and it just coming home from tour after just like being stimulated from being on tour just getting home kind of back to the same old shit back to my you know my apartment back to seeing my mom struggle back to seeing you know my brother struggle just everybody seeing, you know, my brother struggle, just everybody. And

there's just like the struggling, hopeless type of place. And I was very unhealthy. And if, I mean, if anybody like you should know if you're unhealthy and your gut's unhealthy and your brain's unhealthy and you're smoking two packs of cigarettes a day and only drinking soda and eating fast food, if you in that, if that stuff's in your gut and in your brain like where what do you think your mind is you know like so um i just remember man i remember sitting on this on the stairs and just like just like smoking chain smoking and drinking at the same time and just being in this place of like fuck it dude i'd. I'd like if I had to wake up, if I fucking died a night in my sleep, like I really don't care. Like I'd much rather that happened

because tomorrow I'm just going to wake up to the same thing. Right. So, um, I think that might've been the night where I can't really remember cause a lot is a blur, but that might've been the night where, um, I was pretty high like on, on just like weed and just a lot of, a lot is a blur but that might have been the night where um I was pretty high like on on just like weed and just a lot of a lot of alcohol and a lot of cigarettes and I remember going to bed like or trying to go to bed just kind of laying there just all fucked up and I felt like my heart was going to stop like I felt it doing really weird things. I felt my heart doing weird things and I was only 19 and it scared me. And that's the moment where I realized like, oh shit, I don't really want to die. You know, like I was kind of driving myself

to that. Like I was purposely, I'm going to smoke two packs, you know, I'm going to drink the whole bottle, you know, like things like that. Like just really trying to fuck myself two packs you know I'm gonna drink the whole bottle you know like things like that like just really trying to fuck myself up you know like so not doing anything like I wasn't swallowing a whole thing of pills or you know slitting my wrist or anything like that like physically doing anything to take my life quick but I was trying to fuck myself up you get me yeah like I was really trying to just like damage myself. And I got to a point where, um, I tried so hard that my body kind of responded and it scared me. And then that's where I started to kind of look at, okay, maybe I don't want to die. Maybe I just need to get

healthy. So just that one night of excess. Yeah it didn't just stop yeah it didn't stop like immediately but i was more conscious i'm like i'm gonna smoke a little bit today you know like i wasn't purposely trying to damage myself anymore right but i was already like i was already like addicted to cigarettes and you know everything else the food and i was already addicted to it but i wasn't with the intention trying to damage myself how did you transition from that into training and then fighting so i remember going on one more tour after that shortly after that and that's when i told everybody hey i think i'm gonna i'm gonna this is the this is it for me I want to do

something different I think I want to like train MMA and fight MMA and you had no experience zero you're 19 at the time 19 and no experience no wrestling in high school zero I tried out for the volleyball team in high school I made it but my grades were shit and it was more of a joke. So when you tell these guys, I'm going to fight MMA, what was their reaction? They laughed at me. They started pulling up pictures of Bob Sapp and shit.

And they were like, oh, this is Khalil. He's going to look like, you know? They were passing around the phone in the van. And like, yeah, when you fight, you're going to be like this guy and pulling up like pictures of bob sap literally because that was the the biggest comparison because like i wasn't ripped i wasn't shredded i was fat so they looked for a big guy who was an mma fighter and at the time it was bob sap so they thought it was like kind of a joke and i remember hearing a couple of comments of like okay like we'll see you next tour or like if, if it doesn't work out, you know, you always have a spot here. You always have a job here.

Right. And. So where did you go first? Vanderlays. Really? Yeah, man. Vanderlays Silver Gym. So.

Was that in Vegas? Yeah, at the time. So when we started researching MMA, my brother and I, we started researching together. And we would look up certain videos and we got into pride because pride at the time that was like the best fights and i remember seeing vanderley silva and he's doing the yeah the hands and it said vanderley silva the axe murderer muay thai specialist and i was like what the fuck is muay thai and this guy's the axe murderer and i just saw his i saw his violence, and I connected to it in a way. And then we started researching him and realized that he had a gym in Vegas.

And that last tour, I used all the money to collect all my tips and my savings, and that was enough to get my brother and I a membership. And that's where it all unfolded. I heard Vandalay's gym in Vegas was crazy. It was psycho. I heard the dudes would just fight full blast. Pohada. Pohada.

Pohada. Every day, pohada. Yeah. I mean, that was his mentality, right? It was like, you go and you go and you go and you don't quit. And if you get knocked out, like, you'll be okay. Just, you know, get up there, take a break, and we'll see you tomorrow. Yeah, but we sparred twice a week, full on.

Every sparring session was a fight. Wow. And with everybody. And it was kind of like top dog mentality almost. But, like, we all loved each other we all cared about each other we were a unit you know like that gym we all beat the living shit out of each other but we were a family it like nobody could take that from us um until things just kind of like towards the end kind of started to fall apart what fell apart uh i think they were just like

there were just some bad eggs man man, bad seeds, you know, and just kind of broke. I think, I don't remember, I wasn't too connected, but it might have been on the business side or even on the team side and just kind of started to break things apart, spoil the batch, and we all kind of split and went separate ways. What was the technical training like there the muay thai was phenomenal yeah michael costa yeah okay yeah he trained shoot the box with

under cordero and same era as vanderlake and anderson all them he was just like the younger prospect guy um and i would say it's at the same level as like a King's MMA, you know, Muay Thai. It's the same philosophy, same concept. You know, they have their like Muay Thai like belt system. It's very technical, a lot of combinations. What was it like though starting as a raw beginner and going into that? Like how quickly did they have you sparring? Probably within a couple of months. You know, one of my first training sparring sessions

was with Daniel Cormier before he even started training MMA. What? Yeah. Dude, he came in. I was still overweight. I was still big. And Daniel Cormier came in before he even fought MMA. He was just thinking about it. He came to Vanderlei's gym, him and I sparred. He wrestled the shit out of me. I went home so pissed off that day. I was like, fuck this. I'm over it. He was throwing me around. Next day I come in, my coach gives me a piece of paper and it says, Daniel Cormier. He says, Hey, after you leave today's session, he's like, quit being a little bitch and go research this. like go look at this on youtube and i typed in his name and i saw that he was this collegiate fucking gold medal wrestler

and then i came back the next day with to the gym feeling a lot better because yeah daniel cormier had like thrown me around and he like i said he hadn't even competed in his first mma match yet he was just kind of testing the waters wow yeah i gotta find that laptop that has it like has that video on it man this was like this was before i was even an amateur so how long did it take for you to shed the weight and to get in shape and to get to the point where you felt like you could fight 11 months exactly yeah 100 pounds 11 months wow 100 pounds yeah holy shit yeah and so that must have been wild to feel like it's almost 10 pounds a month yeah it was just through i think it was through the training that we were doing right like that like the shoe to box style muay thai training and and the hard hard hard sparring

and taking our body to its physical limit as much as possible. And even to this day, I'm thankful for that because that's, that's what's kind of made me who I am today too. Right? Like when I train now in my conditioning, if I'm on the airdyne bike, I'm pushing, I'm not just coasting, you know, I'm like, how many seconds can I burn 50 cows? And if it's, you know, like, like I i'm really trying to push push the limits because that's where the real like success is you know yeah that's where your body really starts to make a difference you go to the gym and and and bullshit for 30 minutes a day for two years you're never gonna really get anywhere right but if you go and you push 100 every time you go to like your mental and physical limits, like you'll see some results really,

really, really fast for sure. You know? And that's, it wasn't a secret diet and anything like it was hard work and it was like, it was vision and it was like the wanting to really just make a change in my life. Yeah. And I think that that's what the people like people who want to lose weight or who want to change need to hear.'s like don't go and look for this secret diet and this secret you know way of doing things just work hard man you know david goggins like he's like people feel how you but the guy's a fucking beast he's an animal and we do have something inside of us that tries to stop us from everything but you gotta you gotta fucking say fuck it and get up some days and really go hard and really go hard and push yourself and you'll see results and Goggins has a very similar story

yeah he was kind of lost and overweight and the first time he went on a run he could couldn't even run a mile yeah he was he was a mess yeah he turned himself into a fucking machine i'd say like after reading his book and and listening to a lot of what he went through i've i saw so many parallel like so many similarities and i think the the main thing was like goggins went to the military and i found mma you know like the military is a lot different it's like it's a bit more serious a bit higher level of of just not only training but just the people that you're surrounded by and the duty that you're you know attached to um but just from a lot of the traumas that we had the very similar um life traumas as as a kid teenagers things like that

so do you remember specifically when you realized as you started training that this was for you do you remember like when you realized it was changing your life and that you were like so in the beginning were you still smoking and still drinking and still doing all that shit when you first started training i quit smoking after the first day really yeah my first day of muay thai i quit um because you got tired quick i felt it yeah you know i knew i was like this is enjoyable but i can't fucking breathe right you know right i was like this is cool i'm hitting i'm kicking the pad like this guy's holding it for me he's screaming at me to go harder like he's actually trying to get me to hit harder right that's cool but i just can't fucking breathe man you know i'm like i if

i could only breathe then i could enjoy this you know if i could breathe then i could enjoy this like this could actually be something cool how long did it take for you to quit like before you feel like you didn't want another one oh I mean that took forever yeah I mean that took forever I think I think I became it became more day-to-day after I'd say the first month you know after the first month then the the urges and the cravings were a bit different did you go cold turkey at that moment yeah i did but there's another time too like i'd say within that first year i quit cold turkey but there was other times that like as already too like as like an amateur where i like i'd pick up a cigarette i'd smoke it or i'd like smoke for a week and be like i'm fucking stupid what am i doing you know in thailand they

smoke a lot right yeah isn't that crazy like a lot of thai champions smoke yeah it's more more of the trainers from what i've seen um but the guys who are like active champions and who have like a lot of money riding on them like if they were caught smoking they'd probably get like like hit with a stick or something oh no kidding yeah yeah yeah they might sneak it you know just because when you're in thailand when you're a part of a Thai camp, like, you know, like you're under like ownership. Right. And so they might feel like it's a bit of like rebellion, like we're going to sneak out and smoke cigarettes, you know, because it's the only thing to really do. What else are you going to do?

Right. Right. Yeah. So you you quit the cigarettes essentially almost right away. you quit the cigarettes essentially almost right away and then when you it was the first thing that you did really in your life that was like physically engaging that way right yeah absolutely i'd never done anything that called for me to like run or breathe hard or you know like or punch or lift weights or any physical activity. I've never really been dedicated to anything like that in my life on a daily basis.

When did you notice that you felt differently? I'd say about three months in is when I saw my face slimming and my neck. But did you feel differently like even originally like after training? You know that feeling after training where you feel calm and peaceful oh that was after the first i'd say the first day first week it's shocking right yeah i feel like after let's say let's just to be safe let's say the first week which would be three days right within the week i went and trained three days because of that we only had enough gas to get to the gym for three days.

So every single time, but the third day was like confirmation that I just felt so much peace. And like I'd slept so good in between or like, you know, that night because I'm like, wow, I just went and let out of all this bad energy and got so much good energy back and i'm tired muscles are sore but i want to go back but i can't move and i was like man this is like this is fucking awesome and that was really my my take on it when when i first started is that it was just it was an amazing thing and i just got addicted to like that feeling of feeling exhausted but being proud you know I had something that was like proud of I was exhausted because I was actually applying myself to something that was good for me and I was surrounded by good people so a couple months in you start physically feeling better you start to feel your face slimming and then you knew you're on this good path. But did you think that you were going to fight? It wasn't until I went to an actual MMA event, amateur MMA event, when I felt like, okay, I can do this now.

Like I've been training a bit. I've been sparring. And we went to an event to support a teammate. And I saw the heavyweights going at it. And I told my coach, like, hey, man, I'm ready. I want'm ready I want to do this and he's like nah you got to lose 100 pounds because I was still heavy 205 was the next weight class down right and you were like what I'm still like in the 300s yeah or like like high 200s you know 285 something like that right so yeah I think I felt because your frame you should be 205 yeah he knew it you know, 285, something like that. So, yeah, I think. And he felt because of your frame, you should be 205.

Yeah, he knew it. Like, I was only three months in, right? I'd only been training for three months. And I'm like, yeah, I want to do it. He's like, you've been training three months. Right. You know, like, for one, you're out of shape. Two, like, you don't really know shit.

Right. You know? So I think if little did he know that i was gonna like lose that weight in such a short amount of time but he probably would have he probably thought at least a year i think him saying lose 100 pounds was more like next year right right it's like saying a white belt you know like going into third week in jujitsu and they're like i want to compete right you know you're like okay give a little time give a little time yeah you know did did you change the way you ate yeah uh so i went from eating fast food and like sugar and stuff in boxes and all that to kind of just what I saw people in the gym eating,

chicken, rice, broccoli, steamed fish, you know, things like that, stuff I never even would like think twice about. And I kind of just saw what the people at the gym were eating and the fighters were bringing their meals to the gym and eating lunch right after training. I just kind of was just a product of like influence right i'm looking at these guys i'm okay he's eating chicken and rice and that guy's got a bunch of broccoli so that's what i would go shop for and then i so that i could kind of feel like i fit in

and then i you know cook at home my brother and i'd cook eggs and chicken and broccoli and bring it to the gym so we can eat with the guys and kind of eat the same stuff because we'd never been in an MMA gym before. We never knew the culture. You know, my brother played like high school football and basketball where afterward they'd go to 7-Eleven and get like hot Cheetos and put cheese in it and like drink soda. You know, like that's where we come from. That's what we did. So yeah, like I think being in the environment of an mma gym just kind of started teaching us how to eat so we started just eating more

whole foods right real stuff did you you feel the change in your body from that yeah that's where that's where like the bloating in my stomach started to like go down and energy levels started to increase um i that's where i picked up my addiction to coffee i would actually brew i'd brew black coffee and um i'd put the whole thing in the fridge the next day and then the next day in the morning i'd pick it up and just chug it straight out of out of the oh of the coffee container thing. And I'd be like hyped. And then I'd go running and then come back.

And then that became kind of like my new addiction. I couldn't smoke cigarettes. So I'm like, I've got to find some coffee. And I'm like, whoa, jump rope, put on music, that whole thing. So, yeah, it did a huge turnaround for me man like and so how long did you stay at uh vanderlake's gym uh i'd say like two years two or three years yeah all the way up until i transferred over to black house mma and so when you were uh at vanderlake's gym and you're training uh you said about a year in you had your first fight yeah

and was that a local smoker in Vegas? It was Tough Enough so Tough Enough put on good shows great shows there amateur shows that were selling out the Sam Boyd Stadium where we got to fight in front of thousands of people as amateurs

no shin guards no California camo rules the only thing we couldn't do was knee to the head and throw elbows. But everything else was full on. The only thing is the rounds were two minutes instead of five. How many amateur fights did you have? I had seven. I think I went six and one.

And I had the 205 title and the middleweight title because I went down to 185. How was that? Oh, look at that, dude. That's crazy. Oh, wow. That's post-nose job Vanderlei, too. Oh, shit. That's Vanderlei after he got his face fixed.

Yeah. Were you there when he had that done? I think it was right after. Look how young you look, dude. Oh, man. You're fresh-faced. Look at you with your title. Wow.

Yeah, when he got his face fixed, it was so bizarre. He showed up at the UFC one day, and we're all like, who is that? Yeah. And we're like, oh, my God, that's Vanderlap. Like, it looked like a totally different human. Like, he got a new nose, and his nose was bigger. It's like they made him a bigger nose. Yeah, because before it was like smashed shit, right?

Yeah, it was completely flat. He had this kind of like primal, like, yeah, it looked cool. I thought it looked cool. Caveman, yeah. Yeah, caveman. He couldn't breathe out of his nose. His nose was completely useless. It was flattened.

That's how I am. I'm getting there. Is it? Yeah. It sucks. It sucks. Yeah, it sucks. Yeah.

I had mine done. It's nice. Was it like a septoplasty or something like that? Deviated septum surgery. I forget what they call it. This one looked. Yeah, I had the exact same thing. Exact same thing.

Exact same nostrils. Yeah. I had my right nostril. Well, maybe it was the other one. I think my left one was one quarter of it was open, and the right one was completely useless. Yeah. Yeah. That's how I am right now. I can't wait to get it fixed.

Wow. So nice. But Vandele, they took a piece of his cartilage from his rib, and they made him a new nose. Wow. Yeah, they cut a chunk of cartilage out, like a little thing, and shoved it in there and stitched it in place and completely changed his nose and then they did some work on his scar tissue and pulled his face back but the end result was like he's a different guy we were all kind of freaked out about it like he looks so weird yeah he's like a different human yeah his face was more like yeah yeah it looked like more like

pulled back almost they did plastic surgery i mean mean, it was for fighting, but it was, you know, they removed some of the scar tissue around his eyes and tightened it up because you would breathe on him and he would cut. Yeah. Those guys like the Nate Diaz's, those kind of guys who's been around a long time, they have all that scar tissue around their eyes and they get that heavy lid look. That's a very specific to fighting look. Yeah, you got to stay away from all that shit, man. Yeah, well, you've managed to very specific to fighting look yeah I gotta stay away from all

that shit man yeah well you've managed to avoid it you look beautiful you got no problems at all with that in that department yeah I just got a modeling contract you know did you yeah dude yeah look at you out of nowhere I was like wow cool so you got a lot of things going on outside of fighting yeah so back then so you uh you went some amateur fights and what was, what organization was your first pro fight in? I want to ask you about 85. So you'd made it all the way down to 85. I made it down to 85.

Yeah. What was that like? Uh, hell. What do you walk around at right now? Oh, right now? Two 30. Two 30. Yeah.

How many guys at 85 are that big? Like Yoel Romero's that big. He's probably that big. Probably Paul Acosta, right? Yeah. He's big. Yeah. But at the time too, I was only like 21, 22. 85 or that big like yo el romero's that big is it probably that big probably paula costa right yeah he's big yeah but at the time too i was only like 21 22 like i would never be able to do that now never and i was only cutting from i would at the time i was walking around at maybe like 218 my body wouldn't go above 218 um so I'd cut to 85 from 200 on the dot. I knew that if I was 200, then I can make 85.

It was painful, man. It was hell. I hated it. Did you do it with like a Mike Dolce type guy or a Lockhart type guy? No, I did it the worst way possible. I thought I knew what I was doing. I was listening to idiots. Like not even nutrition.

I was listening to other fighters. Oh even nutrition. I was listening to other fighters, like other amateur, like idiot fighters. I was eating literally Joe, I was eating like spinach and nuts. That's it. Yeah. Oh, so you just starved yourself, starved myself. And I'd eat like half a can of tuna and like, you know, just like really dumb shit. No seasoning, tuna and like you know just like really dumb shit no seasoning not really nourishing my body at all right um yeah i think my first professional fight was at 85 my first fight out in rfa i didn't start fighting 205 until the ultimate fighter wow yeah and so your first professional fight you were eating that way like nuts and spinach and just barely feeding yourself yeah barely feeding myself Barely feeding yourself?

Yeah, barely feeding myself. Yeah. I did not get to 205. I didn't fight at 205 until Ultimate Fighter. Wow. Yeah. And how much relief was it to fight at 205? Well, it was cool because on the Ultimate Fighter, I was like, well, I usually fight at 85. So, like, I'm going to eat steaks every day and lobster.

And, you know, we were just, like, eating. And then I got knocked out of the competition a bit early. So then I was just, like, just grubbing and i was like wow this is really nice life and and then uh when it came time to fight i only had to cut a little bit of weight like you know like five pounds or something like that that's not bad at all but until you fight a guy who's cutting a shitload of weight and he's a good wrestler. Yeah. Those are the guys. Yeah. But now, like, I think just with age and everything, to get to 205 now, it's not hard, but it ain't easy.

You know what I mean? Like, any weight cut is not easy. But you got to do it right. Yeah, and I can get there consistently every time and do you adjust your diet um like at the beginning of the camp or do you wait until the very end when you know you're gonna cut the weight like how do you do it i keep a pretty consistent diet just like in life and in training camp i there was a time a couple years like while i was in thailand and a little bit after that i tried um, I tried to do a vegan thing and like, that was just causing for me like some gut inflammation because I was eating like the beyond me and all that stuff. And I was just like, ugh, so that wasn't good for me. And

then I actually, energy levels feel, energy levels felt great. Yeah. Yeah. Energy levels felt great. Um, but it was just, uh, no matter what, I just wasn't't like I felt like inflammation in my gut I didn't know what it was coming from until like my coach started telling me like a lot of the like beans and plants and stuff that I was eating contained lectins which are like almost like toxins that plants and beans and stuff can release as like a defense mechanism so if i'm eating them uh it's not too good but um i went from that to pretty much like a carnivore type keto you know diet where um like my last training camp my my daily meal would be I'd probably eat within a day like four burger patties. Yeah, four burger patties, eggs, steak, elk, like just primarily like meat and fats.

You fought like a predator. Yeah. and fats you fought like a predator yeah and then uh at night i would have i would have a bowl of oatmeal just for like you know for my brain did you eat any fruit um yeah i love blueberries i'd snack on blueberries um but i'm not really like a fruit guy anyway so i like fruit before i work out but uh that's basically how i eat now i eat mostly meat and i eat fruit like i like fruit before I work out, but that's basically how I eat now. I eat mostly meat, and I eat fruit. I like fruit before I train. It seems to – when I was doing – trying to do strict carnivore,

what I would notice is when I would work out really hard, I just didn't have that extra gear. I would fade off. And then when I added fruit to my diet, I changed that. and then when I added fruit to my diet I changed that. I think some, I subscribe to Paul Saladino's way of doing it. He's the carnivore MD guy and he essentially says if you look at the most cherished foods by hunters and gatherers, number one is meat and number two is fruit and honey and raw dairy.

And he believes that to thrive, to have your body operate optimally, that those are the foods that your body is most comfortable with. I think it varies, you know, because Jake Shields doesn't have any problem when he eats vegetarian. He just has eggs for protein and occasionally some other things. But most of what he eats is vegetable-based, and he seems fine. I think, but everybody's body is different. Yeah, man. You know, it's just, that's why it's hard to say what's the right diet for a certain person. You know what I mean? But like what, what helped me was that like, yeah, I just, I never was like, Oh, I only eat keto or I only eat a carnivore, carnivore. Like, man, I just know that like, I want to eat a lot and i'm gonna eat a lot of protein

and like if i like cheese i'm gonna throw some cheese it's like some raw cheese on my burger right and you know will you um do you work with the pi do they uh help you at all if i ask them for any help they will but i just I just, I don't know, man. I try to do my best to just kind of do things. Because they'll meal plan for you and everything, right? Yeah, they'll do all of that. That's an amazing resource. The UFC is putting together the Performance Institute. I think it's a huge resource for fighters.

I mean, when I went there, I was really impressed. I was like, this is a lot that they did to put this place together. Yeah, it's beautiful. I mean, yeah, they do anything and everything to help us. I don't know. I think I just try to – I'm just very stubborn, and I try to just – I try to – I think I have this, like, this thing that, like, it just makes me cooler if i do things my own way

you know like i'm just an idiot like that in some areas of life but um i definitely love the pi for everything that they've done for me every time i go in there they treat me great and like if i need food if i need any advice at the drop of a hat they're you know they're they have usada approved supplements there too right so you know everything's third party tested you don't have to worry about contamination yeah that because that is such a fucked up issue supplement contamination it's real you know i know a lot of people think that people are using that as an excuse to do steroids like oh there's just my supplements were tainted no a lot of fucking supplements have bullshit in them yeah i know that for a fact because at on it when we started putting together um alpha brain and we were what we would do is we'd have a third party that would mix all of our nutrients for us we would test it

independently and we'd find stuff in there that's not supposed to be in there yeah it wasn't steroids but there would be like certain vitamins that were supposed to be in there like why does this come from it comes because they mix it at the same vats that they would mix like some other stuff in. Yeah. And that's what they do. A lot of the stuff, like people were buying creatine from China. Well, you're getting the same lab that's putting that together. It might also be making steroids. Yeah. So you can get tainted creatine or tainted supplements. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it makes total sense to me. And I think I definitely make sure that any subs that I take are, they have that, like, stamp of approval on it. I take some from the PI, but I take another one.

What do you take? You really want to know? No, I like, no, I use a company called X Endurance, Extreme Endurance. They sponsor and, like, work with a lot of CrossFit athletes, but I love every single product that they make. Yeah? What kind of stuff? So, damn, I'm giving you my secrets.

I hope no one's listening to this. Do you have real secrets? I mean, I feel like it's a secret. What's the secret? Do you take beta alanine? Not really. I don't like the tingly. The tingly is a sign it's working, though. I don't like the tingly the tingly is a sign it's working i don't like it's good for you um now they have a product um called fuel five um it's just like

any other um like carbohydrate drink that you would drink like pre-workout pre or uh during or intro workout um they have hydration supplements they have uh lactic uh lactic acid buffers um they have like focused stuff like nootropic nootropic nootropic and nootropics um but i like when i look at their ingredients i just like what i see and i like how things taste and at their ingredients, I just like what I see. And I like how things taste. And I like how it makes me, like, feel. I feel clean. Although I'm taking supplements, I feel clean, you know, if that makes any sense.

It does make sense, yeah. Like when I'm sweating, when I'm working out, I just, like, I feel, like, this energy, like, in my body. Your body is fortified. Yeah, I feel great. I feel clear here. I feel like I don't have any toxins in my body I'm like body's for the fire yeah I feel great I feel clear here I feel like I don't have any toxins in my body you know so I just I take you know their stack and it works for me every time what's name the company again X endurance X and or yeah extreme endurance but I think it's just like X X endurance so when you first started fighting professionally were you

supplementing were you doing any strength and conditioning training? Or were you just MMA training? I was just kind of doing a mix of everything, man. Like I didn't really know what I was doing. I was always that guy that like, hey, I'm just here. Right. And some coach would be like, I'm going to take you to the next level. You know, that fucking saying that every coach has.

Like I'm going to take you to the next level. I'm like, all right, what are we doing? And he's like, you're going to take this supplement, and you're going to work. So I've kind of done everything. I was training MMA. I've trained jiu-jitsu. I've trained just strictly boxing.

I've done it all, I feel like. And now I'm just at a point where, like, I'm back at syndicate MMA with John Wood I love John yeah he's a great guy good guy great gym too great gym there's been a good good amount of people coming through there like the traffic's been nice uh great training partners the environment of the gym is like let's work together like let's not kill each other um and it's been cool man and like that was the old system that I had going on before I'd start traveling. So I'm back home.

I'm back in Vegas for training camp. Got my old coach, old coaches. And let's see what happens for me. Do you have a fight set up next? Nah, but they called me and asked me if I'd wanted to fight in July. But I want to fight more, like, around August. I feel like I'm up to a lot right now. And I know that, like, I'm not, like, putting off fighting.

But I want to make sure that I'm, you know, that I got some stuff done. So that when, like, after the fight, I have something to come back to, you know? I see what you're saying. So, like, yeah, I'm still in it. I'm not, like, running away from it. But I think August would be a good time for me to fight. I like your approach. I like what you're doing because you're thinking about the future.

You're thinking about life. But then you're also recognizing that when it comes down to training camp, you're all in. Yeah. Yeah. 100% Well, I mean, the results speak wonders because it speaks volumes. If you look at the Roberson fight, man, you look like a fucking machine. Sick.

Thank you. You're on it, right? Whatever you're doing, it's a good thing. I just can't believe that you're not strike training. It's like I have a hard time imagining because you're so striking oriented. It seems like there's a lot of good gyms in new york city are there yeah i'm sure striking gyms has to be please send me recommendations i mean um isn't the watt still in new york city is he still open closed down

in the pandemic god damn where's he at now at home Fuck I talked to Nurse a little bit Oh god We were gonna set up something But like I don't wanna be like Phil Nurse is a great coach Yeah Great guy

Um Fuck Really he went under? Yeah So many gyms went under man So many gyms in LA went under Yeah It's horrific

And the guys who didn't go under They had to like sneak people in the back door They were worried about health departments showing up. Exactly. We had a health department show up at our podcast studio in LA. Yeah, it's ridiculous. Yeah. It's like, shouldn't you guys be out there dealing with sick people?

We test everybody here, man. Get the fuck out of here. Seriously. It was just such an intrusion in privacy. And all of a sudden, government was like stepping into the most healthy thing you could fucking do go to the gym and they're closing down gyms during a time where you know you're worried about health it was bonkers yeah nothing nothing made sense but there's got to be a good muay thai gym i feel like i want to find you one i would love that

we'll find you i would love that yeah i just can't imagine that it's smart to not. I mean, you obviously have an amazing striking base, but I just can't imagine that just doing jiu-jitsu and then just getting it back polished up. Sure, you're at such a high level that when you polish it up, it's going to be ready to go. But would it be at the same level that it would if you were consistently training?

I don't know. Who knows? Who knows? I mean, you don't even have to spar. Just pads with someone who's good, you know, someone who's going to, like, run you through drills. Yeah. I mean, that would be helpful.

I'd really like that. Yeah. I'd love that. All right. We put it out there in the universe. Yeah. We'll find you, Jim. Come find us.

I guarantee you there's a place out there. So your first professional fight was with what organization? RFA. Ah, nice. That's now LFA. Right, right. It's Soares. Love it.

Yeah, I was at Black House. I went out there to train. Oh, okay. I was working for Scotty, OTM. Okay, great. Love Scotty, too. Yeah, shout out Scotty. So I was working for Scotty in Vegas at OTM, and then he's like, hey, dude, the numbers in the store look great. Love Scotty, too. Yeah, shout out Scotty. So I was working for Scotty in Vegas at OTM, and then he's like,

hey, dude, the numbers in the store look great. Do you mind coming out to California to do the same thing? And I'm like, yeah, but I don't know where I'm going to live, where I'm going to train. He's like, man, you can crash on my couch, whatever. Scotty's a very welcoming guy. So Scotty hooked me up at OTM, and he hooked me up at Black House. And then once I got to Black House, they saw some potential,

and Ed's like, yeah, man, we'll find you a fight. We'll get you a fight. So Ed got me a fight in the RFA. And then, yeah, it was. Is he still managing people? I'm not sure. Yeah, I don't know. I think so.

And Jorge manages people as well, right, Linares? Joinha. Yeah? Yeah, I think so And Jorge manages people as well right Linares Yeah I think so And then they have They have like a full program over there right Like their whole thing in terms of Strength and conditioning Muay Thai

Wrestling Kenny Johnson Yeah man they have They have a great system Muay Thai, wrestling. Muay Thai, wrestling. Kenny Johnson. Yeah. He's been with them forever. Yeah, man. They have a great, great system. Tough guys. In the days that I was training at Black House, I'm sure they still have it. What made you migrate from there?

From Black House? Yeah. So at the time, I was only making like $1,000 to $2,000 per fight in the RFA, and I wasn't fighting a lot. And I was like, man, I don't know if I want to do this shit. Like I'm training hard. I'm living in California now. Like I'm paying $1,000 per month for somebody's room in their house, you know? Wow.

Yeah, I was living at Jessica Penney's. Like she had a guest bedroom downstairs, and I was like, yeah, can I live here here she's like yeah you know i think it was like 900 bucks for us to make rent so i was like okay i'm over this and so i went back to vegas and i started working construction and then construction i was bringing in a thousand bucks a week and i was like what the hell like i'm not gonna fight anymore like i'm gonna do construction man right and then that's when um uh i came i came in contact with john wood and in an mma fight he's like what's up man he's still training i'm like hell no i'm not training i'm doing construction man like i was so proud to be doing construction because of how much money i was making and he was like i don't know man you should come and hit some

pads with me he's like i know we never worked together but like i think you should come and hit some pads with me. He's like, I know we never worked together, but I think you should come train at Syndicate. And I was like, nah. He's like, please, just one session. Just come train with me one time. And I did. And I was like, yeah, I think I'm going to. So John Wood is responsible for the resurrection. Yeah.

The first one, yeah. The first one. There's been a couple. Have there really? Yeah, I mean, there was that one. And then the second one was the one from Thailand, right? Where, like, I thought that I was just done, and I wasn't going to fight anymore.

So how did you get to Thailand? This is what I'm trying to get to. Johnny Walker knocked me out in Argentina using the Muay Thai clinch. Right, that elbow. And he elbowed me, and first time I'd ever been knocked out. And then reviewing the tape, I realized, I realized that that's what it was. He clinched me and elbowed the shit out of me. So a week or two after that, I was on a flight to Thailand

to go learn how to clinch. Really? Yeah. You didn't think that you could find that kind of training in Vegas? Absolutely not. I don't think that you can find that type of training anywhere in America, if I'm being honest. Really?

Well, now probably. Some spots you'd have to go. Some spots you'd really have to search. But, yeah, at that time, people in America teach the clinch one way. You grab the back of the head, and you pull him down, and you knee him. And I was like, no, there's got to be more of that so i went there to learn it and i found out like yeah this is a whole another sport and where did you go which gym it's called pet yin di that would be pronounced in english like pet pet yin di but in thai pet yin di and they are the they have the most like active champions in thailand right now and this is

in bangkok in bangkok thailand um the the family that runs pet indy uh the father of of the family was one of the first promoters of rajadamnern Stadium, which is like Lumpini Stadium, right? One of the biggest ones. And now his son, Boat, is now the main promoter. So their family has a long lineage of title. You know Sagat? Sagat Panyindi from Street Fighter 2. He was one of CNL, who is the boss boss his name is cn now um one of his

fighters like sagat fought under pet yanni back in the day um so it just comes from that like lineage of just like champions and like legends so this is like 2017 2017 i think the end of 2017 or the end of 2018 yeah the end of 2018 because then I was there wait because you didn't you fight Eric Anders in 18 I think so yeah and that was after you'd gone to Thailand yeah that was after because it was a giant difference yeah I'd already been there because I remember me and Daniel Cormier were going crazy during your fight. We were like, holy shit. Yeah, I came out full tie. Yeah.

Yeah, that's all I was really doing. But it wasn't just that you came out full tie. It was the fucking kicks, man. Holy shit. Eric Anders is one of the toughest motherfuckers that's ever walked the face of the earth. On the planet. That guy just ate those kicks like they were popcorn shout out Anders it was crazy how tough that guy is

didn't flinch didn't shy away from it didn't even make a face bro he's so tough because I know that shit hurt like hell he just dealt with it yeah

he just dealt with it he's a beast man he's got the best nickname ever ya boy I love seeing Bruce Bumper say it Yeah. He just dealt with it. He's a beast, man. He's got the best nickname ever. Ya boy. I love seeing Bruce Buffer say it. Yeah, when Bruce Buffer has to say it. Eric, ya boy. But that fight marked a real turning point for you.

You changed the way you were fighting. You became one of the spookiest strikers was that before after you knocked out gokan sake after gokan was was was gokan after thailand before it was before thailand yeah so it was gokan johnny walker was johnny walker after gokan yeah and and then and then you go to thailand so when you went to thailand was your initial idea to go there to just uh train for a little while yeah one month i'd only plan to go there for one month like the ticket that i bought was for one month and i only paid for like one month of membership at pet dnd and after being there man i'm like nah like i keep like i need to stay here forever yeah i really

wanted to like stay there forever i start like just from the everything the the people the food the culture i love the muay thai yeah i love thai food you know just the way the way of life just walking catching taxis like almost like new y but just, like, on a whole different, like, everyone's happy instead of everybody getting pissed off. How is everybody so happy over there? I don't know, man, but everybody is. And it's, like, the smiles everywhere and, like, good energy and welcoming. They call it, like, the land of smiles.

The land of smiles. And the language to me was so beautiful that I just, like, had to start learning it. And so, like, I'd never. Can you speak Thai now? Ninh Ngoi. Ninh Ngoi. Ninh Ngoi. Which means like a little bit.

Yeah. Enough to where like I could live there and take my taxis and order my food and, you know, introduce myself. Can you read it? No. Do you know what it's saying? That's the hardest part is the reading. But, yeah, I was able to like live there on my own for like almost three years. Wow.

like live there on my own for like almost three years wow um and so like i picked up enough to where like i could live day to day and take my taxis and like i said order my food you were telling me once that the way they throw kicks is different in that they're like more relaxed as they're throwing the kicks like what in what way what do you mean by that so if you ever see the thai stance and you see them fighting like they look like it looks like they're like marching. Right. And they're just like you. It's more like a quick fire. So like instead of being like like hunkered down and ready to defend and then your whole body's engaged. bodies engage it's right it's more of like um imagine if i tell you like as soon as your foot hits the ground you have to lift it up and throw full force from there so like if that front leg is bouncing if that soon as it touches you have to whip it right up so your leg has to be relaxed

in order to do that if it's too firm it's going to be readable. Like, you know, your opponent will be able to read it and it won't have the same effect. So, yeah, mostly everything comes from a relaxed position. I cannot wait to the day like that I can just train with you and like kind of show you what I mean versus like try to explain it to you. Yeah, I would love that. Because it's very like I can explain it while you're trying it. that way you'd be like ah now i get it i understand what you mean they also throw kicks with a straighter leg than some other styles do with a straighter leg in which way like and on like even as they're whipping it across it's almost like a baseball bat as opposed to like it's chambered and then extends at the end because a lot of the uh a lot of the power and everything is from the hip like your hip has

it not it has to turn over you know a lot of people that throw kicks uh especially a roundhouse kick you'll see like the shoulders are still like ain't like angled this way right instead of when you throw the kick like you right body should be fully this way right right so in order to like it's it's because of the the force of the body and your leg kind of like it'll bend and then straighten out um yeah and it's it's full shin like you know imagine like you're trying to kick someone with like you're the full shin you want the whole shin to hit right arms and and attack not like your foot or your ankle because that hurts but if you kick someone with you know just the shin it's different and it looks different and so when you first went over there and you start you was like an was it an immediate

revelation that this is what you needed um yeah yeah because the first day that i ever trained uh i couldn't sleep i remember i got there pretty late at night so i couldn't sleep and i went to go train the next day and everyone was like really intrigued by my size because they'd never really seen anybody my size and then the some of the trainers put me into clinch with these guys who are no more than 145 pounds and they threw me around like a rag doll wow yeah guys pretty much half my size could throw me could trip me could sweep me could lock me to where i couldn't pick them up or break the lock and i was like this is exactly why i came here wow to learn this is pet yandi are they known for clinch because like there's camps that are known for like various specific things pet yandi are they known for clinch because like there's camps that are known for like

various specific things pet yandi is they have great clinchers they have great clinchers um it's not like they're not necessarily known for their clinch i think they're just nest they're known for having the fighters with the most heart and like and having very like skillful skillful fighters but there's a guy named uh pet dam who he fights in one championship but like he's known for his left kick and pet morikot it's from pet yundi but he's also known for his knees and uh long cow he's known for his clinch he's got an unbreakable lock that he taught me that is like ridiculous so all of them kind of have their own thing prow prow is known for like this guy you gotta kill him he's almost unbeatable like he's just this crazy guy where you know it's the fifth

round he's covered in blood but he's just like he doesn't go down you know so all the fighters uh sabas michael he's a pet indie fighter and he's from cyprus um one of Savas Michael, he's a Petty Indy fighter, and he's from Cyprus, one of my best friends, and he's just very technical. So they all have their own styles, but Petty Indy is just known for kind of buying and grooming the best of the best. They're very prideful. They want to have world champion fighters.

How happy were they when you went on and fought anders and just showed that thai style dude they were so happy yeah when i went back to my room in the gym like they it's it's hard to impress the big boss right like he likes to keep a straight like straight face straight demeanor but he was very happy very proud well you impressed the fuck out of us that was in my opinion like the biggest leap that i saw anybody ever make in terms of like you were always a very good fighter you know when you knocked out go kansaki i was super impressed with that you're always a very good fighter but then you see that you're like holy shit this guy's a fucking contender it was like this switch had

been hit and i mean i had to talk to you I was like yeah what are you doing because whenever I see someone doing something that's radical improvement I always I want to get that down I want to I want to talk to you I want to like go I want everybody to know like what are you doing because you did something I was doing Muay Thai real like the real way you know and and using the real system and my dream is to also able to, like, earn enough funds to where I can fly my Thai trainer here and do what I was doing there here. Right. So that I don't have to worry about finding a gym in New York City. You know?

Right, right. Because no one's going to teach me what I learned there here unless I bring over someone, you know? Right. And, like, what that's going to take from me is, like, funds. When you were training in Thailand did you get any wrestling in uh yeah Tiger so I would go to Tiger Muay Thai which was like a 45 minute flight down to from Bangkok to Phuket and that's where I met the Hickman brothers and that's where I'd get my wrestling in with them so you had to fly to get your wrestling in

yeah but when would you do that um I'd say like mostly when ufc would call me so just like how i do now ufc calls me hey you got a fight or what do you want to fight in two months and i say yeah and i would fly to phuket and i would just stay by tiger muay thai or find like a hotel or something there and i would just train with the hickman brothers where i could still get muay thai and wrestling there at Tiger Muay Thai. Right. But now they have Bang Tao MMA, which looks so sick. Their gym.

Their new gym. Yeah, Volkanovski is just up there, like, teaching and training and stuff. Like, the Hickman Brothers, they used to train and coach Tiger Muay Thai, but now they've opened up, like, their own gym at the north side of Phuket. What's it called again? Bang Tao. Bang again? Bang Tao. Bang Tao? Bang Tao MMA.

Yeah, so they've got real Thai trainers. Them two are great wrestling coaches and wrestlers themselves. And now they've got a bunch of people now coming in and checking out the gym and facility. Their grand opening was, from what i saw a success and i can't wait to go back there that's dope well it's it's such an interesting place for guys to go and train and so many people fall in love with the country and and wind up staying there you know mike's wick yeah went over there and just stayed yeah it's very simple life for a fighter yeah you

know you don't have to really worry about anything other than waking up and going to train and whenever you're not training then you can go and relax by the beach or like yeah you know just hop on a motorcycle and go well what's attractive to me is the nice people that's one of the reasons why i moved to austin i like when people are nice it's like it makes your day it makes your day better when i was in thailand like everyone's so nice yeah man it's like it's it's fascinating to me that a place that's known for its incredibly brutal and effective fighting style is filled with the nicest people yeah do you know how they like what it's like before they fight what do you mean like the fighters do you know what that looks like so in a muay thai stadium

the locker room is about the size of this. And all of the fighters that are even fighting against each other are all in the same room. And they're all getting like, you know, massages like with Thai oil and stuff. But then right before you walk out, you sit on a bench and you're just like sitting next to the guy that you're about to fight. And most of the time the guys are just talking, like shooting the shit about life about like something that has nothing to do with fighting they're just like oh yeah did you see that yeah yeah i saw it and then like they're and then they go and they fight and there's no even the fighting itself and the the the spirit of of muay thai is it's it's beautiful man like it's it's crazy like it's not as violent as it is it's so non-violent

you know like when they go in there and fight there's so much respect before a little bit during and after that it's it's it blew my mind it blew my mind and they're they're that's why like all i wanted to do was just learn and study it and be around it because i've never seen a martial art like that ever yeah it's very unusual it's certainly very unusual and it's it's also very unusual that it's so damn effective and if you think about the history of martial arts and you think about the history of kicking martial arts there's so many different countries that developed their own specific kicking styles but they were the ones who figured out how to kick the legs correctly they were the ones who figured out how to fight in the clinch correctly they're the ones who figured out elbows better than anybody they

figured out knees better than anybody yeah it's really kind of amazing yeah i agree and i think that it's it's really cool to that like they have this pride of it and it's it's like a a national like staple or religion like you know it's like it's it's it's honored by almost everybody do you think that that that gambling has anything to do with the effectiveness of it that they'd been gambling early on and for sure yeah because there's there's people that like they make a living off of the gambling right and they're passionate about the gambling and And, I mean, yeah, like anything in life, there can be some bad, you know, like some bad parts to it. But from someone who's coming from an outside perspective

and seeing the type of life that it's providing for these people, I think that the gambling's a good thing. And it also adds the excitement to the matches. Is there any fixed fights over there? Because that's a problem it's hard to say right it's hard to say i know that like some people do get pissed off as far as like the gamblers being able to have the ability to sway the judges um so do they yeah because their their gambling system is very different um it's not just like um like you's going to win and who's going to lose. It's like live betting almost.

Right. And it's like a lot of hand signals and shit. So they're betting with each other? They're betting with each other in the crowd. So like the whole crowd, there's one guy who's got the money. He's usually the guy who's got the pouch. And then he's got guys who are eyes on the crowd and then you see people like throwing like like this means something and like this means something

and so he'll look do you know what it means it's like like this is like three to one like three to one odds and if it's your left hand or your right hand it's like red or blue corner oh jesus christ like three to one so it's like it's like this or like this means something. And so they do like hand signals. Oh, wow. And then whoever is like taking the bets is like you make eye contact and you know that this is the guy that you made the bet with. That's it? Yeah.

And so you got one like. So if he says three to one, like three to one, like what about the number? They do another hand signal. For the number. For the number. For the number. Wow. Right? And then, yeah, so the whole crowd is like there's guys who are there who are placing the bets. And everyone's placing bets with each other.

And that's how they kind of collect their money. But if there's a specific fighter, then they'll make a louder noise. Like people are like, hey like you always hear that it's the guy that right that's every time you score so sometimes they'll make the noise like or they won't make the noise right so a guy can land a clean kick but they'll be like they won't say anything because they're not betting on them because they're not betting on that guy so then they're able to sway the judges or like a punch won't land. Did you see during the Tyson Fury fight with Dillian White that the judges were wearing noise canceling headphones? I mean, what, 94,000 people or something like that?

Yeah. But in that wild, I think that's a great idea. Yeah. Because you can just see. The only thing that I don't like about that is I'd like them to hear the impact of certain shots. Yeah. Because you can just see. The only thing that I don't like about that is I'd like them to hear the impact of certain shots. Yeah, but does the impact of the shot really make it score higher? No, but I mean sometimes you hear the impact of a shot and you realize how effective it is. I mean if you're dealing with significant blows, you can kind of tell,

I mean, if you're dealing with significant blows, you can kind of tell, but sometimes you can tell plus the impact sound adds to your understanding of what kind of force was involved in that strike. Do you think that they were wearing the headphones for the noise reasons or for the focus? I think they were alluding to the fact, if I remember correctly in the broadcast, they were alluding to the fact they were doing it because of focus. Okay. And they were saying, I think that's good so that people aren't swayed by the way the crowd is cheering. Got it. You know, so they could just look at the technical aspects of the engagements. Hmm.

Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, sometimes I guess it is a little bit better to like watch a fight without the commentators or yeah You know and you just you're seeing it for what it is. I would like fight Fight judges to have the same setup that I have when I'm doing commentary though When you know DC and John Anik and I are doing commentary we have all these monitors Yeah, so there's sometimes when shits going down. I can't see it right right in front of me I prefer to look right through the cage, but sometimes I have to look at the screen and I don't think they have that option, unfortunately. No, they're just staring right, right into the cage. No matter what angle you have, right? It's not good enough. It's not good enough because then you miss certain things. You miss certain impacts, like the way people, I would like for them to be able to call for replays too.

Yeah, that'd be great. Yeah. Like if they had like a specific person in the truck that was just for the referees or just for the judges rather so they could say hey um show me that again so you could see like whether a punch impacted or whether it caught an elbow yeah i still don't understand how they're scoring these things um i know they say that it's like you know strikes landed cage control stuff like that but I don't really see that being the way that they're scoring these fights. It's certainly subjective. You know, people that are wrestling heavy prefer wrestling.

People that are striking heavy prefer striking. I mean, I don't know how they call, like, near catches when it comes to submissions. Like, how do you decide? It's very subjective. Yeah, very. Yeah, it's a tricky game you know like here's a good example right Brian Ortega versus Volkanovsky remember that

one round where Ortega almost got him in a mounted guillotine and then almost got him in a triangle yeah but Volkanovsky got out and beat the fuck out of him like, how do you score that? I mean, it's hard. Hard to score that, right? Yeah. Because if you look at it objectively, I mean, there was a moment in that fight where it was almost fucking over. When Ortega had that mounted guillotine and Volkanovski's face turned purple. Yeah, he had to fight for his life right there. Fight for his life.

And then he caught him in a triangle afterwards that. So it's like you got to give credit to Volkanovski for having the heart to gut through it, for having the technique to get out of that position, and then for smashing him afterwards. But is the smashing him afterwards more valuable than those two almost submissions? I don't know. It's tricky. I think Volkanovski, if I want to look at the judges' scorecards, I would assume, rightfully so, he won those rounds. Because he did get out, he did land those shots, and it was super impressive.

And at the end of the fight, he's beating the fuck out of, at the end of the round, rather, he's beating the fuck out of Ortega. And, you know, looking at it as each round in its entirety, he was imposing his will more. And at the end, he was dominating. But, boy, you know, look at like a boxing fight. If a guy clips you and drops you, that's a 10-8 round, right? Imposing his will more and at the end he was dominating but boy You know look at like a boxing fight if a guy clips you and drops you that's a 10-8 round, right? How's it not a 10-8 round if you're almost going to sleep? Hmm, it's tricky. Yeah, it's tricky because I do think Volkanovski should have won that round but I also think like it merits some debate because Fucking those two submissions are so I watched that fight again the other day did you yeah cuz uh

you know I was so impressed with Volkanovski's fight with zombie that I wanted to go back and watch his fight again with Ortega's Ortega and I watched both of them like that motherfucker is on fire yeah he's on fire yeah he's so good right now. He's great. He's in that conversation of top fighters on the planet. Yeah, Alex the Great, man. He's a motherfucker, dude.

And he's so driven, dude. Very. And that's what he talked about at the end of the fight. Like, it's his mind. He's like, it's drive. It's all about my drive to get better and succeed. I think that is a really good word that would, like, describe him. Right? If you can just, like, describe him in one word one word like what's this guy's fighting style like it's like

yeah he's driven driven driven but you know he's fucking he's technical too man his striking is super technical so many feints and setups and his ability to close the distance and move in and out it's very very smooth he's uh. Is Eugene in his corner too? Eugene is in his corner. Well, he's an Australian guy, right? Australian, yeah. He is with City Kickboxing in Australia, but I think he has different coaches on a day-to-day, but does train with them as well.

I think during the pandemic, though, he basically just trained in Australia. I don't even know if they're allowed to train. Australia had some of the worst lockdown ever. I mean, they went full authoritarian. Yeah, they did. They went crazy. Yeah, people were going nuts. I have some friends out there that were just completely over it

and just they were shutting down the whole entire areas off like one case. It was madness. I'm glad that everything seems to be lightening up a bit, though. Yeah. Yeah, but boy, that would make me move. I have a good buddy, man, that moved. He lived his whole life in Australia. He's like, fuck this country.

He moved. I mean, he's born and raised in Australia. He was driving people that way, right? Yeah. Well, he was like, you can't tell me what to do. Like, this is not what I signed up for. It's like, you can't inform. Like, particularly people that already had COVID, you know, when they were telling them they had as mandatory vaccination.

He's like, that doesn't even make sense. He's like, there's all these scientific studies that show that natural infection is superior. Recovering from natural infection in part superior antibodies. And, you know, and this is like he didn't have like a fake version of covid like you know not i don't say fake but um you know um non-symptomatic asymptomatic he had fucking covid yeah and he got over it and they're like you got to get vaccinated he's like fuck you i do like who are you telling me to this doesn't even make any sense this is not scientific like you could test me for antibodies you know know I had the disease. Nobody wanted to hear anything at a certain time.

It was just so much panic. So many things were rushed. So much money was spent on these vaccines and just so much. And so I think of course it made sense to, if you got the virus then chances are you don't need the vaccine not just chances are yeah but like let's say just from like a from like a conservative perspective i don't even i don't even know a word but like so let's say chances are if you got the virus you don't need the vaccine like i said things were so panicked. Yeah. And nobody was even willing to, like, do research in certain areas to try to prove it.

It was also super authoritarian. Yeah. Where they decided it was our way or the highway. We don't care. Do this. Our way. Highway. How did they deal with it in Thailand?

Dude, it was kind of cool, actually, at first. So we heard about it in December of 2019. So America hadn't even really like adopted the idea of COVID until March of 2020. Right. Yeah. So we heard about it 2019 and had already started prepping in January, my girl and I. So we started ordering like boxes of masks and like alcohol and all this stuff just to prepare yeah man like no shit no bullshit and um our house or like her house

in new york was stocked of of everything like just like cleaning supplies so then she came out she came back out to thailand with me and uh that's when thailand told us like hey guys you have about two weeks um we're gonna do a lockdown there's this pandemic happening it's starting to spread everywhere um so you have about two weeks to go to the grocery store and like get what you need to get but your area your your like neighborhoods are are going to be shut down indefinitely like we don't know when but we're just encouraging everybody to just lock down and stay put and at the time people were already wearing masks in thailand because of the pollution right pm 25 or pm 9.5 something like that it was like it's um there's a little particle that you

can breathe in that was causing defects in newborn children because of all the pollution and the barbecue stuff yeah just like yeah so masks were never like a problem, which was cool because we didn't have to hear about like just everyone was like, okay, cool, put on a mask, we'll go shopping, we'll stay home. We don't want to go to jail, you know, because Thai police are like, you either do this or you get fined or you go to jail. So for like the first month and a half, two months, we were isolated at home and we couldn't go outside.

There was a curfew of like four o'clock so in between like you know in the morning time and up until four o'clock we could at least drive to the grocery store but even then there was like a police barrier where they would like sign a piece like they sign you off like you got 30 minutes to go to the grocery into the grocery store and back so um what that did is because everybody was locked down and stationary they were able to see where the sick people were coming from in what areas so like they're like ah this place in the past month there hasn't been one report like one case reported but down here there's been six so let's open this place up and give them a boundary like you can't go past this we're gonna open you don't have to stay at home all day but you can at least go this far but then like everyone down here

because you have six cases we're gonna keep you locked down so they were finding where these cases were at and then letting other places open up slowly but surely until eventually it was like almost everybody was able to travel freely again through like phuket at least and then something how long ago was that this was in 2020 so like from i'd say from march 2020 all the way until july is when everything started like you could be kind of freely moving around. Yeah, freely moving as long as you had a mask. And the airport opened back up. Yeah, so people started sneaking over the border from Myanmar.

And they kind of lost track of where it was coming from then, you know, like it starts spreading again. They were like, how? Like we just, we just pretty much like had a look and like we had a, we had a grip on everything, like how, and they discover that it was from people crossing the border. And, um, so then they kind of like went into another lockdown, but, um, there was a huge, like political uproar going on at the same time in bangkok like the prime minister and stuff so it was it was a good time like i enjoyed being there for for the lockdown it didn't feel too bad were you allowed to train uh no we like the gyms weren't open but um we would train just like at home.

Like George, my coach at the time, I would hit pads with him. He had access to like his father-in-law's Muay Thai stadium, and we'd just go there and hit pads and have a group of like maybe three, four guys to come and train. So the gyms weren't open, but we had our own like personal team. And so eventually shit got too crazy as you were saying before, and you had to get out of there. Yeah. Because, um, as a foreigner, uh, they told us like, if you're a foreigner, you can stay here or you can leave. Like, but we're shutting down the airport. We don't know when we're going to open it back up.

We want to get this thing under control. So that caused a lot of the people to go back to their home country instead of to stay. So I was the guy who was like, I'm staying. So I went to the embassy and I got my stamps for extension, but because of just the embassy being tied up and the pandemic going crazy and other places, um, it was just hard to, to get through any phone lines, you know? So I needed to get an extension or I needed a certain piece of paper for my visa, you know, just for like that, those type of documents. And it was just almost impossible to get and so I started to get pretty like nervous and I didn't want to get like fined or banned from Thailand and banned entry you know the next time I want to come um so that's kind of what

what I was like fuck I just have to go home for a bit then did you ever think about going back now that everything's basically opened up again yeah I want to go back now my girl and i've actually been having dreams like i've had like reoccurring dreams the past month of like being there and i have a thai family you know and like she has a thai family too and we just we really miss it and we miss the essence of Thailand and the training. So we have a plan to go back soon. Fortunately, I've had enough to do, and I've been busy since the fight, and I'm grateful for that. But I do have to go back to training soon,

so I don't know if I'll be able to do it in this break. But it is my goal to be able to go there this year for sure. And if you go there are you gonna stay and do a camp there are you gonna no probably not just go there for recreation yeah i have a pretty good agreement now with like my coaches and stuff that like i'll stay here and like we'll we have something like we got a two fight win streak right now let's just yeah let's keep doing what we're doing we got some you know some stuff planned out so let's let's stick with it and see so i think this is a very good place for balance too because you do get that good wrestling there too yeah wrestling it's got a lot of cool like

outdoor stuff yeah you know yeah a lot of cool great places to run we run the mountain every weekend um yeah it's hot as hell in the winter in the summer but that's like it makes for better training like that Goggins mentality yeah you know it's actually good for you believe it or not yeah that's where you get those we're talking about with the sauna I mean um Emmanuel Stewart used to crank the heat up in the croc gym back in the day and it was hot as fuck in there that was a big part of his training strategy was the heat yeah he wanted people to be able to perform under that extreme heat and it made regular fighting easier yeah that's what my coach says man yeah you know in life it's like as if you look at yourself as a human and you're you're battling the elements

you know he's like it's you versus the elements at the end of the day. The elements strengthen you. They really do. Cold and heat, they have a giant factor on strengthening your immune system, keeping your body healthy, reducing inflammation. Yeah, man. It's just uncomfortable. Yeah.

But that's what's up. Well, listen, brother, thank you very much for coming in here again. And I really wanted to talk to you after your last fight because you were so emotional. I'm like, I know he's got a lot to get out. But I also want to talk to you because I know you can do a lot of other stuff. You're a multifaceted guy. And I really do hope you consider doing a podcast because I think it would be successful. I really do.

Thanks. I think it's been good. I didn't know specifically, you know, like have anything to specifically talk about, but I just wanted to come and catch up with you. And, yeah, it's been a while. It was great. It was fun. Yeah, man, it's been fun. I appreciate it.

And hopefully I'll be calling your fight in July or August. August, right? That's when you're hoping for it? Yeah, August would be nice. All right. Yeah. We'll find out soon who it is, right? Yeah.

All right. Well, please tell everybody how to get a hold of you on Instagram, social media, whatever social media you use. Social media, Instagram is at Khalil Roundtree. My name, K-H-A-L-L. I don't want to spell it, but if you can look it up, all of my handles are Khalil Roundtree. What else? Podcast coming soonree what else podcast coming soon podcast coming soon I plan to also be

I want to inform more people and get more people excited about Bitcoin and I want to thank the people who have been helping me out especially like Ledger people who are going to help me save my Bitcoin and keep it off you know off the internet so yeah thank you guys and follow me on any social media platforms

beautiful yeah all right all right thank you bye everybody Thank you.