The Joe Rogan Experience - JRE MMA Show #129 with Gordon Ryan & Mo Jassim

Episode Date: September 8, 2022

Joe is joined by Gordon Ryan, Gordon Ryan is a champion submission grappler, entrepreneur, and author. Look for his new book, "Young and Successful," on September 16, 2022. Mo Jassim is the Head Organizer of the ADCC World Championships.

Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out! The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day! Alright, what's happening? Not much. Good to see ya, good to see ya. Mo, introduce yourself. My name is Mo Jassim, I'm the head organizer of ADCC 2019.

And for people who don't know what ADCCCC is Abu Dhabi Combat Club when was that founded in 2000 1998 98 that was the first one yeah way back in the day that's pretty wild anything about like the UFC starting in 93 and that's where everybody really got excited about jiu-jitsu and then Abu Dhabi only five five years later yeah because I mean the I mean, the owner and creator... Pull his sucker right up your face. It moves around. You can grab it. Is that okay? Yeah, perfect. Hold on one second, sorry.

What's the matter? I'm not recording his mic on accident. Oh. Wrong one. Start again? No, it's good. Did you record it at all? No, not now.

But was he recorded before? I was just going through the wrong input. I have it on a different thing. I'll take care of it. Oh, okay, okay. All right, we're good. So 1998 it started. And why did they – no gi back then was very unpopular.

100%. It's sort of an interesting story how it started. So the owner and creator of ADCC is Sheikh Tahnoon, and he was going to college in the 90s in San Diego. UFC comes out in 1993. He gets hooked on it, and he just starts training, walks into a jiu-jitsu school in San Diego and starts training. He hides his identity. No one knows who he is, not even his instructor.

He just goes by the name of Ben. That's pretty gangster. Yeah, like literally no one knows who he is except a few people. So he graduates, I believe, in 1995, goes back, and then tells everybody who he actually really is. And, you know, he starts creating this rule set. And you're right, no gi back then was just pretty much non-existent. He went against the grain, and he did something interesting,

sort of like what the UFC did. The original UFCs, it wasn't mixed martial arts. It was art versus art, and that was the concept of ADCC. Judo guys versus jiu-jitsu guys versus um sambo etc etc so he created this rule set and in 1998 the the first adcc happened in abu dhabi it was really interesting because back in the day it was frowned upon to have no gi competitions like brazilian jujitsu guys wanted you to train and compete only in the gi yeah yeah did you you started in the gi right i started in the gi the first like two and a half years was only in the gi and then

i made a transition to nogi when what year did you make the transition so i started in 2011 so 2014 is when i really started to make the transition and then by like late 14 2015 then it was like pretty much all nogi because i didn't have any gi training partners. Eddie Cummings, Gary, like all the competitors at Henzo's, at least John's students, were all no-gi guys. Eddie Cummings, has he vanished? I have no idea what happened to him. I went to his Instagram the other day to see what he was up to. He posted like three years ago.

Yeah. Yeah, he stopped training with us. And then he was training for a while at Unity. And then I haven't talked to him. I don't even know if he's still training like he was he had a phd in physics um so i heard he like started teaching again he's got like a like a normal job now i've i have no idea um so maybe he's trained maybe he doesn't but he definitely doesn't compete anymore so so weird he was so talented he was he was he uh he went in and was crushing EBIs and had really good, tough ADCC matches. He had that super close match against Tanquino.

And then they just, like, after the EBI with Gio, where he lost to Gio, he just, like, we didn't see him anymore after that. Wow. Crazy. But, you know, it's such a wild sport, and it does so much damage to your body. You know, so many guys, I mean, everybody that I talk to years later, they're like, oh, I got two discs replaced in my neck. I got this going on. I got that going on. Because everything we do is concave shoulders, like with the shoulders coming forward.

I, like, can't lift my – I can't do, like, anything overhead. I can't, like, wash the back of my neck because my shoulders are just – I'm always inverting doing this. It's like anything like this I can do, but I can't bridge, like, trying to scrub my back of my head. I'm, like, can't get wash the back of my neck because my shoulders are just I'm always inverting doing this It's like anything like this I can do but I can't bridge like trying to scrub my back of my head I'm like can't get my shoulders back there. So it's just like all a mess and I'm only 27 So once I'm 40, I'm gonna be fucked but I think you could probably fix that. Yeah, I could I'm just lazy That's just like you saying you're lazy is hilarious. That is hilarious every day I go to that I go to watch like John teach and i'm like just sit up straight and then i do it for like 30 seconds like my back is tired

and then i just like end up sitting like this the whole class my fucking head's like leaning forward i'm like oh my god yeah you gotta wonder like what i mean who's who's been able to do it the longest like what's the longest running like competitor i i would say there's andre galvao i mean andre yeah i would say andre because i mean he's competing what since he's 16 he's been he's been at the highest levels for 20 years um you know i saw him in the early 2000s there was a documentary called arte suave he was a brown belt back then this was like 2001 2001, 2002, or 2003, and here he is. How old is Andre now? He's got to be close to 40, right?

I think he's 40. I think he'll be 40 for this ADCC. Is that his last one? Last year was supposed to be his last one, and then he came back for this one. I'm going to plan to make sure that it's his last one. When you do these matches, since you've been doing these no-time limit matches, like the Felipe match, which I think you really shine in those matches, but that's really for the cognoscente.

That's really for the hardcore people that want to see. It's not spectator friendly. Right. It's just to determine who's better at jiu-jitsu. But no time limit matches for spectators are just atrocious because who the fuck wants to watch four hours of jiu-jitsu? Most people don't want to watch ten minutes of jiu-jitsu right so who wants to watch like a two-hour match um but they're important to have sometimes just to show who's the best because you actually have to do jiu-jitsu and know how to do submissions well not in the Felipe match because there wasn't

a submission but um you have to you have to be better at jiu-jitsu than the other guy there's no stalling and playing tactics for 10 minutes and winning by advantage or two points. So they have their place, but to build a sport to a spectator sport is not – no time limit is not the way. Well, it's not the way for spectators, but it is the way, as you said, to determine who's the best. And I think that's supposedly what jiu-jitsu is all about. Really, the early days of the UFC, there was no time limits because it was just like who wins. And that's the purest form of any martial art. It's like, you know, as soon as you have rounds, then you have people gaming the system.

They try to win the round by sprinting in the last 30 seconds and really going hard or, you know, trying to figure out a way to manage your time. You can't really do that if there's no time limit. Which I think that has a place too, like points and rounds and stuff. Because then you have the whole tactical element which comes into play. But I think there's a place for both for sure. But spectators definitely need a time limit. They want to know when this is going to be over. It would be fucking wild though if all UFC fights had no time limit in this day and age.

I mean, they would be brutal. Didn't Hoist have like an hour and something match with Kimo, I believe? I don't think it was that long. It was like something ridiculous, right? No, it was pretty long, but I don't think it was that long. Okay. I don't. Find out how long the Hoist-Kimo match was.

I think it just seemed long because it was so crazy. Because he was finishing everyone so fast. And then he was against Kemo, and it was a little bit longer. Tom Erickson had a match with Murillo Bustamante back in the day in one of the weird offshoots, one of those little small companies that tried to make a big MMA event. Ima event i think there was a no glove event too it was back in those days and i think that match went like an hour wow yeah and you know muriel bustamante was 185 pounds and tom erickson was 300 pounds yeah he's a monster i remember tom

erickson there's a weird sound do you hear that what is that jamie what that? What is that, Jamie? What? That sound. What sound? You don't hear it? No. I hear, like, a feedback. You don't hear it? You guys hear it? You guys don't hear it? No.

Maybe it's just my headset. Hold on. Yeah. All right. I'll deal with it. But it's just, again, it's not fan-friendly. Yeah. My match with Keenan was an hour and 45 minutes my first match

Jeez, that's my longest match. Yeah, how we're in 45 minutes. Yeah, how'd that end that he hooked him? Yeah, there's their done their fight. That's actually that's actually an amazing story. We have to go over Yeah, that's how me mo first met. Yeah, he hired Keenan to beat me up. So it was only four minutes and 40 seconds So it was really like one one round in the UFC today. Oh, wow. I felt like that was just, it felt like so much longer because Hoyce was finishing everyone like the first minute. He would just like hit a double leg and then strangle them when they turned around.

It was also so chaotic. And then, you know, it was so crazy because Kimo came in carrying a cross. Remember he had a cross on his back? Oh, yeah, yeah. Like a giant wooden cross, like walked in with it. Joe Son, right? Yeah, yeah. Joe Son giant wooden cross, like walked in with it. Joe Son, right? Yeah, yeah. Joe Son, yeah.

I remember. And that was one. I remember when Keith Hackney was just punching him in the balls. Yeah. Those original UFCs were, those were really no rules. They were pretty crazy, yeah. But, you know, that's really the birth of jiu-jitsu. I mean, that's where, for people in America, that's where they recognize, like, oh, my God, I don't know shit.

That's what got me into jiu-jitsu. When I was, like, seven, eight years old, I was watching the UFC, and it just happened to be a Hoist Gracie tribute. And there was, like, all the reruns of the early UFCs. And I was like, yeah, I'm going to fucking do that when I get older. And then, like, for the longest time, I, like, wouldn't train. I'll just, like, hear, like, I'll hear Joe, like, breaking down how to do a Kimura. He's like he's like oh yeah he needs to get his left hand here and I like go my buddy the next day I'm like fuck yeah like shit works I'm like fucking doing Kimuras with my fucking friends and shit it's it's really amazing uh how one martial art was if you look at all the other martial arts

every you know everybody wanted to be like Bruce Lee, the small guy who could beat everybody else. But in reality, the bigger people win. Like in any kind of fight involving striking and size and speed, it's just such a giant advantage. Jiu-jitsu is really the only thing where the smaller person actually can dominate a bigger person. I agree 100%.

I was actually thinking about this recently. I don't know any other combat sport where you could have two elite-level athletes and a 60-, 70-pound weight advantage, and the smaller guy wins consistently. Right, in absolutes. Look at what's his name. So we're doing the Hall of Fame for this ADCC, the inaugural one, so I had to look up the stats. The highest submission rate in ADCC is Marcelo Garcia.

Right. 89%. That's pretty crazy. And he was submitting Rico Rodriguez. This guy's 100 pounds heavier than him. Rico Rodriguez, who was a UFC heavyweight champion at one point, he heel hooked him. And that was after he took Rico's back and then Rico slammed him. Remember?

He, like, threw all his body weight back. Yeah, he got pissed and then he's like, let me do a fucking heel hook. Yeah. That was illegal. Because in ADCC, you're allowed to slam only if you're in the threat of a submission. So Marcello was on his back with a seatbelt grip. If he had switched to a rear naked, it would have been perfectly legal. But he just slammed him, flatlined him.

Yeah. It was also like, come on, man. Guy's 160 pounds, you know? The difference in size was so preposterous. But yeah, in any other sport, you would never imagine that a small guy would be able to finish. I talk to wrestlers and like, what do you mean you have open weight divisions? Right. I'm like, yeah, you have like a 66-kilo guy fighting like a 100-kilo guy.

Like, yeah, that just doesn't make any sense. In wrestling, it doesn't make any sense. Yeah, I know. But in jiu-jitsu, it actually can kind of work. Even our last ADCC in 2019, there's a guy from Australia, Lachlan Giles. He got bronze in the absolute, and he submitted a guy named Muhammad Ali. You've got to see this guy. He was like 260, shredded.

So he took out three of the biggest guys uh in 2019 so i think that was the first time since 2007 a guy in the 77 kilogram division 170 uh meddled and remember when gunner nelson when he beat uh what's his face jeff monson jeff monson yeah that's crazy monson's a fucking fire hydrant. A giant fire hydrant. Zero neck, all tattoos. Just took them out. Like communist tattoos all over his body and shit. He's over in Russia singing Russian songs.

That was the one year he protested. He just got naked and started walking around. Yes, I was there for that one. Were you? Yeah, that was 2003. Yeah, he took off all his fucking clothes when he lost it. Who did he lose to? He lost a decision to someone.

I remember. That was the one I didn't see, but I just know he stripped down, grabbed his Speedo, and just, like, threw it to the crowd. Yeah, he walked off naked. Yeah. That's amazing. Imagine being, like, the security guard having to fucking tell Jeff Monson he's got to leave.

Like, just so he's got his cock out and be like, man, you can't be doing this here. I mean, he literally looked like the Hulk back then. Two-time champion. I think he was the first two-division champion in ADCC. So he was a beast. He was the first guy I ever saw do a north-south choke. And a lot of people thought that, oh, you can only do that if you're strong.

Like, that's like a goon move. He's just, like, squeezing his head. Yeah, but no. And then people realized, then Marcelo started pulling it off. And people were like, oh, that's a his head. Yeah, but no. And then people realize, then Marcelo started pulling it off and people are like, oh, that's a real move. That was the interesting thing about Marcelo for me is he would always reinvent himself

every ADCC. So 2005, he's hitting everyone with his X guard sweeps. So that's what everyone's expecting. 2007 comes, he's just finishing everyone with north-south chokes. I saw his debut in 2003. I was there live in Sao Paulo.

Yeah, that was wild because I was there with Eddie when Eddie was competing, when Eddie beat Hoyler. And when he choked out Shaolin, everybody was like, holy fuck. And it was the way he did it, the speed in which he arm dragged and took his back. And then the scramble secures the choke and then finishes it like as they're scrambling and just puts him to sleep. You know what the crazy thing, too, is 2003, Marcelo got second in the trials. So he was a last-minute replacement. Crazy. And no one really knew who he was.

And then it's like Shallon just got put to sleep, and then he even tapped out Mike Van Arsdale. He was Fabio Gurgel's student, right? Correct. And he wasn't even, like, he did a lot more Gi than he did no Gi, right? Yeah, that's what he was known for. And then he just ended up being, like, for me personally, the two greatest champions in ADCC, number one, I'd say Galvao.

But there's an article, some people believe it's Marcelo. So he was definitely a pioneer. Well, Marcelo finished more people. Yeah. It depends on what the criteria is. Like Andre has more medals, but I think that the way Marcelo won was far more impressive. And he's got a lot more division

wins. He's got way more fights than Andre overall in ADCC. He did the division every year because he never won the absolute. Whereas Andre just did the division and then the absolute. He lost his first two and then he double-goaled it,

and then he's just been doing super fights since 2013. So he hasn't had that many fights compared to Marcelo. Marcelo was built so weird, too, because he had these giant-ass tree-trunk legs and this normal-sized upper body. Yeah. Just so weird, you know? One of the head judges trained with him for a week, and he came to Abu Dhabi, and he was telling me he's like the weirdest body type he's ever felt. He's like these tree trunk legs that

could elevate him and he's really small hands. So he's like, once he takes your back, there's, there's no way you could, you could just training, training with, uh, with Mikey's like the same way. Cause his legs are shorter proportionally than his upper body. So like you're trying to match him. Yeah. Yeah. So you're like trying to pass his guard and they're like feet, like little tiny feet, like slip into places they normally wouldn't be able to because his legs are so short. So I'm like fucking trying to pass his guard and his feet are like coming inside my arms. I'm like, man, I don't know what to do here. He sat down outside and I had to get a photo of it because it's so preposterous.

I'm like, what are you doing? How do you sit like that? Where his knees come in and his feet go out and he sleeps like that on plane rides. Like he'll just sit in the chair and then fall asleep apparently. I don't even know how the fuck your body contorts to that shape. It has to be like his body developed while he was doing those positions. It's because I think his legs are actually disproportionately short compared to his torso. disproportionately short compared to his torso.

Like, I think, like, like, for the size of his upper body, I think his legs are actually, like, disproportionate. I think they're shorter than they're supposed to be. 100%. You can see. He's got this long torso and he's... He's so odd. So good, though. So good. He's so good and so weird.

All he does is eat pasta and pizza. And he only eats once a day. Yeah. He's a fucking genius, too, when you talk to the guy. And then drills the rest, the other 23 hours pizza. And he only eats once a day. Yeah. And he's a fucking genius, too. And he talks to the guy. And then drills the rest, the other 23 hours. Yeah, he drills 12 hours a day. Yeah, I mean... Every day. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, but listen, that's where you get results.

You get results in doing those incredibly uncomfortable things. I think he's the third American to ever get a world title. I think first was BJ Penn, then Rafael Lovato, and then Musumishi, I think, is like a three-time Gi champion now. So he's got definitely the most titles out of any American. And I love the fact that he's going no-Gi now, too. He's doing a lot of no-Gi.

Yeah. Well, who's number one, what they're doing in Austin, was so exciting because to be able to go watch world-class jiu-jitsu right here in Austin. Yeah, it's awesome. It was so fun. So fun to just go there and just be able to take that in. Yeah, now the production value and everything is through the roof, and they're doing a good job. Yeah, it's amazing.

So Abu Dhabi, this is an enormous event, right? And this is happening in Vegas. Yes. So, like, the first major event I did for ADCC was 2019. For me personally, my target, I thought the best ADCC ever was 2005, the one in Long Beach. That was my target. It had 2,800 people there. You had a bunch of MMA guys.

You had GSP, Diego Sanchez, Gilbert Melendez, Jake Shields. John Jock Machado had that match against Dean Lister. Dean Lister, that's right. Yeah, so I was like, I got to beat this one. This was the best one. So 2019 comes. We broke the record. We had 4,000.

It was a big success. Then comes this one. And we started selling tickets on Black Friday. So at 10 a.m., I wake up at like 1045, and I had like six missed calls from the thomas and mac which is where the event's going to be i'm like oh shit something went wrong and i answered the phone i'm like what's going on he's like do you know how many tickets you've sold i was like no he's like you've sold 5 000 tickets in 45 minutes so we sold more tickets in 45 minutes a year out

than we had in 2019 and we sold every single premium ticket in the first day. We sold over 7,000 tickets. That's incredible. For jiu-jitsu. I mean. That's so wild. We sold a million dollars in ticket sales for a grappling in one day. That's incredible.

Yeah. So I miscalculated that one. Well, now you know. Yeah. As long as you get this guy involved. Had to charge more. Yeah. I mean, definitely. I mean Yeah. It's a good problem to have. As long as you get this guy involved, you gotta charge more. Yeah. I mean, definitely. I mean, having Gordon around has been a big boost, you know.

I get into arguments about it all the time. I'm like, listen, you can hate the guy. You know, anytime someone tells me they don't like Gordon, I'm like, okay. But there's definitely a benefit. I had a conversation with Mark Zuckerberg about it. He's like, well, what do you think about his attitude? I go, why do you think he's so fucking popular? There's two reasons. reasons one because he's the best and then two

because he talks so much shit like you don't think that's a smart move the best is uh I'm like so shadow ban on Instagram he goes to follow me he follows my backup account he doesn't he couldn't find probably couldn't find my real a soccer bird yes as Zuckerberg follows like my breakdown page the other one but he doesn't follow my real page because he can't find it. I posted one day, I posted like he was following me, and I tagged him, and I'm like, dude, fucking whitelist me, you fuck. I was so shadow banned that he couldn't find my real account. It's so funny because I think he wants martial arts to be very respectful, and he trains in martial arts, and he does MMA.

He really loves it. He loves the sport. Does he? Yeah, and he loves you. He thinks you're extremely skilled. He loves watching you compete. He's like, I just don't know. I'm like, that's what's fun.

It's part of the fun. He's like Americanizing martial arts. But it's good, though, because people see me media and they're like they meet me in person so their expectations are so low. They're like there's no way he could be worse than that. So if I'm any better than I am on social media they're like oh man he's a great guy. That's funny. That's so true.

You talk so much shit. But it's like think about how many more eyeballs are on you to see these accomplishments. Because if you were just quietly running around submitting all the best black belts in the world, it would still be impressive, but there's no way it would get the kind of attention that it's getting. And part of the reason why it gets so much attention is because you're smart about social

media. And talking a lot of shit on social media is very effective for getting people hyped up. I mean, it does two things. As long as you can actually back it up. Yes. Otherwise, you're just a clown. Right. Yeah. And you see that a lot. I mean, it does two things. As long as you can actually back it up. Yes. Otherwise, you're just a clown. Right.

Yeah. And you see that a lot. I mean, it does two things when you talk shit, right? First of all, it energizes your fans. They get all ramped up. But the people that hate you, they want to see you lose. So at the end of the day, they're all tuning in. Yeah.

The flip side to that, though, is it puts a tremendous amount of pressure. You know, so like, you know, people are waiting for Gordon to lose to just cheer. That's the flip side to it. Which is amazing because people in grappling lose all the time. No one goes on a 10-fight winning streak in grappling. A 10-match winning streak is unheard of. Maybe you have a good tournament and you double gold, but to win more than 15 matches in a row rarely happens.

I think Hodger's best winning streak was 20 matches or something like that. So people win some, they lose some. But I know that the day that I lose again, it's just going to be the end of the world. I haven't lost since 2018. I'm going to lose by advantage. See? It was never that good all along. How many matches have you won in a row now?

I think it's 57 since 2018. People don't know how crazy that is. But again, like we were talking about Musumechi, you train seven days a week. Yeah. That's unheard of too. Everybody wants to take days off. Everybody wants to relax. There's levels to everything.

There's levels to your commitment. And it's also your association with donna her your amazing training partners the the lineage that you come from but if you look at the the success it's just the formula's there i mean you could see why you're so successful it's not there's no luck it's not like just the craziest genetics ever it's none of those things. It's consistent hard work plus intelligence plus technique plus the great training partners. I get that all the time.

People ask me what makes Gordon so good. I'm like, he's not the most explosive guy. There's guys bigger, faster, and stronger. For me, he does train seven days a week, and he's just got a gift where he can see a position or any technique in jiu-jitsu and break it down instantly. I've never seen someone who could just break it down to its most basic parts and rearrange it. Have you always had that kind of discipline?

No. A big thing that improved my work ethic a lot, I mean, I was always a hard worker, but when I saw Gary was training seven days a week, and then I saw John, who, like, could barely walk, like, just teaching, like, a class at Henzo's. Then he teaches, like, eight privates throughout the day and then teaches again. Like, he would just teach, like, 8 a.m. at Henzo's in the city, and then he would teach 9, 10, 11, 12 privates. And then he would teach 9 10 11 12 privates and then he would teach afternoon

class and then he would teach like 3 4 5 6 7 8 p.m privates seven days a week and then like we get up and like go to walk and he like his hip like needs a hip replacement he like can barely stand up and i'm just like man if this guy can fucking do this like i gotta step my game up like this is ridiculous and he's been doing the same thing for 30 years. It's just like, okay, like, there's definitely something to this consistency that I should be taking notice of. It's with everything. It's with music. It's with comedy. It's with writers.

Like, the people that can, like, sit down and do the work day in, day out, they lap everybody else. If you can just show up, you're already ahead of, like, 90% of the people. Yeah, yeah. Because most people are just inherently lazy yeah so if like if you just are doing jiu-jitsu for 10 years and even if you don't have a training program you're just showing up every day and just training hard even like an idiot you're still gonna be ahead of most people because most people just don't even take training seriously like me and mo talk about this all the time. This is your fucking job. Most people just treat it like a hobby. I know hobbyists who train more than most Black Belt world champions.

Most Black Belt ADCC world champions train three, four times a week. It's just like a hobby to them. That's crazy. But they're all so lazy that they're all on the same level. They have 10 guys who train three times a week, so they all progress at relatively the same speed so they can get away with it. But now once there's more professionalism and there's more money, as more money comes into the sport, you'll see that change and you'll see real professionals start to grow. Well, I think with you it's not just the training every day, but it's also the analyzing of positions and the doing the intellectual work. Yeah, it's mostly John. He always talks about everyone's happy to come in and do the physical

work. You know, come in, they train hard, they get a good sweat, they're sore, but the mental work is the hardest work and nobody wants to do that. He's like, you tell someone to come in and fucking do, you know, you do three round, three hard rounds and you do a hundred burpees. Like, oh yeah, no problem. You tell them to fucking sit down and you do 100 burpees. It's like, oh, yeah, no problem. You tell them to fucking sit down and figure out why this arm bar is not working, why the mechanics aren't right, and that no one wants to fucking do that. Right. So that's the most important stuff is the mental work.

So does John just analyze? I know he analyzes tape like all day long. He analyzes video footage. But does he analyze it with you guys? Does he break it down to afterwards we do we do tape studies uh like once every two weeks at my house um where uh we watch like specific he has like specific things that he wants to work on for that week or whatever the case is or the goals he wants to accomplish during that tape study so we watched uh so we'll watch we'll watch tape at my house and then he'll'll say, okay, this is the theme for tonight. This is what we're going to look at. Like the last time we watched, we call it scrimmage wrestling, where it's wrestling with submissions under ADCC rules.

And you don't really see a lot of it in ADCC because of the fact that no one even really knows it exists. People just take wrestlers, and they teach them wrestling, and then they go to ADCC and hope for the best. wrestlers and they teach them wrestling and then they go to ADCC and hope for the best. So the last last tape study, we actually watched Diego Sanchez fighting Nick Diaz in the UFC because there was a lot of up-and-down scrimmaging where Diego would hit a takedown, Nick would go for a submission and then Diego would always end up on top and John just builds this habit of we call it hustle till you score where you

just don't stop moving until you get to a score and it just completely changed the way that you know we all think about the ADCC scoring criteria and and how to play the game how does John maintain his motivation dude I wish I could tell you he's just been doing the same thing for 30 years. He just loves it. I mean, I wish I had, like, half the dedication and, like, interest in jiu-jitsu that John has. And, I mean, I'm the most dedicated athlete, I would say, to jiu-jitsu. And it still just pales in comparison.

Like, we're podcasting right now. John's, like, watching, like, a 1957 boxing match or, like, the semif from like the 1960 like judo olympics like it's insane it's just most people when they work really hard towards something they get a personal reward for it like i mean he's recognized widely as one of the greatest jiu-jitsu trainers of all time no but like it's not like the guy gets a lot of like personal satisfaction. I mean, there's not like a lot of people like heaping praise on him. That's not his motivation, which is so interesting to be that dedicated. Like you get a lot of praise. Like you're the guy who you're, when Felipe quit and then you fucking walk around with

a big smile on your face or when you write down on a piece of paper they're going to submit Wagner Rocha with a triangle and then you go and do it. Like you're getting like that feeling out of your own personal satisfaction, your own personal accomplishment and achievement. He's not even getting that. He's getting it from other people's achievements. And yet he's so dedicated. He's really selfless. I mean he doesn't ask – I mean he literally doesn't ask us for anything, no money, no nothing. He just wants you to show up to training.

And I think he gets a lot of satisfaction from building athletes and seeing them succeed with the stuff that he teaches. And I think that's where his happiness comes from is just seeing, like, when I, like, win ADCC or I do something big, like, you can tell he's, like, very, very happy. That's, like, one thing that genuinely makes him happy. I remember with John, like when we, I used to train with him for about a year when they were in Puerto Rico and you know, most instructors they'll just come like the standard is 30 minute

warmup, three techniques, and then you roll for 30 minutes. So me and John would actually hang out after class all the time. He'd just come over, we'd get some food. He'd always be watching tape, and then he'd always be making notes. He would make a program for a week. He'd always have a goal, one week, one month, three months, and he would just go and apply that every day in class. So, you know, that's all he does is dedicate himself to his craft, and you see the results. There's no one like him.

No one else does that. And he doesn't do anything else in life. Like, he has an apartment now. And I'm like, hey, do you go furniture shopping? Do you get plates and dishes? He's like, mm, I have to do that. I'm like, we've been living here for a year, dude. I had to go to fucking Bed Bath & Beyond last week to pick him up plates,

bowls, dishes, utensils. What does he eat? Takeout? So he fasts, and he just goes to Whole Foods at the end of the day and picks up Whole Foods, hits on chicks. But he doesn't have, like, I helped him move into his apartment. Like, no one's ever been in, like, any of John's apartments. So I helped him move into the apartment.

So he's got, like, some furniture. He's got, like, a bed and, like, a couch and stuff. And he's like, I'm going to need to put some furniture in here. I'm like, yeah, that's never like some furniture. He's got like a bed and like a couch and stuff and he's gonna need to put some furniture in Here I'm like yeah, that's never gonna happen, but then I asked him I'm like do you have like cups and bowls and stuff? He's like no, so I had to like go and buy him like all this shit. He like moves in He's like Gordon. What do you think about Wi-Fi? Like what do you mean? What do I think about? He goes is it worth getting?

I'm like, I'm like, yeah, I'm like, you want to hook up your TV and watch Netflix or something? He goes, I despise TV. I'm not going to watch it. I'm like, okay. I'm like, well, what if you want to have your phone connected to the Wi-Fi so you can watch tape? He goes, I can just watch it with the 5G. It's free. I'm like, okay. And I'm like, well, what if you have a chick over on a date and she wants to watch something on Netflix? He goes, good point. How much does it cost? And I'm like, I don't know, like 80 bucks a month.

He's like, okay, I'll consider it. I'm like, all right. He's like a character in a movie. Yeah. He really is. I've never even heard of a person like him. If a person was like that, they would be pretending. Yes. I've never even heard of a person like him. If a person was like that, they would be pretending. Yes.

They're pretending to be this stoic master who's just selfless and dedicated to the advancement of their students. But there's no real people like that. No, that's him. That's just like, that's insane. You guys have seven? I think there's seven of their teammates are in this ADCC. So he's doing something right. Yeah, clearly.

Now this ADCC, how will people be able to watch it? It's exclusively on Flow Grappling. Okay. Yeah, for this one. And so is it a pay-per-view thing on Flow Grappling? It's a subscription. So if you already have a Flow membership, you'll be able to watch it. They gave me a lot of support, to be honest.

A lot of people like to bash Flow, but, you know, I've been following the sport for 22 years, so I remember what it was like before they were around, you know. Like couldn't even watch matches. It's like a dude in a camcorder and you get your DVD six months later, you know. So, for example, this ADCC, they're bringing over 70 staff themselves just to produce this event. So they've been a big help for sure. Well, the commentary was always great on Flo, and it was great on who's number one, but Howell's not there anymore, right?

Is that what happened? That is. That is correct. So there was like, for people who don't know, Leandro Lowe, who's this beloved world champion jiu-jitsu guy, got murdered the day before Felipe Pena. The day of. The day of. The night before, yeah, like in the middle of the night.

Did you hear about that story? It's crazy. So he's in a nightclub the night before. And I knew Leandro, too. He competed in ADCC. I hung out with him a few times. Very nice guy. So based on what I've

read in pretty good sources, he's in a nightclub. Some guy comes and removes a bottle off his table. So he takes him down, mounts him, says, have you had enough? Guy says, yes. He gets up. As he gets up, the guy shoots him in the head, kills him. This is where it gets interesting. The guy who shoots him and kills him is a purple bun jujitsu and he's a military police officer so they arrest the guy and you know brazil they don't mess around over there um there was like 60 70 people outside the police station you know protesting and just waiting for this police officer to get out so what the fuck man yeah it's i mean over nothing i mean just shoot shoot some dead in the club right in the head. So over nothing.

That's a guy who's probably killed a few too many people. If you're that casual about killing somebody. Oh, he mounted me. Fuck that. It's just so crazy. I mean, literally, Leandro could have broken every fucking bone in his body, and what would he have done? Nothing.

Nothing. And he lets him up and he shoots him and kills him. It's crazy. Over nothing. It's ridiculous. It's so sad. It was so sad. So anyway, so Leandro was good friends with Felipe, so obviously it's very emotionally

devastating for Felipe. But that's where it gets weird. So why don't you fill us in on the rest of it. So then I get a call. Like, oh, hey, Leandro died. Felipe wants to cancel the match. So I'm like, all right, we can't cancel the match. They're like, well, he wants to change the rules to 30 minutes.

And I'm like, no. Like, Felipe is notorious for always trying to change the rules last minute or weasel his way into something that wasn't agreed upon. So I'm like, no. I'm like, we either fight as the agreed upon rule set or we just reschedule. Like, we had the bet match. The contract, it was for a no time

limit match. We should also explain to people that you gave him 10 to 1 on the money. So you put up $100,000 to his $10,000. Correct. You guys put it in escrow, which is a wild thing to do. I was the escrow count. It's a wild thing to do.

That's how the whole match came because he was competing against some guy who won the Brazilian trials. And he basically beat Felipe. It was a terrible match for Felipe. Felipe won, but he didn't look great. So he's like, oh, do you want to do a no-time limit match? He called him out publicly. He's like, do you want to do a no-time limit match? We can do a bet match if you want. I'm like, oh, you're doing bet matches and no-time

limit now. I'm like, I'll give you four to one odds. I'm like, you can pick the number. I'll put up four to one. Like, you put up $10,000, I'll put up $40,000, you put up $100,000, I'll put up $400,000. And he makes this big, long post, basically, to say no. And I'm like, really? Four to one? No? I'm like, I'll give you 40, put up 100, I'll put up 400. And he makes this big long post basically to say no. And I'm like, really, four to one, no? I'm like, I'll give you 10 to one.

He's like, okay, fine, 10 to one. So I'm like, okay, fine. I'm like, you pick the number. He's like, 10,000. I'm like, 10,000? Like, that's the best fucking number you can come up with? I'm like, if someone gave me 10 to one odds, I'm putting up like at least 100 grand.

Like, fucking figure it out. He goes, I'll put up 10,000. I'm like, okay. So he wires mo the 10 000 i wire mo the 100 000 and then he's trying to change the rules and i'm like no we have this like contract agreed on um so i'm like we either fight as agreed or we reschedule the match like if you can fight for 10 minutes you can fight for an hour doesn't fucking make a difference like you're gonna do the match do the match um so then he's like oh no i'm not gonna fight i'm not gonna fight so then this is where it gets interesting

because he's like i'm not gonna fight i'm not gonna fight and doors are about to open so flow like has a meeting with him and they're like hey like we'll give you some extra money and he's like okay now i'll fight and i'm like okay so fucking, you wanted to fight, you just fucking wanted more money. Like, so they had to pay him more money to get him to fight. And then he goes out, and you can always tell when Felipe's starting to lose it. He fucking, his body language falls apart. He starts complaining to the ref. So the second he didn't want to sit back, we went out of bounds, and he didn't want to go back to bottom guard, which is the position that we finished in.

And I'm like, yep, he's done. And then I started picking up the pace a little bit. And then we ended up standing back up. And then he just walks over to the judging table. And Howell was there. And he's like, are you done? Like, what's wrong? And Felipe apparently was just like looking around, not saying anything.

Like just like traumatized. So then like this crowd starts booing him. And then he comes back to the mat. And I'm like, yep, he's toast. So then like there's crowd starts booing him. And then he comes back to the, back to the mat. And I'm like, yup, he's toast. So then I started picking up the pace more.

And then like two minutes later, he's like, okay. He's like, I was like passing his guard about to pass his guard. And he just looked, he just, I just hear,

okay, I'm going to stop now. And I'm just like, what? And he's like, I'm going to stop now. I'm like, really?

He's like, yeah. I'm like, all right, buddy. So I just got up and he just fucking quit during the match So then he had this whole post fight interview where he's like, hey, I'm a terrible person and this and that so now he's just getting back to his normal life like things are just starting to settle down and

I Just realized when Mo got here. I'm like we have a second bet. He's like, would you give me the same odds for ADCC? I'm like, yes, absolutely. I'm like, 10 to 1. So we signed the second contract. So now Mo messaged him the other day, and he's like, hey, Felipe, you need to send me another $10,000

for if you guys meet at ADCC. And now he just fucking wakes up to this message like, oh man, I have to send this fucking guy another $10,000. So now we have a a second match where if we meet at ADCC, it's the same 10 to 1 odds. So this is only if because the brackets are random? How are the brackets picked? I do the brackets. Oh, so you do it.

You select. Yeah. Well, you could conveniently select. I asked him to put the top four seeds on my side, but he told me they couldn't do that. Yeah, he always does crazy stuff. I mean, for example, Gordon's the first guy I've ever seen who's doing the super fight and asked to do the division as well. So he's doing both. He's going to do the division.

The crazy thing is this. Potentially, very high chance maybe, I mean, I think Philippe Pena is going to be the second seed. So if they do meet, it'll be in the finals. So the two super fight fighters in 2019 was Philippe Pena's going to be the second seed. So if they do meet, it'll be in the finals. So the two super fight fighters in 2019 was Philippe Pena against Gordon. So there is a possibility where Gordon would face Philippe Pena and then the next, you know, an hour later, Andre Galvao. So

it's just insane. Someone will definitely kill themselves if I submit Pena and then submit Andre. Like some hater somewhere is just going to blow their brains out 100%. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They've run out of shit to say. That's one thing for sure.

Now they're making – the only thing they're making fun of now is my hairline. I have like a little widow's peak. My dad had like a bad widow's peak. They're like, man, his hairline is receding. I'm like, that's the best you guys got. I'm like, this is what we're going to do now? You're just going to make fun of my hairline? Dude, I'd kill 50 kittens to have your hair.

That's all they can make fun of? That's hilarious. There's a moment where someone achieves this undeniable success where even the haters have to just take a deep breath. It's almost like arguing with liberals about Trump. They just refuse to acknowledge facts. There was hundreds of people after the last match, like,

Felipe three and oh, he won that match. Like, they're just like, he won the match. And I'm just like, I'm like, all right, guys. Like, I can't even argue. Who said that? There was a ton of them. I saw the comments. Yeah.

My issue with that whole thing, that whole Felipe Gordon match was, I was actually the one that informed Gordon because he likes to sleep late when when he competes so it was like 3 30 p.m um you know nat tells me like what what happened if my match might get canceled so i was like shit i gotta wake him up so i wake him up and i sit down i tell him the situation and the reality is gordon was 100 percent ready to postpone the match so the narrative is that he was the one that was pushing it to happen, and that's really not the case. And I know that because I was the one that informed him. So how does Howell fit into that?

So then they did this, they had like this, they had this show on YouTube where like they came out and Howell was like, they were doing this interview with these three guys, not this podcast, basically, with three guys, and Howell basically said that I was offered to move the fight up to the beginning of the card, and that I said no, I refuse, and I would only fight and agree upon terms.

I was not willing to change anything in the contract, and that I wasn't willing to reschedule. They didn't mention about paying him more money, and they just left some things out where it just made me look like the bad guy. And I'm just like, this is just not what happened at all. Like, if you guys are going to, like, talk about it. But Howell's a good guy. That's what I don't understand like I've known how forever I don't understand why would he do that was he misinformed yeah so apparently he just got his information

from fucking Felipe's Instagram I'm like no I'm like that's where you fucking got your I'm like we both made a public post and I'm like this is just it's like I'm okay where if people call me out for being an asshole and I'm actually an asshole I'm like okay fine but like if you're just gonna attack my character and just say something just didn't happen and blatantly lie about it then I have a problem with it I'm like just like no guys this is not what happened at all it really sucks because he's a very good commentator yeah yes it's it's very hard to find someone who's that good at jiu-jitsu who understands positions and is also a very good broadcaster. And I think Howell fits that bill.

He's very good. He's very talented. I love listening to his commentary. I was really bummed out when he got fired. But then when you told me the whole story behind it, I was like, oh. Yeah. I didn't want him to get fired. I'm like, guys, you just have to fix this.

This is not what happened. Well, he should just apologize. He should just apologize and say he was misin misinformed and they should hire him again. He's the best at it in terms of like like a broadcaster who's like a really good professional broadcaster who's also very knowledgeable in jujitsu, understands positions, understands the rule set. For example, he I will sign up because we do ADCC rules seminars because the rules are very complex. Hywell took the course, and to be honest, very knowledgeable. So, you know, he took it very serious. I, you know, me and Hywell bumped heads a few times, but I like him.

We were supposed to do a, you know, for ADCC 2022, we were supposed to do like a pre-match show together. So I was bummed, but I invited him. He's going to come to the event and watch. Maybe they can iron it out. Hopefully. Yeah. I mean, did he apologize I invited him he's gonna come to the event and watch so maybe they get ironed out Hopefully yeah, I mean he's did he apologize no he didn't He didn't ever thought a flow flow apologize held in the apologize to me But uh, I mean he definitely fucked it up. I mean, I didn't want him to get fired, but He fucked that one up big time

Yeah, but that sucks if you get bad information from someone's Instagram and you think, well, I know Felipe. Felipe's a good guy. He would never lie. And then you just go and say the thing. You've got to double check. You should definitely double check. Especially something that like.

But Felipe is like notorious for doing shit like this. Like he's like the hardest person ever to negotiate with or do anything with. Isn't it weird though when someone's that good at something but also has kind of a shifty character? Yeah, it's like most people in the sport, though. Really? Yeah. Because everyone's fighting, for the most part, over such a small, minuscule amount of money.

And there's so many people in the sport and there's so little money that everyone's just willing to fucking backstab one another for fucking $10. fucking backs that one another for fucking $10. But wouldn't you think, though, that at this point, when they've seen how much money you make, because you make so much more money than anybody else when it comes to selling instructionals and just... It's like a Connor to the rest of the guys. It's so different.

Wouldn't you say, hey, what is he doing different? You would think, right? I should fucking do that. I don't get it. I don't get it either. I think they're just so blinded by hate that they just are just like, fuck that guy. And they just refuse to like even acknowledge anything. But yeah, I mean, I mean, it makes my job easier. It's great for me because I'm the only guy doing it.

I mean, not everybody. I mean, no one can do what I do. Like no one's going to go on a 60 match winning streak and, you know, be able to call submissions and stuff like that. But there are other ways to build a brand, and these guys are just so bad at it. But conceivably someone could do what you've done if they did what you've done. Yeah. Conceivably it's possible. Yeah.

I mean, it's not— Yeah, if I do it, people could do it. Yeah. But it's just—I don't know, man. It's just— they just don't. Isn't that interesting when at least one person just separates himself from the herd and nobody goes, hey, I need to do what that guy's doing. And then that becomes like the norm.

It's like you must train seven days a week. You must study tape. You must analyze it from an intellectual perspective and not just be a brute. It's so crazy. Actually, we're just releasing it now for ADC. I just wrote a book on this about like building brands and like

how to be successful as like a young person or a young athlete and it goes into like a lot of that stuff but it's just crazy how none of these guys can like differentiate themselves

like okay if you can't win at least like be different like do something different where it's like you get someone's attention like

but you are different the thing is people trying to be's like you get someone's attention. But you are different. The thing is people trying to be different, then you get Dylan Danis. You get people just trying a little too hard. Obviously he has talent, but there's something about that trying too hard that people

are like, eh. It gets played out. It doesn't work. And then when you don't win or you don't compete, then it just kind of spirals out of control. Then it's like he's just making a lot of noise. My thing with Goran too is he doesn't play it safe. A lot of guys when they reach the top, that's when they stop taking matches as

much and they just want to protect their position. He's clearly not doing that. His division has five ADCC champions in it. It's never happened before. He's one of them so he's got fully penna vinnie magalese is in there um orlando sanchez cyborg and all these killers and he's like hey can you put two three and four on my side of the bracket i'm like doesn't work like

that i was like i can't okay i'm like i'm like oh i'm already gonna be there for the weekend like it's just more free money yeah the vision i'm like i may as well just fucking do the division and get more money. Yeah, it makes sense. Have you read Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell? I haven't. It's a really good book. It's you.

It really pertains to you and your success. It's about the Beatles. It's about all these different outliers in sports and art and what they've done that separate them from everybody else. Like with the Beatles, they got this job in Hamburg where they were playing seven nights a week. They were playing five, six hours a night. They were playing every night. So they left Liverpool, they go to Hamburg, they're playing,

and they do this for like a couple years and they come back and they are a completely different band. They're so much better. They're so smooth and in sync. And then when they came to America, when they broke out worldwide, that was where it all came from. It all came from insane amounts of hard work.

Insane amounts of numbers and reps. Did you see, I'm sure you watched The Last Dance. No, I didn't. I haven't seen that. That was really good too. I've heard it's really good. You can see why Jordan was different than the rest of the guys.

Yeah. It's that same thing. It's just like being willing to put in way more work than everybody else, way more thought into it, way more focus, and that's where results are achieved. 100%. And a lot of these guys, too, like, they're all just focused on, like, being athletes.

So, like, they'll teach seminars just to survive, and then they'll just train and do the bare minimum. But,'s like you like you're commentating ufc you don't just just do that like you have a podcast you have this you have that like you got to be doing other shit besides just training like you have to like get your fucking brand in order you got to organize your life you got to do all this shit that people don't want to do and athletes are so tunnel vision just i just want to compete i just want to do this I just want to do this. I just want to train. You've got to branch out and do other shit too. Comics are similar the same way.

When we started doing podcasts in 2009, I told all these comedians, I'm like, do it multiple times a week. They're like, I don't want to. And I'm like, dude, you want to get people addicted. I go do it three, four times a week. And even the guys I was doing it with were like, why are you fucking doing this so much? And I was like, listen to me. You you got to do it more did the more you put out there the better you're gonna get at it and then the more people are gonna

listen to it and they're like yeah but I got to do stand up and there's not go bitch I do stand up to fuck we talking about you go out on stage at night well I got a right well I fucking right to a right right at night like this time to do all these things but like the like most of those people I mean some people can change but like most of those people like the second they start making those excuses yeah I'm just like okay like he's done like this yeah he's never gonna he's never gonna make it but like I just like give up yeah but like every now and they get every now and then you

get like a guy who like you give him advice you're like okay I'll do that and then they just immediately like it's just so easy. Just look at the guys who are successful and just use that as the guideline. The thing about it is with stand-up, there is an argument that impulsive, lazy people also can be great stand-ups. Because they just do it enough where they're going on stage enough and they have these ideas. And then they know how to push the idea to the public. They know how to set the joke up right. And they do it in front of so many different crowds that they polish it up to the point where it's this fucking hilarious bit. I've seen guys that are lazy as fuck and they're great comics.

And you just got to go, okay, you could be better. You could be even better than you are. Believe it or not. And you tell them that, they're like, ah. They don't want to hear it. That's the problem with jiu-jitsu, though, like Gordon said. A lot of them don't treat it as their career. It's just like a hobby. And I tell these guys, it's like any professional sports.

You have a very limited window of your career. Eventually, you're going to have to retire, and they don't think like that. Do you think it's also because the financial compensation is not at the level of like the NBA or something like that where like if you're going to play in the NBA you're playing against these guys that are there. They're fucking grinding they're trying to get there. These guys are practicing every day they're focused and driven and those are the guys that ultimately succeed.

That's part of it too. Another thing that no one talks about to my success is that I have the financial freedom to just focus only on training. Like most guys will win ADCC and then support themselves for that year. They'll do like a seminar tour where for three months or four months out of the year, they're teaching seminars and they're making active income where you got to travel here, you got to travel there. And that fucks up your training. And the only reason why people wanted you in the first place for the seminar is because you're talented and you're winning competitions. So then you just take time away from training, you start losing more, and then the demand for seminars goes down and it kind of spirals out of control. Whereas I set myself up with a passive income and the instructionals and everything else.

So I don't have to do the seminars if I don't want to. I just spend all of my time training. So my training, I have the ability to train way more than these guys because I set myself up in a much better financial position through the passive income. And no one talks about that. People spend half the year teaching seminars and they're like, oh, man, like I missed it. I missed, you know, six months of training. And then they lose competitions and then it just goes down from there. Is it possible to do both?

Is it possible to travel and still get that training in? Or do you really have to be like in a specific set and setting? I mean, you have bodies, right? But like for me, going to Ohio to teach a seminar is not going to be the same as training with John for the weekend. Like it's, I mean, traveling itself just gets old, and, like, you're flying all around. You're not eating, probably, like, you're eating airport food and shit. So, and then you're, like, mistlifting a lot of times.

A lot of times guys travel, and they teach a seminar, then they'll sit on the beach, and it's just, without a routine, it's tough. Like, it's just much better to stay in a routine, so you have, like, okay, I'm doing this, this, this today and this, this, this tomorrow. And the traveling gets old. And I mean, you have bodies, but it's not the same as having like a coach with a training program. Like you just show up at a random gym to teach a seminar. And now you have 50 people who you have no idea who they are.

They're probably going to try to injure you or go super hard. Now's my chance to fucking show Gordon how good I am. It's like, no, dude, I just taught a seminar. I'm not trying to fucking have you jump into my knee and break my leg. Right, right, right. That does happen. But there's a lot of athletes out there

who could go on seminar tours, and those are pretty lucrative. I mean, they can make, what, $2,000 to $4,000 per seminar. Like Craig Jones. It's a great income, but it's active income. Like you have to be there. Like there's only so many seminars you can teach. There's only one you.

There's only so many seminars you can teach in a year. And every seminar you teach is going to inherently detract from your time training. Whereas your model is put out these DVDs and these videos. Exactly. And these instructional. I spend a weekend in Boston filming an instructional. and over the course of a year, it'll make me a million dollars. And it's just one weekend of work, and then everyone in the world can access it.

It's not like I have to be there to teach a seminar for 200 people. I just upload it, and then someone in Europe can buy the instructional and watch it right at home. And that's at BJJ Fanatics. Yeah. So in doing that, you must see those techniques and all the training that you've done. You must see it in other competitors as well. Do you?

Oh, yeah. I mean, a lot of the top-level guys behind closed doors, they'll never admit it, but they tell me, like, yeah, I watch all your instructionals and that's how I... And you can see it. In the older... In, like, my generation and the older generation, you don't see it as much because guys have already fell into their games and they don't want to change, which is why they're getting

left behind and the new generation's beating them. But in the younger generation, like at ADCC Trials, you see a lot of our stuff. You see, like, the back attack system, you see body locks, you see leg locks, you see all the of our stuff. You see like the back attack system. You see body locks. You see leg locks. You see all the stuff that we're doing in the instructionals. Yeah, it's so interesting to see that systematic,

like very technical approach spreading, you know, like that you do see these very, very clear pathways that you guys choose, and then you see other people adopt those pathways too, and you see them follow the same things that John is teaching you guys. You see them. You see other people adopting that. So for like ADCC, we have eight qualifiers. So if you win the qualifier, you get to go to the world championship.

So we have North America, South America, Brazil, Europe, and Asia. The interesting thing to me is the North American trials have skyrocketed past the other regions, past Brazil, past Asia, and past Europe. And this was the first time I did the Brazil trials. Very tough, you know, it's a fighting culture, but they're lacking the wrestling and the leg lock. And if they don't, if they don't adapt quickly, that gap between the North American athletes and everyone else is just going to get bigger and bigger and bigger. It's pretty crazy that Brazil, they rejected leg locks for so long that some of the really, really high-level black belts, like if you tap them with a leg lock, the crowd would throw shoes at you and boo at you. It used to be viewed as a dirty technique, to be honest. Which is so weird.

Well, the thing is it all comes down to technology. People who have the most technology are going to ultimately win over X amount of years. So a big problem for Brazil is the best technology that they have access to or that we have access to is the instructional videos. that they have access to or that we have access to is the instructional videos. If you can be anywhere in the world and buy a John Danaher video or a Gordon Ryan video and you can watch that, that, in my opinion, is the best technology that you have. The problem with Brazil is my instructionals are $250. That's 1,000 reais, and I have 20 of them.

So you're really going to get someone in Brazil that's going to spend 20,000 reais, $20,000 for us on my instructionals. A lot of people in Brazil don't have the financials to be able to purchase the technology. So that's going to make it harder for them to stay at the level that America, Europe, that we're operating at because they just don't have access. A lot of them don't have access to the technology. Many of them do, but many of them don't. So it's going to be interesting in the next 10 years.

It's like if you took two islands and you put nerds on one and you put jocks on the other and you had them fight in the first four months, the nerds are going to get beat up. But then two years from now, now they have fucking spears. And then they have guns five years later. And then the meatheads are still just trying to throw rocks at the nerds. Right, right.

So ultimately technology is going to prevail. So I think the big problem that Brazil is running into and will run into is they don't have as much readily accessible technology um as as america for example um so i think in the next decade or so it's going to be a competition between america and europe russia when when it starts getting money pushed into the sport it gets bigger you get a guy who's been uh who's been wrestling all his life who's fucking grew up in the fucking middle of nowhere russia who starts taking up jiu-jitsu at an early age and he's wrestling, like that's going to be a problem. What are the best like schools, best gyms in terms of like technique that come out of Brazil? Are there some outliers that are more technical? There's a, I think Mika,

there's a new kid from Brazil. For me, I think he's going to be the second biggest superstar after Gordon. He's like 18 years old. His dad is producing some serious, serious killers. A lot of people think. Mika Galbao? Mika Galbao. Yeah, he's a beast. He's a beast. I trained with him.

My mind was blown. Very, very talented. So young, too. Yeah, he's good in the gi. He's good no-gi. Speaks perfect English. And Brazil is a little weird. It's very rare where all of Brazil will come and support an athlete.

And they're all behind Mika. So his dad is producing. And Brazil is a little weird. It's very rare where all of Brazil will come and support an athlete. And they're all behind Mika. So his dad is producing. They got two other athletes in there as well in the 66 Division. And these guys are killers. They were just smoking everyone at the trials. And do they have that same sort of a systematic tactical approach? From what I think is Mika's dad to his coach, and he was like a police officer. So he trains like military style. So whatever he's doing, I mean, it's working. Another big problem

too is all the Brazilians who are super successful all moved to America. So most of the Brazilian champions live in America now. And then you have some good champions that live in Brazil, like Felipe lives in Brazil, but a majority of the champions moved here to either train or open up schools. So it'll be interesting. Brazil has a few guys that are good champions that they're producing now, like Mika's a very young kid, but over the last five years there's a lot less champions coming out of Brazil.

That's really interesting. So they just come over here, and then they start schools and make money. Yeah. Yeah, which is harder to do over there. I mean, the other problem, too, is this. If you want to learn leg locks, who do you go to? Okay, you got John Danaher. There's some 10th Planet guys who are very good.

Lachlan Giles. There's not that many experts in leg lock. So, you know, that's a big issue. And I don't, I mean, other than buying DVDs, I don't know how you close that gap. Because it's, for me, I hate leg locks personally. It's like a whole nother martial art. It's obviously very effective,

but they have to learn that part of the game. And I went to Brazil. This was the first time I did the Brazil qualifiers myself. I went there for one reason. The other ones, they were okay, but I went there to get that passion into Nogi. And, you know, I was there for two weeks, and we smashed it. A lot of competitors. So I'm interested to see what happens in 2024 in the next Brazilian trials to see.

Because I've seen the progression in the North American trials massively over the last four years. So I want to see if that happens in Brazil because at the end of the day, they still own 85%, 90% of all ADCC titles. It is pretty wild when you think about it that way, right? But obviously that's the birth of Brazilian jiu-jitsu, fucking Brazil. Clearly. Exactly. Over the next five years, there will definitely be more Brazilian,

maybe even 10 years, more Brazilian champions than any other country per ADCC. But the next decade, I think, you'll start to see a shift where it's more Americans, more Europeans. And are there good guys coming out of Russia like you were talking about? Has that happened yet? Not yet because most of them just are too busy wrestling or they go right to MMA. Yeah. But I think as a lot of the Samo guys kind of clash and think jiu-jitsu is like soft or whatever the case is.

But I think as the sport grows in popularity, and especially when there's more money pushed into it, I think you're going to have people who are dedicated from a young age who are very good at wrestling, like near Olympic level in wrestling, but not good enough to make the Olympics, so they do jiu-jitsu instead. And they have like Olympic level wrestling with high level intricate jiu-jitsu, and that's going to be an issue.

Because the main hole, one of the big, the two major holes of the last decade in jiu-jitsu has been leg locks, which is now starting, the gap's starting to be filled there, and the integration of standing and ground techniques. The standing position in jiu-jitsu is terrible. The wrestling for jiu-jitsu rule sets is mostly terrible. But when you have Olympic caliber wrestlers who have been training jiu-jitsu since they're five years old, you're going to have a real issue. Yeah. So what needs to be done to get more eyes on it? Because right now, to me, it seems like I know you guys sold thousands of tickets, but those are probably thousands of jiu-jitsu students. Well, I'll be honest. We ought to do more Rogan shows. That'll help a little.

I'll be honest with you. So 2019, me and my team, realistically, we worked on it for four months. We didn't really give it our 100%. But the best feedback I had in 2019 was a middle-aged woman comes up to me and she's like, I just came here because my son asked me to come and I had a great time. So my whole thing is I need to cater to the masses. If I only cater to jujitsu fans, I'm not going to grow. So how do I do that? For this one, you know, one of the biggest influences for me was Pride FC. So we're going very heavy on the production. And I bring up this analogy all the time. How many UFC fans actually train a combat sport? It's probably less than 1%. NFL is what? 1% of one,

you know, no one trains it it so i need to get the masses and not just cater to jiu jitsu fans so that's that's what my goal is with this event the problem is that jiu jitsu watching jiu jitsu is not that exciting until someone submits somebody whereas watching mma everybody understands what's going on that guy kicked that guy that guy punched that guy oh my god he's got his neck. That's the big thing is it starts at the athletes, and most athletes are boring. Like, when I go out, I have, like, the kind of, like, Anderson Silva effect, where, like, you go out and you're like,

this dude is just going to make his opponent look like he's never trained before. So, like, that's why people watch me. If you look at what I do, most people are interested in matches because of movement. That's why Gary is so exciting because you're going to watch Gary Tonin. You know it's going to be a fucking sick match because he's going to be just scrambling all over the mat the whole time looking for submissions. My matches actually don't have that much movement. But when I get a hold of people, it's just like when I get them into certain positions and they just can't escape they can't move they can't do anything that's what's interesting um so most people enjoy movement but when they watch my matches it's interesting because of the fact that i just make guys look

like they don't they don't know what they're doing um but most guys are boring like you see andre go out and he just pushes the guy around for 20 minutes and then hits a shitty double leg and scores two and like yeah everyone knew that was going to happen number one number two no one wanted to watch that um so it really starts uh in the training room um an athlete's always going to train or always going to compete like he trains if you train to fucking submit guys no matter what the rule set is you're going to go out and you're going to try to submit guys yeah there's matches like that one who's number one match between um wagner and h between Wagner and Hinger. Yeah, and Hinger.

It's like, oh. They just pushed each other around for 15 whole minutes. And there was no wrestling exchanges. No. There was no jiu-jitsu at all. It didn't make any sense. Yeah. So, like, you get a match like that, and you're like, oh, man, we're going to watch this Who's Number One today.

Let me show my friend who's never trained. And they see that and they're like, what the fuck was that, man man the best part of that match was eddie bravo eddie bravo heckling oh yeah he was saying something i think he's yelling like eminari oh we were hammered yeah yeah he was he was yelling out some wild shit i think the problem with jujitsu too is for the last 20 years you know it's been ingrained to the athletes it doesn't matter how you win you can win by an advantage you see in the gi championship they win by an advantage and they'll rip open their gi like they won the lottery and i keep telling these athletes the days of just winning is not enough it's how you win you got to go out and market yourself and i think that's the hard part and i was at transitioning

from amateur to going a little bit more mainstream you have to be exciting you have to market yourself well some of the young up-and-coming guys that are very excited, like the Rotolo brothers, like what is the secret to their success? These guys are 19 years old. I was just thinking about this. So the best up-and-comers I've seen are the Rotolos, Mika Galvao,

and there's this American kid, Colabate. Yes. Who just, he won at 16 years old. He won our trials, took everyone out. And the one thing I've noticed, the common denominator for all of them is extremely supportive parents. So Cole's dad's there, Mika's dad, and the Rotolo's mom and father really support them. And they've been competing since they've basically been born. Those kids are very impressive, the Rotolo brothers.

Yeah, I agree with that. On a technical level, in order to differentiate yourself and be a champion, you need to be good at everything, good everywhere, and have one to two things you can do better than everybody else. So the Rotolos are good at everything. They have a unique ability to manage pacing better than anybody, better than almost anybody. So that's one thing.

They have a very unique ability to hit dark strangles from anywhere. manage pacing better than anybody, better than almost anybody. So that's one thing. They have a very unique ability to hit darts strangles from anywhere. They are darts strangle masters, more or less. They have very good darts and they can finish people with them from any position, top, bottom, doesn't matter. And they have an incredible ability to put side-to-side flanking passing pressure where they're never engaged inside the guard. Every time you see them approach a guard, they always touch the legs and they walk to an angle. They walk to north-south. So the whole time you're in a full crunch trying to pull your knees into your chest and they have really long arms. So they have hands on your legs and you're trying to make contact with your legs.

You can't make contact. So they have incredible ability to put massive amounts of passing pressure on you. If you try to stand up or overextend yourself from bottom position and get up, your hand comes out, and then you get strangled with the darts, which they're exceptionally good at. And then when they see you starting to break from the passing pressure, then they pick the pace up. So they have three things which they do better than almost anybody else. And that's why they're so successful. Everyone has holes in their games. And if you

exploit those holes, you can beat them. You've seen Craig exploited some of their holes in their game and Craig managed to beat them. But they do everything well. And they have three things which they do better than almost anybody else. So on a technical level, that's why they're so impressive, is because they have something that differentiates them. And they're very dangerous, so you have to respect them from every position. Which brother tapped Gary? Ty. Ty Rotolo.

Were you surprised by that? I was very surprised, because we did a whole camp based around Dark Strangles. And Gary tried to put a hand in. First of all, Gary turned towards him and actually gave ty the arm all he had to do was put his back on the floor so i'm watching him like what's what's happening right now um and then uh he turned towards him and ty locked darcen i was like oh that looks tight and then uh before he can get any of his escapes going like the cage was in the way

and uh then it just got too tight and he had a tap. And I was like, wow, that was not what I expected at all. Gary puts himself in danger. Yes. Like he is a risk-taking motherfucker. That dude just flies at you. When I watch Gary matches, I'm 100 times more nervous watching Gary matches than I am competing myself.

I watch it and I'm just like, I'm like, why did he just let himself get flattened out in half guard? I'm like, why did he just let his back get taken? I'm like, I'm like, just go out there and fucking like try to kill these people. Like,

don't just mess around. The one time he, the two, the two best performances Gary's had was the 155 EBI where he went out guns blazing and just submitted everybody easily. And that was a match against Paul Horace, I think. Yeah. Cause he like really respected Paul Horace and he's like I don't want to get my leg broken so also Paul Horace at the

time was on all the steroids yeah he was like literally so big he's the most feared athlete I've ever seen in ADCC I'll never forget one of his opponents in 2011 goes up to him before they're about to face each other hey man if you catch my leg please don't break it and there was I'm not gonna name names there was famous athletes who were just terrified of this guy because he hangs on I mean he doesn't let go when you tap did you ever see that video with him and David a villain yeah yeah that that that was so dumb because they should have never allowed them to restart with a locked heel hook where you know ready set go those are in the rules that's so dumb because they should have never allowed them to restart with a locked heel hook where you can go ready, set, go.

Those are in the rules. That's so dumb. That's so dumb because in scrambles, everyone knows this, when you're in the middle of a scramble, you're still moving. If someone's trying to secure it, you're still defending. But if you let a guy say ready, set, go, and all he has to do is crank on it. I agree 100,000%. One of the most controversial. Oh, man. Yeah, set, go. And all he has to do is just crank on it. I agree 100,000%. One of the most controversial. Oh, man.

Yeah, this is it. This is the match. So they let him start from here. It's a bad break in the heel-knee bar. See, he gets broke. See the knee hyperextend. Yeah. Oh, my God.

How bad was his knee after this? I mean, that looks bad. I don't know if he got surgery or anything, but if you go slow-mo, you can see right there. Yeah, that's see right there. Yeah, that's a bad break. Did he break the knee, or is that like a shinbone break? That looks terrible. You get ACL, you get hamstring. So it's a heel-knee bar.

So he has a heel-hook grip, which means that David can't turn back into the knee bar because usually if you have a knee bar with only one leg extended, the guy can high leg and twist and turn but if you turn back into it the normal way to escape you get broken with the heel hook because he has a heel hook grip that seems so insane that they would allow this so insane to start from that position yeah oh god so insane so i think for this match uh this was at least you let go nottingham i think the controversy was he tapped and said he didn't, and that's why they put him there. Paul Harris did?

No, Avalon said he didn't tap. Really? And there was some confusion. Oh, let's see that. Let me see that. I want to see if he tapped. Where? See, that's when they say his leg.

Oh, that seems like he tapped. Yeah, watch. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. They should have looked at that tape and said that's a wrap. But that's one of the most controversial things we do in ADCCs. We'll let you out of the balance just specifically for that. Look, Paul Harris is trying to hug. Trying to hug.

Oh, we want to do it again? Okay, but let's have a fully locked in heel hook. I would have been like, it's over. Fuck that, man. The fake tap is one of the saddest things.

It's so sad. Yeah, he tapped out Matt Lindland twice. Yeah. I had to fight that fucking guy a week after ADCC. I had my broken hand still. I was all beat week after ADCC. I had, like, my broken hand still. I was, like, all beat up from ADCC.

And, like, the weekend after, I had to go out and fight him. He was huge. Paul Harris. Yeah, he's a giant dude. He's so jacked. He shows up in a tank top. He's, like, 230. I'm like, oh, my God.

He's extremely flexible, too. It's weird. He can do full splits. He can rotate his entire torso very easily. Really? Yeah, I mean. That's interesting for a guy that's splits. He can rotate his entire torso very easily. Really? Yeah. That's interesting for a guy that's that built. Yeah, he was behemoth. He did full splits and stuff. Yeah, he was one of the scariest guys in MMA. And then

a few guys figured out his game. Belcher, right? Yeah, Alan Belcher. Alan Belcher trained, I believe he took Lister down to camp with him. And they just went over every single aspect of leg lock defense, and that's all they drilled. They just drilled that constantly.

And so he actually entered into leg lock positions, entered into ashi positions, and then beat him up. Countered him. Yeah. Belcher's a bad motherfucker, though. I hear that. Belcher's fighting. He's a boxer now, and he's a heavyweight.

Is he? Yeah. I didn't know he was. He's a boxer now. And he's a heavyweight. Is he? Yeah. I didn't know he was. He's fucking huge. Find out Alan. Go Alan Belcher boxing. Yeah. I didn't know that.

He's boxing people now. Look at the size of him. That's him? Hello, USADA. That's incredible. Dude, he's a tank. Yeah, he fought 185 in the UFC, but obviously cutting weight to make 185. But now he's a super jacked heavyweight. Yeah, he fought 185 in the UFC, but obviously cutting weight to make 185.

But now he's a super jacked heavyweight. See if you can find a video of him. He actually looks very good. Well, he's a smart guy. Alan's a very smart guy. And he's a very disciplined guy. So, like, oh, it's bare knuckle boxing. Oh, Jesus.

That's even grosser. Everyone comes into these fights. Like, guys who used to fight MMA, they're all, like, three times the size. I's even grosser. Everyone comes into these fights. Like, guys who used to fight MMA, they're all, like, three times the size. I love it. It is. The bare-knuckle thing is weird how that's become so popular. But, you know, like, no one has bare-knuckle MMA. Yeah.

It's weird because you really should. I mean, if you can shin someone in the face, like, why can't you punch them with a bare knuckle? If you can elbow someone in the face, why can't you punch it with a bare knuckle? That was always interesting thing to me about Japan. They didn't allow elbows, but soccer kicks to the head. No problem. And stomps.

Yeah. Soccer kicks, stomps. It's just, soccer kicks are brutal. You really have an unrealistic idea of what your hands are capable of though, if they're wrapped and gloved, because your hands are very delicate instruments.

I mean, some people's more than others, obviously, but no matter what you do with your hands, these fucking bones are not meant to be hitting people. They must, like, break their hands every fight. All the time. Fedor used to break his hand almost every fight. Yeah, I mean, it's so common. Well, it's common in MMA. It's common in boxing,

just in regular boxing. And in the last fight just this past weekend Cyril Ghosn broke his hand on Tai Tuivasa's head yeah but this the thing about bare knuckles I don't understand what they're doing with those wraps because they don't really have bare knuckles I mean the knuckles are bare but the hand is somehow another supported which I think you should be fucking bare knuckle, bare knuckle. It's like, just have, you have bare elbows, you have bare knees, you have bare feet.

Yeah. Does it protect the hand? Maybe for wrists? It must do something. Wrist support, maybe? Yeah, wrist support for sure. I mean, when you think about it, like if your wrist, fist is shaped like that, if you hit anything on the edge, it's going to jack your wrist up.

You know, it'll fuck you up. These two bones are the only bones that are really supported. These break all the time, though, the little ones by your pinky and the ring finger. Do you think it's the way they throw punches? Because I remember Federer used to throw these huge looping punches. Right. Those casting punches. Yeah.

He throws punches like this, too. Like, he'll throw these kind of weird punches. There's something to that. But it's also, it's chaos. You throw him punches, you try to hit him with these knuckles, but you hit him with these two. And then your hand shatters.

And then you have this swollen fucking mass inside your leather glove. And you have two more rounds to fight with a broken hand. Guys do it all the time. But it's just weird to me. Like Uriah Faber, when he fought Mike Brown.

He broke both his hands. Yeah, he broke both his hands. He was throwing elbows. Oh my hands. Yeah, he broke both his hands. He was throwing elbows. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, it's interesting because it's the only aspect of MMA where the part of your weapon is protected. And it's really kind of the weakest weapon. You know, a punch is, I mean, it's very powerful, obviously,

but it's very weak in comparison to a kick. Or an elbow. Or an elbow, yeah. I mean, an elbow, you, obviously, but it's very weak in comparison to a kick. Or an elbow. Or an elbow. Yeah, I mean, an elbow, you feel nothing. You could do that on a table and it doesn't bother you at all. If you did that with your hand, that would really fucking hurt. But you see these guys fighting in bare knuckle boxing and you're like, that's really interesting how that's kind of taking off. It's getting bigger, right?

They're smart marketing. They're doing a great job. You know, they get a lot of hot chicks over there. Did you see that last girl? She're smart marketing. They're doing a great job. They get a lot of hot chicks over there. Did you see that last girl? She flashed the crowd. Was her name Ty something or another? Yeah, she showed everybody her tits after she knocked some girl off.

Nice combination, too. She hit this girl with a clean uppercut and a smooth left hook, and then she's like, and here's my tits, too. Sign up to my OnlyFans. She can buy a bonus for the next one. Yeah, I mean, it was on all over these websites. For a first, bare

knuckle boxer flashes the crowd. Smart marketing move, right? It's just I think it should be bare knuckle. I also think there should be no cage. I really think they should be fighting on an open field. I'm like, if you have a field for football why don't you have a feel for MMA just have them stand in the center just fight like because it's too

easy to get up if you have a cage yeah someone presses you up against the cage you can wall walk you get back up to your feet the case is it completely we oh Jesus that's the full one some good-sized cans too congratulations lady it was a nice combination, too, though. Watch the combination. Boom. And look at this clean left hook. Smack. Dang.

Very nice. She's hot and she gets crap. That was bare knuckle as well? Yep. Oh, wow. Yeah, well, they've got Paige Van Zandt went over there, Rachel Alstovich. So they've got these hot girls fighting each other. Is that in the U.S.?

Yeah. They can fight in, like, Wyoming. Okay. I was going to say, how do they get sanction U.S.? Yeah. They can fight in like Wyoming. Okay. I was going to say, how do they get sanctioned? Yeah. I think they can only fight in Wyoming. It's like fucking cowboys show up with dip in their mouth. I mean, the original.

Fresh bear scratches. All the rich cowboys. Yeah. Wyoming is a wild ass place. It's such a small population. And it's like super duper rich people in like Jackson Hole and then ranchers. Yes. It's weird.

Every hundred miles. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that's the only place where they do it or maybe Oklahoma. That fight was in Bangkok. Oh, in Thailand. The one you just saw? Yeah, that one was.

So they're doing it outside the United States as well. But they're signing a bunch of former MMA fighters that just sometimes their knees are gone. I think Hector Lombard was doing it as well. Hector's doing it, yeah. Mike Perry just beat Michael Venom Page.

Which is pretty crazy. That's a big win for him. Venom Page is a bad motherfucker. Monroe, Louisiana. Oh, interesting. Oh, it was in Montana? So they do have some in other states interesting so ones in Montana Monroe Louisiana yeah it's like I don't know how they sanction that I don't know what the rules are in terms of but I'm

surprised that no one has come up with a bare-knuckle MMA organization used to be in the beginning right well you know you have left way with a bare-knuckle MMA organization? Used to be in the beginning, right? Well, you know, you have Letwe, which is bare-knuckle, like, Muay Thai style with headbutts. That's David LeDuc, that fucking savage. He's the king of that shit. I trained with him once. He's a wild guy to watch.

We did jiu-jitsu together. Oh, yeah? Yeah, he came to Henzo's. He was in town for, I think we were at... Masvidal versus Diaz was New York, right? Yes, I believe so. Yeah. I think it was that card.

And he was in town. And he came to Henzo's the next day. And we did jiu-jitsu. He's like a blue belt, a purple belt. Yeah. I think he's talking about doing some MMA. I think he's thought about doing it. He definitely entered into a grappling tournament.

I saw some video of him in a grappling tournament strangling some people. Yeah, he's not bad. Not bad. He's a wild striker, though. I'll tell video of him in a grappling tournament strangling some people. Yeah, he's not bad. Not bad. He's a wild striker, though. I'll tell you that, man. And he's like one of the rare guys that puts combinations together with headbutts. So like as he's holding pads, he headbutts

the pads. Yeah, he's got a good social media too. It's like him breaking watermelons and shit with headbutts. What's his name? David LeDuc? Yeah, that can't be good for your head. That just can't. I mean, you're trying to. I mean, soccer players get CTE from that fucking.

Just hitting the ball? That light-ass, bouncy-ass ball. Imagine, like, slamming your head into tie pads. That can't be good for the noggin. I mean, I'd like to talk to him in a few years and just ask him what his memory is like. How many more years do you think that you can maintain this level of dedication? Have you thought about this?

Yeah. So it's all, number one, pending my health, particularly my stomach, which is like probably 70% better now. That's amazing. Probably 70% better now. That's amazing. Like, the last podcast, I told you, like, I literally have no idea what we talked about at all, besides me telling you that I was nauseous. Because you were trying not to puke.

I was so nauseous. I was just like, come on, fucking hold me. Tell everybody what happened. So what happened was you got staph infection. Henzo's in New York City was notorious for giving people staph, that basement, because it got no sunlight. It was down there, and you got a bunch of savages out there strangling each other and sweating in this puddle and it just got funky right and so you got bad staff so i had recurring staff infections in 2018 and then uh uh i was

taking oral antibiotics and it just wiped out everything in my stomach, like all the good bacteria, everything. And then I had what ended up being a fungal overgrowth, a massive fungal overgrowth in my small intestine, and a huge bacterial imbalance in my stomach, and then H. pylori, which I had. But it was misdiagnosed as gastroparesis because I did a stomach emptying test where you eat, like, radioactive eggs scan your stomach every X amount of like every half hour to see how it moves through the stomach. And I was emptying slow. And so they misdiagnosed as gastroparesis. I still have people message me every single day who like are catching up on the podcast. They're like, man, I just saw Joe tell me what you did for your gastroparesis. I'm like, I don't fucking have gastroparesis. tell me what you did for your gastroparesis i'm like i don't fucking have gastroparesis um but uh they misdiagnosed it after like four years i went to like all the best doctors in the

country and they're just useless like they just oh we'll do an endoscopy i had one guy do a colonoscopy and uh they're like yeah you look fine um and i was like okay well if i can't get these doctors to to figure it out i guess i I'm just going to deal with it. Hopefully it will get better. And then it just got worse as time went on because the fungal overgrowth just started getting worse and worse. And then it was, like, affecting my kidney function, and it was just, like, awful. And then I had to, like, partially I took a leave of absence. I guess I, like, retired from grappling for a year because I couldn't even, like, function as a human being, never mind.

Like, I couldn't even, like, hold the the conversation I was so nauseous all the time um and then uh we were doing the podcast and I was like traveling I was like looking at houses in Austin because he convinced me to move to Austin and I was here like eating restaurant food for like three days before and we went to the podcast and I was like fuck I can't even talk right now. Because you used to have to eat very bland food. Yeah, but even I would just wake up like 24-7 nauseous. Like the best way I can describe it is the worst hangover you ever had, like where you want to throw up to feel better but you can't, that's like my baseline. And then it gets worse from there.

And then like imagine you go to training and like now picture you have the worst hangover you've ever had. And you have to run a marathon 30 minutes later. Like, the more tired you get, the worse it gets. So then I was like, yeah, I just, I can't do this anymore. And then somehow, like, the stars aligned. And actually, his doctor in California, because he had some bad stomach problems, he's like, you got to go to Dr. Rabar, uh, and, and, and California. Um, and I saw him and he's like, yeah, I don't think you have gastroparesis. I think you just have, uh, uh, something in your small intestines, which is backing up into your stomach, um, and causing like a bile and food backup. And that's

why you're emptying slowly and it's mimicking gastroparesis. So he did a bunch of tests that no one's ever done and like my levels are like way off like one of the things was like normal was between like zero and five and then high uh was like uh like over five or over 10 and my level was like 555 it was just like like 50 times what it was supposed to be so he uh so I've been on this treatment now for a year, a year in October, and I'm like 70%, 75% better now. I can actually hold a conversation. I can eat food.

I can do shit. And now I'm competing again. So are there cases in medical literature that talk about people taking high levels of antibiotics? Because you took it over a 12-month period, right? You were constantly on antibiotics. Yeah, because so basically you take the antibiotics and it wipes out the good bacteria in your stomach.

And then your immune system is trying to fix that. So then your immune system is low. It's not as strong as it usually is. And you're training. I'm training all the time, so I'm always just run down. And then you get staph again. And then you take more antibiotics, and then it wipes out your stomach even worse so then your immune system's on overdrive trying to fix it and then you get staff again so you just

it's like a cycle where you just keep getting staff and keep fucking up your immune system in your stomach so there was probably like a year period from like 2018 to 2019 where i think i was on antibiotics more than I wasn't for staff. I would like get staff and be like on 10 days, two weeks of medicine. And then three days later, I'd have staff again. And I'd go back on antibiotics. Like it was just miserable.

And for anybody who's never taken antibiotics and tried to work out, it just drains you. It just kills you. You have no cardio. You have nothing. and tried to work out. It just drains you. It just kills you. You have no cardio.

You have nothing. So then I started using Hibiclens in the shower when I would train. It's like the soap that they use to wash their hands before surgery. It's like a super strong soap. And that helped a lot. And then I met his doctor, Dr. Rabar. And now that I'm getting better, I hardly ever get stuff. I get like maybe like once every six months.

Do you use defense soap? I don't. I know John was skeptical of that, but it's because he hasn't seen the research on it. Like defense soap is fucking legit. Yeah. And the good thing about it is it doesn't kill any of the bad bacteria or the good bacteria. Yeah. That's the thing with Hibiclens is it wipes out everything. That's not good.

But I'll try defense soap because like there was point where if I was on the mats and I didn't use Hibiclens, I was guaranteed to get staph. I will have them send it to you. Okay, perfect. But my friend Guy Sacco, who runs the company, he created it because wrestlers, like they were working with wrestlers, and they were all getting staff. And so he did all this research into various essential oils and things that are good for healthy bacteria, but kill off bad bacteria. So it's got like eucalyptus oil and tea tree oil. I would love to try it. And it also smells good.

It's the only soap I use. I'm going to try it. I use it every day. But it just, it stopped for me. It stopped all staff, ringworm. I was getting it all the time. Not all the time, but I got staffed twice and I got ringworm probably three or four times. Okay.

So you don't get it like before. It was annoying as fuck. I don't get it at all. And I wasn't getting it at all when I was using it on a daily basis. It's just, it also, it just like, it smells good. Okay. It's just better. It's like regular soap, but it's.

And they have wipes. They have all kinds of shit. They have stuff that even if you can't get to a shower immediately, they have these wipes that look like those butt wipes. Yeah. And you just fucking clean yourself off with them. But, yeah, I'd definitely love to try that. But to your original point of how long I'm going to compete for. Right.

So. But keep going on with that. So what did they do? How did he? What was the medication to fix that? So he just got to my house to do this show. And he's like, what are all these fucking pills? I literally have like 30 pill bottles that I have to take twice a day.

And it's just a combination of like over-the-counter stuff to help me. There's like nothing that's in there that's prescription. But he gave me, I'm on a strong oral antifungal. But he gave me – I'm on a strong oral antifungal. First I treated the H. pylori, and then I'm on a strong antifungal, and then all just, like, immune and, like, gut-supporting medicines that just take time to rebuild the gut bacteria and flush out the fungus and the bad bacteria. I know we talked about this before in the last time, but have you ever said, you know, I'm going to take like a month and just do some serious hardcore fasting and see if that helps? So I did do the fasting. It wasn't my choice. I just literally couldn't eat. But I did try to do probably about three weeks of fasting. And it just it didn't help. I think that I needed the

medicine. The first success I had was when you introduced me to Brigham with the ways to well. So they gave me, you know, a bunch of stuff, which increased my appetite a lot and was helping I was able to because my main thing is keeping weight on and gaining size. I'm like a very, I'm big, but I'm a small heavyweight. Um, so my, depending on my stomach, I'd be 205, you know, one day and then I have a good month and then I'm 225, 230, then I'm back to 210 and my weight would fluctuate based on how much I could eat. So they, they put me on this regimen and, uh, they gave me, uh, you know, a bunch of stuff that increased my appetite. So I got super big, but I was still getting nauseous. So it didn't fix the problem. I could eat more, but then I would just be nauseous after. So then I was using a combination of the Ways to Well stuff with his doctor. And

now their stuff makes me more hungry and I can actually eat food now. So everything's getting a little bit better. And I feel like I used to just eat like two eggs and I would just feel like sitting in my stomach. It wouldn't filter down so I would just be carrying food all day long and then I'm trying to force feed myself to keep the weight on and they actually did a test and they're like yeah you're you're not only can you not eat but your body's only absorbing like 60 of the food that you actually do eat so I was eating like 10 times less than I was supposed to and then just not absorbing half of it. So it was just like a total disaster.

How much longer do you have to be on all this medication? Well, I have to do a retest like this week. I have to take like a P test and some blood work. And then I'm going to do a meeting with him on September 20th, right after ADCC. And then he's going to tell me where to go from there. We have to see what my levels are. But I'm sure he's going to keep me on a lot of the stuff.

It's just like overall stuff to like help promote digestion and overall stomach function. But I'm just listening to what he says because everything he's said so far has been accurate. A lot of the meds are over the counter, right? They're all over the counter. Because he's a medical doctor, but he's also like a holistic guy as well. Like an integrative guy.

Because I had stomach problems too. I went to UCLA. I went to Cedars. I even went to the emergency room six times because I thought I had a heart attack. And yeah, it's like so much pressure on my chest. And they're like, it's not your heart. So I went to every doctor.

I go to this guy. He fixes me in one week. And it's been seven years. What was your issue? I had a parasite. Oh, wow. So they thought, and I went to the best doctors in the world, and none of them could figure it out. What kind of parasite was it?

I don't know what the exact name was, but I went to Mauritius, which is a very tropical island. And so I took antibiotics. I was cured in a week. So I know he's messed up because he's been over a year of treatment. That's wild. That's crazy. Yeah.

And still dominating everybody. I'm looking back now I have no fucking idea how I did this. So we're doing tape study a lot of times and we're doing tape study with my match against

Lucas Barboza and I'm talking about tactics. And so right before the points part of the the fight started, I set to guard and I'm like, I'm like, pause. So it's like 20 of the guys watching the tape. And I'm like, you see tactically here, I should have just kept hand fighting because he was getting really tired. He was way more exhausted than I was. I'm like, I should have just kept hand fighting and kept wrestling him i would have broke him in the next few minutes i'm like but i was so goddamn nauseous that i had to just fucking sit to guard and recompose myself to get ready for the overtime because i fucking just couldn't wrestle anymore

because i was so nauseous it's like a lot of stuff you see me do like isn't tactically correct but i'm just like trying to manage the nausea through the match what's crazy that when you talk about if your health holds up with most grapplers they, they're like, oh, my back, my arm, my this, my that. But you, it's just a stomach thing. Just my stomach for now, yeah. So if that gets to 100%, how much longer do you think you'll maintain this level of discipline? And activity.

First is contingent upon John coaching. I'm not going to compete unless John's coaching. Really? Yeah. So if he retires, you're done? Yeah, I'm done. Or if he fucking gets into a car accident or something, yeah. Wow.

So, you know, John is a major part of this, so I won't do it at him. Nat is also a huge part of it. She runs the diet and the lifting and supplements and everything. That's such a giant advantage yeah having a girlfriend who really knows her shit when it comes to like bodybuilding weightlifting she's so so probably with without john or without her i probably wouldn't do it um so as long as those two are there uh i'll be doing it uh probably until i'm 40 i want to i want to compete till i'm 40. Wow. 13 more years. That's wild. Yeah. Everyone's like, oh man, Gordon's in his peak

now. It's like, no. My peak is going to be between 35 and 40. Because what people don't understand is most sports, you peak earlier because they're explosion-based sports. Football, explosion-based sport. Wrestling, explosion-based sport. But in jiu-jitsu, it's a sport built

mostly around isometric tension. And my entire game already isn't a movement-based sport. But in jiu-jitsu, it's a sport built mostly around isometric tension. And my entire game already isn't a movement-based game. It's an isometric tension game. It's about negation of movement. I'm not athletic, so I don't try to make myself more athletic than the other guy. I try to make him less athletic than I am. So you peak, especially with my kind of game or a Hodger kind of game, you peak much later later so instead of peaking where you have you know you're 28 and now you're gonna your explosivity will decline after that age it doesn't matter my game isn't built around being explosive it's both about being strong built around being isometrically strong and negating movement so you hit your isometric peak between the ages of 35 and 40 while you still maintain cardio after 40 you start to

diminish with the cardio but between 35 and 40 is when i'll cardio after 40 you start to diminish with the cardio but between 35 and 40 is when i'll be my strongest and i'll have another 10 to 15 years of technical development which i've only been training for 12 years now so i'll have twice as much technical development and i'll be more physically mature by the time i'm 35 so that's the time i'm really going to peak it's not now at 27 it's's 35 to 40. Wow. That's wild. We just got to make sure we get more eyes on this fucking sport. That's the thing. It's just

guys like you, people like the Rutolo brothers, people like Mika Galvao, people who are submitting people. These young guys that are coming up, guys like Gary, exciting people to watch. Mark Galley's doing a real good job too. Yes. Yeah.

And amazing him coming over from Gee and now like that fight with Lovato was amazing. To dominate him

and almost finish him is really crazy. You know what's crazy about that is Nicholas never did standing position

ever in his life. Not in the Gee he never wrestled never did anything. All that wrestling was. Not in the Gi, he never wrestled, never did anything. All that wrestling was like two months of wrestling with John. That's crazy. I've never seen a Gi guy transition to no Gi like that. He's been training, what, five months? Even less than that. That's insane.

Just so smart the way he went to you guys. Yeah. Such a smart move. Yeah, he was willing. I mean, he's with it. Like he understands like, you know, what we're doing. And he has the same mindset of, you know, control that leads to submission.

So he's like a perfect fit. Have you seen like an uptick of people watching and people like who's number one in flow? Have they noticed that there's like a steady increase in the amount of viewership? 100%. I'll be honest with you. The problem is a lot of jiu-jitsu is just painful to watch.

Right. The gi is rough. John John Machado said that. He goes, man, the gi is so boring. Even I don't like it. This last who's number one was me and Penna was the biggest flow grappling show ever by a landslide. It was bigger than 2019 ADCC. Wow.

So now this ADCC is going to blow everything out of the water. So there's definitely a huge increase. So when you say big, how many people tuned in? I don't know the numbers. They don't give you the metrics? They don't tell you? No. Oh, they're like Netflix?

Yeah. Yeah, fuck out of here. Tell me the numbers. I know. But they said it was bigger by a landslide. The problem with the Gi, though, is it's competitor-based. I just don't see them ever getting massive amounts of people to go watch. They'll always have a lot of competitors.

Like last weekend, I think they had 5,000 or 6,000 competitors, but they're never going to get spectators. There's too much education to appeal to the masses, in my opinion. The best part is that people will never admit this and they fucking hate it. I think I'm the only person who can save Gi Jiu Jitsu. Like, if I started competing in the Gi, that's the only way people would watch it. But no one will ever say that. You have thought about doing that, right?

Yeah. I'm going to start. Mostly, I just want to learn how to teach in the Gi. Just so I can, if I ever have a school or something, I can teach students. So I'm confident in the Gi now. I trained with Merigali in the Gi and other Black Belt world champions, so I know where I stand. But I don't feel like I can teach Gi Jiu-Jitsu as good as I can teach No Gi Jiu-Jitsu. So I'm going to start training in the Gi after ADCC, just recreationally.

And then if I want to compete, then I'll do a match here and there. But I definitely want to start training in the gi just to sharpen up the teaching and everything. Could you imagine if you won a gi world title? Well, that would also be a great way to get people to compete against you because they would probably jump at that. There's a lot of gi guys that are experts in collars and sleeves. I've seen them in the gi. People, they don't believe me. I'm like, are experts in collars and sleeves. I've seen him in the Gi. People, they don't believe him. I'm like, he's really good in the Gi.

I've seen him with my own eyes. They just think you lose your power as you put on a Gi. That's not how it fucking works. No. Like, John Jock Machado used to tell me, because, you know,

John Jock only has one hand. Yeah. So he, when he transitioned to Abu Dhabi, it was very easy for him. He goes, because he never grabs. Like, his game is all overhooks and underhooks, but he was elite in the gi and elite in no gi with basically the same game.

Yeah. He was so good, though. Oh, John John's a bad motherfucker. Like, all of my entire game is like, if you're standing and I'm on bottom, you go into ashi garami. Well, if I have pants to grab and I'm in ashi garami, it's going to be easier to knock you down. Yeah. If you're on your knees, then I go butterfly sweep with sumageshi's if i can get to a belt and pull you onto me right it's sumageshi's easier and then it's forcing half guard from top

position and if i can get to half guard and i can feed a lapel and use a stronger crossface i can pass your guard easier yeah and then mount and back there's just more friction to hold people and more collars to strangle with it's just the main thing that fucks me up is, like, if I get caught in, like, a spider guard or a lasso guard, like, with an expert who, like, can, like, keep my grips and not allow me to start flanking the legs. And I get caught, like, in a deep spider guard or something. It's kind of annoying. But people are just idiots and just think that you just lose all of your jiu-jitsu if you take the gi off or put the gi on. Yeah, that's pretty dumb, but they're hoping.

But at least you could trick them into competing with you for a little while. I don't think we've ever seen a no-gi guy go to gi, though. Like a strictly no-gi guy. I can't think of one. It's always been gi to no-gi. Yeah, no, I don't— So gi's more technical. Right.

Got to train in the gi to be good at no gi. Well, that was always a weird thing where MMA fighters would tell me that their instructor made them train the gi. I go, explain how that makes any sense. Yeah. And Eddie Bravo would say, like, okay, now imagine if you were supposed to be playing in the U.S. Open for tennis. And they say, my friend, you got to learn racquetball. You're like, what? It's different. It's a fucking, there's a wall. Why am I playing racquet Open for tennis. And they said, my friend, you got to learn racquetball. And you're like, what? It's different.

It's a fucking, there's a wall. Why am I playing racquetball? Yeah, imagine. No, they've got to get more technical. Imagine any Olympic training center. They just bring in geese for the wrestlers to wear. Right. Like, you're going to do judo today.

I always thought that combat samba was so strange, because they're wearing headgear and shin pads and MMA gloves and shorts, but with a kimono top. Yeah, that's out there. That's what Federer was in. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's where he came from. Yeah, I mean, he was a world champion in that. But my career is rolling around on the ground, so I can't really talk shit.

So you think by the time you're 40, then you'll be done. Where do you think the sport will be by then? I mean, if you really look into the future in 13 years, how big do you think can it grow? I think there's going to be some money. I mean, the problem is, like, I'm trying the best I can, but I'm one guy. So, like, I'm trying. I mean, there's a trickle-down effect, so everyone who fights me gets paid, like, twice as much. So athletes will make more.

But I think that it is possible to bridge the gap into a spectator sport. I think there's always going to be a cap on how many people will watch it. Like, it's never going to be as big as the UFC. But I think it will be a lot bigger than it is. And I think that we can start getting people to get paid well as, real athletes for for matches like um i think that i'll be making seven figures a fight and other people are making six figures a fight um so that people can compete and not have to worry like they can just compete and be athletes like right now if you want to make a career you have to own a school or you have to teach seminars you have to do something else

you can't just be a competitor um like for most people um you know now if i'm competing i can be like i'm the first guy i think who can just make a like a career and be rich off just competing um but that we're a long way off to have anybody else be able to do that how much of an impact has i know you just recently started using a cold plunge how much of an impact has that had on your recovery yeah so i uh i had the morose co um and uh you were talking about it and brigham had one and for those of you who who don't know i fucking hate cold water like if it's who doesn't it's not like if it's below 80 degrees i won't get it it. Below 80 degrees. So I'm, like, talking to Rogan. He's, like, been trying to convince me since I met him.

He's like, sauna, cold plunge, heat shock proteins. Try it, bro. And I'm like, so then one day I'm like, oh, fuck. So then our friend at Roca was doing an ice bath. And it was, like, one of the ones that you, like, pour the ice into. Like, just a bucket, and then you pour the ice in. So I like said it, I got in it and I was like, oh, this is fucking terrible.

And I sat in it for like five minutes and I got out and then I messaged Rogan. I'm like, I just did an ice bath. He's like, which one? I'm like, I'll just pour some ice in. He goes, yeah, it's fucking weak shit. You can only get it to like the high 40s. You can't get it down to freezing.

And I'm like, okay, so I'll try a real one, I guess. But I felt, I don't really feel physically a lot better, but I feel so mentally sharp after I do it. I feel, like, very calm for the rest of the day, for, like, the next 24 hours. And I feel just like, if I want to go to sleep because I basically just had a fucking panic attack, I can warm up and I can go to sleep. Or I can, like, wake up and, can go to sleep yeah i can like wake up and like do shit that i have to do um so then i tried brigham's at like 30 degrees and i sat for three minutes and i fucking got out i was like on a different planet yeah that's the morosco one and shit and it was like it was like actually freezing there's ice floating around i was like oh my god that was

terrible um but then i felt really good after and And so now I do them like five times a week probably. I do it like five times a week. I just got it. And I sit in usually three, four minutes. And I did seven one time. And I could have did more. I should have did more. But you got to like be in the mood to go for a record.

Yeah. I did it once for 20. But I did it because I filmed it. And I put it on Instagram. I was like, I just want to see how long I could go. Wow. So I just filmed it. And I did on Instagram. I was like, I just want to see how long I could go. Wow. So I just filmed it and I did 20. It was fucking horrible.

And I couldn't warm up for the rest of the day. I drove to work. It was 95 degrees outside in Texas. I drove to work with no AC on. My windows rolled up shivering. Yeah. We did it the other day. I had like a barbecue at my house.

And one of the guys who's here filming uh for future kimonos one of my sponsor uh he's like a cameraman and he's never done an ice bath before so he gets in and i'm like sitting down i just did it so i was sitting by the fire warming up and i look back like fucking i don't know it felt like a half hour late and you're still in there and we're like i'm like how long has he been in there for like 12 minutes i'm like oh fuck so he gets out and he's like yeah i could have did longer but i don't know i just figured i would get out. I'm like, oh, fuck. So he gets out and he's like, yeah, I could have did longer, but I don't know. I just figured I would get out. So I'm like, okay. So I don't think anything of it.

Like two and a half hours later, he comes up to me and he's wrapping the towel still in his underwear, just shaking. And he's like, do you have a shower I can use? And I'm like, yeah, man. Go to the bathroom. He sat in the shower with the water as hot as it could go for like an hour.

And he comes out. He's like, okay, I'm a little bit better now. Like still shaking. When you go from cold plunge to sauna, it feels amazing. Because you warm up instantly. Well, it takes a couple minutes, but I mean the 185-degree sauna feels like nothing. Is that okay to do, though? I always thought it was hot to cold.

But you can go cold to hot? Yeah, it's okay if you're not a pussy. Yeah, you go, you should always end in cold, though. Okay. You end on cold because the idea is you want your body to reheat itself. What temperature do you do for the cold plunge? Because I hear different things. You should do 40, 50 for a couple

minutes. He's got it at 36. Yeah, we have it at 34 at the house and this, the blue cube that I have here in the studio I love, it's a little different than the Morosco because the water circulates. So it's even more uncomfortable. And that's 37 degrees. But I can't differentiate between getting in that at 37 degrees and the Morosco at 34. It feels the same to me because obviously three degrees is nothing. But that one thing that does feel different is the circulation of water.

So when you get in the blue cube, you're like, Jesus, what the fuck is this? It's like it's more uncomfortable. If you move in the Morozco, you feel it like, oh, fuck, I'm getting cold way faster. Yeah, like when I check my watch to see what time it is, how long I've been in there for, like just the movement, like then your like fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck someone commented the other day on my Instagram like like move around more because apparently when you sit still either body creates like a thermal layer hmm where it like I don't know apparently you don't get as cold yeah move around

so I started like moving around and I was like oh I'm gonna sit still down that's where the blue cube is really excellent, because the blue cube is the water's always moving. So you don't ever get that thermal layer. I'm trying to convince him to do it. Oh, fuck. I wish we could play. So he had his girlfriend go in the thing.

It's fucking hilarious. So I'm like, so Rogan has this rule. I'm like, he fucking invites people to his house, he's like i'll give you a thousand dollars to do a minute i'm like like you should do it with lena he goes okay he's like there's no way she'll be able to do it i'm like i don't know money's a pretty big motivator for lena so she fucking he's like i'll give you a thousand dollars to do it for a minute she's like a thousand dollars he's like yeah he's like okay so she gets in. I'm trying to coach her. I'm like, nice deep breath. I'm like, she gets in.

She's like, oh, oh, my fuck. Okay. So she's shivering. And I'm like, nice deep breath. Take it easy. She's just screaming, $1,000. $1,000. Turn it off.

She gets in. It's like 15 seconds. She's like, how many minutes? How many minutes has it been? How many minutes? And I'm like, it's been like 10 seconds. And she's like, $1,000, $1,000. And she makes it through the minute, and she gets out,

and she's on the floor in the blanket, shivering. My daughter's 12-year-old friends did it. I had three of her friends come over, and I go, if you guys go in there for one minute, I'll give you $1,000. And their eyes are lightened up. They're thinking of toys, all the shit they're going to buy. Did they make shit they're gonna buy did they make it yeah man they all did it they all did it one one of my daughter's friend's sister who's nine did it nine years old she jumped in there for a minute just just gritting her teeth i know now i have to do it she's just gritting her teeth thinking about toys

i gave it to him in $100 bills too. These crisp, clean $100 bills. They're looking at it like, this is amazing. I go home, Joe Rogan just gave me this. Yeah, they're like, what if I do two minutes? I go, then you get $2,000. I was going to give them $1,000 a minute, but no one ever did more than a minute. When do you do it?

Do you first thing in the morning or post-training? Right before I get here. So I worked out this morning, and then right after i work out i go right into the sauna i do 20 minutes in the sauna and then i do three minutes into the cold plunge that's my general daily routine what about post-training does it help with lactic acid uh yeah it definitely does well it flushes your system in a wild way right because your circulation like, when you're in 185 degree sauna, it's really hot, man. The last 10 minutes is

rough. 185? Yeah. The last 10 minutes is rough. And I throw water on the rocks, too, so it's fucking hot. We're at Brigham's. We were supposed to do, like, 20 minutes. It's, like, me, Nat, Justin Wren, and Brigham. Like, the four of us, like, smashed into this four-person sauna,

which we barely fit in because we're all huge. And he's got the timer outside. The timer doesn't go off. So we're like fucking 27 minutes in. We're like, how long have we been in here? And he's like, oh man, we're like seven minutes over. I'm like, oh perfect. We're about to have a heat stroke. I used to do 25.

I was doing 25 for a while, but I would just be so tired after it was over. I felt like I was doing too much, like the time was too much. It was like I'd passed the point of diminishing returns. So I feel like for me it seems like 185 degrees, 20 minutes, and then as far as cold plunge, three minutes seems like the magic number. Occasionally I'll do five minutes. One thing I will do, though, if I go back the magic number. Occasionally, I'll do five minutes. One thing I will do, though, if I go back and forth and back and forth, then I'll do more sauna time.

So I'll do like 20 minutes in the sauna, and then I'll do three minutes in the cold plunge, and then I'll do another 20 minutes in the sauna. And by the time that 20 minutes is up, I'm barely suffering. And then I'll do another two minutes in the cold plunge, and I end it always on cold. That's what I was going to ask you.'s what I was gonna ask always end uncle always and uncle because it's easier to end on hot because it just warms you up you're like okay I'm done but when you end on cold then you're like what could you fuck it fuck and you make your body heat itself back up and that's where you get a lot of this the sauna is what I'm missing like I feel like if I do like a hard workout like in my in my gym I have to like take like ten minutes at least to cool down before I can get into the cold plunge.

My body is so shocked. I feel like if I just sat in the sauna and relaxed for 20 minutes after the workout, it would be a lot better to then move into the ice bath. It also increases your red blood cell count. It has a mild EPO-like effect and it it also maintains your heart rate so if you do a hard training session and you're you have elevated heart rate and then you go straight into the sauna it maintains an elevated heart rate like i've gone in the sauna with uh one of them chest straps on the my zones chest straps and it was reading 140 beats per minute just sitting there in the sauna yeah because i'd gone right from working

out and gone. And so it's so fucking hot. Like you don't get a chance to like completely cool down. So your body's pumping all that blood. It's like an extra 20 minute workout. It is. Yeah, exactly. While you're static, you're just sitting there and your heart rate doesn't go down. It just stays pretty, I mean, slowly. Well, it does go down slowly, but not when you're in there at 185 degrees for 20 minutes because you're fucking suffering. not when you're in there at 185 degrees for 20 minutes because you're fucking suffering. So when you're suffering, you're like, like, when I looked at my

watch and I see, like, I'm only at 12 minutes. I know it's 8 minutes to go, and I'm like, fuck, this is rough. That's me in the ice bath. I don't even look at the timer. I'm just counting the seconds. It's so much worse. I'm like, fuck, 5 seconds only went by. Yeah, it's hard, but the'm like fuck five seconds only went by yeah it's hard but the benefits are really worth it

the benefits for your immune system and then mental clarity as you're talking about I just feel so sharp mentally after like I'm like having all these ideas pop into my head I'm like answering emails I was like procrastinating so it's been good for me for sure I have one at the house I gotta use it once

you don't use it? I've never used it once. You just have it sitting there? Now that my girlfriend used it, I have to. He's like, we have one of these in Puerto Rico. I'm like, how is it? He's like, I don't know. I never used it. You have to use it.

And my girlfriend just did, what, two minutes yesterday. Now she's hooked. Are you still in Puerto Rico? Yeah. Do you stay in there? Yeah, I love it. Fuck taxes, right? I just always go back and forth, Puerto Rico, Miami.

So for taxes, you have to spend like 51% of your time there or something like that? Yeah, 183 days. But I always hit like 210, 215. I like it. I just get away from everybody and it's very relaxing. That's dope. I'm a homebody, so I'm not one of those guys who has to go out all the time. I thought it was pretty gangster you guys moving your entire organization to Puerto Rico

because they wouldn't let you train in New York. Yeah. How crazy is that? Looking back on that now, how fucking crazy was all that? Dude, I saw it. Tell you you can't do jujitsu. Did. What?

Like, the government's going to come in and tell you you're not allowed to train. I know a lot of people who lost their businesses. And now COVID's still around, and all the people who are yelling at you are just walking around like it's normal now. How about that Dr. Lena Nguyen, the lady from CNN, is now telling everybody that her children's verbal skills, their speech development was hampered by wearing a mask. Like, yeah, they could have told you that. They said that?

Yeah, people, speech experts would have told you that. This is terrible for children. This idea that you're just going to, with no problem whatsoever, stop society. Has there been any studies that show the masks were effective? N95 masks, they have an effect. But none of them are 100% effective. It's a respiratory disease. Respiratory disease is spread, period,

end of discussion. If you talk to virologists, they'll tell you, you cannot contain a respiratory disease. I mean, you could like protect yourself if you're in an area where there's like a heavy spread and you have an N95 mask that's properly fitted, it will have an impact. But you know, the most important thing is to protect your immune system. And that's the least discussed aspect of the fucking pandemic. Just be healthy. Yeah. Don't be fat. Don't be fat. Take a lot of vitamins. Vitamin D deficiency is a giant problem. At one point in time, they did a study which showed that 84% of the people in the ICU were deficient in vitamin D. The funny thing is I thought obesity to be the number one is actually, I believe, vitamin D.

Yeah. It was like 78% was obesity and 84% was- And what'd they do? They just had everyone go inside. Yeah. Perfect. Let's get fatter and paler. I was in Europe last year.

I got a ticket for not wearing a mask outdoors. Oh, my God. He sent me this voice note. I was so pissed. I was about to crack my phone in half. He's like, yeah, they stopped me outside and they gave me a fucking ticket. I'm like, can I just imagine if I was in that scenario? Like some fucking cop telling me, hey, I'm going to give you this fucking $400 ticket.

I'm going to give you a ticket for not wearing something that doesn't even work. Yes. Outdoors. Yeah. And now that they know that they don't work, like they've talked about it on CNN. I mean, like that same lady, that Dr. Lena Nguyen, just said that it's like facial decorations. That a regular cloth mask is like facial decorations. And they increase

the chances you get bacterial pneumonia, right? Yeah. Because if you wear the same mask over and over again, it just traps all the bacteria onto the mask. Fucking gross people. They're not cleaning that thing. It smells like your bad breath. I know you've got to get out of here at 2 o'clock, right? We're okay. You're good? Yeah. We'll keep going. Yeah, the fact that you guys had to do that and that you had to move

the entire organization down to Puerto Rico was just, I love that you did it, but it was like, wow, what a crazy sign of the times. We had to move somewhere because we didn't know what was going to happen in Austin, places were going to shut down. At least moving there, we had a place to train. So I was like, we'll move there. And then that was going to be like a three to five year thing. And then we were trying to open up a school and we just like couldn't open up a school. Disaster.

I went to a shopping center. There's 40 outlets. Two of them are occupied. I tried for a year to open a school. It was like impossible. I'm like, they wouldn't return my calls. Like it was impossible to work that. I'm like, guys, this is just, I don't a year to open a school. It was like impossible. I'm like, they wouldn't return my calls. Like it was impossible to work. I'm like, guys, this is just, I don't know what to do. It's a little too relaxed out there. That's the problem with living in paradise.

Island time, you know? So island time is real. It was just impossible. How much of a jujitsu scene is there now? Like, did you guys like, over there? Because you guys went there and, and I mean, how many people stayed and kept training? They had jiu-jitsu there. I mean, I think some of them were upset, to be honest. That you guys showed up? They're like, how are we going to compete with these guys? Right.

You know what I'm saying? But it's not too big there. But, I mean, everyone who moved there with us moved back here. moved there with us moved back here and then a couple of guys like three of the guys we have Fernando, Luis, and Juan who have lived their whole lives in Puerto Rico like Fernando's almost 40 he's been there his whole life and they moved to Austin with us oh wow to train so that was pretty cool but yeah when we were training out of our buddy's gym he actually used one of the he used a gym for one of his camps that uh where he brings guys down and then uh it was called combat 360 and we were just training there for the year trying to open up a gym which he was like hammering away trying to get people to

help us and just was literally impossible to do any sort of business john was going to strangle one of these guys so me and john go together and this guy's like trying to charge us and John just has no patience for incompetence we made was fucking talking to everybody there which is the problem we meet with this the owner of the shopping center and 40 stores two of them were occupied he's trying to charge like 250 a square foot so John just like looks like he's about to kill this guy he's like you're trying to charge me manhattan prices for this and i told the guy i'm like look around like we'll bring you you know if we get 400 students here we're gonna bring you football wouldn't budge then that was i was like all right guys it's just not

gonna work here then i was like here i like did the i did the show with rogan i talked to him for like a half hour just like probably most of his friends and he convinced me to move to austin i'm like i'm like rogan has this just like probably most of his friends, and he convinced me to move to Austin. I'm like, Rogan has this thing where every one of his friends, he's like, come on, bro, just fucking make the move. It's the greatest city ever. It's really. I love Austin. It's so great, and there's only a million people here. For now. You get around.

Where are they going to go? You have to build. There's no houses available. When you get around It's so easy Me coming from LA, everything was a fucking hour Everything Go to the comedy store at 8 o'clock at night

It takes an hour It should take 22 minutes from my house Everything takes an hour And plus in the morning, you want to fucking shoot yourself LA's the fucking worst It's crazy, going down to Orange County is death. It takes hours. It would take us two, three hours

to take my kids to Disneyland. It was crazy. It takes an hour just to get from LA to LA. And if the shit goes down, if something happens, if there's an earthquake, if something goes down, you're not getting anywhere.

You're not getting out of there. There's just too many fucking human beings. Also, people devalue people when there's that many people. People become like a problem. They don't become like a valuable asset. Like, oh, this is my community of people. That's my neighbor Bob. Hey, Bob.

No, it becomes all these fucks. Look at all these fucks in front of me. New York's the same way. Yes. But people in Texas are so nice. They're the nicest. Anywhere you go. It doesn't even matter matter They're all fucking armed Dude I fucking We fucking We fucking pulled

To Terry Black's The other day There was like a fucking 100 person line I parked like right in front A dude fucking runs out He's like I knew it was you

I knew it was your truck He's like come on in We're gonna take care of you They fucking cut the whole line Oh that's awesome They fucking got us Everything we needed And was like You guys need anything Please us everything we needed and was like,

you guys need anything? He's like, please let us know. And I was like, no, it's okay. Those guys are great. They're all so helpful. Terry Black's is the shit.

I eat it every single time I come to Austin. God damn, those beef ribs are preposterous. They're so good. There's sausages and brisket. I love barbecue. I'm so happy to be here.

There's just so much good shit about this town and then there's so many comedy clubs here and I've talked talked so many comedians into moving here now. He loves fucking comedy. I'm thinking I'm going

to see Kill Tony tonight. Oh, you're going to have a great time. The only thing I like doing because I'm from LA but not too much of a fan as I used to be

but the only thing I like doing there is going to the comedy store so every time I'm there I go like three, four times a week. Yeah, the comedy store is awesome

but we're recreating something like that here. We have an amazing scene. I mean, there's like three, four times a week. Yeah, the comedy store is awesome, but we're recreating something like that here. We have an amazing scene. I mean, there's like 12 world-class comedians that have already moved here. That live in Austin full-time? Yeah, that move here. And we don't even have, I mean, the main comedy club is still being built. My place is still being built.

I'll definitely be stopping by all the time. But we'll be ready somewhere around January, right? The turn of the 2023, we should be ready. Is it going to be multiple rooms? Yeah, we got a couple rooms. Yeah, it's going to be fun. And then there's a lot of other good spots around here too. Like there's a Creek in the Cave.

It's a great room. The Vulcan where we're at Tuesday and Wednesday nights every week. That's a great room. Then there's Cap City Comedy Club reopened, The Domain. So Austin has a booming scene. It's a great place for stand-up. It's just like they're fun crowds too, man. They're not fucked up and woke and annoying.

I was in the comedy store one time. Mark Maron was performing. This guy gets up, like starts yelling at him. And it's like it's Mark Maron. It's not Andrew Schultz or Anthony Jeselnik. And this guy looked like he was like on a gram of test. What's he yelling at him for? He's yelling at him because Mark Maron made some Jewish joke.

And he finally stops the bit. Marc's Jewish. That's what he says to the guy. He's like, bro, relax. I'm Jewish too. And this guy's like, it's not funny and stuff like that. I'm just looking like, who goes to a comedy club with that mindset? Self-righteous twats.

LA's filled with these fucking virtue signaling douchebags. They're filled with people that want to show everybody how righteous and ethical and moral they are. That's why I love Tony. Because Tony just doesn't tolerate it at all. He just fucking crushes you the second anything happens. He's the greatest host of a podcast, like a live podcast ever. He's the best at it.

That's just crazy. That show killed Tony. He's so fast. No one's faster. I used to see him in the comedy store all the time. And I'd be dying laughing, but people would just like the looks on their face. Oh, he goes hard in the paint. But if that's what you like, he's your guy.

Yeah, the dark humor just kills me every time. No, he's an animal. And so, you know, he's out here. Tom Segura's out here. Christina Pazitsky's out here. Yep, yep. Tim Dillon. Brian Simpson just moved here.

David Lucas is here. Hans Kim is here Duncan Trussell's here we got a lot of fucking comics here right now it's fun it's fun

so every Tuesday and Wednesday night it's a party at the Vulcan such a good time I love stand up comedy it's just weird to me because I remember growing up watching

Eddie Murphy's Delirious and when he was ripping on Arabs and stuff like that me and my brother were just dying we'd be like yeah he's ripping on Arabs and stuff like that me my brother were just dying like we'd be like yeah He's ripping on us now, you know

Like we made it Everyone's just like they think like being offended is like a badge of honor. It is. Yeah, it is It's something like it's social media social media fucked everybody's head up because everybody had an opinion now Yeah, everybody had an opinion people. Yeah the most opinion. The worst people. Yeah, the most complaining. Yeah, the people who don't have any accomplishments and just have all day to spend on Instagram. Those are the people who are most heard. That is what the problem is, is that they have the time to do that. And it's a great distraction from accomplishing anything in your real life.

If you just spend all your time complaining about shit, you feel like you're getting something done. My thing is intent. It's obviously they're just performing. Like, do you really believe, you know, like Chappelle, like, do you really believe he's just a bad person? Like, it just doesn't make any sense. They don't care if they really believe that. They care if they can pretend that they believe that

so that they have a target, so that they can pour all their outrage at and it makes them look more virtuous. But it's really just about cutting someone down to make yourself look better. If you look at the content of what Chappelle put out that they criticized, it's not transphobic at all. I've seen it six times. He's genius. And it's great that he does it and that they attack him because it shows how ridiculous it is.

Because then people watch and they go, what the fuck are you complaining about? Like, what is going on? Like, this is comedy. Comedy without victims can be pretty fucking boring. Yeah. Okay? It's like someone's going to take the hit, kids. But it's amazing because everyone they try to cancel who just doesn't apologize.

You just get bigger. You just get way bigger, yeah. Yeah, you just get bigger. Just don't quit. They canceled one of Chappelle's shows, right? Like, they went to the venue, and he had to... Oh, that didn't mean anything. No, I know it doesn't, but...

But those were silly people that worked there. They're like... Oh, they were the employees? Yeah, we will not stand for this. So he went to another place right across the street. Like, it was right down the street. It's just crazy to me, because... Last minute change of venue.

When I grew up, if you didn't like something, you just don't watch it. But that's not enough for them. Well, it's just these fucking people, man. No one can watch it. Everybody's special now. This is what happens when you give kids participation trophies for getting their ass kicked at soccer. They grow up and they think everybody's special.

No one's a loser. Everyone's amazing. Your opinion's valid. You need to be heard. You need to speak your truth. Go speak your truth. And everybody's like, I need to be heard. We can't tolerate this in our community.

Meanwhile, you're ready to turn on the next person. They'll never be woke enough. No one will ever be woke enough. When they fight, they'll push the boundaries until they eliminate everybody who's not this far left, and then they'll go further left. They'll go full communist. They'll never be satisfied. That's the point. That's the problem, because they're malcontents.

These are not normal, healthy, rational people with good lives that are successful. Didn't Kevin Hart apologize for years ago for that bit? And they still, it wasn't enough. It didn't matter. And he said he wasn't going to apologize again. He's like, I'm not apologizing again.

I did it a long time ago. I'm a good person. These are just jokes. They don't want to apologize because whenever someone apologizes, then they actually get canceled. Well, what they want is you to bend the knee. Bend the knee. Power.

Yeah. It's just a weird time for people and their opinions you know because it's so easy to get an opinion magnified like if you have an opinion and then a bunch of people retweet that opinion and you know you see people they spend all day on twitter just posting their opinions on things and and bitching about shit that's why i love ship always like i don't give a fuck about twitter it's not a real place yeah It's not a real place. Yeah, it's not a real place. Well, it's a real mental institution. That's what it is. If you, like, no bullshit. If you collectively looked at the people that post the most on Twitter and then you looked at the amount of medication those people are taking, the amount of therapy

those people are taking, the amount of anxiety and mental illness those people have, it's not representative of the general population. It's a sick group of people. Yeah, I mean, I just don't get it. Like, why should Andrew Schultz or Justin McFans not be able to go watch the show? I just don't understand that. Why should an adult not be able to go enjoy something that you don't?

It just makes no sense. Because people are crazy. It literally makes no sense. But it's also people that don't have, like, real struggle,, like physical struggle in their life. One of the things you find out about jujitsu people. Jujitsu is one of the best medicines for a human being because the exercise is so fucking difficult. It's so hard to get good at jujitsu. And then training is so hard that that everything else is kind of easy.

You have a real problem. Yeah. You're not fucking worried about bitching when someone's trying to break your arm. Yeah, exactly. People who don't—everyone's so comfortable now, they don't have real problems, so they just make up imaginary issues to complain about in their head. What they need to do is get some imaginary real problems like jiu-jitsu. It's not a real problem like you have to do it, but you should do it.

And if you do do it, you'll be better at the other things you do. And you'll be better at coping. Just your coping, because you're dealing with real adversity. Someone's fucking mounting you, trying to strangle you. That's real adversity.

It's not a microaggression at the office. But jiu-jitsu's tough out of the combat sports because basically you just get your ass kicked for the first three, six months. That's what people need. And you don't even know what's happening. There's so many people out there thinking they're the shit. They're nothing. They need to know they're nothing. They need to know that they're basically helpless.

And that's what's great. I remember the first time I ever went into jiu-jitsu class. It was at Carlson Gracie's. And this purple belt just fucking raped me. Just manhandled me. He wasn't even bigger than me. He was the same age as me. I had no disadvantage.

Yeah, you couldn't rationalize it at all. There was no rationalization. And I was like, I know how to fight. I used to kickbox. I can fight. I was a Taekwondo champion. I can fight. And this guy was just doing I know how to fight. I used to kickbox. I can fight. I was a Taekwondo champion. I can fight. And this guy was just doing whatever he wanted to me.

And it was like, wow. And I remember leaving there going, well, that's important to know. Because I didn't know that that was real. I didn't know that I was that – I thought, well, bigger people could probably kick my ass. And, you know, world championship black belts could probably kick my ass. But a regular person, no. It's like that's good good for you getting your ass kicked like that is fucking good for you because you gotta break it down before you could build it up and it's like as close to a superpower as you can get oh yeah like like grappling or fighting a normal person who has like no

martial arts experience oh my god it's like literally playing with a child yeah like you see like like bodybuilders grappling like jiu-jitsu God. It's like literally playing with a child. Yeah. Like, you see, like, bodybuilders grappling, like, Jiu-Jitsu guys, and it's like, doesn't matter. They're like, they're just, they look like children playing with their dad. Do you remember the old No Rules fight with Pedro Sauer? Pedro Sauer fought this bodybuilder, this fucking giant jack bodybuilder. He was Hunter Hickson. Yeah.

I remember that. The big monster. Yeah, it's like a famous old school, like, one, one of them, uh, dojo matches. No, I haven't seen it. It's another one of those cases where we were talking about like the early days of, uh, MMA, like recognizing that jujitsu is really like the only martial arts that delivers as promised. Yeah. Like a small technical person can defeat a small, a larger untrained person. And that's what it showed. I mean, I always heard for the UFC 1, they purposely picked Hoyce instead of Hickson or something like that because of his muscular stature.

Sort of. Is that true? There's a little bit of that. Also, they couldn't control Hickson. No one could tell Hickson what to do. Hickson was not playing any games. And Horian, I I think had a lot more control of the situation

if Hoyce was his champion but the idea was if anybody ever beat Hoyce then you throw in Hickson and he mauls everybody because Hoyler and Hickson had much more impressive competitive careers Hoyler certainly did but Hoyler obviously was much smaller yeah I mean he competed

at Abu Dhabi at 45, right? Yeah, exactly. All right, so tell everybody one more time. It's on Flow Grappling. Tell everybody the dates. ADCC 2022, September 17 and 18 in the Thomas and Mac Arena, Las Vegas. Awesome. Fantastic.

Gordon, you're the fucking man. Thanks for being here. Bye, everybody.