The School of Greatness - 335 Randy Couture on Becoming World Champion and The Modern Man

Episode Date: May 30, 2016

"A real man doesn't have to wear it on his sleeve." - Randy Couture If you enjoyed this episode, check out show notes, video, and more at http://lewishowes.com/335

This is episode number 335 with UFC heavyweight champion of the world, Randy Couture. Welcome to the School of Greatness. My name is Lewis Howes, former pro athlete turned lifestyle entrepreneur. And each week we bring you an inspiring person or message to help you discover how to unlock your inner greatness. Thanks for spending some time with me today. Now let the class begin. Welcome everyone to this incredible episode with the man of the hour, Randy Couture. I'm so excited about this. I did not want to stop this conversation. I had so much fun and enjoyed how far Randy went in this episode and how much he talked about.

We talked a lot about many things, but for those who don't know who Randy is, he's a former collegiate wrestler turned UFC fighter turned superstar actor, and he is best known for starring in all three of the Expendables, Ambushed, and the Scorpion King 2. He also served as a four-time U.S. Olympic wrestling team alternate and is a six-time world heavyweight and light heavyweight UFC champion and Hall of Famer. Now, he also served as a soldier in the U.S. Army, and he did that before he actually went into the UFC. So he served for many years, and then it wasn't until his late 20s and early 30s when he got into the UFC, when most people actually start retiring at that age. And he is the first of only two fighters to hold two UFC championship titles in two different divisions.

Now, he is known as one of the roughest, toughest guys in the world. And also, I was so touched by his generosity, his calmness, his love, his joy. I mean, he is an amazing human being. He's more than what it looks like on the surface. And we talk a lot about his history. You know, his father left when he was a young kid and he had a lot to deal with growing up and really wasn't able to express his emotions in a certain way and talked about how he's overcome that. We talked about the definition of a real man and what it means to be masculine in the modern world.

We talk about how to achieve your dreams at the age when people don't think is even possible. We talk about reinventing yourself as Randy has done over and over and over again. We talk about relationships as Randy has gone through many different ups and downs in relationships. We talk about how to raise children who want to be fighters. We talk about a lot here, and I'm super pumped and excited to introduce you to him because he is just a genuine, incredible human being, and I think you're going to fall in love with him as much as I did. Make sure to share this one out, guys. This one's a lot of fun. Check out the full video interview

back at lewishouse.com slash 335 because this one is a powerful one and we really go there in a lot of ways. Also at the end, Randy never got to tell his dad how he really felt about him leaving when he was a young kid. And at the end, he shares with me what he wished he could have told his dad before his dad passed away. So some powerful things here. A lot of great stories from working on The Expendables with Sylvester Stallone and Chuck Norris and Arnold Schwarzenegger and all these superstars. Shared some incredible stories.

And I think you're going to fall in love with this. So without further ado, let me introduce you to the one, the only, Randy Couture. Welcome, everyone, to the Sports Ranks Podcast. We've got the legendary Randy Couture on. Thanks so much for coming to this video, man. I appreciate it. You are like the epitome of the ultimate man, so I'm excited to have you come on here. You're like the ultimate badass, the ultimate man.

But I think the idea of you is like this ultimate badass and man. It's like you're also the nicest guy I've probably had at the studio. You're like the warmest, kindest, most gentle soul as well. Thanks. I try to keep it simple. Yeah, yeah. It's great. I want to share some facts about you that I found on the internet, and you have to tell

me if these are all true or not, because you never know what the internet says. But is it true that you served in the U.S. Army? That's correct. From 82 to 88? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Six years in the United States Army. Went in at 19, had a brand new family coming along, and couldn't afford to stay in college, basically. I walked on Washington State in 1981, 82.

Wrestling? Yeah, and didn't have a scholarship or any of that stuff. So I decided to join the service. My dad was in the Navy. My uncle was in the Navy. The Army seemed like a way to go for me. They were given a $5,000 enlistment bonus at that time as an air traffic controller, which I was interested in aviation. I originally joined because I wanted to fly.

And so I took the $5,000, went to air traffic control school and was an air traffic controller. But they figured out pretty quickly that I could wrestle. There was like a freestyle wrestling team with the Army. Yeah, the all-Army wrestling team, which I didn't know anything about when I joined. I won a post-tournament at Fort Rucker and then went straight to Germany. My first duty station was in Germany. And at that time, in the peak of the Cold War, there was about 5 million soldiers stationed in Central

Europe. There was a lot of soldiers because of the Soviets and the whole thing that was going on at that time. And so they had huge sports programs for morale and all those sorts of things. And I ended up winning a wrestling championship in U.S. Army Europe, basically. And I got a chance to try out for the All-Army Wrestling Team. Wow. And wrestle representing the Army at the Inner Service Championship.

And then found out that that was a qualifier for the Olympic trials. That's insane. So this whole thing took off that I thought had died, you know, when I got married and had my first kid. Uh-huh. You know, I was a one-time state champion in Washington and was trying to walk on and make the team. You didn't get a scholarship. They weren't looking at you.

No. You essentially weren't good enough for a D1 scholarship. Yeah, that's basically what it boiled down to. I had a couple of junior colleges that were interested in me at that time. They were looking for the guys that wrestled year-round that were going to the junior nationals and

winning national titles at that junior age bracket. And I never did that. I never wrestled freestyle or Greco at all. And then here I am in the Army wrestling Greco in freestyle, really first time I'd ever done it. Sure. Amazing. And so you went to the Olympic trials.

I represented the Army and was an alternate on the 88 Olympic team as a soldier. Amazing. In, in the four, four of my six year enlistment, I spent wrestling and won a couple of inter service championships and, and ended up placing very, very high in Greco. My coach was a Greco guy and, uh, Floyd winner. And, uh, those guys, those coaches were, were important to coaches were important to me because my dad wasn't really around. Those were the guys I looked up to. They taught me that work ethic.

And those were the guys I kind of emulated. Taught me how to be a man in a lot of ways through the sport of wrestling. So all my coaches, Coach Casebeard, Coach McAvoy in the Army, Coach Winter, and then in college, Coach Burnett and Coach Say, those were important guys in my life. And, yeah. What would you say is the definition of a man to you? What's it mean to be a man?

The definition of a man? I think a real man doesn't really have to wear it on his sleeve. You can be tender. You can show emotion. You can be vulnerable, if that's the word you want to use. You don't have to prove anything to anybody. You never let your ego get in the way of what's right, what you really need to do. And we all struggle with that.

We all have that. We wrestle with that, if you will. And I don't, you know, I don't know. Maybe it was because my dad was never around much. I was always striving to gain that, find that self-worth. If I wasn't good enough for my own dad to be around, there was always that kind of doubt in the back of my mind that I had to prove myself.

I had to earn it somehow. That's why I got into the sport of wrestling. I knew through stories from my mom that he was a wrestler. He wrestled. So I thought maybe I'll get his attention if I wrestled. It didn't work out that way but i found where i was supposed to be i found the thing i was good at i found the thing that helped me travel down the road and gain that appreciation and value in myself yeah did you

feel like you had a lot of aggression when you were wrestling or you're kind of taking it out on the mat on other people or i was never a fighter i'd never gotten it i had you know maybe two street fights all through school. And maybe that was because I was on the mat getting that physicalness and getting all that out on the mat. I was never really an angry kid. I think I was always kind of that guy that was smiling even when he was getting his ass kicked. So I don't know. it just wasn't wired that way yeah um and i think for a guy that walks up in a cage and fights somebody that's

people can't have trouble wrapping their brain around that yeah you know even walking out walking out the tunnel walking out to the cage i was always winking smiling you know this is what i'm here for this is what i train do. I'm here to have a good time and show everybody what I've been working on. And this is my opportunity. It wasn't about anger, animosity, aggression, any of those things. It was about competition for sure. There's a difference between being competitive and being aggressive and having that. Do you think a lot of the guys who maybe are wrestling or in the UFC or high-level MMA

are doing it out of competition or more out of anger, trying to prove something, trying to show their manhood? I think we're all competitive for sure. Everybody's an individual. What motivated them to step into it is a really, really personal individual question. Same thing about retiring. Everybody asks me because what about Mandalay Silva should he retire what about Dan Henderson who's a good friend of mine who's still fighting

well into his 40s should Dan retire that's a tough question to ask me because you're 48 when you retire yeah I definitely pushed it further than a lot of guys may push it Dan's been fighting longer than I fought. Still competing at a very high level.

It's a personal thing. Tito Ortiz, his first UFC was the same as me, UFC 13. He's still fighting, still fighting for Bellator, and still has that passion and wants to put himself out there and grind out a camp and go out and compete against somebody. I just had other things I wanted to focus on. Such a personal thing. Yeah.

So since your dad wasn't around growing up, who was the most influential person in your life? Well, my mom, obviously. She was working two jobs a lot of times to take care of three kids, mostly by herself. I had a chore list every week. I learned a work ethic. And just, you know, I was the oldest of three. I had two younger sisters. And there was a lot of responsibility on me as the oldest guy in the house, the only guy in the house for a long time to

take care of things, to get stuff done. Did your mom ever remarry? She did for a while. She was married to Don through my junior high and high school years. I guess it lasted about six years. There were

a whole bunch of things about Don that I really liked. He was an outdoors really liked he was an outdoorsman he was an avid hunter an avid fisherman he was one of those do-it-yourself kind of guys fix the cars you know let's build let's build a cement stairway in the backyard up to the back you know i knew how to do all that kind of stuff so for a kid my age that was like wow that's really cool you know i would love that sort of thing but the same time, he was kind of a verbally abusive, kind of an incessant tease, but always took that way too far. And it was, I think, hurtful in a lot of ways.

Yeah. So any confidence you gained, you got kind of undermined. There was something still wrong. Yeah. What about the male role models for you? Like the – Again, my coaches were real important. Some of my friends' fathers took me under the –

one of my best friends, Mark Baggerly, his dad, Mr. Baggerly, Ma and Pa Bags, they called him Mom and Dad. He was our Boy Scout troop leader. Tim Deachman, my neighbor, one of my good friends, his dad, John, you know, my car need fixing. I'll go to one of those two. They knew how to fix it. They knew how to build it. They knew how to take care of it.

And those were the guys that, you know, picked up the slack in a lot of ways. What would you say were the biggest lessons that your coaches, your wrestling coaches taught you on on the mat and off the mat and how was their approach to teaching? I think just diligence, whatever it was going to be, you needed to work for it. Nobody was going to hand it to you. Nobody's going to feel sorry for you. You better suck it up and get it done and do it yourself. Don't rely on somebody else. The sport of wrestling is one of those few sports, I think, that develops that kind of character. Spend the time,

run the extra mile, do the extra drilling. It's going to pay off. You're going to see the results and you're going to win the matches, the close matches, the tough matches. I think that I learned that from the sport and from those guys that taught me and made me work in the sport. Right.

What about being in the Army? What was that like? Wrestling, but also what was the energy like with just all the men in there? What was that experience like? I mean, formative time from 19 to 25 years old. Very long, yeah. What was that experience like? I mean, formative time from 19 to 25 years old. So looking, you know, going through military training, basic training and advanced training and aerosol school, primary leadership school. Those are all schools, military schools that I went through when I was in that during that six years as well as being part of an elite wrestling team and all the work that goes into that. I think you start to look at the world in a particular way.

You look through a specific set of eyes and apply that to every problem that you come up against. And I think that that's what ultimately carried me down the road and allowed me success to get through college from 25 to 29, It allowed me success to get through college from 25 to 29, older than most of the guys on the team that I was competing against and competing with. And then ultimately into MMA at 33, almost 34 years old. That's when you started. I competed until I was 48.

Was that your first UFC fight? I was 33, almost 34, yeah, May of 1997. A lot of guys retire then, don't they? By combative sports, most guys are over the hill at that age already. But I think that's changed a little too. Through the science of sports, 40 has kind of become what 30 used to be in a lot of ways. We're seeing a lot of guys. You can recover a lot faster.

Across the board, a lot of guys are pushing it into their 40s, well into their 40s where it used to be. And you pushed it maybe into your 30s or mid-30s as a professional athlete, as a high-level athlete. What's the difference between preparing for a wrestling match where you know you're not going to get kicked in the face compared to preparing for an all-out cage fight where it's like the guy's trying to literally kill you as opposed to pin you. It's a different energy. Wrestling is a concentrated version of MMA. A wrestling match, even if it goes overtime, is only going to last nine minutes.

The average collegiate match is seven minutes. A freestyle match is six minutes, and then there's some overtime if it's that close. It's quick. Yeah. And you're being called constantly for stalling, for passivity. So you've got to move. You've got constant action. That's one of the first things I had to learn was to temper that wrestling mindset that I'd spent so many years developing and know when I could rest, know when I could pull back, play position, take a break.

Because for a 25-minute fight, there's no way you can go at that pace. You're going to tank at some point. And you don't want to be there. Run out of gas in the middle of a fight is not a good place to be. So learning to kind of temper that energy, when to turn it on, when to turn it off. And that only comes with experience. So I think finding a good, healthy group of guys to train with, guys I knew and guys I trusted that were going to – I knew they were going to push me.

They wanted to punch me as bad as I wanted to punch them. But at the same time, they were going to take care of you. They weren't trying to hurt you. They weren't, you know, they weren't trying to prove that they were better than you or that I had a great group of wrestling friends like Dan Henderson, Matt Lillen. We all kind of got into this at the same time. And so we knocked the hell out of each other, but we had a blast doing it. What was the most memorable moment for you as a wrestler?

As a wrestler? I think the Pan Am Championships in Havana, Cuba in 1991. I was a Cuban in my weight class. I'd wrestled him several times. I'd never beat him. He was a silver medalist in the Olympics, a silver medalist at the World Championships. He was very, very good. medalist in the olympics silver medal silver medalist the world championships he was very very good uh and then i wrestled him in the finals in havana in front of fidel uh and i beat him that

was the first and only time i beat him uh it was it was amazing uh just a great match i was on you know it was like one of those times when you got everything right and you peaked and just had that that competition where everything just flowed. I picked him up and I threw him and I actually made the news, the throw did. So it was just one of those events where everything came together. Is that video on YouTube any chance? I don't know. I got to link that up in the show notes if we can find that.

Did you qualify for the Olympics then? That qualified the weight class, the hemispheric Championship, the Pan Am Championships. Wrestling is one of those sports where you have to qualify your weight class to go to the Olympics. Unlike the world championships in a non-Olympic year, anybody can go. Anybody that has a team can send a team and go to the world championships. Or the Olympics, there's a qualification process. You have to qualify through either having placed at the world's top six or top two in your hemisphere. Yeah.

And did you go there? I ended up losing in the trials. Oh, man. I was the number one guy in my weight class in 92 and 96 and managed to take second in those trials. So, yeah, devastated. That's tough. They go four years and then stumble in the final match to make the team.

So I was an alternate in both those years as the number one guy, the guy everybody expected. But I think that, you know, that motivated me. That kept me motivated into my 30s. You know, I still wanted to compete. I still felt like I had things to accomplish. And it worked out. Had I made one of those teams and won my medal, I probably would be coaching somewhere.

We wouldn't be sitting here talking, to be honest. You're 30 years old. I'm done. Achieve the dream. Yeah. I would have stayed in coaching and just continued to coach as a college coach. Yeah, I would have stayed in coaching and just continued to coach as a college coach and would have never probably forayed into MMA and done all the stuff that happened there. Isn't it funny how sometimes our biggest letdowns can turn into the greatest opportunities for us? Yeah, if we keep our wits about us and stay focused and not let it change us and ruin us as people.

I play on the USA team for a sport called Team Handball. Oh, yeah. Great sport. Yeah. I've been to the last Pan Am Championships in Brazil and Argentina, the last two in 2012, 2014, and the 2016 is next month. And so I'm going with the USA team to Argentina again for a week and a half to compete in the Pan Am Championships to qualify us for Worlds.

So I'm right there. Yeah. And I'm 33, so I'm still playing the sport kind of at an older age. It's not as intense physically as UFC, but it's still really intense. No, it's an absolute – It's a physical sport. Yeah. I'm a fan of the sport.

It's a great sport, right? I haven't lived in Germany for three years. It's huge in Germany. It's very, very popular in Europe. Huge, yeah. Much more popular than it is here. It's pretty much sport, right? I haven't lived in Germany for three years. It's huge in Germany. It's very, very popular in Europe. Huge, yeah. Much more popular than it is here. It's pretty much unknown here. Yeah.

And so I'm familiar with the sport. Yeah. That's cool. Did you ever play? Never played. Yeah. Watched it. Yeah, it's fun.

I like to watch it. Yeah, it's cool. But I never had the opportunity to play it. Yeah. So it's cool that you had that experience in Cuba. I'm going to be experiencing that here very soon. So how did you prepare then for UFC fights? You went from wrestling and transitioned into MMA and UFC.

How did you decide like, okay, I'm going to start punching people now? And I've never done that before. I've only been in two street fights essentially. I never learned to punch. Which is a whole different thing. A whole different thing. How did that transition happen? I used that wrestling eyes that I developed.

You look at the world in a particular way. Okay, here are the rules of engagement. Here's what I need to learn. Here's what I think, how I see myself as an athlete, how I match up. There's a lot of things that were habits that I developed as a wrestler.

First of all, the mental skills to deal with the adversity of competition, which is the difference between a lot of the best guys and some of the guys that had the physical talent but never really kind of got over the line, never really finished strong. I had the opportunity to work with sports psychologists and learn some mental skills and and apply that then to fighting and then the a wrestler breaks things down in a very tactical technical by the numbers kind of way that's how we learn in wrestling and i just started applying that same thing to to fighting

it's like okay i need to know what these jiu-jitsu guys are doing. How does this work? And I start putting myself in those situations and technically trying to learn their perspective and what they're trying to do. And what are the pitfalls for me as a wrestler who tends to be aggressive? Where am I going to get in trouble here? And the same thing with boxing, kickboxing, all that. I'd never really doneboxing, all that.

I'd never really done a lot of that. So I just had to keep putting myself out there, be willing to get punched, be willing to get submitted, be willing to take my lumps, basically, as I learned. But that learning curve, I think, was fast because I was a high-level wrestler and was willing to check my ego and just put myself out there regardless of what i'd done in wrestling that didn't matter at that point yeah so it worked out what was the mindset like the approach when you're like okay i've got a i've got a fight coming up how did you think did you think differently on a daily basis was your you know Where did you go in your mind, in your zone? Well, I think for me it was sit down. Okay, they want you to fight this guy. I'll sit down with my trainers, my strength coach, my ground coach,

my striking coach. Those are the three guys that are going to help me prepare. We'd sit down. We'd look at footage. We'd try and find the oldest fight to the newest fight of this guy and just watch him fight. Every fight or as much as he could. As many as I could find.

Wow. We'd watch him, get an idea how he progressed, where he was, where he won fights, where he lost fights, where he seemed to score, where he didn't seem to like to be, and then have to be rational about, okay, well, how does my style fit with this guy? Where can I put him? I have a pretty good idea of what I'm good at. How can I put him in positions where I'm in the best spot to win this fight, to make him

uncomfortable, to make him quit, to make him work harder than he wants to work and make him quit? And then you formulate a game plan. Okay, these are the things I need to be aware of and watch out for because he's good at these things. These are the things he doesn't seem to like or want to do or where he wants to be. And then you start fashioning.

Certain days you're doing strength and conditioning. Certain days you're sharpening striking tools. Certain days you're sparring hard with sparring partners that are making you work and making sure your mindset and your physical conditioning is up where it needs to be. Sure. And you map it out. Here's fight night seven days back. Here's my last hard workout because I need to rest and have my legs under me.

You just map it out. Okay, these are my strength conditioning days. These are my mitt work days. These are my hard sparring days right and you go all the way back to here's the day we are actually watching film and and formulating this plan and now you start executing the plan every day and uh and you you get halfway through it you're like man what was i thinking that looked really good on paper but i am beat. I need to take a day off. I need to learn. You know,

that's what I had to learn. Yeah. I had to learn to listen to my body. I had to have a confidence in the plan to take a day off here or there to let myself recover, let myself, you know, get a breather,

active rest days where you're out of the gym. You're not in on the mat, grinding out another day, go ride your mountain bike, go do something else that is still physical but not the same thing. It gives you that break. The grind is tough, man. And when you were – let's say it's an hour before the fight.

What was your routine like? You're in the arena. You hear the noise, the 50,000 screaming fans. That's why you're smiling. You're the ticket. That's why you're smiling. You're the ticket. That's that time. What do you do, think, breathe, eat, feel? You don't really eat much then.

Most of that's been taken care of. You eat earlier in the day, and you're really operating on what you ate the night before, after weigh-ins. You have a ritual, a warm-up. You know, you wear a specific set of clothes. You go through a specific set of calisthenics and warm-up exercises and stretching, and then you have a game plan. So, you know, you're going to put yourself in kind of drilling

in those situations, the things that you've trained to put yourself in kind of drilling in those situations the things that you've trained to do that whole 10 12 weeks uh you mimic those as much as you can in that back room on that little mat yeah uh and you know the the monitors are there so you can see what's going on the other fights you have to be careful especially when you have friends fighting you can't emotionally plug in get excited into those because I'm spending energy that I'm going to need when I got to walk out there and I got to fight. So that's always a hard thing too. But just, you're very focused and enjoying the moment. Yeah.

I think that's the main thing. Can't let go of everything else. Yeah. And everybody's like, aren't you nervous? I'm like, no, why would I be nervous? I chose to frame it differently. This is something I learned through dealing with a sports psychologist.

Nervousness implies something negative is going on, something you're nervous. Automatically, you have a different posture and demeanor when you say you're nervous about something. I'm not nervous. I'm excited. You were smiling a lot. I've worked hard for this moment

to walk out there in front of everybody and show them what I've trained to do, what I'm here to do. It doesn't mean I'm going to win. It doesn't mean it's going to go my way. But you set yourself up to win. But the people who really care about me don't give a shit whether I win or lose. All the fans and everybody else, they may be hot and cold whether I win or lose. But I can't place my value on that as a person, as an athlete.

Where did you put your value? Friends and family. I mean, those are the ones that really matter. Value yourself enough to do the work, to prepare the best way you know how. And you make a mistake, you get knocked down. You got to pick yourself back up. Learn from that experience. Was there ever a time where you were like, man, there's no way I can get out of this?

Or maybe it's going to be really challenging for me to get out of this situation in the cage where you're just getting pummeled. You're just like in the worst, most uncomfortable situation. Yeah, I've been there a couple times. And then you somehow got out of it and you won. Was there ever a situation where you got out of it? I've been there a couple times. And then you somehow got out of it and you won. Was there ever a situation where you got out of it? I got out of a couple of situations. Probably the toughest fight I was in was the first time I fought

Pedro Rizzo. It was my first fight in Atlantic City. Big Brazilian kid, great kickboxer. Tough kid. It was a back and forth battle. I went out and won the first round, almost had him TKO'd. Spent a ton of energy trying to finish the fight. Exhausted.

Didn't finish the referee. Big John McCarthy was the referee. I'd cut him. I'd hurt him, but it didn't stop the fight. And then the second round, he came back, kicked me. I blocked the kick but punched myself in the nose, broke my nose. Oh, man. So I'm bleeding all over now, and then kick but punched myself in the nose, broke my nose. Oh, man. So I'm bleeding all over now.

And then he kept kicking me in the leg. It was the first time anybody had really kicked me. That's hard. And he kicked me in the leg 14 times, I think, in my left thigh. Same spot. I have a dent still to this day. Still? Where the tissue just didn't recover.

Right in the same spot. It's hard to walk when you get kicked in a number of times. Yeah, by the fifth round, he kicked me once, and my leg just gave out. I ended up on the floor. Really? Right as the buzzer ended. When I came back, and that was one of those times after the second round, I'm sitting there with a broken nose, bleeding.

Your legs are not broken. Just exhausted. I'm sitting on my stool looking at Dan Henderson, who was my corner man, and they give you that 10-second warning. Seconds out, 10 seconds. I did it after three minutes. I'm just sitting there looking at him, and he's looking at Dan Henderson, who was my corner man, and they give you that 10-second warning. You know, seconds out, 10 seconds. I did it after three minutes. And I'm just sitting there looking at him, and he's looking at me. He's like, what are you staring at me for?

Let's go. I had to make a decision right then. Wow. What was I going to do? And I got up and went out, and I won the third round, won the fourth. He won the fifth. So he'd won the second and the fifth. I'd won the first, third, and fourth.

I ended up winning a unanimous decision, but it was a brawl. Tough fight. Wow. First fight my mom ever went to. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my gosh. She was like, I'll never watch it again on TV. She always had to wait for that phone call.

Right. She's like, I know. I can see. You're fine. You're all right. I'm here. I don't have to wait for a phone call. She came to every fight after that.

Really? Yeah. That's cool. And I was in a fight up in Portland, Oregon, against Noguera, who's a great submission guy. And I was in a couple of tough spots in that fight and managed through. We prepared. The training process with my ground coach.

He understood the submission game as well as anybody, Neil, Neil Millanson. And, uh, we just kind of prepared counters for any potential submissions that this guy seemed to like. And I ended up in all about all of them and managed to get out of about all of them. Wow. I ended up losing the decision, but, uh, it was still one of the fights I'm proud of that. Wow. We'd done the work decision, but it was still one of the fights I'm proud of. Wow. We'd done the work,

and it was a great fight. I'm curious, how has MMA and wrestling affected and impacted your personal relationships, either with friends, with family, but also with intimate relationships? Well, I have, to this day,

some of the best friends that I've ever, I mean, through wrestling and fighting, some of the guys that are my closest ever i mean through wrestling and fighting some of some of the guys that are my closest friends the guys i rely on i know i can count on and i think they know they can count on me uh i know it's also been i've been married and divorced three times it's been a challenge uh staying connected uh with with with one person, with all the travel, all the, you know, just everything kind of has to take a back seat.

With your goals and your dreams. You're trying to be the best at something. And, you know, my kids, my family, they've sacrificed as much as I have for that. And it's tough. Challenging. Yeah, very, very's, it's tough. Challenging. Very, very challenging. Um, you know, I got married early. The first time I got married, I was, I was 19 years old and out of necessity,

I think I went on autopilot, you know, a girlfriend, uh, I dated the same girl my whole senior year in high school. And, uh, we, uh, kind of broke up. i was going across the state to washington state walking on the wrestling program there she stayed at university of washington and i'm like we're gonna stop how's this gonna work and uh we ended up breaking up but i came home i didn't make the team in november uh for thanksgiving the travel squad i got beat out by a senior. He went on the trip. I went home for Thanksgiving. We went on a date.

She called me three weeks later. I'm pregnant. Oh, man. And I went on autopilot. I'm like, I'm not going to be like my dad. Right. I don't care what happens. I'm going to be there for this kid.

It's going to be part of his life. I'm going to be there for this kid. It's going to be part of, you know, I'm going to be part of his life. I'm going to be there. I'm not going to be like my dad. And we ended up getting married that February. I quit school, walked away from school, and joined the service. And I was in the Army for six years. Had my second child, Amy, while we were stationed in Germany. And, you know,'re just slowly heading in

different directions as we grew up. She's a great person. We always got along. We raised two amazing kids. What's it like with the relationship with those kids? Again, you so focused and committed.

I think they understood it. They came to all the fights and I think they appreciated it. And, you know, they came to all the fights and I think they appreciated it in a lot of ways. It was an example of that hard work and that work ethic and all that. At the same time, there was the sacrifices. I didn't see him as much as I wanted to see him. I wasn't, especially after we divorced,

you know, from nine to 18, you know, wasn't there every day. I wasn't there as much as I'd like to have been or as much as they probably wanted me to be. But at the same time, fighting allowed us a bunch of things. Yeah, opportunities. As a professional athlete, there were things that were benefits to that. So the sacrifice went both ways. What are the main lessons you've wanted to teach your children about your your sons about what it means to be a man and be a good father

and well my youngest is 13 so he's just now kind of getting into puberty and and all that stuff and and uh he's an only child my only child for my second marriage and uh and uh so there's a lot of challenges ahead with him. And again, you know, especially now I'm as busy as I've ever been, uh, again, divorced and, and he lives in Oregon. I'm living, you know, in Vegas. Uh, it's, it's a challenge to get up there as often as I want to see. He's just now kind of getting to that age where he's got the confidence to travel a little more himself. But even then he, you know, he's got his own life. He's just now kind of getting to that age where he's got the confidence to travel a little more himself. But even then, he's got his own life. He's got his own friends.

He's got his own things that he wants to do. They don't always revolve around, well, let's go hang out with Dad for the weekend. And being a weekend father is a tough thing. It's tough. You want to have a good time. You don't want to have to discipline and make corrections and do any of that stuff when it's the only time you get to see him this month. And so that's a challenge.

His mom's a very strong person, very strong personality. And I think that's a challenge too. What lessons are you trying to teach? Your other son's a fighter, right? Ryan's fighting. He fights for Bellator, and he's a very, very smart. Went to college, got his degree in math, and then decided he wanted to fight. He's always been into wrestling through junior high and high school

and did very, very well but was always a very smart kid. What are you trying to instill in him from the lessons you've learned? I think he understands it. He it it's it's about work but at the at the root of it you have to have a passion for it yeah you have to love it if you don't love it especially in a sport this difficult you're not gonna make that's true you're not gonna make the sacrifices and do the things you need to do to get there, to be the best at it. He may not be the most athletic or the most technically talented guy, but if you're willing to work, that'll make a huge difference.

And he seems to be willing to do the work. What's your approach to teaching him what it means to be a man? Again, your father wasn't there for you. How do you try to teach him about masculinity and being a man? I don't know. I kind of follow what I learned in the Army, which is lead by example. And yeah, I've made mistakes.

I've made plenty of mistakes. But at the same time, I've owned them and been willing to be honest about them and not try to hide or deny. Right. I think you have to stand up and take responsibility for yourself. And I think he gets that. In a lot of ways, he's a lot like me, which is cool. I'm proud of him. He's a lot like me, which is cool. I'm proud of him.

He's a great kid. He's married now. Got married going on two years now, a year and a half now. Wow. And his wife's lovely, and they live in Vegas and train with me. That's great. Getting more and more involved in the gym and trying to run the gym. I'd love to just hand that all off to him and go right off into the sunset and do my thing.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a great kid. That's cool. He does a great job. Every single person that meets him is so complimentary about what a nice man he is and what a great kid he is and what a great job he does, how easy he is to work with, how fun he is to be around.

Sure. I mean, what more could you ask for? Yeah. Talk to me about toughness and aggression. You know, you're considered, again, a lot of people consider you one of the toughest guys in the world, but you're also one of the nicest. What does toughness mean to you? And is it that hard work attitude or is it something else? Yeah, I think it comes from that work ethic. But it's not something you know you have unless you're willing to test it,

unless you're willing to put yourself out there. I don't think people realize, and I guess maybe it's the sport of wrestling. We used to do grind matches, 90-minute matches. 90 minutes? Straight. Come in, tie your shit on. No breaks, no water, no nothing. You're going to wrestle for the next 90 minutes straight.

Don't know where to hide, know where to go. That's the first time I've seen grown men actually break down. Really? And cry. And just be, I mean. This is high school or college? You find this was on the national team. Wow. We had some days like that in the Army as well. I mean, you find this was on the national team.

Wow. We had some days like that in the Army as well. High school was, I mean, wrestling is, for all intents and purposes, wrestling is the Marine Corps of high school athletics. That's it, man. That and football, I would say. Football's pretty close. It's tough. And you're going to find out where your breaking point is,

how mentally tough you are, how much you really want to be there, how much you really want and love to do what you're doing. And I think you find those boundaries and you find that you can go a lot harder and a lot longer than you think you can. Your brain is telling you, oh, I'm tired. telling you, oh, I'm tired. But you suck it up and you either have a coach or your training partner that pushes you, that motivates you to keep going, to keep going, to keep going. Even when your brain's screaming that you want to quit. Wow.

And your body, then the next thing you know, you've gone 15 more minutes. You've gone 20 more minutes. When 20 minutes ago your brain was telling you you wanted to give up. Yeah. And then you, I was like, wow, I didn't quit. I kept going. And now that boundary has been set back a little bit further. Now you're going to go that far before your brain starts screaming.

And again, through the help of your, your, your own passion for it, your training partners who you don't want to let down and your coach who you don't want to let down, you're going to go another 10 minutes. And now I got pushed back 10 minutes further. And you just keep pushing that boundary back and going harder and farther than you thought you could go.

But if you don't absolutely – That's mental toughness. Yeah. And that was – it became my goal. It's something I learned at Oklahoma State. I think in the Army, I learned – junior high and high school, I learned the – I loved the sport. And I learned – junior high and high school, I learned the – I loved the sport. In the Army, I learned that I could compete on an international stage.

I don't think I had that confidence to do that when I was in junior high and high school. Interesting. I think when I was in the Army, I learned I can compete at this level. You learned the toughness. I was an alternate on the Olympic team as a soldier. I can do this. Yeah. Then I got a scholarship to go to Oklahoma State, one of the best wrestling colleges historically in the world. And now I learned to win.

I learned what it takes, the mental toughness to push myself and to work harder than anybody else and win. And I didn't always win, but I learned that I could win. And again, went on to win four national titles in Greco and be the number one guy in 92 and 96. Fell short, didn't achieve my goal, making the team, winning my medal. But I think that, again, that setback motivated me that much more to continue to keep going, to push myself further.

I had more to achieve, more to do, and then MMA rolled along. And I think if I'd have won my medal, I'd have been perfectly happy. I'd probably be a big old fat wrestling coach right now blowing a whistle somewhere instead of continuing to – I probably would have never been a fat wrestling coach. You'd still be training. Yeah, yeah. But you went on to win six UFC titles, right?

Is that right? And I'm curious. You said this is the first time you saw, I guess, boys, men cry when they hit their breaking point wrestling in these nine-minute sessions. What was that like when you'd see – was this a lot of people would do this or a few people would break down and cry? I saw it a couple times. It doesn't happen. What would happen in the room when you saw that? Were people accepting of that or were they like quit being – quit crying and stuff?

No. That's the thing. Good training partners, your teammates, guys that you know you can trust. Again, when you find yourself in that situation where you can't go anymore, where you just – you literally emotionally break, they're going to pick you up. They're going to help you go further, help you get through it. And that's what we do for each other. So it was more about support and love and connection, not like quit being a pussy. No, I mean, no, it was never like that.

You're never going to chastise that guy because that could be you tomorrow. Right. You don't know. Interesting. So you really were embracing that experience. Yeah, I had to. That's cool. We're all struggling with it.

A 90-minute match is a long match. It's a long time. We're all struggling. We're all fighting the same fight. And so on any given day, that could be you. And you realize that. There's a recognition of that vulnerability of that potential of that wall that barrier and we're all trying to push it back yeah but we're

all we're all fighting it do you ever feel like you had to suppress uh emotions when you're fighting like i have to be tough and strong i can't show my emotion. Absolutely. Really? I think we learn to box things up as athletes. You know, we learn to stuff things, put them to the side and stay on task, stay on focused on what we need to do to go out and be effective and win. How do that affect you? That's what's weird about acting now. You have to express yourself. Yeah, they want that. acting now you have to express yeah they want that and i've spent my entire life and i had that tendency anyway yes uh to to stuff things and not be terribly open and gregarious with my emotions

sure i think you know even as a kid uh so i spent a ton of time boxing it all up pushing it to the side and staying focused on what I needed to do. And now I'm supposed to just let all that out. Like this is weird. Prior command. Yeah, this is weird. Do you feel like boxing the emotions, that that held you back in any way or that it was the only way to be successful? I think that's where it had a detriment and affected my personal relationships.

Do you feel like you could have done it? I had an adversity, and maybe it was because of the type of personality that my mom was and that my dad wasn't there. I didn't have an example in the house on how to deal, especially with those kind of confrontations, those emotional type of confrontations. And so I boxed all that up and just not engaged at all. I didn't like that kind of confrontation, which is weird for a guy that gets in a cage

and punches people in the face to be afraid of that kind of confrontation. An emotional confrontation. Yeah, I couldn't deal with that. Really? I hated it and had an aversion to it and would do anything to avoid it. And a lot of times I would stick my head in the sand and not deal with issues, not deal with problems. And that's, I think, you know, I was good at it as an athlete. And I think that being good at it in life, that wasn't good. You know, things got bigger, things festered. They,

they took till they got to a point where they're insurmountable. You can't get over them. The connection is so fractured and broken that you can't fix it and end up walking away. Wow. Do you think if you learned this at a younger age, whether you had your father around to guide you in that process or you just learned how to share your emotions better and communicate certain things that were frustrating you or whatever, do you think you'd still be as ferocious of a warrior in your sport? That's a good question. It's hard to say.

I think, yeah, part of what made me who I am and what made me good at what I – it was my ability to kind of push that stuff to the side and stay focused and being a bit stubborn, pig-headed, I think. Being a bit stubborn, pig-headed, I think. And had I learned to stand up in those emotional situations for myself and say what I really needed or say what was really bothering me and confront, I probably would still be married to one of those ladies. Really? More than likely. The first one, we were so young. Yeah.

Gosh, that's an excuse. Right. You're just figuring yourself out still. We had no idea. Yeah. Really. We have two amazing kids that are amazing despite us. Yeah.

You know, I had a lot in common with the second one. But she's, again, a very black and white person, a very sharp-tongued, very straightforward. And that kind of confrontation, I couldn't deal with it. I didn't have the skills to deal with it. I think I'm better now. There's something about turning 50 for me. Most people say it's 40. Right.

I just say I'm a late bloomer. Yeah. I don't know. But it was something about turning 50 for me that all these things kind of I felt like came home and I understood myself better than I ever have. I knew what I – I know what I want. I know what I'll put up with. I know what I won't put up with. I'm better at communicating what I need, what I, I know what I want. I know what I'll put up with. I know what I won't put up with. I'm better at communicating what I need,

what I feel. Uh, I just didn't have all those skills in my twenties and thirties. Certainly. What do you think it takes to learn those skills? Is there a classes? Is there, you know,

what is it? I think being willing to open yourself up, you know, I spent a ton of time when you, when I failed at something like marriage, I, I, I want to know why, you know? And so I, I spent a ton of time when I failed at something like marriage, I wanted to know why. And so I'd spend a ton of time, more time than I care to admit, with counselors, you know, digging around in myself trying to figure out how did I do this again? How did I let this happen?

What am I messing up? You know, why? I wanted to know why. I think if you're willing to put yourself out there, there's tons of places you can find answers. You can, but you got to be willing to muck around in that dark shit that's in there that we all deal with. It's a lot of nastiness in there.

We're all wounded. Somewhere. All faulty somewhere down the line. Yeah. You can have the best parents in the world and in that, they're damaging you. They're wounding you. Or you could be bullied in school or have some other –

A million different reasons and things that could have happened. Learning disability or something, yeah. Interesting. So what is your definition of masculinity now then? Like if you wanted to teach your sons and you're like, okay, this is what it means to be masculine, what would you say is that definition? Man, it's such a tough question. I know.

I think just being true to yourself, true in your heart, and being strong enough to let people see that. I think we have a tendency to put up walls and put up fronts and not really, you know, we're scared to let people in, to let people see really what's going on, really what we feel like. And I think a real man is strong enough and confident enough to open up and let you see. You think a real man cries? I think a real man does. Yeah. You know? Expresses emotion.

I think you have to, yeah. Yeah. I think you have to uh or you're not feeling you know that's what you shut it off so long that you just don't feel anymore yeah and i think that's not good yeah i love i love the answer i got i got a few more questions for you if that's cool we got some time still yeah okay come on i'm loving this um some other facts you're on dancing with the stars huh yeah how was. How was that experience? A blast. Karina Smirnoff was

amazing. Amazingly talented and fun. Fun to work with. I've interviewed Julianne Hough. I've had her on the podcast. She was great. She was a judge when I was on. She wasn't dancing then. How'd you do? Her brother, Derek, was dancing.

I've worked out with Derek a couple of times. He's incredible. They're amazing. I could sit and just watch them goof around in practice because they're so amazing, so fluid. They make it look so easy. I could do that. Then you get out there like, oh, shit. I'm in way over my head.

But a blast, absolute blast. But work, you better be ready to work because it's a lot of work. It's a crash course in how to be a professional dancer. So six hours a day training. Six, seven hours a day. And there's no day off. Even on Sunday, you're, you know. In the studio.

You've got dress rehearsal. You've got camera rehearsals today and dress rehearsals tomorrow because the show's tomorrow night. I mean, that's Sunday and Monday. Wow. And you've been spending four or five days leading up to that learning a new dance. Yeah. You're going to walk out there on national TV and do. and you've been spending four or five days leading up to that learning a new dance yeah you're gonna walk out there on national tv and do so i mean it's intense and how far did you go i made it three weeks yeah i think i've you know here's the thing at the end of the day it's a

reality show yes and it's not always about the dancing i think we were probably better dancers than some of the people that went a lot further in the show, but there's more to it than that. It's about votes and about getting all this stuff. The hero that they want to put out there. Yeah. So there's a whole bunch of other things that are involved, but I had a blast doing it. Would you do it again? I would actually. It was fun. I really enjoyed it. I've loved to dance since I was a kid. My mom, I think we're all petrified in the sixth grade going into the seventh grade. We knew we were going to have to do school dances and we're all petrified.

And they do dancing in PE class in the sixth grade. I think, you know, square dancing and other types of dancing, but to kind of break you in and get you ready mentally that this is what's going to happen in junior high and high school. And I was petrified like everybody else. And my mom's like, oh, I love to dance. I used to do competitions when I was in school. And she taught me how to jitterbug.

And so I had this great group of friends. We'd have dance competitions and all this stuff at our parties. And I just always loved it. I never did it formally until then. We'll make sure to link up. We'll find a video to link up from you dancing with the stars. Yeah. I think everybody was a little surprised that I could – 220 pounds I could actually move.

It's really cool. Now, I'm curious. Now, you've transitioned from UFC, MMA fighting, and you started getting into the acting world. We've kind of talked about it a little bit. Some of the big things that I've seen that you've done, you've done all three Expendables. So you worked with Sylvester Stallone, Schwarzenegger. Yeah, some of the best guys in the business, for sure. Biggest actors in the world.

Yeah, absolutely. That must have been incredible. You also did The Scorpion King 2, is that right? Mm-hmm. And Ambushed and a few other things since then, right? I think I've done 29 now. 29 movies. Yeah.

Holy cow. I've been doing it for 15 years. 29 movies. My first movie experience was Cradle to the Gra movies. Yeah. Holy cow. I've been doing it for 15 years. 29 movies. My first movie experience was Cradle to the Grave. Okay. And they were looking for real cage fighters. Wow. So they went through the UFC.

It's like, we want some real cage fighters. Do you have some guys? And I had my SAG card from a commercial back in 96. Oh, really? You were already in it. So they called me, Chuck Liddell, and Tito Ortiz to be in this movie as cage fighters. It was not a stretch, right? Yeah, yeah.

And it was kind of an underground fight scene. And I ended up getting a fight scene with Jet Li, who was one of the stars in the movie. And I had one line in the movie, let's go, chicken shit. I must have said that 25 times. Practiced it. Like, oh, my gosh gosh if i have to say this one more time they wanted to get the perfect look but that was like getting to go to oz and see behind the curtain you know how you know the guy back there pulling the levers and making the smoke

and the fire it was really cool very intriguing very interesting uh getting to see the whole process and i immediately fell in love with it. I've been a guy who loved the movies since I was a little boy. My mom used to take me and my sisters to the Lynn Twin in Linwood where I grew up to the double feature. They had the clown or something going on between the two movies and we'd stay and watch both movies.

Since I was a little kid, I always loved the movies. That's cool. What's more... i guess you said you don't get nervous before a big fight but what's scarier for you a uh your first ufc fight or your first big movie what was like more nerve-wracking i yeah the first time i fought it was definitely uh walking out it's just so surreal. 50,000 screaming. Yeah. And I think, you know, having had those experiences, walking out on the wrestling match for some big matches,

you know, NCAA finals, Olympic trials. Pan Ams. World championships, some big matches, prepared me for then eventually walking out of that tunnel for a fight. Different rules of engagement, a whole different thing. Fans were crazy. But you kind of had a experience but i had it kind of stepped up and then i think really being involved in the first season of the ultimate fighter uh the reality show uh having a camera follow you around 24 7 you got used to it you got for the first week it feels weird and you're like oh there's

a cameraman again it's kind of you's kind of self-conscious about it. But then after a while, you're just doing what you do and you forget about it, which can be good or bad. Because you say crap you shouldn't say. But I think then I was used to being in front of the camera. I wasn't self-conscious anymore. So then you get the chance to go to that first movie. And again, I'm there as a fighter. That's not hard.

Right. I mean, I've been doing that for a long time. So I just could be what I was. And I didn't think about the camera. I wasn't worried about that. And then it built from there to actually getting to try and find ways to play characters. You get to do and say and be things you would never be in real life, which is what's fun about it.

That's cool. What was it like with the Expendables, with all the all-stars? Man, it was surreal. I think even they're looking at each other like, can you believe we're all here? This is crazy. Really? Yeah. You had this sense that they were like scratching their head, kind of looking at each other.

Expendables 2, we're in this city in Bulgaria called Plovdiv. And we're at this airport that we utterly destroy this airport in one way, shape or form. And we're chasing Jean-Claude Van Damme's character through this airport. And it's cold outside. So we're in these tents and we're all like tacking up. We're all putting all our gear on. There's Chuck Norris, Bruce Willis, Schwarzenegger.

You'd had this training. Stallone. Everyone. Everybody there. We're all kind of getting this gear on. Like a locker room? Yeah, it was like a locker room. Shut up.

So we're all kind of looking at each other like, can you believe this? This is insane. This is amazing, yeah. It was really cool. Wow. And you were like the, I mean, those guys were all mostly actors. You were becoming an actor. Was it different for you than I think for them, you think?

Because you're like, wow, these guys are just big movie stars. They certainly know the lay of the land. And if you want to learn, if this is what you're aspiring to do, then what better group of guys to hang out with and kind of watch how they operate. And they demonstrated to me why they've been at the top of their game for 30 plus years many of them and the dichotomy of the couple of guys there that maybe have been way up and down you could tell they demonstrated why they've been way up and down too so uh it was it was you know a learning experience for sure if you're paying attention again i apply those wrestler's eyes to everything i do and and so i'm i'm paying attention i'm spending time in video village

learning about lenses learning about camera speeds learning about why you shoot this one that way and how you light that one that way and that sort of thing uh just because it's really intriguing it's a very interesting process it's magic in some ways it is man did they uh did anyone kind of like bring you under their wing like sylvlvester or Schwarzenegger? Did anyone like say, hey, come here, Randy. Let me help you out a little bit? I've had a couple directors along the way that have given me tidbits. I got to work with David Mamet in Red Belt.

Great film, kind of an American samurai story. And he's a well-renowned writer and director. And just kind of getting to hear from him don't worry about the words. Just spit it out. Just say it like this.

And Sly kind of reiterated that too. A first scene where all the Expendables come together in one. We're about to go in these the expendables come together in one. We're in this, we're about to go in these tunnels and try and rescue the girl. And, you know,

there's four or five of us around there. It's the first scene where all of us come together. We, you know, the movie had been shooting for a couple of weeks, but that was the first one where all the expendables came together in one camera shot. And so it was kind of,

everybody was kind of bludgeoning about it. And, and then we're standing around this tunnel entrances and there's three or four different things of dialogue that have to happen. So you have to know your lines, but you have to know your cue too. When he says this, and it was kind of going sing-songy the way it was coming out. And Sly's like, no, that's not, we're in a hurry here. We're getting ready to, you know, we're synchronizing our watches to go into this mission. This is not how this would be said. Spit it out. to, you know, we're synchronizing our watches to go into this mission. This is not how this would be said.

Spit it out. Quit, you know. And so we're like, okay, that made sense. So we just, you just let it go. And then it sounded right. It worked right. And so, you know, little things like that that you have to pay attention to that these guys know these things. On that cast, the Expendables cast, who was the most impressive to you?

You were just like, man, that guy is just a pro. And it's just like, well, I spend the most, obviously all three movies were their slides, baby. Yeah. And,

and, uh, he wrote the first one, um, like Rambo, like Rocky. I mean, he's,

he's very, very talented man. And to, to see, I don't know how he survived the first movie as the writer, the director. Producer, whatever he is. In front of the camera. We're running three units.

He's looking at all the dailies, doing all the rewrites, plus acting and directing. I'm like. He's a machine. And we're working nights. We worked nights the entire film. I'm like, when does this guy sleep? Wow. But to have him adjust dialogue you know

you know what it makes more sense for him to say that you say this you say that and let's try it that way so there's a lot of editing on the go and then you know what this scene needs it's just it needs flat we need a we need a one-liner or something and he'll come up with a one-liner off the top of his head. Really? He was just really, really brilliant. Very, very smart. Schwarzenegger is the same way. I've seen him step up in front

of a thousand people at the Arnold Classic for the After School All-Stars. And just off the cuff. He's amazing. Gregariously engaged the entire audience. Humor. That's a gift. And everybody thinks because they talk funnier, they have an accent, they're not smart. They're very smart guys. Yeah. Brilliant. Wow. What do you think is the biggest misconception about you that people have? Well, I think people most know me for walking up

in a cage and punching guys in the face. And so there's a kind of a veneer or a particular appearance that comes with that. Yeah, there's a, you know, I'm a competitive. I can be a tough SOB if I need to be. But I think I'm a very normal, you know, I'm a normal guy. I could have lived next door to you for years and you'd have never known the difference. you know i'm a normal guy i could have lived next door to you for years and you'd have never known the difference yeah uh i've struggled with a lot of the same things that everybody else struggles with they have a tendency to put these athletes up on these pedestals and it's really hard for them to live up to that so i never tried to create a persona and i felt bad for guys like

tito he kind of created this bad boy's persona and and i've had this conversation with him he's like he hates it he doesn't want to live up to that all the time and you see now as he's matured that he's kind of let that go he doesn't really have to be that guy anymore exactly he's got everybody expects that of him everywhere he goes exhausting man i can't imagine that that's really who he is and i just tried to keep it simple. Try to be who I am. I love, I have a love for this. I really enjoy competition.

Individual combative sports is what at 10 years old. Again, I started it for the, for the wrong reasons, probably to get my dad's attention, but I found what I loved. I found what I wanted to do. So,

um, it worked out. Have you reconnected with your dad a lot? Well, my dad passed a couple years ago. But in the last 10 years of his life, we spent more time together than we did for the first 30 of mine. Wow, that's great. Do you feel like you loved fighting?

Yeah. I used to bring him to the fights. So you did come to the fights. And he was a big fan of that. That's cool. You know, he never saw me wrestle, which is where it started for me. He came to a few soccer games when I was a kid. I loved soccer too.

I started playing soccer at five years old. He came to a few soccer games, but he never came to a wrestling match, at least to my knowledge. Did you get to – He missed out. Yeah, he missed out. Did you get to, you know, kind of open up and use some of the tools you have now to share kind of how you felt about things from the past? We never got that opportunity.

We came close a couple times, but we never really – and he was one of those guys that was very open with the way he felt. He didn't want to communicate. He didn't want to communicate. He didn't want to go there. Yeah, it was hard for him. And I think there were things there that still hurt, still hurt for him. Yeah, he probably felt shameful and guilty and all those things. I don't know. It's hard to say, but I suspect.

Yeah. And I saw as he got older, and he never really paid much mind. He didn't know my oldest two, Ryan and Amy, but my youngest, Caden, he'd moved down to the lower 48. He was closer. So whenever I went to see Caden, he would drive the six hours down from Central Washington and spend the weekend with us and really kind of doted on Caden. And in my mind, I'm like, what the hell? What about the other two? Yeah.

What about me? Are you? Where were you when I was this old? And I think that's where he was at. He realized he'd missed something and he was kind of making up for it by Christmas gifts and different things with my youngest.

Spoiling at me. And my youngest kind of got closer to him than any of the rest of us did. Grandpa Ed. So, and then, you know, obviously the passing was, that was tough and it is what it is. Yeah. So you never got to really share with him how you felt or what we were upset about?

No. No? I think he probably would have felt better if I did, if I had just blasted him and just let it all out. What do you think he would have said to him? I think he would have felt better. It would have been cathartic for him. But I just was never wired that way. And I don't think I had the skills to let all that out.

At some point, I just had to come to terms with it and let it go. I realized all the things that he put me through, all the things that, that, you know, dealing with my mom and as a single parent that she had to do to take care of three kids, they made me who I am.

Yeah, exactly. So I'm okay with that. You know what? I can't harbor animosity and anger because of those things that made me who I am if I'm okay with who I am. So I had to let go of all that. If you could just tell them one sentence what you'd want to share, you don't have to scream at them, but what would you do? I think that's what I would tell them. You know what? I was pissed off and I was upset that you were never around and you know i had to do father-son soccer games with with

tim's dad john instead of you uh you never even saw me wrestle one time but all those things drove me they motivated me they you know and i could have made a lot of other worse choices yeah i had you know a lot of guys used that as an excuse to be dirtbags, to be douchebags, to be drug addicts, to be whatever. It motivated me to be better, to do the things I've done. That's great. That's great. Final couple of questions. Okay.

I feel like I could talk to you all day about this stuff. I love the mindset, the toughness, everything that you're going through. This is exciting for me. What are you most grateful for in your life recently? My family and my friends. I have an amazing group of friends. They

help me with my charity endeavors. They understand me. They don't want to talk about fighting. That's how... Fans and... They don't care about that stuff. They don't care about any of that. They know me since way back before you were yeah before you were the guy when i was wet in the bed

yeah and so you know my mom and my sisters um yeah i think that's what it boils down to my kids are amazing yeah you know and and, and the biggest struggle was with the youngest, with Caden, and trying to be a bigger part of his life, finding time and spending more time and having an impact on him. Yeah. And he's kind of coming into those years where it's going to make a big difference. Yeah, for sure. And it's a challenge.

Yeah. What's the dream for you now? Is it to be, you know, if you could write the story for the next 50 years, you've had an incredible first half of your life, essentially. If you could write the next half of your life, what would the movie script look like for you? Like, what would you create? What roles would you have? What type of person would you be? You know, would you run for office?

You know, what are the things that you want to do? Yeah, I don't see myself running for office. And I don't know, for some reason, again, I think turning 50 was something about all that. I've been writing poetry since I was in college, my mid-20s, and accumulated all these poems and things that i'd written over the years i've never shared them with anybody ever and and if something happened i don't know at 50 turning 50 and realizing i lived a half a century i started posting some of them and letting some of that out and uh you know my gi foundation is something that means a lot to me you know having worn the

uniform in the 80s and never had a shot at, never got to put my ass on the line, unlike the guys nowadays that are dealing with traumatic brain injuries and PTSD and living through things that a lot of guys didn't live through before, missing limbs and stuff. Yeah, it's tough. Trying to raise awareness and money and help some of these guys out that need a little extra help has been something I've been involved in for the last eight years that means a lot to me. You know, seeing Ryan continue to flourish and do the things that he seems to have a passion for and, you know, kind of hopefully pass that mantle on to him.

Let him take the brand, take the things that I started and let him continue with that. I'd like, you know, that's something I want to continue. And I'm having a blast acting, uh, get, you know, learning more, getting better at it. Uh, I, I, I want to be challenged. It'd be easy to do the, the action films or, or, you know, the fighter stuff, the martial arts stuff. I, I, I want more challenging stuff. So trying to ferret out and put myself in those situations, uh, learn to let all that stuff out and just show it and, and, uh, and embrace it. Uh, you know, are you doing a consistent acting class too,

where you're, I have a coach that I work with that I really, really enjoy. And he's been on every end of the spectrum. He's an amazing guy. Barry Primus has been working with him for about six or seven years. That's cool. So getting a chance to spend more time with him when I can. And it seems like we get less and less time. But when I got a role coming up, when I got

a script that I'm going to have to, you know, it's a challenge. Yeah. He helps me kind of ferret out, dig through it and find a way to relate to that character to tell the truth, to play that character and tell the truth no matter what he does. Right. Cool. That's cool. Okay.

This is a question I asked at the end for everyone it's called the three truths three truths question and i didn't prepare you for this so this is off the cuff for randy but um if this is uh you know many years from now it's your last day and it's your last day here on this earth and you never know do you you never know but let's say it's many many years another half a century these lungs for the last time right here. You never know. Yeah. Yeah. This is it. But let's say it's 50 years from now. Let's say.

Let's hope. How's that? Okay. Let's hope. Yes. And you've achieved everything you want. Everything you say you want, you went out and you've done it. A lot of hard work still, but you've created it.

And everything you've created for whatever reason has been erased. All the movies, the books you've written, the poetry you've put for whatever reason has been erased. All the movies, the books you've written, the poetry you've put out there, it's gone. And your great, great grandchild comes up and says, here's a piece of paper and a pen. Can you write down the three truths that you know from your whole life, everything you know to be true, if you boil it down to three simple things that you'd pass on to us, essentially, that we could look at, we could frame it, and it would be your example of how to live life or what you know to be true.

What would be those three truths for you? I think you got to live. I think a lot of people are going through the motions. They're not really living. You got to love. I think we, it sounds like a poster already doesn't it live, laugh and love I think I've had a lot of fun

doing the things that I do even when there was a lot of work involved but I think you do those three things the best that you can don't go through the motions do what you want to do live how you want to live.

And you better smile and have fun doing it. And try to find somebody to share it with. Love somebody. Find somebody to share it with. I love that. Simple, man. But it's effective. That's great. Well, before I ask the final question, I want to acknowledge you for a moment, Randy, for your incredible symbol of excellence. At every stage of your life so far, you've been a great symbol of showing what's possible for people. Starting late, kind of getting fame late in your 30s, starting a sport that you've never done before and excelling it, being six-time champion, world champion. It's incredible. Like selling it, being six-time champion, world champion.

It's incredible. But also doing it with a smile on your face and not having to be this tough guy, mean or nasty about it. But really being like, hey, I can be a nice guy as well and also achieve my goal in the context. Still punching in the face. But your level of humility is unbelievable. Your humility and your symbol for excellence. I know how much work you put in. It's unbelievable the amount of energy and effort you put in to achieve what you do.

So I just want to acknowledge you for your incredible symbol and for the man that you are and how you represent manhood in a great way. Well, thank you. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Appreciate that. And before I ask the final question, where can we hang out with you and connect with you most? Where should we go? What's the website or social media? I'm on Randy underscore Couture on Twitter,

Randy Couture on Facebook, XCNatch on Instagram. Okay. Where do you hang out the most? Where do you like, which platform? They all, you know, everybody's got a smartphone now. They all kind of come to your smartphone. Um, where do you hang out the most? Where do you like, which platform? They all, you know, everybody's got a smartphone now. They all kind of come to your smartphone.

They're all kind of intertwined and connected. So if I post on one, they kind of bleed over and post everywhere. And, and, uh, you can kind of track me that way. The,

the gym website, uh, the GI foundation, extreme couture, GI foundation.org. Okay. XC, GIF.org. All those are kind of the calendars of where I'm at,ation.org, XCGIF.org.

All those are kind of the calendars of where I'm at, what's going on with me. Sweet, sweet. We just had a big month for the charity this last month. Yeah. Big ride down in Georgia, big country concert down there. We just had our eighth annual ride and country concert in Vegas as well. Nice. Okay.

Rubbing elbows with a lot of soldiers and having a lot of fun. That's great. We'll have it all linked up here on the show notes afterwards. So make sure you guys go check it out, follow Randy and check out the, uh, the sites as well. Uh, the final question is what's your definition of greatness? Uh, I think it's, it's easy to admire and kind of peg the guy that wins all the time as being great. But in my opinion, I think a true measure of greatness is how somebody deals with losing, how somebody deals with loss, and how they respond to that adversity. That's what's really going to show me your character. That's what's really going to tell me what you're all about. And so that's when I start to pay attention is what happens. You know, everybody talked about Ronda Rousey losing this

last year and, and I'm like, well, now we get to really see what Ronda Rousey is made of and, and what, what, how is she going to respond to that adversity? And I suspect that, and we haven't seen it yet, but I suspect that she's going to pick herself up and we'll see her come back as strong as ever. But, uh, you know, uh, I think dealing with that, that kind of adversity and losses is what greatness is all about. That's what great people do. Pick themselves up. They figure out where they went wrong and they get about doing it better.

The legendary Randy Couture. Thanks for coming on, man. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. And there you have it. I hope you enjoyed this episode with the one and only Randy Couture. And if you did, make sure to share this out and give Randy some love. Tweet him.

Post about him on Instagram and Facebook. All of his information is back at lewishouse.com slash 335. If you enjoyed this as well, leave a comment. Leave a comment below the blog or below the YouTube video over on youtube.com slash Lewis house. And let me know what you think. Let me know what you took away from this episode in the comment section as well. And if you enjoyed this, make sure to please leave us a review. When you leave a review, it helps us get more awareness about the podcast. So if you love the podcast, if you appreciate getting

it for free, if you appreciate the guests that I'm getting on here, then make sure to help spread the word by promoting it and also leaving a review on iTunes. You guys mean the world to me and you're never too old or too young to achieve your dreams and pursue them. And Randy's an incredible example and symbol of that. So I hope you took that away from this episode and you can still go after your dreams and be a nice, genuine, loving human being. You don't have to be some nasty, mean person. Even if you're fighting or wrestling, you can still be joyful and bring a smile to the cage and to the ring in any area of your life.

You can do it with joy and positivity and lifting others up around you. You don't have to take others down in order for you to get to the top. It's about making sure everyone wins around you. And I hope you guys feel that and know that and continue to do that in your lives as well. I appreciate you. I love you guys very much. You mean the world to me and you know what time it is. It's time to go out there and do something great. Outro Music