EP #98 - What Does It Really Cost To Chase The UFC Dream - Cam Rowston

I'm super excited to share this great yarn with the future UFC middleweight champ Cam Rowston!

Cam fights out of City Kickboxing and is currently tearing up the middleweight division. 

We breakdown the Chimaev vs Strickland fight, the performative side of the UFC and how to sell a fight without becoming a fake character. 

Cam talks about the reality and the sacrifices that come with chasing the UFC dream. We also talk about how he almost fought in ONE Championship, the difference between Aussies and Kiwis, what it really takes to be an MMA fighter, and much more! 

Stoked to finally have Cam on the podcast, I've been trying for 2 years to get him on and we finally made it happen! Leshhh goooo

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Transcript

SPEAKER_03 0:00

And I'm here with Cam, the battle giraffe Rouston.

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Thanks for having me, Scott.

SPEAKER_03 0:06

Hey dude. Finally got here. We finally got you here, bro. Oh man. I'm so excited to have you here, bro. Mainly because like, well, one, I've been trying to get you on even before you're in the UFC. But the other thing that I'm just so like pumped about is just like just like what you've achieved in like such a short amount of time in the UFC. But then of course you've been working for years and years before it. But um yeah, man, like future UFC middleweight champion right here. Remember the name. Hell yeah, dude. And then recently came off the um the unanimous decision win against Robert. Um I'm gonna butcher this last name. Is it Bryzek? Brycek. Brycek. Okay, that's close. Um, and then you obviously got that win from like just free round domination, didn't quite get the knockout. Oh, that's right, the TKO, but again, just free round domination. Um, you must feel pretty awesome coming off that.

SPEAKER_00 0:53

Yeah, it was it was good. It was like um it was basically the whole game plan that we had without the finish. Um, but I mean getting a finish is cool and that, but fuck, you just go there to win. That's the main thing. You just gotta go there and just get on the scoreboard and get a win. Um and so the like coaches were real happy with the performance. Um, Cobb, Huge, Mike, Andre, they were they were stoked.

SPEAKER_03 1:17

Yeah, well, there's it's just like there's there's nothing to question on it, you know? Because oh it's not like some I guess what sometimes might happen, which also seems strange to me, but if you get like a lucky shot, like a lucky knockout, maybe, or someone, you know, but there was no lucky shot in that. It was like you won very clearly.

SPEAKER_00 1:34

Yeah, there was uh there was a few moments where like I felt like when we were starting on the feet, like I think it was in the the start of the third round, I'm like, fuck, he's still pretty dangerous, though. Like he's still got power, so I'm just like, nah, I'm not gonna let lucky say I'm not gonna let him get any chances for a lucky shot. And I just as soon as I could get in on the legs and put his back on the mat, I was like, that's it, you're not getting up. Fuck yeah, dude. That's awesome. And I have a gift for you.

SPEAKER_03 2:00

I know that you're a lover of the uh outstanding look at that of the Tim Tan, the double coated. I remember you telling me, and I was like, I think he deserves a treat.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

This is the only flavour of Tim Tams people should be buying and eating. Double coated? Double coat or die, that's what I say.

SPEAKER_03 2:14

But the dark ones are so good that you don't like do they still do them? The dark flavour, dark chocolate?

SPEAKER_00 2:19

That wasn't. I wouldn't know, but it's uh 0.5 stars on the health on the health star rating, so you know they're good for you. Yeah, that's how you know it's the real deal. If you if you if you do a whole pack in one sitting, that's that's how you know that you're uh you're a true Tim Tam connoisseur. Have you done that a few times? Oh many times. Many times the family pack of like the the single ones, like my mum will buy those when I go home to Sydney and it'll just be that's it. Like there's wrappers all over the bedroom. It's just gone. I was just like, why do you buy that? You know if you open it, it's I have one and I can't stop. Yeah. Yeah, they are they are very addictive. Did you ever like dippet of milk? Yeah, yeah. The uh the the what do they call them? Dunks. Dunks. Yeah, you get like warm milk and then you bite one end off and then you you drink the milk through the through each end of the tin tam.

SPEAKER_03 3:01

Yes, I actually slam, I think. Okay, nice. Oh, you can do some some double-coated Tim Tam slams. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 3:08

I definitely will be.

SPEAKER_03 3:09

Hell yeah, dude. Oh well. Cheers. A celebration. We should be celebrating.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

Nice.

SPEAKER_03 3:14

Good on me. Spaits. Apparently, this is uh This is what I reckon's one of New Zealand's best beers. Actually, I was gonna save this question for later, but now, since we're drinking, I want to ask you about New Zealand and Australia, in my opinion, both do really sh like a lot of shitty beers. I don't know why we're so good at it. Australia, you guys have like Forex Gold, VB, but in New Zealand, you might not think they're shitty. But uh you know what I mean though? Like kind of your budget beers?

SPEAKER_00 3:40

Yeah, they're just the uh the mass-produced beers.

SPEAKER_03 3:42

Like in New Zealand, we've got like Lion Red, you know, we've got like Steinlager. Space is like better, but like I don't know why there seems to be so many of them. But who do you reckon does it the best? Like a mass-produced beer.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

Who does it the best? Well, I'm gonna have to say Australia. Easily. You reckon? Yeah, Australia. The um yeah, there's a few beers like um mainstream beers now that have aren't like mash-produced that are coming through. Uh Great Northern in Australia is a real good one. Um Carlton's been around for a long time, but Carlton is starting to do like like low carb and like uh pale ales and IPAs and all that stuff, and they're getting pretty good. But down in um down in Tassie, Cascade is like a real big is like you go to the pub and you get they don't even sell Coca-Cola, they sell like Cascade Cola, Cascade Lemonade. Right. Yeah, like they don't they don't even do that. So if you go to Tasmania, Cascade, and if you go up north to Queensland, like up near where Brody and Carl are from, the Great Northern, that's those are good beers.

SPEAKER_03 4:43

Oh, okay. Alright. I'll have to I haven't I've only ever tried like yeah, Forex Gold and VB, so sounds like I need to try some more mass-produced Australian beer, but uh yeah, I'm a spates man, even though I'm not from the South. Export gold is Auckland, but uh export gold's also quite good for for what it is, but I reckon these are great. They do crates of these now as well. You guys don't have crate day in Australia, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:06

No, we don't have crate day.

SPEAKER_03 5:07

No, we're not as feral.

SPEAKER_00 5:09

Well you guys are feral, but different. Different feral, you know. We've got um Anzac Day is a lot different in Australia than it is here. That's a big piss up, eh? Yeah, Anzac Day is just a big piss up. Dawn service, like everyone goes to dawn service, and then by about 8 a.m. the pubs open. You people just like jam a coffee, go to the pub, and just everyone's like blind by about 12 pm. There's just like old vets and stuff like stumbling out of the pub and just girls losing their high heels, and yeah, it's terrible.

SPEAKER_03 5:36

It's so terribly good. It's so different, yeah. It's so different to New Zealand with how we do it. But then because the rock invented the and invented, well, came up with Crate Day, I think it was early 2000s or whatever. And then I think they've tried ever since to like try and like become more magnetically.

SPEAKER_00 5:49

Not Dwayne the Rock Johnson, but no, no, the rock radio station. Okay, no, not Dwayne the Rock Johnson saw like his Samoan cousins, and he's like, you know what, we're gonna just drink a bunch of beers.

SPEAKER_03 5:58

Yeah, the amount of Samoans I've heard here though say that he's his cu that their cousins, I'm like, yeah, right, bro. That's like the classic like high school thing, like even like younger, and same with like anyone who plays rugby, it's like, oh John, like back in the day, it's like John Olomu, like, yeah, bro, he's like my cousin, and I'm like, yeah, bro, I bet that was like the standard. Um, but uh, but yeah, that's um yeah, man. I wanted to one thing that I really want to talk to you about on here as well, is um actually before we get deeper, I want to ask you what did you think of the Chamayev and Strickland fight? I want Cam Rousden's opinion.

SPEAKER_00 6:31

Uh it pretty much went the way I thought it was gonna go. Like uh Strickland facing some adversity pretty early, like gets taken down. And I've seen you know, you've seen him get taken down in that fluffy fight. Fluffy's not really well Fluffy Hernandez, he's not really Chamaev, but um similar kind of game plan, just like bum rush, get the take down, hold him down, try and melt him on the ground. And Strickland didn't melt on the ground, just like stayed pretty calm when he got up and then just like boxed his face off, and then uh just denying him take downs, making him more and more tired. And I people are saying like, oh, it was Chamayev's weight cut, like he cut 20 pounds or whatever in a day and his training, and like well he's always been he's always been really bad at weight cutting. Yeah, he well he's always just been like a front runner, like a guy who's like real good at the start, and if he can't get you in that first or second round, then his his arse goes and he just fucking he just does nothing.

SPEAKER_03 7:22

Yeah, because in that DDP fight, he um he had DDP down like the entire time, apart from also one point where DDP almost got a red naked choke, and I was like, oh my god. DDP by whatever. Um but uh but this one with Strickland, like yeah, he's just so s you have to fight his fight. Yeah. Yeah, I find that really uh interesting. Like I don't know, when I watch um some of those fighters and I'm like, who how many of them make you fight their fight? And Strickland is one where he's like he makes you just box.

SPEAKER_00 7:49

Yeah, Strickland will just Strickland you. He will just um he's just like a master at kind of using his what what some of us call like his retard beat or like his his retarded tempo, and he's just like real it's very hard to pick up on that. Like if you don't have someone in the gym who can replicate that and it's the first time you get it in the in the ring and you see it, it's like if over five rounds, three rounds, whatever, like good luck trying to figure that out in 15 or 25 minutes.

SPEAKER_03 8:15

Yeah, I was watching a Mighty Mouse breakdown of it, and he was just like Strickland fights because it looks it he's quite slow. He's not exactly like fast paced bomb bomb bomb, he's real slow, but also um what else was I gonna say? Like he just uh he's um he's really stroppy. Like again, like you try and take him down, he'll have a way to get back up. And um he just yeah, freedom fighter, freedom fighter, democracy fighter, democracy. Some of the shit he was saying in the build-up was like, Oh my god, man, like but then at the end he's like, Oh, I didn't mean it. I'm just like, okay, whatever.

SPEAKER_00 8:47

The beef was fake, which uh really annoyed me when they shook hands before the fighters like uh it was all a work, yeah. We all we all got worked up over nothing. This is fake.

SPEAKER_03 8:54

I know that was unfortunate. No jumping over the cage, you know, fighting the other team. Yeah, it's unfortunate. That's intense. Imagine like you hate someone so much you want to fight the rest of their team. I mean, that's only happened once, obviously, with the Khabib Connor fight, but would that ever happen again? Maybe.

SPEAKER_00 9:10

Yeah, maybe maybe we could see it happen. But I mean, like, the amount of money you get fined now in the suspensions, it's like if it if you're not in a multi-million dollar fight, is it really worth it? Like jumping over the fence and like being suspended for whatever it is, 12 months, getting fined hundreds of thousands.

SPEAKER_03 9:26

Like, I mean Strickland was suspended for a bit because he had a scrap with an on one of his teammates' fines.

SPEAKER_00 9:31

That's that's the most Strickland thing I've ever seen.

SPEAKER_03 9:33

And he rocked up in like jandles, and I'm just gonna go.

SPEAKER_00 9:36

Yeah, yeah, and he kicked the kicked the slides off, getting into the cage. And Chris Curtis is there breaking it up. That's so funny.

SPEAKER_03 9:42

I'm just yeah, that guy's I saw he's so out of the gate. I watched a video of him like I don't know, just like some clip of like someone throwing a surprise party for him, and he like pulls out a gun, and then he realizes that it's actually just like an innocent party, and then I'm just like that's crazy, man. I don't know, he's a wild boy, but hey, he's entertaining and but um what do you think about that whole like performative part of um you know selling fights? Because because I I totally get that, you know, you gotta be you gotta say a lot of things, you know, you want to draw people, bums on seats. Obviously the most of the UFC audience is American, people love drama, etc. But it's not the WWE, you know. And I know you're a big WD WWE fan, John Cena in there. Um, but what do you think about that with UFC?

SPEAKER_00 10:26

Um I think it's good, like guys are doing it. Uh there's people who do it well, and then there's people that do it terribly. Like if you can do it in a way that um you can still stay like genuinely yourself without creating this completely different character who's like like a Colby Coventon. Oh yeah, that's so cringe. Yeah, if you can do it well and just kind of I guess dial up who you are already to like to like an 11, and then then it's gonna work well, I think, because then you're just you're basically on the whole time. When you're when you change your character and you've got to say all this other stuff, like it's I think it's gonna be hard for those guys to keep accounts and tabs on what they said and like what kind of character they're trying to be in and all that stuff. So and like you can tell as well when guys aren't genuine about it, that it comes off like it comes off like a bit cringe, right? But when you get someone like Strickland, you know, who was saying all this stuff about Hamzat being a terrorist, and we're like, Yeah, you know what, he is he's a terrorist, isn't he? Like Strickland's right, like and then he's saying, like, um, you know, Hamzart bully p bullies people in the gym, and we've seen videos of Hamzat before, like, before Strickland said all that of him just like ragdolling guys and just smashing them in the gym. So it's like, you know what, I think this is I think this is real, like there's something behind it, it's pretty genuine. Obviously, it wasn't in the end, like they were still kind of pretty cordial with each other, like uh shaking hands before the fight, but yeah, we if you can do it like Strickland, where you're kind of genuine and you leverage off who you are already, then it's gonna work wonders.

SPEAKER_03 11:58

Paramount hate and maybe I just always like see the clips come up and they like cut off half like halfway through what he says. It's always like um yeah, it's interesting. I hate the ads with Paramount, man. That's one thing that's frustrating if you watch on Paramount stream.

SPEAKER_00 12:12

Yeah, like um the ads when the guys are walking out and stuff like that, or the ads in between rounds, like it's really distasteful.

SPEAKER_03 12:19

I don't know, it just kind of like brings down the the I don't know experience overall. Like I understand you gotta make your money and you know whatever, but it's a bit much. It might uh my thinking.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

But I think a lot of the casuals as well, though, like when the walkouts or the break in between rounds happen, they're like, Whoop, go to the fridge or whoop go to the toilet, take a quick breath, so they they don't really care.

SPEAKER_02 12:39

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SPEAKER_00 13:29

True.

SPEAKER_03 13:30

I always love what people say in the corner. I think that's like the most exciting part.

SPEAKER_00 13:33

Yeah, it is. It's great. You especially if like I'm doing film study on guys who I'm gonna fight. I always watch in between the corners, see what their coaches say. Like, are they do they have smart coaches? Are their coaches a little bit dumb? Like, are they yeah, have they can they figure stuff out in the fight? So it's always good to like hear what the coaches have to say.

SPEAKER_03 13:51

I mean, for the probably the most legendary one in recent memories, different the Jack Della Medalina one. That was that was probably the best that last round.

SPEAKER_02 13:59

Keep banging the gun.

SPEAKER_03 14:01

I mean that's just top tier. Yeah, it wasn't great in the last one though. No, well, but probably not great in the last one, no. And then Jack's like, ah, and it's like, don't say ah. Yeah, no ah. We're not saying ah. Yeah, poor, yeah. I mean, it's a tough, very tough fight. Um, very, very tough in the well welterweight is um it was kind of like not that exciting for a while, and then suddenly it just became very exciting with all the new prospects and that. So I definitely yeah, I find myself really enjoying even like low like the undercards and stuff, just the it's a very exciting division at the moment. Um yeah. Anyway, dude, I wanna I wanna go back with Cam Rouston's journey because I think it's important to talk about your work ethic and also how long you've been doing this for. So kind of the premise of what I like to talk about with people on here is like the dream chasers, and you're a big dream chaser yourself. And um, I kind of want to talk about like your first MMA fight that I found on was it in 2014? Is that correct? Against Reese um Reese Savage. Reese Savage, yeah, back in 2014. So I kind of want to like go back to Cam back then. Like, what made you want to not take the fight necessarily, but like when you were like MMA, like this is my thing, this is what I I want to do.

SPEAKER_00 15:14

This um well when I took that fight, I wasn't really like this is it, like I'm gonna make a run for the UFC. I think when I took that fight, my coach at the time, uh Scott from training grounds, uh, my the first gym I was at, first coach I had, he he's kind of called me out in front of the class. He's like, Gam, I gotta fight for you against this guy, Reese Savage, blah blah blah. This date I was thinking it was like five or six weeks away, and everyone kind of looked at me like, is he gonna say yes? And then I was like, Yeah, yeah, yeah, of course I'll take it. But I was kind of like low-key, just like shitting myself. I was like, fuck it, first MMA fight, like oh, what's gonna happen? Um but yeah, it was just like uh fuck what was I doing at the time? I was I think I was 19, so 2014, I was 19. I just started uni that year. Um trying to trying to juggle like uni and work and training and stuff like that. I think I was working two jobs, like I was working at a supermarket at night, and then in the mornings, like I was doing like this like visually very casual like PT training work and stuff like that. And so I was like trying to figure out how to juggle it, but I was like fuck it, like I'll just train when I can train and stuff like that. If I can't make it into classes or into into like a the MMA gym, I'll just go to the weights gym and like run on the treadmill or like pump out a circuit or something like that.

SPEAKER_03 16:30

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 16:31

And then I remember when we got to the day of the fight, it was um it was just down or just up the road from where I live. Like I had a lot of fights up the road from in the RSL, North Sydney Bears RSL, where um where I used to live, like it was 20-minute walk away, like two-minute drive away. So it was um it was pretty cool. Like I've been there heaps of times um just to go to the pub and like watch sport and stuff, and it's like well now I'm fighting here. And I oh the going back just one day before at the weigh-ins, like the dude was like definitely cut weight to make the 90 kilo limit. I think I weighed like 85 kilos at the time, and he definitely cut weight. He was just like this big um I think it might have been Samoan or something, just this big Samoan guy, and I'm just this just this kid from like the North Lower North Shores, 85 kilos like uh fuck. Just uh wracking. Yeah, classic case of like looks good getting off the bus. And then fast forward to the fight, it was um three by three minute rounds. It was still like professional rules that we have today in MMA, except we just couldn't elbow and it was three minute rounds, so that was the only difference. Whereas like guys taking their first MMA fight now, it's like shin pads, big uh big eight ounce gloves or seven-ounce gloves, um, no elbows, no knees, stuff like that. So mine was a pretty pretty fast like crash course into MMA and like the deep end. I just remember in that first round, he he basically just tried to take my head off in the first minute. I I had huge black eyes after about two minutes, like my eyes had swollen up and all that stuff, but um he didn't drop me or anything, and then I don't know, I it was just kind of a bit of a blur after that. I remember it was um just listening to my corner, just hearing them saying, Move your feet, move your feet, and I was just like Jack Deller's coach, I was just pinging the cunt just with like left high kicks and jabs, that's basically all it was. And then yeah, got a unanimous decision. Um it was kind of like after I got hit in those first few moments that kind of woke me up, but then when it woke me up, I was like in a daze because I got hit so hard, I was like, Oh shit, I'm fighting. Oh fuck, like what's going on now? Like I'm a little bit like I'm like a little bit out of it, and then the the fight ends or whatever, and I get my hand raised for a unanimous decision. We go on the back, and like my coaches are just like staring at me, and both my eyes are just like just like panda eyes, just huge. What my right eye the next day like swollen, almost shut. My mum was like, Oh my god, like what the fuck is this? This is you used to play basketball, now you're now you're doing MMA. She's like, What the fuck is going on?

SPEAKER_03 19:03

What did mum think about it when you um were like, yeah, I'm gonna pursue MMA?

SPEAKER_00 19:08

Um she didn't like explicitly tell me no, don't do it, or no, it's a bad idea, or you're gonna get hurt or anything like that. But she like all mum, she was like low-key, pretty worried. She knew I was like at this MMA gym basically day and night training there, but she she just didn't quite understand like the obsession? Yeah, she didn't quite understand the obsession. Um I think my dad came and watched that first fight, and even he was like, Oh my god, like this is game fighting. Yeah, this is this is uh this is pretty pretty nuts, like um 2014, right? This is pre-Connor McGregor, pre-Ronda Rousey, so UFC wasn't quite mainstream yet in in Australia.

SPEAKER_03 19:45

I think it was on Fox Sports or Fuel no Fuel TV at the time, which was I want to say the first time I ever heard of the UFC, which was Conor McGregor as well, would have been I wanna say it was like a Conan O'Brien interview or something in like 2012 or 13. I first I don't know, I think it was like just a Rhonda Rousey as well. I remember like because that was a big deal having like women in the UFC, I think, like fighting, and it was like unheard of, like, whoa man. I think around that time. So yeah, it would have been such early days, and um there's still such a there's such a like I did I didn't really understand what MMA even meant. I thought because all I knew about was just yeah, boxing, kickboxing. I didn't even know what jiu-jitsu was. I never even heard of that until years later. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:28

Because when did you first get into jujitsu? Uh well I started training at this gym training grounds um the start of 2013. So I'd already been training for just over a year at the time of my first MMA fight. Um I remember when I wanted to sign up to the gym. I was um the I'd finished high school and I was like, right, I'm gonna join this gym. Uh now going there to sign up, they're like, oh you're not 18, you just gotta like I was a few months out from being 18, like you you need someone to sign for this. And I was like, oh yeah, sweet. And then I take it home. I'm like, yeah, no way.

SPEAKER_03 21:00

No way.

SPEAKER_00 21:01

She's like, what's this? I'm like, oh, it's just you know, it's a gym, like there's boxing, kickboxing, ever like jujitsu, grappling. She's like, nah. And then I was like, Well, when I'm 18, like I'm just gonna go down there and sign up, yeah. So yeah, then I turned 18 and like after a week of drinking and partying, I then joined the gym. And there, yeah, no, I was pretty much didn't leave after that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 21:25

Well what was there a moment when you were like in those, I don't know, maybe those first few weeks or something when you were trading there where you were like, I love this.

SPEAKER_00 21:32

Yeah, yeah, it was um god, it must have been like I think I was doing the boxing and the kickboxing in the first like the first week, and then after that, I was like, Oh, I'll try the jiu-jitsu, and then when I went in and I tried the jiu-jitsu class, and it was like because if you're there at a gym for a week, like boxing and kickboxing, they're not gonna let you spa. They're gonna let you spar after a week. That's just like dangerous for for everyone. And then so I get into jujitsu and just got this old school Brazilian. Coach was like no drinking water during class, like like slapping people if they're doing the technique wrong, and just like if you had long finger, he'd check everyone's fingernails in the start of class, and if they were long, he'd like paint your fingernails and stuff like that. It was he was real old school, and like it was my first day, and he's like, Oh, we're gonna roll. And I rolled with him on my first day, and he just basically put me through the washing machine, and that's when I was like, Oh, this is sick! Like, we get to spa like every every session, like we're we're not just like doing technique and stuff, we like we get to go at it. So, like being 18 years old, loving the UFC, and like you get to do all this stuff, you're like, Fuck, this is this is pretty sweet.

SPEAKER_03 22:37

Mean. So that would have been okay, that's interesting. Yeah, it reminds me like a long time ago, like in in the city, there was a place called Jai. I mean, it's still there actually, Jai kickboxing, but they used to have a lot of like Thai guys there, and they would kind of do what you're saying, like you do like you know, like doing a plank, they kick the shit out of your stomach, or like you're trying to do an exercise, they slap you real hard, they're all playful, it's really fun. But um, yeah, like um that it's interesting that that um was it in the jujitsu then you were just like, yep, MMA, let's go. Yeah, pretty much this is this is this is this is it.

SPEAKER_00 23:08

And then was it no gi or gi at the time? Well, my jujitsu instructor was so old school that he wouldn't let anyone do nogi until they'd been training for like a year. Oh right. Yeah, and we only had we only had one noge class uh on the weekend, and because he's Brazilian and he's old school, he doesn't work on the weekend, yeah. So he wouldn't be there, so I just go to the no-gi class anyway. That was taken by the MMA coach Scott at the time, and he didn't care. He was like, Yeah, you can do the no-gi. So um it was mostly Ghee Jiu-Jitsu for like the first two years, like getting ready for MMA fights wearing the gi, which was unheard of. Yeah, you wouldn't be doing that these days. Go to City Kickboxing and ask all the pro MMA fighters how many gi classes they do a week, they'll say what's a gi.

SPEAKER_03 23:51

Yeah, I've I there's I've noticed that with um a few of the guys like the at the UFC guys or in the high high level fighters at CKB, there's like a bit of a split. Some of them who grapple, some of them who just have to do it but don't want to do it. Um yeah. Isn't Carlos a bit like that?

SPEAKER_00 24:06

Nah, Carlos is uh he's he's actually got a gi. I think he's got a blue belt. Oh, does he? Yeah, he got his blue. I think he got his blue belt after I remember the boys after he got his contract, they were stuck over there during COVID or whatever, and they were training with um they were training at Atos in San Diego, and um yeah, they got the he got his blue belt while he was over there. Brad got his purple, and I think Izzy got his purple as well. Brad might be a brown belt now, I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_03 24:33

What was the hardest jumping belts for you, like with jujitsu going from is it like white to blue, blue to purple?

SPEAKER_00 24:40

Like um uh probably like the the way to measure it, I reckon, would be like the competition when I was versing people in comps, and it was definitely it was the white to blue belt. Going from white belt comps into now blue belt divisions and the comps was huge. Like I remember my first blue belt division, I was like, I got my blue belt, I was doing a comp like a month later. I was like, oh man, like I've got my blue belt, I'm the I'm the fucking man around here. I've had I've got like two or three MMA fights under my belt, I'm a blue belt, like I'm gonna smoke these guys, and I go out there, and there's like this little Brazilian dude, and he's just like 60 kilos soaking wet in the gear. This is an open division, and he's like rolling underneath my legs, takes my back, and just strangles me by the collar, and that was it, and that was my day done.

SPEAKER_03 25:23

Yeah, that's so brutal, it's so humbling.

SPEAKER_00 25:26

Yeah, then then you realise like some of these guys who are in the blue belt division, like they could be purple belts, like maybe they should be purple belts, maybe they've been held back, or the instructors like because obviously it's all subjective, right? The grading, depending on the coach. So it's like if these guys are like ready for purple belts or they haven't got them yet, and you're just got your blue belt, fuck you're gonna get smoked.

SPEAKER_03 25:48

Yeah, that's crazy, eh? Like the difference between uh yeah, just someone who just got the blue belt, but but also depends how long they were a white belt for, right? Like, what if you're a white belt for 10 years? Yeah, and then you get the blue belt, and then you go into the blue belt competition, you maybe you do all right, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 26:03

Yeah, but then there's but you just but you've just never been graded. Exactly. And then that that's the flip side of the coin. You got these guys who are like what we call sandbagging, who have been the same belt for ages, they just jump around to different gyms, and then they just go into like the blue belt division and they're the level of a high purple or a brown and they just smoke these guys.

SPEAKER_03 26:21

Yeah, it's an ego thing, I guess, isn't it? But um interesting. Yeah. Have you heard of um I had Adam on here a while back and we were talking about was it McDojo's? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Have you ever been to one before? A McDojo?

SPEAKER_00 26:34

Uh I think it was just when I got my blue belt. I went to the UFC gym in Sydney in Rockdale, and like um that's basically just a revolving door of instructors there. So they like instructors will be there and and then they'll leave because it's like it's like a UFC gym, so they get all these like hot heads training in there and stuff like that. Like they think they're real hot shit, but the training's just maybe not that good. Yeah, and like there's a lot of egos like training at a UFC gym and stuff like that. So yeah, I remember I went in there and just the the coach was just showing the most gimmicky stuff ever, and then like the guys in the class were as well were like they had like shadow box to warm up and stuff like that. It was just yeah, it was it was just shit. Sounds cringy, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 27:18

It was real cringe, yeah. Yeah, and the UFC gym. It was actually like the like the brand UFC. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Because I've heard like the UFC Performance Institute and stuff, um, but I guess that's not really a gym, is it? Or it is maybe they do trainings there.

SPEAKER_00 27:34

This is just like a like a regular gym that's like city fitness, big treadmills, big rack of dumbbells, and then they'll have like jujitsu mats, bag, bag era, huge. This gym is like almost like four or five times the size of City Kickboxing, like it's like a Les Mills, and then they put mats in there and they have classes as well, like that. So imagine you got guys who lift all the weights and stuff like that. Just take a Les Mills gym and you've got all the meat heads in, like, yo, I'm gonna do jujitsu as well. Yeah, I'm gonna fuck people up in MMA, I'm the man. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:02

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:03

Do you know how much I deadlift, bro?

SPEAKER_03 28:04

Like, come on. Yeah, stuff like that. Talking about have you had people talk to you about how much they bench in your MA class? Because that's crazy. No, I've never. That would be wild. I can't I can't imagine I imagine some people have done that, which I find nuts. It's like, yeah, I can bench like 250 or some shit, and then it's just like, okay, but we're gonna roll it on all that means.

SPEAKER_00 28:23

Nah, I've never had anyone like tell me their numbers on what they lift and stuff like that. But I've had people always in like the altar program and stuff, they go, Oh, you know, I used to play rugby and or I used to that's the classic. I did like they just tell me their background or something like that, or like I used to do taekwondo, or like um Jeet Kundo, or something like that. I'm like, that's not gonna work, that's just not gonna matter here. Like, you're probably better off having zero, like just zero background, because then you're just a blank slate.

SPEAKER_03 28:51

Yeah, I was chatting to um Patty on here who was just on before you, and he was saying um when he did the altar program, because he'd he's um he's a he's a uh got a couple of um stripes on his white belt or something, but he'd been doing like geek jujitsu for a while, and he said that when he did the altar program, he had to unlearn like jujitsu moves because for for MMA, but um he thought initially it was gonna be an advantage. Found that quite interesting.

SPEAKER_00 29:15

Yeah, he's yeah, he's um yeah, he's he's been doing jujitsu before he did the altar program, but yeah, a lot of people just they come in and they're like they think they can just transfer their skills from their background into this, and it's like nah, you just just take everything in and don't worry about what you already know. Yeah, I suppose so, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:34

There's just so many other elements to it. Um I wanna yeah, I also like you also have done a lot of other competitions outside of MMA, but I kind of want to know like what other martial arts have you done? Like obviously, I know uh you've done what your King of the Ring champ twice, super cruiserweight, and uh and cruiserweight champ 2022, 2023. It's pretty fucking cool. And then you've done jujitsu competitions. Have you ever done anything else? Like boxing competitions or yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:00

I had uh two amateur boxing matches, boxing fights when I was uh God, this is like 2015 and I lost both of them. So it was it just how like how was it? Oh, it was terrible. It was honestly like it was just shit. Like I went in if anyone has uh like if come from like a different like a kickboxing background or MMA and they go into amateur boxing, like it's you basically gotta get a knockout to to score a draw. Like they're it's uh it's a very um what's it called I wouldn't say yeah, I guess you could say it's a biased system. Like they see guys who are just purists in boxing and the judges are gonna tend to lean towards them a bit more. Definitely lost my first fight. I got smoked, I got two standing eight counts in the second and the third round. I was boxing some guy who was like maybe like 10 kilos heavier than me, and he'd had like 30 amateur boxing fights at the time. Um, just a big lanky, like a little bit taller than me, just a big, lanky, strong boxer, like punched real well. Um got to test out my chin in that fight, so that was good. But then the second fight I had, it was um yeah, I was just uh fought this short little uh I think he was Tongan, and I basically just like was the matador the whole time moving around and just popping him with a jab. He landed a couple of like big overhand shots and left hooks, but no, no standing eight counts for me, no standing eight counts for him, and then they gave him a unanimous decision. No, and this was at North Sydney Leagues RSL up the road from me as well. So we had like all all my friends and all the people from my gym there, and they yeah, they basically just booed the guy out and they were booing the judges and stuff. But that was my experience with boxing in uh New South Wales, and yeah, I'm done with that.

SPEAKER_03 31:45

Yeah, been there done that. Have you ever tried anything else? Like um like uh do you ever try to do karate when you were a kid that was real popular when like I think but when I was young as well, and then like Taekwondo or like Hapkido? Never tried any of those?

SPEAKER_00 31:58

No, um my mum was like adamant that she's like nah you no no physical combat contact sports, like she didn't even want us to play rugby. Me, because I got an older brother who's two years old, and she was like she was like, nah, you're gonna do tennis or golf, or I ended up doing basketball. My brother was playing like a lot of soccer and tennis, and so she was like, This is perfect, like they're never gonna get hurt again at that back vibe, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:27

No, I'm Georgie's super proud of what you've achieved, bro. But um, yeah, that's that's interesting. I was like, no, no physical sport, and then um, yeah, the most physical sport you can think of.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

Yeah, I'm just like, well, if I can't do any contact sport, I'm gonna do the most contact sport I can when I'm allowed to. Yeah, and that's what you've done.

SPEAKER_03 32:44

Hell yeah. Um I wanted to ooh, what was the other one I was gonna? Oh yes. So coming to New Zealand, is it did you move here in 2018 or 2019?

SPEAKER_00 32:54

I moved here at the start of 2019.

SPEAKER_03 32:55

2019. What was the um appeal for you to move from Australia to New Zealand to train with CKB? Like what caught your eye about the gym? Like what was what stood out to you where you're like, I need to train here and be here?

SPEAKER_00 33:07

Um I knew about the gym for a while. Um, my coach back at uh back in Australia, he was always kind of telling me, like, oh, you should get over to New Zealand and like go and this is in like 2016-2017. It's like just go for a holiday and just go check out this gym. And I think I was 20, 21 at the time, like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever. Like, I'm like, I'm happy here in Sydney, just kind of like training here, then like doing whatever during the day and stuff like that. He was he was on to it back then. He was like, There's this guy, Israel, over there, who's like winning all these kickboxing fights, he's a middleweight, he's six foot four, just like you. Like, you should go learn some striking over there from those guys. I was like, Yeah, yeah, cool, cool. And then um it was probably whenever Izzy fought Tavares. Well, first of all, so he made his Izzy fought um Rob Wilkinson in his UFC debut, and I was um training with Rob at the time. Rob was living up in Sydney, and I helped him train for that for his UFC fight against Israel, and then if you've seen that fight, you know it was uh very one-sided, and I was like, and I was pretty high on Rob at the time. I was like, fuck, Rob's good, like he's got good wrestling, I think he's just gonna take Izzy down and just just hold him down and just like just fucking clubber his face off with like hammer fists, and then obviously he didn't do that, and Izzy smoked him, and I was like, damn, this guy's pretty good. And then um I watched Izzy fight Brad Tavares, and excuse me, and then when he fought Brad Tavares, I was like, fuck, this guy is slick. I'm like, man, maybe I should go over there and like see what's in the water and just like try and learn some stuff from him. And then uh I ended up having a fight in September of 2018 against this guy, um his name's his name's Izzy as well, but he's uh he's Tongan, so they call him like Iszy Docks. And uh I can't sorry, I can't remember his last name. And basically he cleaned me up in about two minutes, he just hit me with a big overhand and I got knocked out. And that was the first time I'd been finished uh in a fight, and he was he was one of Rob Wilkins, uh sorry Rob Whitaker's training partners, so he like is from a real good gym, and I was uh I was a little bit lost at the time. I was like, fuck, what do I do? Like the gym I'm at isn't really giving me what I need. Um I don't really have many training partners anymore, and then I was like, fuck, maybe I'll just go to New Zealand and just go check this place out. And so then I came over to Auckland for about a week, maybe a week and a bit. Um must have been the end of October or the start of November in 2018, and then between doing like tourist stuff, I was I was um ducking into the gym like during the day, did a couple of like the 9am sessions, and I was like, fuck, there's like a lot of people here, like these people got jobs, like sure, surely, yeah, surely these people have jobs. And I was like, man, there's a lot of big people as well. Like, this is what I need, like I need big bodies, and then on top of that as well, like then when the class starts and I see what they're teaching, and you know, you got Eugene explaining things, I was like, wow, this coach is like he's pretty switched on, he's pretty smart. And then um, so I did like the week of training there, really enjoyed it, did like the night, the night trainings as well, and the guys train hard. I was like, man, this place is really good. I think I should move over. Like, I'm either gonna go back to Sydney and maybe keep training at the gym I'm at and try and keep fighting. And if I do that, I was like, wasn't real confident I'd get anywhere with it. I was like, I'll probably end up being like a 50-50 fighter, like win one, lose one, win, win one, lose two, something like that. Or do I move over to New Zealand? I was like, and then I was thinking about it, it's like, well, you know, drive on the left here, you speak English, you got the same power outlets, it's like it's pretty pretty big no-brainer, you don't need a visa or anything, it's just like moving to another another state or another city in um in Australia. So then I just like I was living at home at the time, so it was it was just easy. I just packed all my stuff up that that uh that I needed, put it in two suitcases, sold my car, and then just moved over to New Zealand. That's it. Yeah, no, that's just history. I did tell my mum, I was like, I'll be back in a year. I'm just gonna go try it out for a year. And then it got to like that year, and then then and then they're like, Oh, there's this uh flu coming out of China. Um we're not too sure what's gonna happen. I was and then when we went into when they started closing the borders, my mum's like, What are you gonna do? I was like, Well, I'm just gonna stay here, like I'm not gonna leave. Like I've got a I've gotta lease an apartment here, I've got like heaps of shit and stuff like that. I can't just pack up all this stuff again, like fuck, I just packed everything up in Sydney a year ago, I'm not gonna pack everything up in New Zealand again. Because I was like, fuck, if I pack everything up now, will I end up coming back?

SPEAKER_03 37:38

Yeah, and then will you continue at the pace of pursuing I guess the you know, to get into the UFC? I guess that was the other one. When when was that moment you were like, I am but that's that's the goal, that's what I want, like to get into the UFC. Um was that at that time period when you moved to CKB?

SPEAKER_00 37:57

No, I'd say it was before that. I was um when I was still in Sydney, I was like there was a gym training grounds I was at with my coach, whose also whose name is also Scott. Um great name. I don't know much about MMA in terms of fighting the he's um but I was like Scott, he knew some people around Sydney, like he had connections with other MMA gyms, and I was going to this one gym called VT1 to go and train with this UFC fighter, Richie Walsh. So Richie was um he was in the UFC from like 2014 until I want to say like 2017. He did the ultimate fighter. Um he got to the semis. The ultimate fighter he was on, Jake Matthews was in it as a lightweight. Okay, yeah, yeah. Dan Dan Kelly was in that one, and um fuck who else who won that one? Uh Elias Theodoru. You remember him? He had like the really long hair. Rest in peace, Elias Theodoru. He uh he won that that ultimate fighter, and I think um Nordine Taleb was on there as well. But the coaches were um Carl Noak was the coach for Team Australia. I can't remember who the coach was for Canada, but anyway, Richie was in the UFC, and it's like wow, there's like a guy who trains 20 minutes down the road for me who's in the UFC. He was a well to wait, but um basically when I started training with him, and then I was like, I could touch him and I could hit him and stuff, I was like, Oh, he's in the UFC, but I'm like kind of like doing pretty well, then maybe I could be in the UFC. Then one day Richie was like, you know, you could be in the UFC if you wanted to, if like if you train properly, and I was like, sweet, that's it, I'm gonna go for it.

SPEAKER_03 39:33

Mane. Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I guess you do need like an indicator of someone locally, because I mean, when I when I even I'd think about it, especially in New Zealand, like in Australia, I guess you guys are like just geographically like a little bit closer to America in some ways, and maybe maybe it feels more possible. But in New Zealand, like I don't know, like not just for UFC, but just a lot of sport and even a lot of opportunities. It's always like everything's so far away. I don't know, we're so fucking small or whatever. And now obviously, you know, CKB's taking over the UFC, which is awesome. But it's just like, who would have fought for one? But then also, like, to be a big dreamer in New Zealand is um it's like quite a few odds stacked against you. I mean, even in Australia, maybe to a point, but you as a lot much bigger country, and maybe there's more access in some ways, but well all New Zealand, like I think now things are getting a lot better just um in terms of the world stage where we are with a lot of things, including the entertainment industry too. But I just think like for a long time we've always been like, yeah, oh underdog, like hard to you know get there, but but you need something to be proved like locally, like obviously like Izzy and even like Dan Hooker and like a lot of those guys have now proved that like no no, like there is a and there's a pathway to to follow, and then like with CKB, there's even a pathway to get to the UFC or even not even just CK, not even just with the UFC, um like professional combat sport careers. Who would have thought?

SPEAKER_00 40:52

Like Yeah, yeah, that's um yeah, for well for sure, like Australia seems like the if you want to make it in professional sports or entertainment or something like that, you're gonna you're gonna go over there to try and do it, like um all the big uh what what would you call them, like record record deals and studios are over there for music as well, and like I guess the money's over there for the sport, so they get way more um endorsement and eyes on them. So yeah, for a while it was it was Australia, but now all the Australians are coming to City Kickboxing if they want to be in the UFC.

SPEAKER_03 41:25

Yeah, it's it's ironic. It's funny how that changes, but um I think still with like a lot of other things. I mean, on a on a like a kind of more of a more geopolitical thing, obviously there's a big influx of Kiwis moving over to Australia more and more every year, which um I understand, um, but I do think like yeah, like um we we need to back ourselves a bit more in New Zealand, I think. Because what yeah, for you actually, I'm actually interested in your opinion. You could be in New Zealand for a while, training at the gym, you've met lots of people, and you've been around a lot of Kiwis and a lot of Aussies. What are like the kind of the main personality differences you see? Because a lot of people everyone thinks we're similar, obviously, when you travel, but like that I don't know, in my opinion, I think there are some couple key differences, but what do you think they are?

SPEAKER_00 42:06

I feel like Australians are a lot more um they're they're like uh well how would I say this? Like they're whatever their ideologies are or their or their thoughts, they're very they're they they can't be budged on it, they're very um down the middle, yeah. And uh the Kiwis are a little bit more flexible with how they think and like uh with uh like they're open to discussion a little bit more, like a lot of the Australians I know they're very just down the middle with what they think. So I can't there's definitely a word for it, but I can't it's not coming to me right. Stubborn? Stubborn, yeah, stubborn's uh there's I know a few stubborn ones like that. And also the the Kiwis are like way more laid back, yeah. Yeah, even more laid back than Azus, yeah. Even more laid back than the Australians for sure. Um But uh the yeah, the differences uh they're not that many. The way I explain it to some people is like New Zealand's kind of like Canada and Australia's a bit like the United States, and the Philippines is like Mexico. I've still never been to the Philippines, but you've trained there a fair few times, right? I've been there once. I went uh that's yeah, I went there um God, I went there in 2017, December, to try out for one championship. Yeah. Oh, I didn't know that.

SPEAKER_03 43:26

I knew you went to the Philippines to train, but I didn't know you were there for one championship.

SPEAKER_00 43:29

Yeah, that's I went over there for a week. They had like these um try-outs for they were calling it the One Warrior series, which is like their contender series, like their Dan the one the one championship equivalent of the Dana White contender series. Um it was like there wasn't too much um like information on what you do, like where we're going over to fight, where we're going over to to just like do interviews and stuff, but basically I registered my name and all my info, they're like, Yep, sweet, the tryouts of this date, and like you just had to get yourself there. Bought a ticket to get over there, got like an Airbnb and stuff like that in the city. My coach Scott came over a few days later, like a day before the trials, and um we get we get uh like an Uber or whatever out to the the place where we're doing the trials, and this place is just like just in like it's basically in like the favelas of the Philippines, right? Brandon Vera and Rich Franklin are there. Um they're they're like the hosts of the show. Um I turn up and I'm the only guy basically who's above lightweight. There's one other guy who's this like Iranian-looking dude who's my weight. And the trials were um you hit pads with your coach for three minutes, so we just like did heaps of fancy shit on the pads, and then you do a three-minute grappling round with someone, they pair you up, and they paired me up with the Iranian guy who um who was my weight, and he was a karate guy, so they're like half guard, go top bottom half guard, and they just say go. The guy had no idea what half guard was. Yeah, and so I basically just like subbed him out in like 10 seconds. Yeah, I just passed his guard, took his back and just choked him out, and then he was on top of me, and I just swept him over. But the funny thing was like because they can only watch two people at a time, and there was like 40 people there, so they spend we spend the whole day there basically, and we're like, well fuck, what are we gonna do? So me and my coach, we just go for a walk around the area, and that's when we realise we're in like the favelas of the Philippines, and there's like dudes with like machetes in their belts and stuff like that. We go, we walk around, we find like this little market, we get some fruit, and then we we see this uh this cock fighting arena that's here just next door. So then we go and we sit down, we watch the cock fighting for a couple hours. It was wild, it was packed in there, absolutely packed.

SPEAKER_03 45:44

Yeah, nah, that's nuts. That's pretty nutty, yeah. Yeah, yeah. What an experience. And then what? So after that, so did you get the did you like like you could be in one championship? Did they give you the contract?

SPEAKER_00 45:54

Nah, so then they sit us all down like it's survivor, and then they're like, We are taking the following people, blah blah blah blah blah. And then it was just like I'm like, dude, I just like fucked that guy up. I'm like, I'm a middleweight, like everyone's real smart, whatever at the time, and then and then yeah, they're like, Alright, thanks guys, see you later. And then they took everyone that they wanted, they took them back in inside, and yeah, we just left, and then that was it. What the fuck? Sat in the manila traffic for about two hours trying to get back to the Airbnb. Oh man, that's rough.

SPEAKER_03 46:25

That's pretty, that's pretty brutal. But is it is it just because there was enough people yet your weight grade, you weren't appealing, there wasn't like maybe enough people in the middleweight division and one championship at the time.

SPEAKER_00 46:35

Like uh no, they had I think they had a middleweight division at the time. They had um they had plenty of people in that division. I I don't know what they were after, but yes. They uh I I think a year later they ended up doing the same thing, but they went to Australia and they had open trials in Australia, same thing, like register interest. Basically, everyone I knew who was a professional fighter in the in New South Wales, some of them in Queensland as well, had registered for this, and even Kieran Joblin had registered, he came over from New Zealand, and they uh won championship just pretty much just signed everyone that turned up. Yeah, they just signed up all the Yeah, it's crazy. They just signed up all the talent. Um pretty much over the next year, like we all got everyone basically got a fight for that. Um and then if you if you didn't get a fight, you had one lined up, and then COVID came around and that was basically the it. That that was it. That was like the end of the Warrior series. They didn't after COVID it never took off again.

SPEAKER_03 47:32

Wow, that's that's bizarre. That's so strange. That's that's that's that's strange. This is a little audition seem odd, but I know like one championship is primarily like a Asia Asia Asia per Asia competition, right? And like um, yeah, because they've got all the different like Brazilian jujitsu, Waitai, and then MMA and all that. Um I've seen like a few guys from what's that show, physical Asia. I don't know if you check that out. There's a few like a few Mongolian guys in there. That's pretty sick. I'm surprised there's not more Mongolian guys in the UFC. That'd be cool. But um, yeah, yeah. That's buzzy. That's a buzzy story, bro. Wow, you could have been in one championship. Yeah, it could have been a one championship. Thank god I'm not locked into that. No, I don't know if it doesn't pay as well. I don't know how flexible it is. Um but it's I know the UFC they're quite strict, right? With you have to be in the UFC, you can't go and do like can you do other competitions?

SPEAKER_00 48:25

Because sometimes I see guys go off and do like wrestling ones or like you can do that if you um if you there's like certain stipulations and like rules and like um uh like like rule sets that they that you can go and compete under, but you always have to like run it by the UFC before you go and do it. Ah, okay. Yeah, yeah. Because you see like Armin Saruki and doing like the R the wrestling raff or whatever it's called and stuff like that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:51

Yeah, I saw that. Yeah, and then he ended up like trying to punch the guy afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 48:55

Yeah, that was that was phenomenal.

unknown 48:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:57

Yeah, that guy is um again, it's amazing what media can do, right? Like, um, if like like Armin's an interesting case where I'm like, wow, like everyone kind of thought he was a bit of a dickhead, like maybe some people still do, but then he's done such a crazy media run where it's like hey he's still number one in lightweight, but then Dana's like, nah, don't really like him that much. But it's like, yeah, you want stars, but then um yeah, you don't put your stars in fights. I don't know, you don't like that star, I guess. I don't know. It's uh it's interesting, yeah. I'd I'd I find like, yeah, I mean obviously not how much you can talk about, you're in the UFC, but UFC politics are like, yeah, it's kind of and then the White House card, which is also bizarre. I just find it being at the White House like just kind of old. It's like that movie Idiocracy. Yeah, I feel like we're kind of living in that. We're getting we're getting pretty close to that. I feel like we are. Have you ever um have you seen the the robot fights? Like the like the new ones, like like the like the um I don't know what like what business makes them, but they have like all these different like robots and they're like all that I don't know, make them fight each other and stuff.

SPEAKER_00 49:58

I've seen like some sparring of the robots go and sparring each other and like one of them falls over at the end, but you're never gonna be able to replace human fighting with robot fighting. There's no it's nowhere near as interesting.

SPEAKER_03 50:08

But like um, but like yeah, I would I would bet on it. It's just like it's just fucking I don't know. We're in a very like weird paradigm of that stuff. Like I'm I'm waiting for it when they're gonna release robots to come do like my housework and stuff. Like that surely is not far away, right? Oh, so it's pretty far away in New Zealand, I reckon. Oh New Zealand, we're always five years behind. We're always like, you gotta give everything about five years extra when something happens over in like the States or like in other parts of the world, and then it reaches Australia probably like a year later, and then it's New Zealand, it's like another five. We're a bit behind. I love New Zealand, but we always we we we do lag a little bit. Um for your fights. Um, how much um psychological work do you do you do for yourself to get into the ring? Um do you need to do quite a lot of like mental prep? You seem like someone to me who just sort of like I'm here, I'm fighting, that's it.

SPEAKER_00 51:02

Nah, I don't I don't have like a like a psychological coach or like a sports psychologist or anything like that. I just I don't know, I just you just do it. Turn up and do the thing. You just turn up and do the thing. Like um sports psychologists, like uh I get a lot of offers now from guys online who are like, oh I'm a sports psychologist, I wrote this book, I worked with this guy, and I'm like Should buy my course. Yeah, like I'll I'll do it for free for you, and like we'll have a chat on the phone. I'm like, you've had no MMA fights, so you don't know anything about the sport. Like you played soccer or golf or something like that. Like, I don't need your opinion on this. If I uh if I need help like with anything psychological, I'll just go and ask some of the guys I train with, like what they think about that. But like I've picked up a lot of stuff over the years, just training with like Izzy, Carlos, uh Richie back in Sydney, Rob back in Sydney. Guys who have just walked the walk, you know. You just gotta go and find out how they deal with it. Maybe they deal with it in the worst way possible. And you're like, okay, don't do that. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna not gonna prep the way you prepped.

SPEAKER_03 52:09

I think the most interesting one I heard was Rob Whitaker say that like his nickname, the Reaper, is like kind of like an alternative personality he puts on for like when he gets in the ring. And I that kind of makes sense. I think when you go and fight someone to the almost brink of death, like you kind of have to be like, Well, I don't know, like I don't know, you I have no idea, but you probably have to put your mind in some place where like oh they're gonna come and take everything from me, they're coming to hurt me. I need to make sure that I don't back down, or I don't know. But that's that's what he said anyway.

SPEAKER_00 52:37

Yeah, I mean I definitely feel like that's kind of how I get prepared now. Like when I'm in the back and I'm just kind of warming up and stuff, it's like all I can think about is fighting. I don't think about Cameron after the fight, what he's gonna what he's gonna eat after the fight or anything like that, or gonna who I'm gonna see after the fight or the the plane ride home the next day or the or two days afterwards, like it's just it's only the fight. Like whatever happens in the fight happens. I'm fully prepared to like go go back in a in in like an ambulance into the to the hospital if I need to. Like I'm just gonna fight as hard as I can. Like I do this weird thing before every fight, like I brush my teeth before my fight. Oh clean. Yeah, before I leave, I I don't know why I do it. Like it's so respectful. Maybe maybe it's before like a training thing, but I like I brush my teeth like like that's the last thing I all I usually do in the mornings before I leave the house. Like, yep, that's it, everything's done. Like I've packed my bag, like I don't need to worry about the mess in the house, like I've brushed my teeth. That's it, like whatever happens now happens.

SPEAKER_03 53:43

That's um, yeah, no, no lucky undies or anything you brush your teeth. But yeah, that that's like you just feel fresher for the fight, or it's just like some kind of I don't know, thing you've picked up.

SPEAKER_00 53:51

Uh just some kind of weird thing I've picked up for some reason. I don't know. It's it's a very yeah.

SPEAKER_03 53:56

Well, I'm sure your opponents are like you're on top of them and then you're punishing them, it's like, well, at least he's got a good breath. Colgate has a McLeans today. Fucking hell. Because I've always, yeah, because a lot of guys in the gym, um, which you will know more than I do, is the a lot of stinky boys. And girls. And that's uh I haven't um I haven't encountered as many compared to the boys. Um you gotta get in there at 9 a.m.

SPEAKER_00 54:22

Those girls.

SPEAKER_03 54:24

Those girls some stinky girls in there.

SPEAKER_00 54:28

Yeah, they gotta wash their hair.

SPEAKER_03 54:29

Yeah. I bet. Uh yeah, that's yeah, that's one of the things. I asked um I had a Zion on here and I was asking him if he had ever tapped out from someone's bad BO before. Have you ever had to stop BJJ? Like you stink, I can't actually roll or do this with you because you smell so bad.

SPEAKER_00 54:47

Yeah, when I first started jujitsu in the Nagi, some guys would just they wouldn't have a rash guard on underneath, and they would just be like like 50-year-old dads or something, or coming from construction into not showered from a day or just like on the tools, like no rash guard, just body hair, skin, and you're just like no fuck that. Like they got you a mount, and basically all their skin just causes like a full closure and you can't breathe. You're like, nah, fuck that, I'm out, I'm out of this. Yeah, some of those smell is doing it. We'll start again. We'll start again.

SPEAKER_03 55:21

Let me just get some little spray. That must have that should be a thing for jujitsu, surely, or just I don't know, MMA or like grappling. It's just like please put on deodorant for the love of God. But um, some people don't. Um I want to also ask you um about uh what are the common uh misconceptions you've experienced being a fighter when you tell people like, oh, what do you do? And you're like, Oh, I I I'm an MMA fighter, and people are like, Oh, alright, tough guy. I don't know. Like, do people have like strange comments they make to you?

SPEAKER_00 55:52

Um people have mostly been positive? Most people have been positive. Who have I encountered anyone that's been that's been negative about it? Um some people have thought that like um just a little bit arrogant about it. I don't know, maybe it was the only fighter they know is like Conor McGregor or something, or uh you know post post uh Mayweather McGregor, so then maybe they think like I'm I'm arrogant or something like that or a bit stupid, but no, most people I've met haven't um haven't had anything negative to say, which is good. Um I am waiting for the day, someone has something negative to say, and then yeah. I mean you just see the ears, right?

SPEAKER_03 56:33

It's just like nah man.

SPEAKER_01 56:35

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 56:36

But like um, I remember like the first time I heard of MMA, I didn't and I heard of like Conor McGregor, I was just like, oh fuck this. Like I just tuned out. But I understand the art of war and the mental battle, like I I kind of understood that later, but I think the first time I saw it, I was like, I don't know, like the shit talking to me, like, and just I I understand it to sell it at the time, but I think I just thought it was just so meat head. Um, and then I realized there was a bit more to it, and then I saw the interview with Conor McGregor and Nate Diaz, and they were like, Can you count to five? I was like, Okay, that's pretty fucking funny. I'll count to ten or something, sorry. But I thought that was like okay, that's pretty funny. Some of those moments. Um, but um, yeah. Um, what would you say? Um I feel like because I think now that what I can see, and you've probably seen the how popular MMA is now, especially the UFC, it's just such a popular sport, and a lot of people I'd imagine, like are so interested in like you know, before in New Zealand it might have been like rugby and maybe Australia do NRL or whatever, but now like UFC MMA, it's like, oh, that's a career path I should pursue. But like, what are the realities I guess uh for you like in your day-to-day life that you know that I guess if you could ch talk about kind of the realities of pursuing the sport that you've had to encounter in your journey?

SPEAKER_00 57:54

Yeah, it's um like the I'd say now pursuing MMA at this at this moment, like if young people want to get into MMA, it's I'd say it's uh it's a lot more of a realistic option for sure. It's still quite hard because it does the sport doesn't have like those traditional pathways that stuff like rugby has where you get like uh you go to a rugby school and then you get picked up by an academy or and you get pushed through like this program. You just have to now it's just like you need to you need to just do quite well on the regional scene to get yourself noticed and the regional scene now is like Shuriken, Eternal, Hex. They're very like they're quite prominent, like they're on UFC Fight Pass, they have quite a big uh like presence on social media, so it's easy to get up there, get noticed, and get a manager, and then that manager can like maybe know some people in the UFC or like knows knows people and knows people and can help push you through a bit more. But like when I first started, like the the regional scene was pretty it's pretty bleak. Like Eternal was Eternal probably only done like 10 shows at the time, they were uh exclusively in Western Australia, they weren't on Fight Pass. Um I was fighting for this promotion called Brace. Brace is no longer with us, it's gone under. It was I think they got to like 51 or 52 shows. They did get on fight pass for a little bit. Um Hex was on at the time. I never fought on Hex, but I think at the time that I was fighting Hex was probably the the biggest promotion you could get on, and then there was like um there were shows over here in New Zealand and stuff, but they weren't as big as the ones in in Australia. So pretty much like um all those all those pathways are now kind of like albeit they're not really the pathways you get from traditional sports like soccer. You get you get in an academ into an academy in soccer in Australia and New Zealand, like that's that's like that's like your golden ticket. That's like Willy Wonka. Same thing with like rugby league, you get picked up by one of those academies in Australia, like that's a golden ticket. But here it's like it's a bit it's it's not as black and white as that, it's a bit of a grey area. Like if you can train well, get yourself like a a good coach who's kind of been there before and knows how to do it, that's gonna help a lot. And then if you can do well on the regional scene, that's kind of I guess the the pathway that that that will get you to the UFC.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:22

What's your sort of like I guess out of a out of a fight camp? Because I'm assuming most people understand what a fight camp is, and obviously the weeks up to the fight and what you have to do, but uh obviously there's so much training outside of fight camp that you're doing and your lifestyle. So what would like a day-to-day of your life be like for Cam Ralston in terms of your lifestyle to maintain yourself before fight camp?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:45

Um yeah, like right now, uh kind of floating around. I don't have a fight booked in, so I'm just in what we call like a building phase, building building the body up, so like building the strength of all the joints and stuff like that, which is which is a you know a lot of weight training and like strength training, and then building skills as well. So you want to learn some new skills, um, now's the time to I guess take risks in training. Not like risks that are gonna like put you in dangerous positions, but like you gotta try and try these new moves out. You go and you learn them, like doing a lot of jujitsu classes, a lot of grappling classes. Then you gotta try them, try them out in training. Um it's still like this the volume of training is still just as high, maybe in maybe a little bit more than a fight camp, but the intensity is way, way more down. So like I feel like I'm spending more time in the gym, but the time in the gym is nowhere near as intense it is during a fight camp.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:43

Right, right. And then of course you have to monitor, I mean, I've got the Tim Tams there, but like you have to monitor your diet, sleep, and all that as well. Because I think um, well, just when I look at you guys and like athletes in general, um, like the level of commitment to even outside of like the gym, there's a large, there's a significant commitment. Like, for example, you can't just go out for like someone's birthday party and have like 10 bears or something, or you can't like in the more like get macca's like you know, or something like that. You have to be very strict every day. Um, so what like how's I guess like the sacrifices you have to make? Uh could you chime in on that a bit?

SPEAKER_00 1:02:19

Yeah, yeah, like uh outside of camp, you do have a little bit more leeway, but again, like you still don't want to be going out on the weekends and like sinking 10 beers. You you you can do that after the fight, maybe like the the week or the or the two weeks after the fight you can do that, but anything after that, I feel like you're just you're just not gonna be able to get a proper weekend for the following week. Maybe you do that on a Saturday, Sunday's a write-off, and then Monday you turn up and you you're not focusing because you're still kind of still a little bit like in that party mode or you've lost your sleep and then you've lost another day. So it just always like the days accumulate that you lose. Then in a fight camp as well, like there's there's no way there's no way you can do any of that stuff. I mean, yeah, you can eat like Tim Tans and stuff outside of camp. I think that's alright. But the partying, losing the sleep is just gonna impact your loads. I um in the last fight camp, uh was it yeah, it was the last one, the the UFC Perth one. I I missed one of my best mates' wedding. I knew him since I was about four years old, so I missed I missed his wedding, but I sent my mum and my dad in my in my place instead. So that was cool. Um, but yeah, he was pretty happy that I won my fight. But I mean, it's just stuff like that. Like um, I remember Blood Diamond told me he was like, you can't have it all. If you wanna if you want to have it all, like you're gonna have nothing.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:39

Yeah, that's so true. Yeah, this amount of sacrifice you'd have to make in order to, yeah, missing friends' weddings or significant moments, or you know, God forbid someone passes away and you you know their funeral and all that. I mean, that's that's tough, man. That's that's hard stuff to like and I think it's important like with uh talking about these kind of things and level of commitment you have to have because I don't know, I don't really hear this stuff get spoken about as much from guys at your level, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:04:06

Yeah, I mean it's um this there's guys who have been doing this as well who've sacrificed way more than I have. Like I missed out on a wedding, yeah. It looked like a pretty cool wedding, but I mean some of these some of these guys have that I've been training with, you know, they've missed like the birth of their kids and like funerals and no, my friend got married, but maybe they missed like the family member's wedding or just something a little bit bigger, and you know, they've missed way, way, way more than I have.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:38

Yeah. I guess that's the thing as well when you go down that path of chasing it, and I just I don't know, I just think it's important to I guess you never really know until you do it, but it's a I guess have an idea of like what it means, like six, seven days in the gym, you know, in bed by ten pm or earlier, and then up at five a.m. you know, every day, all day.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:00

Yeah, I mean you've gotta I guess you just gotta really enjoy it if you're that's the thing with me, like I just enjoy training, I love being in the gym. You know, you see me coaching the classes and stuff, I coach classes at uh at CKB and I enjoy coaching the classes, it's not like oh fuck, I gotta I gotta coach this class, like I get to coach this class, and it's like um it's good this is j that's like my social life as well, coming into the gym, you know. I don't I don't really have many friends outside of the gym. Um and so like if you can make it a pla like Eugene's done a real good job of just turning the gym into more than just the gym, like it's just a community. So like if you enjoy going there in there every day and and and training and stuff, that's just like one aspect is doing the professional training, then there's all the other stuff as well that keeps you in the gym. So he's done like a real good job to create an environment that like keeps keeps the guys in there, like makes them well for me anyway, enjoy being there. And that's that's what makes it a lot easier. It doesn't really feel like that much of a sacrifice. Like when you're going in there, you're like, yes, it's like it's just like going to school every day and hang out with your mates without having to do the schoolwork. You're like, oh sweet, yeah, I'm going in there. I'm gonna pick on Brody today, and then I'm gonna go and get lunch down the road, and then I'm gonna come back. And me and Broganer, we're just gonna talk shit for like an hour. Like it's it's fun.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:16

Yeah, yeah. No, I I I love that part of um as well as it's one thing I did notice, like, I mean, a few years back when I I just obviously do incredibly casual training. I just go and then that's where I know Cam from. Actually, Cam, yeah, you were actually the when I went to like one of those 6 p.m. like introductory classes. Oh yeah, the kickstart. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, you did that, and I came along to that and I was like, oh yeah. And that was at the old gym as well. And I was like, oh, I was like, okay, like was that in the little room and it had like all the holes in the wall? Uh no. The reception? Where did we do it? Yeah, it was it was um where did we do it? I wanna I wanna say it was in the ring in that old gym. Okay, yeah. I want to say it was in the ring in that old gym. When there was just only a kickbox, like a traditional kind of ring there, and then um, but there was the room upstairs for the jujitsu with holes in the wall everywhere and and all that shit. And I remember that was the first time I ever tried jujitsu. Um, and I was like, this, I I don't know if I like this, but I know it's important.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:13

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:14

Um it was um, yeah, yeah. I remember like I'd never ever I've only ever seen wrestling really before, and then I just had never tried jujitsu. But um it's um yeah, that's been for me like the thing. I'm just like wow, this is so like hard, but I just know that like if you can be alright at it, like man, just you can it's just like you can just help you so much with trading. And also like I think for me what I noticed with like sparring, which I have done a little bit of, but I just find if I I don't know, if you get hit in the head a lot, I don't know. For me, I'm like, yeah, I need to work tomorrow. Like whereas jujitsu is like not that, and obviously I just tap. I don't I'm not one of you know, pe some people might not tap and stuff, which I find a bit strange. But um, you must have experienced that a bunch, people who you've trained with and they just don't tap.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:57

Oh, yeah, so many, yeah. Tap today, train tomorrow. That's what my uh jujitsu coach used to always say. My my uh first Brazilian jiu-jitsu coach, he was uh he's real big on like making sure that you like tap early, save the injury, but then he's also the guy who's like trying to yeah, trying to break your arm in an arm bar.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Gotta get the technique right to make it realistic. Yeah. Fuck. Yeah, yeah. Um, what else are I gonna I'll probably just I'm gonna ask that one as well. Let's see if I've got anything else kind of nearing the end here. I'm thinking um yeah, we can go into some maybe um some quick fire questions for you. Alright. Alright. Um have you ever tried a tick uh to tickle someone in MMA? No. Has anyone tried to tick? Is that a thing? I thought I saw a match or something, someone tried to tickle someone's foot.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:50

You mean like in a match or sparring?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:52

In a match, in a match. Nah, no way.

SPEAKER_00 1:08:55

That's cheating.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:56

Is that illegal?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:58

Nah. It's just weird, but I don't know. You could. I don't I don't think you would if you tried to tickle them, they would like register, they would just be like so.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:06

Just be numb. Yeah. Just be numb. Yeah. So yeah. I was just like wondering because I I just like it's just so silly. But your hands, your fingers are free, so I don't know. Um have you farted in a match before? Yeah, I've uh I've I've I've sharded. Oh shit.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:22

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:22

Damn, you actually w and like a what like a MMA? And so in a proper MMA cage you sharded.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:27

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Damn. Yeah, yeah, it wasn't a lot, it was just a little bit came out. Wow. Was that because of like a like grappling that someone cheated? Huge takedown just got slammed and I was just yeah, and all the pressure just landing right on my stomach. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:41

Oh my god. Um that's that's the first time I've ever heard that song sitting on there. So shouted. Wow. Um, any music in particular that gets you in the mood for for training or something you like listening to?

SPEAKER_00 1:09:55

Yeah, yeah. Getting ready for say like a spider or like a big wrestling session, I'll jam like some Rage Against the Machine, uh Rise Against, um Lincoln Park. Something along those lines is like usually pretty good to get me going. You know, it's like that's like caffeine for the ears. Yeah, yeah, some good hype music in that.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:14

Nice. Um and then um I guess yeah, before we um wrap up, um is there any um final words?