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[Music] Eugene Beerman welcome to my podcast thanks for having me Dom it's good to be
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here M it's it's an absolute honor the Mad genius um that's your your nickname
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uh one of the one of the nicknames what else is there not one that I give myself
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but some people throw that around you yeah how does that sit with you uh not to I mean I'm far from a genius yeah um
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that's that's definitely not an app description on me but um I'm a little
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bit mad but yeah maybe the Mad part and not the genius part um it's an honor to
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have you around here um I'm I'm a big fan of um UFC and MMA but there's this's
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I enjoy watching it but I don't really know what's going on there's probably
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like a diverse group of people listening to this some that would have no idea what it's all about so MMA mix martial
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arts and UFC Ultimate Fighting Championship are they the same thing they are they are not exactly the
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same thing so the UFC is the biggest organization uh that run um uh MMA shows MMA fights you'd
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think of them as like the NBA so there's basketball leagues all over the world
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right but the NBA runs the biggest one the the one that everybody aspires to and the UFC is the equivalent of the NBA
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so if you're an aspiring MMA fighter you're trying to get into the UFC league
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and when you've got into the league then you're in the you're you're in the Big
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Time MMA is the actual sport itself so that would be basketball so MMA basketball NBA UFC that would be a
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pretty good description I think I think that's a that's a great thank you for
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that explanation that explains a lot and um you're you're like a guru in um the
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the MMA UFC World um City kickboxing your business what feels like you're about to interrupt me uh I'm a coach uh
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don't oh this is going to be a tiring you this is going to be a hard podcast
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you're so modest you ah like what you've done what you've done is incredible is that like are you able to
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sit back and um go yeah I did that well or I didn't do that well or are you just
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are you just I don't know did people do that though I definitely I know you're a
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deflector of all your success and you've I think successful people uh never truly
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find the success that they're driving through all driving to get all the time
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so you're like you're people sit here and tell you you're successful and then
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but in my mind I'm like well [ __ ] man I haven't done this yet and this yet and
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this yet and this yet so the list of things that I want to achieve and be successful at is longer than the things
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that I've already achieved and being successful get I guess that kind of where my mind goes when you hear that
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like a growth mindset yeah yeah it's a growth mindset so you're like oh yeah
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I've achieved a bit but I've got so much more to achieve and do so I guess that's
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probably why I'm reluctant to say that I've reached massive levels of success
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but Guru all of that I'm Just What I Am is a guy that's the first person to get
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up and open the doors in the business and the last person to go to bed and close the doors of the business first
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person there last person to leave being that person for the last 25 years so any
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success I have can um be attributed to that yeah I mean it but there's um yeah
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this podcast might sit uncomfortably with you because it's um kind of like maybe a bit of like this is your life um
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which maybe won't S sit comfortably with you but you've I mean you've you've
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helped um accelerate some some careers and make some Fighters and what was essentially a niche sport household
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names like this style Bender Dan the hangman hooker Shane Young Blood Diamond um caros coming they're just ones that I
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can name and I'm not huge on the sport but then there's so much other stuff
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you've done as well well with um City kickboxing like um some you call it like
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a a gym for lost songs I think I've heard that and it's um you're kind of
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like a gang leader in a way in the best possible way like you've got this collection of um you know rag
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tag Misfit people and you've sort of given their life purpose and direction I yeah well man I have people
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from all facets of life I have uh you know misdirected misguided people but I have very very successful people too
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some of the top lawyers top owners of big uh businesses in New Zealand All training under the same roof but what
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they all have in common is they're all searching for a little bit of release
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and Define themselves a little bit and for whatever reason whether you are a gang leader or
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whether you are one of New Zealand's top lawyers you seem to be able you gravitate to the same thing and that's
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my arts and coming in sweating learning the learning the art hitting a bag hitting pads learning to control people
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for whatever reason no matter what area of the society you're in you you have that same
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pull towards the same thing and it makes people feel good and um I think I'm in
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the business of making people feel good A little bit of escapism a little bit of
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just let's just get away from everything and put our full concentration into this
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and forget the worries of life that we've got on just for an hour yeah I provide that I think look at your eyes
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light up when you talk about it you you just love fighting don't you and helping
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people I think I love Mar I love what the gym does I love the gym environment I I love what it does to people because
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it's like a when you're a kid you immerse yourself in your imagination so you go away and
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you play play with your Legos you play you know Indians and cowboys and whatever and you for that moment you you
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believe you're in it and you're real and you lose that going into adulthood well
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what the gym does the gym is just a big playground it's where adults can come
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and be like man you know I'm I'm this person I'm that person I'm and they can
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just Escape in a little bit of it's reality but there's a little bit of like
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you know Mis reality in there as well because they just get to escape and I think
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that um you need that when you're adult you need to get away and just be with
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yourself the only thing the only thing that matters is what's in front of me
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and what I'm doing right now there's just not many moments in an adult's life
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where they can do that and um are you still driving like an old white Haunter Civic in the style bind the movie uh You
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featuring it quite prominently I want to get into that later this is your podcast
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it's not is his podcast um but you drive having this like beat up old rusty White
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Honda Civic um I I want to know is that like um like stage for the movie or is that your car no that's my car that I
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just got rid of it like literally just got rid of it um like did you even get a trade in on it or you just had to like
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dump it so it was sitting in my garage and my wife got a new car and then we had another car and I it
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was just basically taking up too much room and something had to go so um I was forced to get rid of it but yeah it
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brought a tear to my eye but I did not no what man I had that car I had that car for you know would have been close
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to 20 years and it served it took me to the gym back and forth took all my Fighters like Israel all all my Fighters
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have memories of their car cuz we traveled the country going from City to city um fighting in the back of their
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car yeah and we it it did the job good old Honda Civic from what from the research I've done on you like you're
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not motivated by money at all but um you you you didn't have to be driving that
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car you that was a that was a choice on your part what are you driving now not not a
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McLaren uh no no I'm driving a not quite as old but reasonably old Toyota Yus yeah Toyota it's like an old lady's
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car yeah but I'm not going to I'm not going to lie I'm a I'm a bike guy right
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okay I'm a motorbike guy so I've got a couple of nice bikes but the cars it's
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yeah they just get you for me to be yeah hey and um so you're on a brand new TV
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show on um TV and Z online called motivation which is kind of like um I don't know the easiest way to explain
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it's probably like New Zealand's Got Talent except it's got the worst prize
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ever the prize is like one a oneyear scholarship at your gym to get beaten the crap beaten out of you um how did
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they get you over the line for that cuz I get the feeling you're you don't
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overly enjoy talking about yourself this is what people this is probably and probably you're you're one of the only
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persons to ask this questions in my little media realm um my media around that I've done
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but at least half of that idea was my own idea yeah so I got to give us some producer friends and I saw I thought
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this it might be a good idea so I kind of floated it to them then we went back and forth with some ideas and then um
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but turned into what it turned into but it was half of that was at least my idea
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which half I don't know but yeah I was I was all for the I just thought it was
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the right time I thought it was the right time to expose some parts of the gym that I was
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previously not wanting to expose I thought it was the right time for I guess the public to have a look inside
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and the inner workings of the gym or the inner workings of the SP sport I I started watching it it's a
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phenomenal watch so you got fighters that are that are already they're not complete novices so fight some of them
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have had like a 100 fights and then they come to um City kickboxing and suddenly
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they're you know sparring with um Dan the hangman hooker and they get their ass kicked uh so suddenly they feel like
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like a fish out of water or a novice and the reality is they still experience Fighters it's a real fascinating
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Insight yeah yeah I mean again for the viewers that aren familiar for MMA it's
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like it would be like a club rugby player getting um you know he gets to train with the All Blacks for four weeks
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so he's going to get his ass kicked for a while until he can but but at the end
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of those four weeks he's going to be very familiar with the environment he's
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not going to be at all level but he going to have one foot through the door and he's going to somewhat know what he
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needs to do to get where he wants to go and that was more like the approach of getting them involved with the higher
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level guys and yeah I think I hope people enjoyed it yeah it's bloody great and I'd urge people to check it out yeah
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relentless on TV andz okay so let's get back to your early years so your um Dutch dad Samo and m y can you sort of
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like break down your inner workings and figure out what comes from where um no yeah all definitely from my
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parents from my upbring I had I'm still do shouldn't talk about them in past
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tense because they're still around have terrific parents um my dad's a wonderful
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dad very I guess he's a kiwi but some very Dutch values he's he provided us kids
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with everything we needed every opportunity um and and my mom was uh very heavily religious lady so that's
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where we got those sort of values about being honest and truthful and the more typical Christian
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values I also got and I'm look back at this now and I'm thankful for this but I
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also got a lot of freedom I feel I got a lot of freedom to make mistakes and um it's not that's not
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something I've necessarily carried on with my kids I feel like I've gone the
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other way I got a lot of freedom yeah I just I just got to do things and I didn't necessarily have to check
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everything off with my parents my parents went helicopter parents um um they gave me an opportunity to do things
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and they gave me an opportunity to make mistakes and learn from them um I have not carrying on that um I'm not carrying
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on that Philosophy for sure I'm I just think don't I don't think it's done
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these days is it the old um yeah you give someone enough rope that's the same
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but you you seem like a super driven kid though way like I I heard stories about
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you so you were your rugby was your your go-to sport um you were pretty good at rugby quite reca like first first 15 at
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your school when you were 15 I was the first 15 captain and stuff so I was okay um I suffered from I think rugby as and
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especially the professional era like H was this relatively small uh person and Rugby's or at least at the moment is the
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game of giants in it at the moment um so in terms of a professional career I think I was never going to be big enough
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and um I also was very dedic ated and trained really really hard and at the lower levels of
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rugby um sometimes you don't have like-minded people around you so like some kind of
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like it can dig at you it can get to you yeah so you're making all this effort
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they're not professional so they're not making an effort and you you it's that
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inequality you're like man very frustrating so that's where I found a little bit of frustration in terms of
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rugby yeah so you're better suited to a solo sport I think I and the end in hindsight I think yeah definitely it was
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yeah yeah cuz I think I heard this on another podcast you did or maybe read it uh in an interview somewhere but so
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growing up as like a teenage boy you do um like long hill repeats on Bullock track Bullock track is like a really
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steep steep hill sort of at the back of like motac by the ockland zoo it's maybe
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3 or 400 meters but it's like a a massive massive vert and you'd go out there in the dark on your own uh like
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training for rugby where did that sort of like like I don't know self-drive or
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whatever it was come from I have in recent years done a lot of interviews and podcasts and press
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conferences and stuff but for most of my life I would say I was definitely an introvert I loved being by myself and I
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when I was by myself I felt I could that was when I felt most comfortable and when I could collect all my thoughts
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about life and so I was when I trained by myself with which I did a lot of that's that was where I got into my zone
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where I started to think about life and goals and what I wanted to do and where I wanted to you know where I wanted to
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end up I did all of that while I was training by myself it was not just about the physical training but it was about
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the mental release that I got from training by myself in the middle of nowhere and doing all these things I did
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a lot of training by myself for sure and it was around this time that you met Cara she's your wife now you guys were
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like high school sweetharts yeah yeah yeah how how did how did that come about you're the same age or she old I
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we basically the same age that wasn't any great story it was just sort of that
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was the old typical kiwi saw a girl at a party thought she looked pretty nice went up to her found out she had
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some mutual fans got introduced by the mutual fans and yeah That's All She Wrote is you guys got four kids now so
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like it's it's all you've known for each other so you you've been together since
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you were kids essentially it's really cool I think that's it's really powerful
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stuff yeah man yeah it seems a bit of a thing um man I got my Fighters at my gym
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can't keep a girlfriend for more than a few weeks so yeah breaking the mold a
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little bit but yeah I'm not going to lecture them about that it's it's a
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Brave New World you you um yeah how did the Rel CU you left school when you were
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15 initially and you end up bouncing back to school but how like how did the relationship survive when you left
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school you think you know you and Cara she's at school you're not at school
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suddenly you're in different Circle she went to a different school so so we were
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we were we were lucky in that respect so shorty shorty so we already had a bit of
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distance and stuff between us but um yeah I mean didn't make a difference when other school we were already used
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to being a part but U I don't know we survived I'm not like I not a womanizer I don't like talking to woman
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I would prefer not to I would prefer to be amongst my mates and amongst a bunch of BLS look some guys are good at
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talking to woman and others are not and um I can talk to my female Fighters quite well
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but damn I can't say anything on this podcast about female Fighters but you can say what you can say whatever you
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want um I don't know maybe the masculine side of those woman womanly those woman
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make me feel a bit more comfortable comfortable communicating with him okay I got
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you trying to put it trying to put it nicely yeah but yeah I just wasn't a womanizer and I I suppose I suppose the
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woman in that sort of fighting environment I mean it's it's probably a very lty sort of environment very
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testerone test F environment they probably need to they are very feminine woman when they want to be but the fact
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of the matter is they're being they're in a masculine world yeah they're surrounded by BLS they're
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surrounded by testosterone um and man to be a woman in a fight gym you've got to be tough
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you've got to be tough and sometimes you have to let go of some of your more
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womanly or female characteristics um just to survive so yeah maybe that's why
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I get on okay with the woman Fighters imagine imagine if you found yourself single like you'd have to trim your
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beard maybe maybe wear something other than a swand dry the Civic you need to get a nicer
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car to pick people it's never going to happen um you there was an amazing story
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about you which you I'm sure you've told a million times before so you're
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probably sick of telling but it just it fascinates me cuz here you are you know 17 16 year old Eugene so you leave
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school at 15 you you realize that it's um it's a [ __ ] show out there there without any
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qualifications and there's very limited options um just the fact that you had
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the the foresight to think that I think when you're 15 like um I don't know when
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I was that age like a job's a job like if I was getting a couple hundred bucks
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a week I would have been happy with that but you decided you wanted more for your
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life so you went back to school the school basically just wanted you back to play rugby but you wanted to go back to
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study and um you spent like every basically every spare second of every day in the school library yep I mean
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that if you want to put my life leading to what it is now in one pivotal moment in my life where everything changed it
00:20:02
was that moment when they weren't going to let me back into school and and I had
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the realization that I had um I had effed up everything at school or effed up my life up until that point
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by not paying attention in school not realizing the importance of an education and uh what it did for me was
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it forced me into a situation where my back was against the wall and I had to basically learn my entire four to five
00:20:35
years of schooling in one year um and at that point I felt like the success or what my life was writing
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on was how well I did that and so I took that pressure and I tried to turn that pressure into something
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positive and at the end I got my qualifications but what it more made me realize do is like mate I can actually I
00:21:01
I never saw in myself that I had the potential to do anything that I wanted to do I just didn't I thought I was just
00:21:09
a kid and when you're a kid you think I'm just a kid I'm going to grow up
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pretty normal and not going to do any extraordinary things um and I I it changed all that it just made me realize
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man if I work hard I have the potential to do whatever I want especially if I achieve this and from that moment I knew
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I could be successful at whatever Avenue that my life took me down yes I mean it's it's inspirational stuff so you'd
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go to the library and you'd sit your alarm for 3 hours and then um even if you got all your your work and your
00:21:43
study finished then you just keep going and to fill in that 3 hours I mean it's
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like it's just astonishing really like it's a just a a work ethic that I I
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don't know I think when you when you get older as an adult you can have more of
00:21:55
appreciation of it but to have that at that age as a 16 17 year old boy when all your mates
00:22:00
were outside playing sports or whatever it's um amazing sort of laser focus was
00:22:06
tremendously hard I know that because and and I really really hope that what I had essentially done was drift
00:22:14
through uh third fourth fifth and sixth form without learning virtually nothing I hope that doesn't go on today I hope
00:22:23
the education system now not picks up those kids that are drifting like I was and pluck them out and helps them um but
00:22:31
yeah I ended up with nothing so I had to go straight back to the start and try and learn everything in a year and that
00:22:38
was tremendously hard I would probably not do it again but the reward I got out of that was man I just got an
00:22:45
empowerment out of it right so um I wouldn't change it for the world yeah and that sort of changed the trajectory
00:22:53
of your life a little bit so then you left school went to law school um and then you discovered um fighting so you
00:22:59
dropped out of law school is that yeah one year one year of law school yeah how are your parents they must have been
00:23:07
speing yeah were they yeah when you get when you get someone get into law school
00:23:13
in your family then I mean sure um law current law students now and uh lawyers now and it's the big thing right it's
00:23:21
like oh got on law school got on Oakland got onota it's a big thing in your family right so um yeah I I walked into
00:23:30
a gym and I just got the bug and then I knew that that was want to do what I wanted to do with the rest of my
00:23:39
life I just I was quite sure that after I had a couple of fights that um that's
00:23:45
what I wanted to chase that's what I wanted to do in some form or manner yeah
00:23:51
but you can see your parents concern cuz it's like um you've done all this hard
00:23:55
catchup work at school um and then you get into to law school and then suddenly you're throwing it all away for like a
00:24:02
career with no options yeah but you're throwing away for a hobby essentially aren't
00:24:09
you I mean you've turned it into a wildly successful career but at the time it was a hob more or Le it's it's a
00:24:20
lifestyle it's a lifestyle you cuz cuz you you you you just mildly mildly offended about 50
00:24:28
guys in my gym just in by calling it a hobby no no what what I mean I don't want to what I mean is like when when
00:24:36
you started so from your parents perspective you're 18 19 they're like so
00:24:40
you're quitting law school for what yeah um CU i s also also yeah talking about
00:24:45
the guys in new JY like I I saw a YouTube clip a couple of weeks ago and it was Joe Rogan on one of the late
00:24:50
night talk shows like 20 years ago explaining what UFC is like everyone knows what UFC is now but like when you
00:24:55
were starting out with your fighting it was like it it wasn't like a there wasn't like a a potential career path
00:25:02
that there is now 100% 100% yeah I mean trust me from the outside people are like yeah
00:25:10
this ridiculous like you're going to stop law school to basically chase a sport or a hobby but martial arts when
00:25:17
you get really deep into it is a lifestyle it's a code by which you live your life and so that's the side that I
00:25:27
was committing myself to um but I also I I knew from my experience in life up until that point especially the
00:25:37
pivotal point when I decided I'm going to change my life and be like now buger
00:25:40
that I'm going to go to university and change my life I'm going to give me some
00:25:45
good options into the future I also knew that I could achieve anything I wanted to achieve I felt I felt I had that in
00:25:52
me so um although my parents and from the outside people wouldn't have seen yeah I I I backed myself at that point
00:26:01
yeah I backed myself for sure sh and it's paid off handsomely um yes so you you were a fighter and you're you're
00:26:06
quite a good fighter 49 fights all up yes across uh three different disciplines yeah what are they
00:26:15
kickboxing mu Tai yeah MMA and I had a boxing fight right and I I watched a clip on YouTube just before you came
00:26:22
over I think it was your 49th and final fight and uh yeah there's a quote at the
00:26:26
end you said it's one of the best feelings in the world like win or lose how how is it the best feeling in
00:26:31
the world even if it's um not a successful night um nothing when you're going out and
00:26:39
leading into a fight nothing in your not not an instinct in your body or anything
00:26:45
in your brain says that it's a good idea and you should be gravitating towards it
00:26:50
everything every hair on your body every thought in your brain says don't do it
00:26:56
this is this is the stupidest thing that you can sign yourself up to overcoming that whether you win or
00:27:04
lose is the fight that's the battle that's the battle for most Fighters yeah
00:27:10
the secondary battle is the result but firstly just to get in there and and beat all of those demons that is an
00:27:18
amazing feeling in itself yeah amazing feeling oh you love it don't you you love it how how do you find not being a
00:27:27
not being a fighter now like just like watching other people is is it sort of like you vicariously
00:27:34
living through them in a way not well it's tremendously difficult it's tremendously difficult because obviously
00:27:40
as a coach you have you can only control so much of the environment the rest is up to them and so that lack of control
00:27:48
that you have um it it really it eats it you um it's much much you know for anybody
00:27:58
young Fighters and or old Fighters aspiring to be a coach 100 times easier to be a fighter 100 times easier to be a
00:28:06
fighter why so I'm I'm in charge of everything I'm in charge of what I do if
00:28:11
I perform uh it basically comes down to me uh you know everything that happens on that night when lose draw what
00:28:20
decisions I make whether I perform well um it all comes down to me I'm in control of it all the coach which has a
00:28:29
very helpless feeling of not being in control cuz it's not them fighting yeah
00:28:35
so so if your Fighters lose you sort of you you sort of it stings for you as well it does it does it does Sting it
00:28:41
does Sting you've got to but you've got to like man you've got to really immerse
00:28:46
yourself in that in in that fight you've got to give your full commitment emotionally spiritually physically
00:28:56
physically maybe in the training if you're Hing them train but during the fight you've got to put everything into
00:29:01
it all your intellect all your brain all your commitment everything all your emotion it all goes into that 15 to 25
00:29:10
minutes and uh man if they lose you know you lose as well yeah you're you're
00:29:16
you're the same team you're the same person yeah yeah um so City kickboxing
00:29:22
2007 you you you opened that up um what were your goals and dreams back then they're a lot different than what they
00:29:29
are now well I started that gym just so I could fight more so it could support me doing what I might so could support
00:29:37
me doing my hobby right I said you said to think you do some personal training have some people I thought I'd have like
00:29:45
30 women come in or 30 I should I can't talk like that anymore I had 30 people
00:29:50
come in office men and women they'll do a workout they'd pay their fees and then
00:29:56
they' leave me alone and I'll TR train all day and this wonderful facility that
00:30:01
they're essentially paying for um and that was the plan but that yeah um I just found out the realities of owning a
00:30:09
small business is completely different to that you really how how s just some tough years lease
00:30:17
bills all these things that I wasn't too accustomed to cuz I'd lived under my
00:30:21
parents roof I was suddenly responsible for I had a lease with many thousands of
00:30:26
dollars and I had to come up with money um at the end of every month um electricity all the responsibilities of
00:30:33
being a small business owner they get thrust on you and you start to realize man it's not just as simple as opening
00:30:39
the door and letting all the people flood in you've got to do some advertising you've got to get a
00:30:43
reputation for doing as well and then yeah so it started that that that was the original idea but then it turned
00:30:52
into something else and then of course what happened is those 30 office workers that I me to get in every lunchtime they
00:30:59
gradually turn into 30 young aspiring Fighters and yet 30 young aspiring Fighters don't want to come in and pay
00:31:07
their fees and then leave an hour later 30 young aspiring Fighters want to come in sometimes they don't have any fees to
00:31:13
pay because they've got no money and they want to stay there all day and they
00:31:17
want to train with you and they want to know this and they want to know that and
00:31:20
they want to know this and then before you know it your dream of running this Boutique little Fitness Studio turns
00:31:26
into this monster turns into this monster and then and then it develops into what it is today
00:31:34
but yeah right it's been been a funny volution though what you say at least from an Outsiders perspective no no man
00:31:39
it's been a ride I'm telling you it's been like a hell of a ride I look back I
00:31:44
I do look back fondly on all those days from its Inception to where it is now yeah and I've heard you call it a gym
00:31:51
for broken Souls what does what does that mean can you elaborate on that look man if you if you if if you walk into a
00:31:59
gym like mine a gym a martial arts gym or a fighting gym you you are coming there specifically for that when you
00:32:07
walk into uh you know a a health club or Le Mills or something you're going there to
00:32:15
use the weights and to use the machine or to use the treadmills or stuff but when you when you wake up one morning
00:32:22
and you say man I'm I need something I've got to what am I going to do I'm
00:32:26
going to get into this fighting gym as martial arts gym those are people generally that are searching for
00:32:33
something in their life that's missing and that's what I mean and those sort of
00:32:39
people come and gravitate towards the gym and those are the sort of people that get the most out of the gym because
00:32:43
they find what they're looking for at the gym yeah oh that's so cool yeah how do how do you manage the
00:32:52
expectations of people that come through the door now cuz I'm you know due to the
00:32:57
success you've had and um the profile you've got with the UFC I'm guessing
00:33:01
that there's a lot of people that that knock on your door and say I want to be
00:33:04
you the next style Bender or I want to be this or I want to be that like how do you manage that sort of expectation cuz
00:33:10
that's um you like yeah making to the UFC I suppose that's like a that's the a
00:33:16
1ent thing right yeah with great great great great difficulty yeah with great difficulty because on the same at the
00:33:26
same time I'm a believer that anybody can achieve their dream their dream okay anybody can do
00:33:35
whatever they want if they put the right steps in place and work hard and blah blah blah blah blah um the fact of the
00:33:41
matter is it's only 1% of the people make it so you're trying to balance
00:33:46
their expectations with reality is very very difficult we're in a day and age
00:33:53
now more than ever where I'm getting young people come into the gym and they are coming into the gym and
00:34:03
they are stead set on becoming a professional fighter in the UFC you're just becoming a professional
00:34:11
fighter and that is tremendously difficult thing for me to deal with that wasn't even an option
00:34:20
when I started fighting we every fighter in the gym when I was in a gym had a job
00:34:26
cuz it just wasn't even an option now kids are coming at 18 19 20 I asked a kid the other day have you I didn't
00:34:34
realize he left school I was like oh you live school I said oh have you got a job
00:34:38
he was like no I haven't got a job I said what are you looking for I said I'm
00:34:41
not probably won't get a job and I was like what are you going to do and he looked at me and he goes I'm going to be
00:34:45
a fighter and I was like man it's what a crazy world we live in where now young
00:34:51
people are seeing that as an actual career path yeah as an option as an option but it's I it's my job to just
00:34:59
let them know not kill their dream but let them know the reality of the situation that it's a very uh tough path
00:35:06
to take and um if you want to take it I'll get behind you but just understand
00:35:11
it's going to take uh it's going to be very very hard work to get there if someone's got that
00:35:16
red hot burning desire um but they don't have the the like the the talent to
00:35:21
match it and you know they don't have the talent were you were you are you going at having tough conversations
00:35:30
or do you reckon even if someone doesn't initially have the talent if they've got
00:35:33
that like sort of work work ethic and that drive and that burning desire that they can overcome
00:35:39
anything to answer the first part of that the very the way that you put it first I'm going to say that I I am
00:35:46
probably tremendously bad at having T tough conversations yeah I'll tell you why cuz
00:35:54
I've never told anybody that they can't achieve their dream and I know in my
00:35:58
head that there's been people in front of me and I know they can't it's
00:36:02
probably a little bit unrealistic to have that goal and I've never told a single person they can't reach it but on
00:36:10
the you know to to back myself up here a little bit I also believe that there has
00:36:16
to be a little bit of self-discovery there that what is the harm and them trying to reach their go what is a har
00:36:23
trying them trying to reach for the stars what what bad can come out come out of it and I know the martial arts
00:36:30
Journey you might not get to the top but I know you know I know what what it can
00:36:34
do for your life if you reach even halfway I know how much positivity it can bring into your life even if you
00:36:42
don't achieve the exact goals what you what you what that you're set out to do
00:36:47
um you're learning you're learning a code to live by that is just a beautiful
00:36:53
thing right so it's an intentional thing you're not scared of having tough
00:36:56
conversations but you just want people to sort of like figure it out in their own time let them figure out out for
00:37:00
them themselves there's no harm in it all they're going to do is train learn
00:37:03
martial arts learn the martial arts lifestyle live a beautiful healthy lifestyle meet some of the best people
00:37:09
I've ever met in my life they're going to meet them they're going to
00:37:11
intermingle with them it's just a great um positive environment something that
00:37:15
they should be involved with that's going to that's going to elevate their
00:37:19
life anyway also you don't always get it right like I've I've heard stories about
00:37:24
your um your initial meetings with um your two most famous students I guess Dan hooker and israela you both um tried
00:37:32
to like Palm them off to other gyms didn't you is that a fact yeah yeah little little a little
00:37:40
bit little bit little bit dumb but I was also I was also quietly confident that my gym was doing things a little bit
00:37:49
differently to the other gyms and that if they that they would probably find their way back yeah so but you didn't
00:37:57
you didn't see like UFC potential in either of them initially no I did you did yeah I did
00:38:05
but I don't know just a part of me wanted them to also see the potential that my gym and my coaches had and my
00:38:14
and and I had so go away have a look at what other gyms are doing and then come back and be like oh you guys are there's
00:38:21
something a little different about what what you guys are doing there something a little bit different about the water
00:38:26
you guys are drinking so I think I'll situate myself here yeah I wanted them
00:38:31
to see that as well what do um what does an average day look like for you uh must
00:38:37
be like a time management Master Class like you've got four kids at home how
00:38:41
how young is the youngest Like Preschool age right what why's going to kill me
00:38:48
um I'm going to say four four [ __ ] I could be wrong there yeah see what what
00:38:54
does the day look like what time are you up 4:30 my alarm goes every day for the
00:39:00
last however many years yeah decade plus decade and a half maybe even the last 20
00:39:06
years 4:30 I get I I drag myself out of bed grab a protein shake jump on my motorbike go to the gym I'm there about
00:39:17
five yeah I'm there about five take a few classes train Fighters up to about now uh 1 2:00
00:39:28
go home pick up my kids from school get them come have have some food with them a little bit of homework play around a
00:39:36
little bit back to the gym at 4: and then I'm at the gym from 4: till about 839 yeah 8
00:39:45
89 yeah so my day split but yeah it's it's it's I mean I don't know how many
00:39:51
that's a long day so and then then you go home a little bit of wind down time
00:39:56
or straight to or uh at man i' I virtually have to go straight to bed cuz I get up at 4:30 so
00:40:04
if you imagine I get home around this I get home at 9:00 eat um spend some time uh with the with the wife my two older
00:40:14
boys that gets me to 10 I got to have a shower um what's that 10:30 and I got to
00:40:22
get up and like what's that 5 hours later yeah so that's that's a lot of
00:40:27
sleep you're not prioritizing your sleep are you no but I mean I i' yeah I've
00:40:31
never slept much I have I have difficulty sleeping you know if I if I sleep past 7 I'm happy I'm like man I
00:40:38
had to sleep in if I get past 7:00 a.m. so yeah but that's my day but people you
00:40:44
know like you can sit here and be like man that's a long day it's l and that
00:40:48
but it's not a long day when all you'd rather do in your life is be doing what I'm doing then
00:40:56
it's exactly what I want do and I think that's the my best answer to people
00:41:00
saying oh man it's so long such a long hours I'm you do it every day for the
00:41:06
last you know 15 years I'm like Hey brother because I'm living my dream I'm
00:41:12
doing what I want to do I'd probably be there for longer if my wife wasn't
00:41:15
nagging me I'd stay at the gym till 10 you know yeah that was going to be my
00:41:20
next like does car like does it create friction at home that you're not there and
00:41:28
it has over the years for sure for sure I've gotten a little bit better at that
00:41:31
but look I couldn't do what I did like there wouldn't be any success there
00:41:36
wouldn't be you know there quite honestly wouldn't be an isra Eda or Carlos orber or anyone if there wasn't
00:41:43
aara Nukem that's just the truth um if if she wasn't the woman that she was
00:41:49
that basically brought up my kids um with a little bit of input but she did she's she's mostly brought up those kids
00:41:57
by herself um if she didn't do that and she wasn't graceful about it and let
00:42:02
that happen and supported and supported me then there wouldn't be those guys cuz
00:42:08
I would maybe because I would be bringing up those kids and dedicating more of my time to my family so um I
00:42:16
made sacrifices in that regard she made sacrifices in that regard and um it is what it is but yeah I'm not going to say
00:42:23
that it was all 12,000 whistles over last 15 or 20 years there was definitely some um shouting matches and some things
00:42:32
forun across the room but that's that's that's life you know that's real life
00:42:37
yeah it's real life if you yeah if you come home late enough so the kids are
00:42:41
asleep she won't want to create a scene is that why you imagine you're sitting in the driveway like is that a
00:42:48
trick you you use so um you you've been through some um just inredible adversity as well I I
00:42:59
think most most you don't get to your 40s without going through some sort of
00:43:02
adversity I think that's the same for everyone but um do you want to uh talk
00:43:06
about the 2012 Tahiti incident with um Wilman Rodriguez Gomez who was he he was a good friend of yours very good friend
00:43:13
of mine um someone I started fighting with um and then uh at my original gym and then when I went and started my own
00:43:19
gym he called me up and said oh I would like to come across with you when you start your own gym and for you to train
00:43:25
me which is a tremendous honor right it's not someone that it's not a new
00:43:31
person coming and asking me it's it's someone that I was fighting with and
00:43:34
train with at the same time so um I took that I took that as a I took that responsibility like really really
00:43:42
seriously and um yeah we went to Tahiti he had a match in Tahiti and he unfortunately uh passed away in the
00:43:53
ring because he had some maybe a aneurysm that wasn't picked up um and it was made worse by the fight and he got a
00:44:03
he got a blow that he got a fatal blow on the fight and um he never recovered so um man life another pivotal
00:44:12
life-changing moment for me um I I 100% contemplated never doing that sport again CU he he died on your arms
00:44:22
right you were there basically yep he died in my arms I grabbed him I held him I
00:44:28
I questioned the medical staff that were working on him and I was like why you need to do this you need to do
00:44:34
this yeah you know there was a disarray you know in the moment and um and then uh yeah it just when you
00:44:46
have things like that happen in your life when you watch people more or less die in front of you you it's it uh it
00:44:54
leaves an indelible it leaves an impression you know and it certainly left an impression on
00:45:02
me they probably to this day I would say there's probably not a day but maybe every
00:45:11
second day nowadays that I don't think of that kid a year you know for for at
00:45:16
least the first decade when he passed away it was every day I used to in some formal fashion think about um my friend
00:45:24
wman and U probably got that done to every second day but I'm not afraid of that like you I don't want to forget you
00:45:32
know I want him to be in my memory so um it's not it's not a negative thing I
00:45:38
like that my thought flashes to him every now and then I think that's how it
00:45:42
should be so um I think that's what all anyone wants as well like um I don't
00:45:48
know I'm probably projecting here but like if I was on my deathbed I think your biggest fear would be being
00:45:53
forgotten or people not remembering you so I think so I think like Liv living someone's heart like that or their mind
00:45:58
and thinking of them every day or every second day like 12 years on I think um I
00:46:04
think that's humbling says a lot about him and you yep that for sure I um yeah yeah I
00:46:13
every year I visit him I don't know it's just one of just part of oh his burial site his burial
00:46:20
site yeah and and there was there was another incident when um when Izzy won his first um yeah World title belt you
00:46:27
you took the belt to Tahiti y yeah yeah I mean I know I strangely think everything's interconnected you know
00:46:40
um I was 100% adamant that I was going to quit the sport at that point and our original coach me and wiman's
00:46:51
original coach came over to my house and had a very poignant talked to me and he put things
00:47:00
in a way that made me scared me frightened me a little bit and his words were basically
00:47:14
yene if you leave the sport how many of your Fighters do you think will leave the sport with you and I said to him I
00:47:21
said R I think they'll probably all just carry on and then I kind of walked into his
00:47:27
trap that's exactly what I what he wanted to hear and then he turned to me and he said is there anyone else on this
00:47:34
planet that you would trust to look after those Fighters and put the same you know and look after them in the same
00:47:41
way you do with the same dedication and the same commitment and then there was a couple
00:47:47
minutes of silence while I thought about that and then I turned to him and I said
00:47:54
n yeah wow yeah it still makes me emotional thinking about that moment I don't talk
00:48:01
about it too often but yeah I said n you know what there's no one that'll look after
00:48:09
those kids better than me there's no one that would do quite as good a job and obviously a part of that
00:48:15
was my ego talking but at that point I I just knew that he he and that one small
00:48:22
conversation he changed my mind completely and I was like yeah I was like [ __ ] I've got to keep
00:48:29
going I've got to keep going I cannot put these guys in that danger and that
00:48:35
that young fell was in um they can't do this without me and then amazing because I've never s I've
00:48:45
never had my mind changed like that yeah in such a simple conversation put in such a simple direct way um our old
00:48:54
trainer um L hey who still runs a jym one of the best um trainers and he's you
00:48:59
one of the best coaches in the world still um yeah I have to thank him for that conversation because um my life
00:49:08
would have Tak a completely different direction if it wasn't for him bringing
00:49:11
me back into the sport yeah powerful yeah I think thanks so much for sharing that cuz I can tell it's not
00:49:18
easy for you to share so I do appreciate it um yeah do do you do you think at that moment you changed as a coach so
00:49:24
instead of just like teaching people to to go in there and be [ __ ] Savage as you're teaching them to look after
00:49:30
themselves as well or was that was that like a sort of tun yeah 100% I realized the seriousness of of what I was doing I
00:49:37
always took it very very seriously but I took things to another level I was like
00:49:41
man we we there's a side of us that we love and there's a side of us that we
00:49:47
find fun and but there's a side of it that's so so so serious and if we keep doing
00:49:56
this and we keep putting our boys in the situation we've got to get them out of
00:50:02
there um we've got to get them back to their family parents love ones kids in one
00:50:10
pieace so yeah I I I just took that to another level I took that very very seriously yeah for sure yeah it seems
00:50:18
Seems like you're carrying a big burden but it was uh it was ultimately like a a
00:50:22
pre-existing condition with e Wilman it it it was and it and and to be honest it quite often
00:50:31
is um yeah there's a young man right now who's been in a coma for about 3
00:50:38
weeks um who who in denan and who's not looking too good at this stage um I'm
00:50:47
praying for him and hoping that he pulls through but again pre-existing condition a very simple thing to do
00:50:54
would be to get a MRI um uh m is the cheapest MRI you can get it's two grand it's not a government uh
00:51:04
funded or subsidized um test for sports anyway for Recreational Sports so most Fighters can't afford to do it and they
00:51:12
don't do it but it would pick up any pre-existing conditions and probably save a few lows
00:51:17
but that's a bigger problem with society that we're not going to go into but yeah
00:51:22
yeah it's an unfortunate thing that happens in the sport sometimes yeah and there was a another um recent incident
00:51:27
it was um again another another tragedy but um this time you know completely um outside the Octagon or the ring uh FV
00:51:37
yeah um jeez I I rewatched the um Izzy fight this morning where he uh he's talking to Joe Rogan afterwards and he
00:51:45
does the tribute to fou and then um puts the belt down on the the ground and Bows
00:51:49
in front of it it's powerful stuff it's emotional stuff so fou one of your
00:51:53
Fighters um very promising young fighter and then um was like a street attack like a coward Punch Yeah Yeah that's
00:52:02
just losing people to tragic circumstances is just so so difficult it's and the difficulty of it is that it's
00:52:14
just so avoidable it's such a waste of life tragedies and if when you follow
00:52:22
them back and you break down every detail reverse engineer near them you figure out that there's a thousand
00:52:31
simple things that you could have put in place or done or walked left instead of
00:52:36
walked right stop to do your shoelaces up there's a thousand things that could
00:52:41
have happened that could have prevented that tragedy and that's why they're such
00:52:45
a shame and that's why they're so hard to deal with so hard to get over as well as that that was a very
00:52:56
close member of our team yeah very close member part of a fighting family part of
00:53:00
a family that have um dedicated part of four brothers that have dedicated their life to um my team in my gym and now
00:53:10
those Brothers have gone from 4 to three over just some crazy [ __ ] over nothing over nothing really so
00:53:18
tremendously hard time um for me and Israel and the and the boys at my gym to deal with but
00:53:29
what can you do man you got you got to just got to just pick yourself up and keep going eh yeah I was going to yeah
00:53:36
that was going to be my next thing that I asked you like um yeah how how do you process that as sort of like a coach SL
00:53:42
leader Mentor like you're grieving yourself but also you've got to Rally
00:53:46
these uh these guys around yeah for sure it was tough but I'm yeah I I try to deal with my
00:53:59
stuff myself yeah do yeah just internally I internalize a lot and deal with it myself so I'm definitely not the type of
00:54:10
person I'm not going to sit in front of Janet and talk to her and that's just
00:54:13
not me I and that's fine I think that's fine I think everybody has the different
00:54:18
mechanisms that they use I just go with them myself and just figure it out myself and get in my own head I don't
00:54:25
need to talk to people about it so um but that's not the case for everybody and the problem with having a team
00:54:31
that's so deeply affected by this tragedy is you have to put a blanket out there that kind of captures all the
00:54:38
different people and the way different ways that they are dealing with it and you put this blanket out that kind of
00:54:43
figures them all out and brings them all in at the same time and so I guess that
00:54:48
that was the the difficulty at that time but um yeah I just the way that I put and and look this is the thing man like
00:54:59
when I want to motivate some guys especially that have been through the era of those tragedies and we've had a
00:55:06
couple other tragedies um to be fair at the gym it's very easy for me to look at
00:55:12
these guys that are on the mat and talk to them and be like there's some guys
00:55:18
that we know that will if you're not going to put an effort here and you're not going to live in
00:55:26
this moment and give this everything give this Sport and this team everything that you can there's some guys that are
00:55:33
looking over us right now that will trade places with you in a second and that's a
00:55:40
very poignant and confronting thing for me to let them know that because I think you have to I
00:55:47
think they have to be reminded of that I think every boy trying to be a professional fighter or professional
00:55:52
fighters in my gym have to be reminded that this like life is fleeting sometimes and you you are here now like
00:55:59
you have the ability to do all the things these guys who are on our wall on our painting they don't have the ability
00:56:05
to do it they'll trade with you right now make the most of what you're doing
00:56:09
make the most of this life do what you're doing you've got an hour in the
00:56:12
gym make the most of it you can become a better fighter you know they can't do
00:56:16
that anymore they're doing it through you essentially yeah yeah that's a good
00:56:20
way of reframing it isn't it that's how I frame it yeah and and I don't think
00:56:24
there's anything wrong with it I I I like I enjoy framing it like that I enjoy using those guys as inspiration
00:56:33
and motivation for the guys coming up and I think there's I think it's the
00:56:37
truth yeah are you a reasonably emotional guy do you do you cry quite a bit I don't I would say I don't cry that
00:56:46
that often but yeah there are moments that'll [ __ ] I just just when you reflect on the hard stuff yeah I mean
00:56:52
I'm human yeah I'm human so there are moments that you just yeah especially
00:56:58
for instance when you're talking about these guys here um yeah you sometimes you just emotion
00:57:05
takes over man it's yeah those those scars Run Deep yeah I find I'm getting
00:57:11
emotional as I get older like during my 20s and 30s I could probably count on one hand the amount of time times I cry
00:57:17
like Nana's funeral that sort of thing and as I get older I'm more sort of open
00:57:22
to it it's quite confronting though way yeah but I I think yeah you've got to
00:57:27
admit as you get older you have more you give life more value right CU you've
00:57:33
seen more things you've seen you've seen more tough circumstances and tragedies
00:57:37
and you're like man you just value life a lot more and you value your time way
00:57:43
more than when you're young when you're young think you're going to carry on
00:57:48
forever yeah 100% actually there there was a scene in the sty binder movie where you you were on the the sofa next
00:57:55
to Izzy and um you you you start um crying or you getting quite emotional when you're asked if there's a point
00:58:01
where you thought you couldn't face the day yeah do you have many of those days
00:58:07
yeah no no I don't I don't have many of those days at all but that when that that was in reference
00:58:17
to that tragedy with uh fall yeah with with f just happening and um and and and just to
00:58:29
clarify by not facing the day never in any way meant offing myself what sometimes there were days where I was
00:58:38
just like man just let me stay under my bed sheets and just hide there for or let me just let me
00:58:48
fall off Into Obscurity let me move down to inago and Stewart Island and just let me live
00:58:55
the rest of my life there like just [ __ ] you know I'm human mate like you know
00:59:01
when you're facing something like that you're like man I just just get me away
00:59:05
from all this get me away from this heartache get me away from this pain let me escape cuz this this isn't this can't
00:59:14
be happening this can't be this this can't be real so I'm I'm not the person
00:59:22
that'll probably you know that'll off myself one day but I'm some you know I
00:59:26
definitely go through thoughts of like man is this all worth it just get me out of here I don't want anything to do with
00:59:32
this with this pain with this heartache just check me over the Caro the reality of the reality
00:59:39
is the pain follows you right pain follows you follows you under the bed sheets it follows you to inago so um but
00:59:47
just for a fleeting moment you're like [ __ ] I need to I need I need release
00:59:51
from this I need to get out of this but the pain follows you all that the only thing that ever helps with pain like
00:59:59
this is is time time and it never really heals properly no cuz there is that saying that um Time Heals the wounds but
01:00:08
um I I don't know I think your body just doesn't really necessarily heal the
01:00:13
wound the body just lears to adapt with this extra burden or pain you car patches it up a bit e it's always it's
01:00:19
always like underneath the plaster it's always there man when you lose someone
01:00:23
so close to you it can never leave you leave you yeah for sure that's tough oh
01:00:28
that's a lot yeah also you're um your Honda Civic it wouldn't have made it
01:00:32
down inag yeah ando's a wonderful place I quite like him you do you yeah hey um oh
01:00:40
yeah you can wear your bush [ __ ] there all year round yeah I'd be I'd fit in
01:00:43
down there I reckon yeah let's talk about um the UFC for a bit because it's
01:00:48
um it's such an intriguing is it the fastest growing sport in the world I think I believe it still is yeah it's
01:00:54
it's amazing Dana White do you know Dana White at all have you met him you had
01:00:58
some meetings with him if we pass each other on the street I'm sure we'd recognize each other but I
01:01:03
haven't had big long conversations with him at all the longest conversation I
01:01:07
had with him was uh at a fight um another coup a few months ago yeah I just asked him um you
01:01:18
know are we the ones fighting on UFC 300 is it going to be us and then he told me
01:01:23
no it's not going to be us it's going to be another Alex perer and and then I
01:01:28
just said cool thank you and we moved on that's the longest conversation I've had
01:01:31
with him wow he's he's done a great job from a business perspective but um I
01:01:37
suppose you said come at it from a Fighters perspective and I I know nothing about any of this but all all I
01:01:42
know is like I saw a Conor McGregor interview and he said I've made more money than anyone else in the UFC but
01:01:47
I've also been ripped off more than anyone else in the UFC in terms of I suppose you know what they pay the
01:01:52
fighters versus what they're making as a as a company any thoughts on that do
01:01:58
they screw the fighters over a little bit I believe that they could probably share more of the profit yep for sure
01:02:10
um not going to get into you know we can't I mean I'm not going to get into
01:02:14
numbers that that needs someone who's much smarter than me to talk about that
01:02:19
but um it's a sport where the fighters make a lot of sacrifice yeah and not throwing
01:02:27
a b ball for a hoop or they're not trying to you know cross a ball over a line and put the ball on the line and
01:02:34
stuff they are physically uh trying to hurt each other tremendous tremendous uh sacrifice that they're
01:02:43
making um and I just believe for that sacrifice yeah I mean they they deserve to be well paid for that sacrifice and
01:02:52
for entertaining the masses yeah well that company is all about the talent isn't it
01:02:57
it's all about the fighters yeah and You' got to look at it from both perspectives like at the end of the day
01:03:04
that sport has grown up with that brand the UFC it wouldn't the sport wouldn't
01:03:09
be where it is without that brand and without that company and without Dana White um I guess the argument is always
01:03:17
going to be till the end of time is um do the fighters get paid enough and then some of them are going to be satisfied
01:03:25
with what they get paid and some of them are going to be think they can get paid
01:03:29
a lot more so yeah it's a difficult thing yeah have you been following the slap at all do you do are you familiar
01:03:36
with the slap I I'm I think that's ridiculous it is ridiculous it's absurd
01:03:44
but sh it's entertaining yeah yeah but yeah I don't know it's you think it's ridiculous like
01:03:51
from you just you just don't get it or from a danger perspective or a health a
01:03:55
danger perspective and I just yeah I mean what talent do you need to to [ __ ] your hand back and slap a person as hard
01:04:05
as you possibly can is that like are we starting to Define that as a talent I don't think it's a talent I
01:04:14
don't think it's a talent that should be rewarded anyway yeah oh I love I love
01:04:17
that you're so refreshingly honest so so um the the week of a fight at one of
01:04:22
these big UFC events what does that look like for you because I'm guessing say
01:04:26
whether whether it's Izzy or Dan or whoever there's no more training you can
01:04:29
do in that week so are you sort of like a therapist a counselor are you just keeping them keep
01:04:34
keeping them calm and level what are you doing that last week uh to be honest U I've got a lot of other people in the
01:04:41
team that do that what I like to do um nowadays is I like to oversee everything so I like to kind of sit over the top of
01:04:50
everything and make sure that everything runs smoothly and also what I like to do is a lot of
01:04:58
my own fight preparation and a lot of that is like just touching up on like last little
01:05:05
bits of video analysis um we do do a little bit of training um not much um so I like to
01:05:12
make sure that I'm covering all my bases in those trainings and I like to oversee
01:05:16
everything I like to oversee that the transport Logistics people have got that right I like to oversee that the
01:05:24
dieticians uh got his part right I like to know that the managers of the fighters are you know got everything
01:05:32
like in line and ready to roll and security is good to go I just like to make sure that everything's running
01:05:38
smoothly yeah that's kind of my role there's not a lot to do you're right um
01:05:44
but in terms of my own preparation I do a lot of it's it's a very calming week
01:05:50
for me where I get a lot of time to myself and I just touch up on little things to do with the opponent and the
01:05:56
strategy go back and forth with my other coaches and just make sure we've got
01:06:01
our eyes dotted and our te cross I guess yeah and are you um are you a big star in those environments so you you get to
01:06:09
Vegas or Florida or New York there must be like super fans that recognize you and I yeah yeah for sure but and no like
01:06:18
I mean no one for the most part all the obligations are the fighters that Fighters have to do all the media and
01:06:24
stuff I hide hide back in the me me and the coaches we just hide in the hotel we
01:06:29
try not to have or the Airbnb or whatever we try to have not try not to have anything to do with that I don't go
01:06:35
to the press conferences and stuff and I just stay at the house it's nice and
01:06:39
quiet at the house when everybody's at the media days in the press conferences
01:06:43
and stay at the house and just collect my thoughts let them do all the hoopla and then I come in on that fight day
01:06:50
yeah so it's so so so you're in the Octan in between rounds and you're
01:06:55
you're not excited that like Donald Trump sitting behind you or Ryan Reynolds is there
01:07:01
or are you a little bit star strike you must have these moments where you're
01:07:04
like holy [ __ ] you know how did a how did a boy from East Oakland end up here yeah or
01:07:12
no just don't buy into the [ __ ] at all no I mean n no you must had a selfie
01:07:20
with Rogan no n but I I don't know you've got to you got to be a fan you got to be a
01:07:34
fan to see someone as a star I feel and I I don't especially nowadays man I don't watch movies or TV or anything I
01:07:42
wouldn't know who half the people are all these people come out to Israel and
01:07:46
d and that and there's a thousand photographers that come up and take photos of those to I'm like I don't I
01:07:53
want to know who the guy was yeah so I don't really get Starck it's probably like Dave Chappelle
01:07:59
or something like that like a when you don't know who the people are you don't
01:08:02
really you don't really good St but the other thing is like the other thing is
01:08:07
when you do meet some of these um people which I have done they're just blogs M they're just
01:08:14
blogs mate like they they're just they're the same as me really they're
01:08:18
not any different to me it's just I guess when you're on TV and stuff um uh
01:08:25
because they're on TV and they're on the movies or whatever the platform they're
01:08:29
on I don't know some people put them on a pedestal and stuff but at the end of
01:08:32
the day they're just normal people yeah 100% but have you met anyone that stands
01:08:36
out you like oh actually he you know he's just a person but he's a really
01:08:39
good person or she's a really good person Mark Zabo oh really Zak yep yeah yep had a a really good uh 10 minute
01:08:48
conversation with him about he's really into martial arts and fight Sports um
01:08:54
very nice uh gen bloke very pleasant conversation um yeah yeah he's he's he's
01:09:01
a good dude when I walked away from the conversation but I know he's really cool
01:09:05
straight dude good on him ironically you're probably one of the only people in the world that doesn't have like an
01:09:10
Instagram page do you have an Instagram page uh I do not but I tell you what I tell you
01:09:18
one thing the the business has an Instagram page the business has an Instagram page and a couple of Romanian
01:09:24
lads took it over they tried to Heist they they took the passwords and then they messaged us and they were this the
01:09:31
classic oh will give give me you know $500,000 or something to get the page back and I was like I'll just start a
01:09:39
new page yeah you can have it yeah but in the end it's good knowing who Mark
01:09:44
zerug is quick call um and his Direction and he puts you on to the right people and
01:09:52
they get back your Instagram page what do you mean in his Direction have you got a direct dial to Zach you get his
01:09:57
team you get his team you never get a direct dial to to the man himself but you are able to get his team and they
01:10:03
are able to point you in the right direction when terms of getting your Instagram page the rigar roll you have
01:10:09
to go through to get your Instagram page is crazy you have to send photos of yourself to get it B and I was like man
01:10:15
I can't do this so I just I had to make a few calls and then I got a back sh
01:10:20
that's got not who you know oh educ semi semi-educated guest who would who would
01:10:25
win out of um zacker BG and Elon Musk I always got to back my man Zach Elon Musk is a bigger dude though
01:10:33
isn't he does does wait or he's a bigger dude but um Mark he knows about fight
01:10:41
Sports and he's dedicated and he knows about technique and strategy and he's a
01:10:45
proper fight Enthusiast I think um Elon would just be going in there and relying
01:10:50
on just pure size weight and athletic advantages and I'm not sure I'm not sure that's going to be enough I
01:10:57
think um technique and I think I think Mark's technique and skill Will trump
01:11:03
elon's physicality it's just my opinion I appreciate it geez you're a big fan of
01:11:08
Zach Z can do no wrong with you um and what about post fight at the UFC what what what does that look like especially
01:11:15
on a bad night so um I'm guessing like a a big night where you you went about um
01:11:21
it's a celebration so there's nothing that needs to be said what's what's it
01:11:24
like when it's I have nothing to do with a big Knight after a a big win cuz they
01:11:34
are they are just some you just don't want to be a part of them they're just
01:11:38
too there's too much drunkenness and Deery going on there's a lot of parting
01:11:44
going on yeah you can understand even from a coach's perspective you must understand why like 12 12 weeks 16 weeks
01:11:49
of intense discipline yeah yeah there's a lot of steam to blow off yeah 100% I
01:11:54
mean I'm not I'm I'm All About It um I think you should blow some steam off and
01:11:59
you should celebrate your wins they don't you know they're finite they don't
01:12:02
come they don't happen forever you can't do the sport forever celebrate them have
01:12:06
a good time do it safely is my one sort of thing you know do it on a safe environment around people good around
01:12:12
good people that's always the the key thing there um but a night where you lose yeah absolute dog [ __ ] there's
01:12:22
never been there some of the worst nights of my life did do you do you say anything to the fighters on the night or
01:12:28
do do you like give them time to sort of debrief and process themselves yeah depends who they are depends on their
01:12:34
personality some Fighters they want to go get debriefed straight away what went wrong what could we do better and you
01:12:42
got to do an analysis right then and there um you know um you know hook it never say a word to them you just walk
01:12:52
out of the stadium and go home grab a feed and go home you don't have to say
01:12:57
anything to them we're lost you don't want to hear about it that's it you you
01:13:02
don't want to acknowledge it um but man just losing is tough at the top losing is tough and such a Cutthroat
01:13:10
sport cutro real and you got to understand you have how the UFC Pay structur is structured is you
01:13:19
have X amount you have half of your pay for showing up and you have half of your
01:13:24
pay for winning so essentially if you don't win you're only getting half as
01:13:29
much as you could have potentially earned if you win and that could be $150,000 $250,000 $300,000 yeah cut because you
01:13:40
can't win that's pressure yeah that is a lot of pressure that's huge pressure
01:13:47
huge pressure imagine in 15 minutes being able to you know having the responsibility to be up 300,000 or down
01:13:54
300,000 in a 50 minute space of your life only that you just train 3 months for and this is what this your your
01:14:02
family needs that money you know you your family the people your blls that everybody needs that money all the
01:14:09
people around you they need that money if you go without it man it's huge pressure yeah actually yeah there's
01:14:17
something in the style being the movie you sort of touch upon the financial situation like as he does in particular
01:14:23
like uh so are you on a like percentage deal with him yeah yep mostly works like
01:14:28
each trainer um and they they're on a percentage um and then each trainer negotiates what that percentage is
01:14:35
between him and the fighter right so you get say like 10% 5% whatever I get get a
01:14:40
few percenti he makes out in the in his movie that like he's set up for life and
01:14:47
um it looks like he's he's doing pretty good um but he he says you are as
01:14:51
well yeah yeah I mean as he has looked after me but I've looked after him you
01:14:59
see it's uh the relationship is he there's a part of that movie where he
01:15:05
gets a bit pissed off and he probably says something that is he probably shouldn't have said or I don't I
01:15:10
disagree with it at all I don't agree with it at all and most people wouldn't
01:15:14
agree with but izy um came to me with the a goal and I was like man let's do it it's I'll do
01:15:26
everything in my power to help you achieve that goal and um and I did and and he's
01:15:33
eternally grateful for that and he pays me for that he pays me for that and um and in return I do the very best job
01:15:45
that I could possibly do I did that for a decade without ever getting a scent you know what I mean and I didn't know
01:15:56
whether he would ever make any money because you just don't know there's so
01:16:00
many things that can happen um you know in a Fighter's career you don't know
01:16:05
whether they're going to be successful and make you know large amounts of money
01:16:09
you just don't know so I went on that Journey with them we went on that journey together and we were we were
01:16:18
lucky enough to you know kind of break through and achieve some of our goals and we did that together and we look
01:16:25
after each other because of it yeah it's been a incredibly successful um partnership and um I mean due to his age
01:16:33
now it looks like it's you're going to be the only coach that he ever has you
01:16:36
know for this for this portion of his his career like it's not going to be like a Joseph Parker situation where
01:16:41
it's like no we've reached the end of the road it's time to try something
01:16:44
different yeah but you have to the reason that I have a lot of fighting that um stick with me and my coaching
01:16:59
team and my gym is because my coaching team myself and my gym are always evolving there's always
01:17:06
something to improve there's always something to learn there's always a new
01:17:10
pull out of the sport where you can make an take an advantage from over other teams and it's that first for
01:17:20
evolvement that keeps the fighters interested in and training with you and when you stop doing that when you get
01:17:25
bored of the sport and you don't want to evolve and you don't want to find out
01:17:28
the new techniques the new strategies that's when Fighters are like man I have
01:17:31
to go somewhere else you're not evolving as fast as the sports evolving so I'm
01:17:35
not evolving and so it's one thing me and my coaching team have always done we've moved very very quickly with the
01:17:41
sport yeah how's your relationship changed over the years as he's got more famous
01:17:47
and more successful um yeah I don't know I probably wouldn't have thought about you
01:17:52
know this line of questioning until after watching the sty being one line particular you about thek
01:17:58
sheets the which I like yeah yeah I mean he's less accessible like I don't
01:18:07
see him as often but it was easy to see him you know when none of us had any money because what
01:18:17
could you do you had to hang out with me you had $5 in your pocket and I had $10 in my pocket so to give to give a we
01:18:27
had $15 all we could do was hang out together in the gym well that's not the
01:18:32
case anymore I'm still always in the gym but he he wants to um you know he wants
01:18:39
to have some bance the fruits of his labor like he wants to enjoy the fruits of his labor and he's he's entitled to
01:18:45
do that so um you know he can now he can go in jitsy and go fishing and travel to
01:18:52
see his friends in London and stuff like he had he has the freedom to do that I guess what the what the thing that is
01:18:59
that he has to be aware of is he just has to keep everything in Balance he's
01:19:02
still a professional athlete he still a professional Sportsman so um you can do so much of that but at a certain point
01:19:10
um when does that start to take away from who you are and what you're doing he's got that balance pretty good for
01:19:15
the most part um I think um he's turning a corner a little bit later in life and
01:19:21
realizing what all kind of athletes that are coming into their mid-30s realize and that realization is that they've got
01:19:28
to dedicate themsel a little more to their craft than what they did when they were young um and I think he's coming to
01:19:34
that realization so he's got a he's got a few good ones left in it yeah I heard I I heard him do
01:19:41
a podcast with a guy called Theo Von who loves um loves the fighting yeah and uh
01:19:46
as he talked about through his 20s it was like he was living on a diet of uberit and now he's got like a mate that
01:19:51
lives with him that's like a chef so he's taking care of the nutrition side
01:19:55
of things which um I suppose it's all like yeah one percent is or two percent
01:19:59
is here and there maybe a little bit more than that for the nutrition but yeah like as you know like you just your
01:20:05
your body your body your mind might work the same as when you're young but your
01:20:11
body just starts to operate differently yeah and so you if you want to be a professional athlete at the top level
01:20:18
you have to adjust the way that you live from especially from your mid 20s yeah you're not going to be a get away with
01:20:25
that stuffff so it's just again he's going through a bit of a learning phase
01:20:30
or he's been going through a bit of a learning phase the last couple of years
01:20:33
getting that balance right um realizing that his body isn't operating the same
01:20:38
way it was when he's um 25 um and he's adjusting he's adjusting a lot of things
01:20:44
in his life and his lifestyle and the way that he trains um to suit that I think the important thing is that you
01:20:50
make that realization and start to make the adjustments yeah well would you say that you two are friends
01:20:56
or do you need to sort of keep a respectful sort of distance in order to cuz I'm the stoping to movie there's a
01:21:03
couple of um couple of scenes that are really [ __ ] awkward to watch actually one where he's um he's not in training
01:21:09
cuz he's clipping his nails and you give him a serve then there's another one
01:21:12
where he's late for an early morning training in Vegas you you um you drop the seab bomb it's a very angry scene
01:21:18
I'm guessing if you're if you're really broy with someone you can't sort of have
01:21:22
these tough conversations is this something that you've consciously done over the years like sort of keep each
01:21:27
other at arms length yeah that there's definitely uh a tight Bond there a friendship right but I guess
01:21:37
um I'm a little bit judicious with it because most of the time with Israel most of the
01:21:46
time my integration into his life is as a coach it's as a coach so I'm very
01:21:53
judicious um with the moments that I have to be a friend but it's definitely
01:21:57
there he he's my mate I won't train anybody who's not my mate I won't uh you
01:22:02
you have to be someone who I would consider your mate before I am willing to give you so much sacrifice and me and
01:22:07
my coaches are willing to give you so much sacrifice so I guess I'm just a little bit judicious about when I need
01:22:13
to be his friend but and when I need to be his coach because at the moment at the moment or most of the time in his
01:22:19
career I've had to be more of his coach than his friend so yeah I guess that's
01:22:24
good way to explain it CU you're you're very different very different dudes
01:22:28
aren't you like he says on the star Bend movie that you're much much older than
01:22:31
him but you're not really like he's in his 30s you're in your 40s but so when
01:22:35
so you're you're in your white Honda Civic and he drives up for the first
01:22:39
time in his um brick red McLaren was orange McLaren whatever it is what like what do you make of that are you like
01:22:47
for [ __ ] sake [ __ ] we again we're very very very different right okay so we we
01:22:55
have completely different perspectives on lives and how we approach things and oh I'm a little bit more
01:23:03
conservative so um you know I live a comfortable life I'm not going to lie like I've I've don't I've got to you
01:23:11
know I've got some money um I didn't always have money there was a time when
01:23:15
I had no money but and I am conservative with that I'm I would rather people think that I don't
01:23:24
have any money yeah which is a little bit of the opposite approach for him I think he doesn't mind um being a little
01:23:31
bit more flashy um with his money but at the end of the day what does it matter at the end of the
01:23:40
day he worked hard for his money and I worked hard for my money and how we display that it doesn't really matter
01:23:49
it's not illegal money it's not money from drugs it's not it's hard earned
01:23:54
Blood Sweat and Tears money the best kind the best the best kind you have to sacrifice years in
01:24:02
years heartache Blood Sweat tears it's the best kind of money the money that
01:24:07
you actually have to grel in the dirt to get pick yourself up and climb to the highest Pinnacle to get so um that's the
01:24:15
best kind of money hard ear money is the best money and he's entitled to spend it
01:24:20
and display it however he wants and I'm entitled to do it how I want different
01:24:24
right yeah I read a quote from you saying that um if you lived on your own you could just in your house just have
01:24:29
like one chair one bed one One Bowl One knife one fork what do you spend your do
01:24:36
you when you fly to like the UFC do you you you Splash out on business class seats I do not I do not I I yeah this is
01:24:46
the thing right I I you're you're a big dude those economy seats are awful yeah
01:24:52
but you're talking about you're talking about 10 grand yeah you but come on you one of
01:25:02
the top coaches in the UFC you're talking about it's still 10 grand so don't matter how much money I get I
01:25:08
still look at I'm like 10 grand why would I spend 10 grand on a seat for a 13-hour flight I could do so much more
01:25:17
with that 10 grand so much more and there's two there's that side of it and and that comes from I just
01:25:24
came from a middle inome I didn't come from a poor family I came from a middle
01:25:28
inome family so there wasn't there wasn't there you know we had money but
01:25:31
we didn't have great amounts of money so 10 grand is a lot of money to a middle
01:25:35
income family I'm like 10 grand that has a lot of value for me no matter how much
01:25:39
money I've got 10 grand on a seat is just ridiculous right um but also there's there's another side
01:25:48
of it and yeah I am I have surrounded myself with a lot of people some of them are
01:25:58
very wealthy some of them are middle income some of them are are very poor and some of those
01:26:03
people have helped me get to the heights that I've got some of those people have helped Israel get
01:26:13
to the heights that they are I'm not going to spend 10 grand on a seat when I could give that 10 that 10
01:26:20
grand can go to them because if it wasn't for those people I wouldn't be I
01:26:24
wouldn't have the ability to buy that seat or I wouldn't have the ability to
01:26:27
support my family and you just can't justify that that's how I look at things
01:26:32
in my head that's where I that's where I come from something can I get this 15
01:26:37
grand business set no because I know people that helped me get through this journey who I help and support as much
01:26:43
as I can I can't justify getting that 10 or 15 grand seat when I know my mate
01:26:49
would do so much more with that 10 or50 game it's just ridiculous I I love that
01:26:53
so much I I I uh was listening to a very old podcast you did this morning and um
01:26:59
you told a story about your your sister who's like the head of um FIFA yeah women's women's soccer you guys were
01:27:05
comparing your schedules cuz she was bitching about how much flying she does so you're comparing schedules and then
01:27:10
uh turns out she she does about the same amount of flying as you but most of her
01:27:14
flying is either done in first class business class or even private jets um I thought but that was an old podcast I
01:27:22
thought you may have changed by now with all the success is but nah nah what you
01:27:26
say is what you get eh she don't know about this life brother she don't know she don't know
01:27:33
anything about the hardship of my life okay she she's ried up in coton W by those people in Switzerland she doesn't
01:27:39
know nothing about the hardships of um being a UFC coach n but yeah I I I will not spend money unnecessarily if um I
01:27:51
think it's just stupid or a waste of money or I think people probably more deserving of that money than me spending
01:27:57
on on something frivolous it's just the way I am maybe that's the Dutch Side of
01:28:01
Me Maybe that's the Dutch side of me got I've done over a 100 episodes of this
01:28:06
podcast now I don't know if I've ever met um anyone that says as comfortable
01:28:10
in their own skin as what you are yeah that's I think that's a that's
01:28:16
a big compliment I think that's a massive compliment have you always been this way or definitely no definitely
01:28:21
haven't always been this way I think fighting and martial arts helped me become that way I think um I was not a
01:28:28
particularly confident person um when I was at school or when I was at University or or playing rugby but
01:28:36
there's something about like there's something about walking into a cage
01:28:41
walking into a ring and fighting someone that there's something about doing that
01:28:46
and taking away from that what you take away from that is that man such a difficult thing to do
01:28:54
why would it be difficult for me to talk to Mark Zuckerberg I've done that I've
01:28:59
walked in the cage I've trained for 12 weeks he essentially wants to beat the
01:29:03
[ __ ] out of me I want to beat the [ __ ] out of him I've shook his hand at the
01:29:07
start I've shook his hand at the end tremendously hard for me to overcome that um I managed to do that why would a
01:29:13
conversation with Mark Zuckerberg or a podcast with dom Harvey or any sort of conversation or anything in life be
01:29:20
difficult after that yeah the answer is that when you really think about it that
01:29:24
that's the hardest thing I've done in my life that's the hardest thing I've done
01:29:27
in my life everything else is easy compared to that so it's a funny sort of perspective that not everybody's going
01:29:32
to agree with or not everybody's going to have but that's kind of My Philosophy
01:29:36
that's how I kind of look at things that's my world view if you like you
01:29:40
think getting in a cage is tough have you ever done economy Oakland to New York 17
01:29:44
hours no that's hard I believe I believe no I believe I have I believe I have
01:29:51
you're unbelievable I believe I have it's [ __ ] tough but this is like I I will do it but you know who
01:29:59
won't do it my wife and if she goes she she goes up to business or then [ __ ] I'm
01:30:06
not going to stay down on economy I love that there a little part of me that like when I when I'm on a
01:30:14
trip with my wife it's like oh [ __ ] thank God she's on this trip my I don't
01:30:17
have to get economy General hey um one thing I want to ask you about is your thoughts on um like to Poppy syndrome
01:30:23
and uh I suppose in particular what I'm thinking about is um you've you've have
01:30:27
you ever been nominated for Coach of the Year at the hellberg I have you've been
01:30:31
nominated but you've never won I've never won but um so what well to me that seems that
01:30:40
seems I'm probably projecting here but if I was if I was in your position and I
01:30:43
was um you know wild had the success that you'd had with um City kickboxing got these guys into the UFC
01:30:52
had all the success I'd want some acknowledgement back home I I don't know I think I'd I'd be a
01:30:58
little bit upset maybe no because um I didn't do it to win a hellberg no no no
01:31:07
I did it to win for me Israel could be recognized as the best fighter and the best coach in the world and I that was
01:31:15
the and I did it so that Israel could be the best fighter in the world that was I
01:31:19
didn't even really do it so I could become the best coach but that comes with it um and I didn't didn't do it for
01:31:24
hellberg so I wasn't particularly yeah I didn't care that I didn't get it I was
01:31:31
happy that the lady that got it noene oh tyu yeah tyu got it that year I think I
01:31:37
don't know a lot about nple but the they won the World Championship and that's an
01:31:42
amazing feat as well it's a it's an award show there can only be one and
01:31:48
you've got a whole lot of magnificent achievements only one of them can win the award so
01:31:54
it is what it is God you're so laid back are you bothered by anything like what
01:31:59
does anything what like what tell you what I'm bothered by people that are born after the year
01:32:08
1995 what does that back 29 yeah yeah I guess so I just have a group of young people in my gym that I call the 95s and
01:32:15
that's anyone born in the year anyone born in the year 1995 onward I just think yeah I just
01:32:24
give them so much [ __ ] what look this is a very generalized saying okay and it's probably going to
01:32:32
get me in trouble but they just don't have the common sense that I used to have or me and my peers used to have
01:32:38
when we were you know 25 21 20 they just they've got nothing it's weird that's a
01:32:46
big generaliz there must be some of them that have some initiative or I'm I'm
01:32:50
obviously I'm taking that I'm taking for the most part I'm taking the piss um for
01:32:55
the most part right I'm taking the piss but there are a few that are just clueless they're just clueless and so
01:33:03
they should all suffer because a few of them are clueless in front M so so they all get loved into the same
01:33:10
group and they called the 95s they some of the dumbest people I know and they have a leader which is a young man named
01:33:18
Neo Sterling who seems to have adopted their kind of leadership of the their little gang within the gy but yeah I
01:33:25
don't know it's just young people I don't know sometimes they feel or seem
01:33:30
like to me that they're not getting any smarter than we were when we were young
01:33:34
so yeah and the the second half of your life what's that going to look like you're going to you're going to
01:33:42
you're going to die in the gym you're going to still be working taking hits to the pads in your
01:33:48
80s Orin it's a funny thing because I I I try not to make a big thing of it Dom
01:33:56
but when you're doing what you want to do in your life when you say oh this is what I want
01:34:02
to do in my life and you're actually doing it youve found a very special place and I why I say I don't try to
01:34:13
make a big thing of it is because most people they honestly don't really get to
01:34:17
achieve that my parents for instance you know may be in retirement but not as early as I found found this sort of
01:34:25
Freedom you know what do I want to do in life well [ __ ] I'm doing it every day so
01:34:30
every day like I don't work every day fantastic to me every day is it's a
01:34:35
holiday every single day I'm doing what I want to do it's a special place not
01:34:39
everybody gets to gets to that place so um what am I going to do be doing and the second half of my life is I'm
01:34:47
probably going to be doing the same thing bro probably the same thing I would like to spend a bit more time with
01:34:54
my family though I am softening to that I am softening to that as I get older I can see like yeah I was a very
01:35:06
young parent I was 17 and uh I'm 100% a better parent in my 40s than I was when I was 17 I can see
01:35:13
that now yeah my my um my younger boys um spend as much time as I can with them and I would like to as they get a bit
01:35:21
older be with them a lot more than I was with my older two who are 22 and 18 now
01:35:28
so that that's a little goal of mine make up for a bit of lost time with them
01:35:31
yeah and and don't let that time get away on these young my young three and fivey old that I've got now so that
01:35:38
that's probably what I need to concentrate on it's hard to way because you can't get time back you know that at
01:35:42
the age they are right now they're only that age today 100% And also maybe you
01:35:46
won't like them because they're all up born after 95 yeah that's the ironic thing but yeah
01:35:54
do you see yourself in them is there is there a bit of Eugene in all of them in terms of like personality traits and
01:36:01
attitude and no no for sure for sure I see a little especially my older boys I feel uh I see a lot of me in them um
01:36:10
some some of the negative things some of them are negative things that I saw in myself that are in them and so I'm able
01:36:16
to recognize them and try and help them with that and some of them are the more positive things for sure what what are
01:36:21
the negatives what are you what are you claws or things that you need to work on
01:36:25
not well I've worked on them I've worked on a lot of them but when I was young I
01:36:29
was a very very shy introvert I tried I didn't try to intermingle with people I
01:36:35
only had a few friends um and sometimes when you're interv you're missing out on
01:36:40
so much sometimes you need to get out there and just live life and do more sometimes it holds you back um so yeah
01:36:48
one of my sons is probably just a bit too conservative need to get out there more and just be a bit more more open
01:36:54
and open to possibilities yeah um but um yeah both my sons are great people they
01:37:00
work you know they they tremendously hard workers which is something I've carried on from my father true to me
01:37:06
true to them so yeah there's a lot of positive things as well I love that hey
01:37:11
this has been a really enjoyable chat hope hopefully it hasn't been uh too punishing for you no no like I I haven't
01:37:18
done a good podcast uh for a while and I tell you what I enjoy doing a good um kiwi podcast bro yeah I appreciate it
01:37:26
and I I appreciate you for all that you are like there's um yeah it's it's it's
01:37:31
kind of old school you know it's uh the one thing I've learned from doing this podcast
01:37:36
I've had some really successful people on is that the only check code is hard
01:37:39
work and that's that that's it and I feel like you're um you're a poster boy
01:37:43
for that yeah and just being a southman i that's that's my one advice to people
01:37:49
who are just running into all of a sudden in their life running into heaps of media and reports and press
01:37:54
conferences and podcast interviews is just man just all I've the best advice I
01:38:00
got was just be yourself don't worry about what people think and um when I get in front of an interviewer or a
01:38:07
press conference I just talk as if we've known each other for you know the last
01:38:11
20 years and just I just be myself you can never go wrong like that when you start to [ __ ] and pretend and sound
01:38:17
a certain way pretend like you're something else that's when it just goes
01:38:19
close it just goes to another level and you just dig yourself a hole so yeah oh I want one final thing um then we'll let
01:38:28
you go uh yeah in the sty binder movie there's a scene where you talk about um
01:38:33
him like reading reactions and you dealing with social media and stuff yeah how I I don't know if this is something
01:38:40
that you just born with and it's in your DNA um but how can you like ignore the
01:38:44
noise and ignore other people's opinions and things like that [ __ ] it's tough way it's tough
01:38:54
because I am the way I am so it's easy have you just always been this way or
01:38:58
did you grow into this I've always been this way but I'm not I'm going to say that I have slipped
01:39:06
up a few times yep when YouTube started to come into prominence like years and years and years
01:39:13
ago I remember reading a comment and I had a friend it was a com it was my fight and it was a negative comment
01:39:22
about my fight and a friend of mine found out who it was and I saw that person like two years later and I went up to
01:39:31
that yeah I went up to that person I was like you and then we had some pretty strong strong words yeah but then so
01:39:40
that was way back then but I I come I mean I mean how how old are you if you don't mind me ask you're 51 yeah I mean
01:39:48
man we come from we come from a different generation right there was a little bit more accountability for what
01:39:52
you said yeah now there's no accountability at all you can hi you can save from a
01:39:58
distance anything you want to but I don't come from that era I like if someone said something to me on the
01:40:05
playground that person was literally 10 m away from me and if I didn't like it
01:40:09
or if it was insulting then I had the chance to rebut that or I could not acknowledge it or I could acknowledge it
01:40:17
now you can't do that and that's the problem there's no accountability and
01:40:21
when there's no accountability you should just stay the hell away from it in my opinion because those people are
01:40:28
in a much stronger position than you they can say whatever you want they can say whatever they want to
01:40:35
you and you can't say anything back or do anything about it and in that sort of
01:40:40
environment I I suggest people just stay away from it it's a very difficult thing
01:40:45
for young people to do very difficult it's one of the things that Israel struggles with but it's one of the
01:40:51
things that un fortunately some of his competitors have found out about him it's like a weak a weak point it's a
01:40:59
weak point and they know it and they they they man they they know how they they know where his weak pointers and
01:41:06
they know they can get to them through that social media a lot of Fighters now uh have got that Archilles heel and a
01:41:12
lot of other Fighters are using that Archilles heel to break through and it only takes you're talking about small
01:41:18
percentages and if you're emotional or if you're a certain way before a fight
01:41:23
that takes your decisionmaking processes that Skuse them a little bit that could
01:41:28
be the fight so um very difficult thing we deal with in this modern era but um yeah there's no accountability just
01:41:36
ignore that stuff easy for me to say harder to do easier see than done yeah yeah for sure D um hey mate thank you so
01:41:42
much for your time Eugene it's been awesome and I I I can't wait to see um
01:41:48
who is the next star that comes out of City kickboxing cuz you've got these guys and what was like a fringe or a
01:41:52
niche Sport and you've made them like household names and um but beyond that
01:41:56
you're just a good guy and you're teaching like good lessons good morals
01:42:00
and good values to a lot of people and I love it appreciate it Dom thank you for
01:42:04
having me on the podcast couple years we'll do it again when you're bigger and
01:42:06
B eh keenz keenz The Nutty no what was your nickname not the Nutty Prof the mad scientist the mad scientist scientist
01:42:14
hey thanks so much mate no Wicked oh