Kamaru Usman defends his natural physique, dismissing PED claims and 25-30% pre-USADA usage while crediting genetics and hard work for dominance over fighters like Gilbert, Colby, and Masvidal. His mental resilience—sharpened by meditation, fatherhood, and losses like Leon Edwards’—fuels his comeback plans despite doctors’ advice to rest, with a potential February/March return. Usman critiques UFC’s post-career athlete control, debates Zhang Weili’s title legitimacy, and praises Trevor Witt’s tactical guidance, contrasting Edwards’ underwhelming reception with his own welterweight reign. Stem cell treatments and disciplined training (elliptical, saunas, cold plunges) underscore his commitment to reclaiming the title, proving elite athletes thrive on focus over fleeting validation. [Automatically generated summary]
Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out The Joe Rogan Experience Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night, all day Just gotta, uh, you know, make sure that you side of whereabout is up to date Is that what you just did?
It's like if you have an athlete, and the athlete has to rest and recover, and you're waking them up at 5.30 in the morning, you break their sleep cycle, you're affecting their training.
It's, oh, well, I don't know, because I'm not them, but, you know, I think some people, fighters feel like, oh, it's their, oh, we're going to catch them.
It's 5.30 in the morning, we're going to catch them before they do anything, which is...
Well, Ali was saying that it's EPO, that it's, like, short-lasting, so if people take it, and they take it at night, it'll be out of their system by the time USADA shows up.
So he's like, yeah, I know that guy's doing it because I can see the marks on him and stuff like that.
And so they start pointing out, because I have like five scars on my stomach, like burn, like discoloration on my stomach.
And they start pointing at that, and he starts talking about it and making up this whole theory.
And it kind of hurt my feelings a little bit, because it...
It should make you happy.
Okay, so here's the story.
I was a little self-conscious about it because, so this is what happened.
I was in college.
This was my, I want to say junior year, sophomore, junior year, going into my junior season.
And actually, I think it was after my junior season.
So I started getting these.
I got it like a mole on my stomach.
And I got one on my hand.
And I'm one of those.
I'm kind of like a clean freak.
I shower after practice right away.
So I start scratching it.
And then it starts bleeding.
So I'm like, fuck, that's not a regular.
I thought it was like a pimple.
That's not a regular, like a zit or something like that.
So then I, you know, over time, it was like, maybe it was like five little ones, like tiny.
You could barely see them.
So I'm like, you know what?
I'm going to ask the doc.
We have a team doctor.
I'm going to ask him about it.
So I went in for a physical, and then before the season, I asked him, hey, you know, I have this right here.
I don't know what they are.
So he looks at him, and he goes, oh, these are non-cancerous moles.
They're just little bitty moles.
You know, it's very, very common.
I'm like, shit, not for me.
I don't know.
That's not common for me.
He's like, yeah, they're very common.
I'm like, yeah, well, how can I get rid of them?
I try to scratch them, and they bleed, and he's like, yeah, you don't want to do that.
What we could do is, I can burn them off.
And I'm like, okay, fuck it, let's do it.
Cause, hey, spring break was gonna come up.
Like, I started, I started, I started, I'm lifting now, I got a body now, you know, I'm a junior and I look jacked.
So I'm like, spring break is coming, I want to look jacked, I want to look good.
You know, so I don't get walking around with those, fuck no.
So, he's like, I can burn them off.
So, he burns them off with, I think, nitrogen or something like that.
So, he burns them and then he goes, hey, those are going to fall off in a couple days.
You know, just give them time.
So, I'm like, okay.
But I was still training heavily during the summer because I was just like an addict of wrestling.
I wanted to...
For me, I wanted to get catch up to everybody and I wanted to exceed everybody So this was my time the summer that that was my time for me to catch up so my dumbass I go back the next day.
I go to school and Back to the school and I go in and I go drill.
I go wrestle.
I couldn't stop I was just training all summer so I wrestled and I didn't think anything of it and Like, okay, they just burned those, but nothing has happened yet.
And so I wrestled.
And then later that evening, I'm sitting in my, I go, I get down, I get in the shower.
And I'm showering all of a sudden, just burning down there.
And I look down, and I had, like, scraped them off.
Like, so as soon as he burned him, he said, don't do anything.
They're going to fall off on their own.
But my dumb ass wrestled and it rubbed up against it.
And now they all fell off.
So then they scarred it because now I was like out for like seven days, like putting Neosporin on it just so they can heal.
And then they scarred over.
So I have those from just that moment.
So then this fucking guy is like, oh, he's doing PEDs.
Look, look, he's got the marks on his stomach.
And it hurt my feelings.
I'm like, I'm like one of those guys who I'm like...
I don't even think about PEDs because my work, even if I don't care, I probably have dealt with someone that was cheating or competed against someone that was cheating, but my work will far exceed all of that.
And so when I see idiots online or say, oh yeah, I know for a fact he's doing PD, I'm like, have you ever been to fucking Africa?
Have you been to Africa?
There's a lot of Francis Ngannou's walking around.
There's a lot of guys like me just walking around.
And because of the work and because of the way that I fight, they're like, oh no, he's definitely got to be doing something.
Because they can't explain why you are the way you are.
Why your performance exceeds what their mind is mentally capable of.
People don't care about it, but I don't think people understand.
So to make it to that fight, just to get in there, to step in there on fight day...
Nowadays, I'm so grateful because you deal with so much from family, from relationships, to children, to injuries, to finances, all of that and coaching to where by the time you actually step in there, it's like...
Like peaceful.
This is like I'm grateful to be in here that I actually made it in here.
So I think that Covenant fight was probably the first one was probably the sweetest.
For me, what I would love to do is ask, and hopefully in the future I can do that, and just sit down with these guys and ask them, like, how did you feel after that?
Like, are you human?
You've got to be human, too.
You've got to feel something after you go that far.
I think one of my favorite, I think, I don't know if it was, it might have been the Edson-Barboza fight or some other fight where he was on top of the guy.
He was holding him with one hand, holding his face, and he was beating his face with the other hand.
I was like, this is the most savage shit I've ever seen.
I got very offended when they were talking about Poirier, and I think it was Stephen A. Smith was talking about one accidental loss, I forget how he put it, to Michael Johnson.
I'm about to show him all the new ninja shit that I've learned.
I'm going to put it on him.
And I know he hasn't been training.
So we get to the gym and he just happens to be sparring day.
So I'm smiling.
I'm like, yeah, this is going to be the day.
I'm going to show him, little bro, learn some shit.
And I'm on the other side of the room, and the first couple of rounds, I kind of go with guys that would go at my pace.
And so I think it was maybe the third round.
And Rashad, he comes in, he takes his sweet-ass time.
This is when he was at 2.05.
He takes his time, and he gets ready, and all of this.
And then he's going, and the whole time I'm eyeballing him on the other side of the gym.
I'm eyeballing him.
I'm like, yeah, I'm going to go with him today.
So now it's the third round.
I'm like, yeah, Rashad, let's go.
Let's go.
He's like, all right.
And this was MMA gloves.
And this was back there in the Black Zillions.
We didn't really start using the seven-ounce poofy gloves.
We would use the UFC MMA gloves.
And so Rashad had his gloves on, and we start moving, and we're going, we're going, and I'm just like, like, go ahead, let me try some shit.
I don't know now.
So I throw, I throw like a one-two or something like that, and I just kind of hit his hands, and you know, he's moving with me, moving with me, and I'm like, let me ramp it up on him.
I know he's not in shape, let me ramp up on him.
So I'm picking up the pace, I'm picking up the pace, and no, I couldn't hit him, and then he starts hitting me.
But he was hitting me a little bit, like, with a little bit more conviction than I anticipated, than I thought.
I was like, why is he...
And he's hitting me, and I can stop it, and now he starts fucking me up.
And he's beating on me, and I'm like, no, okay, let me go to my wrestling.
I know I could always get him there.
And I shoot for takedowns, he stuffed them all, like two or three of them, he stuffs them.
Then he hits me, he starts hitting me again, he has me against the wall, and he's just beating on my body.
Then he shoots for a takedown, he takes me down.
And I'm just like, fuck.
There was nothing I could do.
I just, I didn't have the knowledge to really defend myself.
And he mounts me, and that was one of the worst things at that point.
205 Rashad, on top of you, is bad.
Because, you know, you could see it in his fights when he was at 205. Like, when he mounts guys, he'll crucify guys.
That's like his thing.
And he crucified me.
He beat my ass so bad.
Usually I drive us to practice and I drive us home.
He knew he beat my ass that bad.
He drove.
He's like, yeah, let me drive home.
So he drove.
I was sitting in the passenger seat and I'm just looking at the window.
I couldn't make eye contact with him.
I'm looking out the window the whole time like, holy shit.
And then we get home and usually when we're home, I'll make lunch or we'll get lunch.
This day we didn't get lunch.
I usually sit on the couch and maybe watch old fights or watch something like that in the living room.
But no, I was in my room the whole time.
I was like, no, I'm not coming out.
And he would just randomly come in, open the door, hey, you all right?
You good?
I'm like, yeah, I'm good, man.
I'm good.
I'm good.
He's like, all right.
You want something to eat?
Like, no, I'm okay.
I'm okay.
I felt like he purposely knew he beat the shit out of me.
And then how he just had to check on me all through the day to make sure that I was okay.
But it messed with me because I couldn't do anything about it.
I couldn't defend myself.
I didn't have the knowledge to.
And that was what was so hard about my first professional loss as well.
When I got submitted, I didn't have the knowledge because I wasn't doing jujitsu like that.
I didn't know what and how to defend myself at that point.
So those were hard.
This one, not so much because I knew exactly, you know, where I went wrong.
And it wasn't like Rashad beat my ass.
There was nothing I could do.
This one, that wasn't the case.
So, you know, this is a little easier to deal with.
It's weird to really explain, but it's, you get to a certain point to where people start putting expectations on you.
They start like, oh yeah, you're gonna do this, you're gonna do that, yeah, you're this, you're that, to where I didn't get into it for all of that.
I was never, I was never attached to the title.
Now, as weird as that sound, I didn't.
I was never attached to it.
It wasn't like, oh, I'm champion.
I gotta hold on to this.
No, and I've said it before, and I continue to say it.
In my head, each and every time I was fighting for that title or defending that belt, I was fighting for the title.
I was a contender in my head.
I felt like that.
I have to go contend for this belt each and every time.
So, because I feel like when you're defending, you're tight.
Now you're on defense.
You're not thinking offense.
You just want to...
Anything to hold on to this.
Anything to hold on to this.
I was never really like that.
So everyone felt like kind of started putting expectations like, yo, you're about to break this record.
I didn't even know what Anderson Silva's record was until like before the last fight where everyone started saying, oh yeah, you're about to break the Anderson Silva's record or you're about to tie this.
Yo, you already broke George St. Pierre's record.
I don't care.
I don't give a shit.
The last time I cared about the number was when I was 5-1 and I was about to get into the UFC. I was like, yeah, I'm 5-1.
Damn, Rashad went on like a 15-fight win streak one time.
Damn, I wish I could do something that great.
But I just, Rashad even told me at that point, he's like, just take a fight at a time.
As long as you worry about that next fight and that next fight and the next fight, don't add up.
And so, yeah, it was almost like a relief of expectations of everyone's Pressure of, oh yeah, you're the goat this, you're the goat that.
That's relative.
That's a relative, like, it's hard to argue that situation because George St. Pierre was the greatest in his era.
With what he had to deal with, the opposition he had to deal with, he was the greatest, hands down.
And, you know, when George St. Pierre kind of moved aside, Woodley was that guy.
And then Robbie had a stint there.
Robbie was that guy.
And Pat Miletic had a stint when he was that guy.
So did Matt Hughes.
And so to say, oh yeah, that guy's the GOAT, that's relative because styles make fights.
And you can never really tell what would transpire if this guy goes with that guy.
Styles make fights and it's also guys are building on the work that was done before them.
Because if you look at the fighters from 1993, that's the best example.
Because it's one of the rare sports where we get to see a stark contrast between the early days of the UFC and the current days.
If you go back and watch basketball in 1993, it's pretty similar to basketball today.
There might be better athletes today, people are better at everything today.
But it's still basketball.
The UFC is almost unrecognizable.
You watch the way people fought back then versus the way people fight now.
I mean, there's no comparison.
You got to go to UFC 12, you see Vitor's debut, and you go, okay.
Now we're looking at what a real modern mixed martial artist looks like.
And then there's a few guys along the way that were outliers, that were much better than everybody else.
And now you have a whole roster filled with people like that.
And when you watch the development of fighters, every fighter learns from the people that are in their gym and they learn from the people that they see fighting.
And so everybody of today, you have Tyron Woodley's videos to watch.
You have the fights that George St. Pierre had to watch.
You had all these different fights that you can watch and you can learn from all these.
The Anderson Silva fights, the Jon Jones fights.
There's so much knowledge that's accumulated in the minds of the athletes now, and that's built on the people that came before them.
I'm like, yeah, of course, they have to do the work.
Yeah, of course, you know, the thing that's most impressive about a person like yourself is that in spite of all this knowledge out there and in spite of all these athletes, you are still dominating.
There's so, the level's so high.
There's so many great guys.
I think the level of your competition was higher than the level of anybody else's competition.
I think when you look at the guys that you faced, and you look at Gilbert, and you look at Colby, and you look at Masvidal, you look at all these guys that you've faced.
Man, that's a serious resume of hard-hitting fighters.
Yeah, I started, when you start watching, and like I mentioned, I started doing research when I started getting more and more into MMA. And yeah, I'm like, damn, Joe had hair.
And also the eyes on them, there's so many more eyes, so there's so much more attention, so there's so much more, it's so much more intensity to a lot of these up and comers.
The idea of being the welterweight champion of the world.
You walk into an arena and you raise your arms and 18,000 people go, yeah!
That's alien.
You might as well be living on the moon.
That doesn't even make sense to most people.
So when they see someone like you and you're killing it and you're going on this unbeaten streak and you're dominating everyone, you dominate Tyrone Woodley to win the title, you knock out Masvidal with one punch.
Holy shit!
It's wild!
So they just want you to fall apart because they can't compare to you.
And so people would like screen grab that and make a fake page with that as the avatar and have a page dedicated to that like you got knocked out you got this you got for them to take time out of their day I'm like shit I'm special But mostly people that don't have a good life.
I was dreading talking about this, but not in a bad way, but it's funny to me.
So...
The fight is going and there's a zone that I've learned to put myself in and my coaches can kind of attest to this because I do it even in training.
There's a way that I train, that I practice to where I try to get myself into the zone which is as similar to a fight experience as I can be and to where I try not to be bothered by anything that's going on.
And my body has adjusted and gotten used to this.
So in the first round, the fight's going on, and boom, that situation happens.
He hooked my legs, and this is my bad knee.
Well, my not-so-good knee, but both of them aren't the greatest.
So I'm like, okay, let me hip him through.
So I tried to hip him through, but he just had great position.
You know, kudos to him.
And I get taken down.
That I probably was more upset about.
Giving up that takedown.
I was like, fuck!
I gave up a takedown.
So we get down and he, you know, he tries to, you know, he takes it back and I'm just chilling.
And waiting for the bell and the bell goes off and I get up.
And I didn't realize this until I watched the fight back over.
I get up and I almost kind of smiled.
You know, I get up and I jog back to my corner.
But I look at it and I'm like, okay, I know that's where I was at at that time.
I was in that zone to where I'm unbothered by whatever is happening.
I'm going to make this be whatever I want it to be.
And so the next round I just take off and I just start kind of wailing on him.
And so, by the fifth round, I kind of have him in a spot to where I'm just like, I never think, okay, yeah, I've got to fight one.
Let me just coast.
Let me hold on to him and win.
I never think that.
I want to, if I can get the finish, I'm going to try to get that finished.
And I want to do something spectacular.
You know, I'm like, okay, we're going to take a risk here.
We're going to do something great.
And I remember, and this is the great thing about Trevor Whitman, in the training camp, we work on certain techniques to kind of put him where you want him.
And get him out of there.
Like even in the Masvidal fight, like everyone, oh, the knockout just happened.
No, I set him up for the knockout.
People didn't realize.
I did the same sequence in the first round that I did to finish him.
And so I start that with Leon.
You know, because I've kind of got Leon in a place now to where I, you know, I could kind of really kind of dictate whatever I wanted to do.
And so we get him and I get him up and I think her breaks us from the cage.
So we're moving and I'm trying to set him up and I'm trying to get his feet moving.
I wasn't doing the greatest of job, which is this is all on me.
And I'm trying to get his feet moving.
You see me changing levels.
And what I wanted to do was set him up and I was going to throw the punches that he couldn't see and I wanted to sit him down and get him out of there.
I wanted to throw him with conviction and really, like I did with Masvidal, and get him out of there.
And so I'm like, okay, what I'm going to do is I'm going to shake left, shake right, and then I'm going to let him go.
But I got to get him moving first.
And I didn't do a great job of that.
And so I'm moving, moving.
I'm like, okay, I got him set up.
All right.
Which I really didn't.
I shake left.
I shake right.
And I'm sitting in the ambulance and they're asking me, do you know where you're at?
I hugged everyone because he was on video and everything.
I remember sitting it was like Leon gave me like a 20-minute nap Which was it was I think about and I was laughing hysterically in the in the hospital because I had to go in just to get scanned and all of that which everything was fine So it's like, immediately I come to, I'm in the ambulance, they're asking me, do you know where you're at?
I'm like, yeah, Salt Lake City, UFC 278. Like, what's your date of birth?
I'm like, I answer, you know, and they were like, wow, perfect.
I answered everything perfectly.
They're like, oh, we still need to take you to the hospital.
To the hospital just to get you scanned and everything like that.
I was like, all right, fine.
So we go to the hospital to get scanned and everything.
But I was already good.
I was okay.
I was maybe disappointed that I lost, but I wasn't bummed.
The first loss that I had in my career, that one fucked with me.
It was the uncertainty of the future and also because there was nothing I could do with that.
I couldn't defend myself because I didn't have the knowledge of it.
That was what hurt me the most is I'm like, because when I was in that position, I could have fought it because I was standing up with the guy a backpack for almost a minute, and I had no idea what to do.
And I wanted to go back to the ground and try to fight it, but in my head I said, shit, I don't know what I'm doing down there if I go down there anyways.
So no, I'm just going to stay up here until I eventually tap.
But this one was like, okay, I know my mistakes.
That's one thing I've said.
I'm very, very honest with myself.
I am honest with myself to where I'm like, shit, okay, he got me.
He got me.
I didn't do a good job of what I wanted to do, and he got me.
And I don't like the notion of everyone saying, oh, he got lucky.
Yeah, he got lucky.
Yeah, of course.
But luck to me is not what everyone is saying.
Luck is when preparation meets opportunity.
That's luck to me.
You can't tell me that Leon didn't train that kick.
Of course he did.
I'm not even a Southpaw and I trained that kick.
I know he trained that kick and there's a video, I don't know if that was before the fight or after or whatever that was, but they're like, look, this video of him actually training.
Yeah, of course you train that.
That's what a well-rounded, the number one contender, mixed martial arts in the world should do and they should know how to do.
Yeah, of course he trained that.
So yeah, he did get lucky.
He prepared to be able to land a kick like that.
I presented him with the opportunity, and he landed the kick.
And here we are.
So, you know, people are kind of trying to take away from his win.
No, he landed a good kick, you know, and he put me out.
Trevor Whitman, Ben Charrington, George Santiago, and these guys, they do a great job.
And my strength and conditioning coaches, Corey Peacock and Aaron, they do a great job of preparing me They do a great job of what they have to work with, getting that prepared for battle.
And for me, it was executing what I wanted to do.
In that moment, there was a setup that I was trying to set Leon up, and I didn't execute it the proper way.
I didn't move his feet the way that I wanted to move his feet.
I didn't put him in the position where I wanted to put him in order to be successful with what I wanted to do.
And so that was all on me.
No, it was a great one.
And the instructions, and I tried that based on the instructions that I got from Trevor.
And it was amazing instructions because Trevor did tell me that, hey, when you're throwing your right hand, you're looping it and he can see it because it's South Pole and he's just leaning back.
Is that because like you do see moments in fights where things don't go fighters way and you start to see some frustration.
You start to see them like lose some of their focus.
Like they kind of get taken out of their game because things aren't going their way and you see things bothering them.
So is that something like, so if you recognize that you can put yourself in this very specific state of mind where no matter what happens, you are exactly the same way?
It's amazing for him to be able to witness now everything that's going on in my life and see it firsthand.
You know, that feels great to me.
That's one of the joys of where I am now.
Which I think has kind of ultimately led me to the point where I am.
Because it's...
I see things, I'm just more grateful for things.
And I see people kind of like look at me like an alien because if I'm not upset at certain things that don't go my way or if I don't react a certain way to certain things, people are like, oh, well, why?
Why aren't you reacting this way?
Why aren't you?
You should be more upset.
Oh, you're not disappointed?
You're not hurt?
No, and especially about this experience.
The biggest, I would say, the most hurtful thing for me is I didn't represent.
Well, it's not that I didn't represent.
I did.
I didn't get the result for the amount of work that I put in.
The amount of work that my coaches put in with me.
Okay, the one moment, I have to be honest, that did hit my heart a little bit was when I was in the hospital with Ali.
We were in the hospital together when I was getting scanned.
I was already back.
I was watching the video clip of it.
He showed me that because I wanted to see how it happened.
And I was like, damn, he got me.
That was a good shot.
You know, I was envious of it.
Like, I'm like, damn, he set me up good.
That shit was beautiful.
You know, it's like a form.
It was just nice.
You know, kudos to Leon.
But then the camera pans into the audience, and they showed my daughter.
My daughter cried.
And...
And she'd cry.
It was the weirdest thing.
It was like an instant trigger response, like boom.
My heart, like I wanted to cry just seeing that for her.
Because as a parent, as a father, that's one of the worst things is we couldn't, and I learned that when my daughter was an infant, is when they're sick or something's bothering them, you just feel it.
It just hits your heart.
And then when my daughter was crying, it got to me.
I was like, oh shit.
I didn't like seeing that.
And then, you know, Connor, I think Connor had tweeted something and was kind of blasting me about it.
Like, you know, for bringing her to the fight and this and that.
Yeah, like he tweeted some mean things or certain things like that.
And it was just like, I'm out low with people sometimes.
But for me, it was like...
Fuck no!
They don't understand it.
They're just in a low level of thinking to it.
They don't understand.
Absolutely, I'm gonna bring her.
My daughter's not only going to see when daddy's victorious and daddy just continues to beat everybody and daddy has to put her in the best school or whatever she wants to be.
No!
Because I'm in a weird place.
I'm trying to teach her.
She has a work ethic, but it's kind of like, I don't want to do that today or I don't want to go to gymnastics or I don't want to do that this week.
And she's kind of like, doesn't want to do it.
Oh, I don't like it anymore.
I want to quit.
And I'm trying to teach her the best way that I can without forcing her to do something of what it takes to work hard.
My daughter has been going to the gym with me ever since she was six months old, so she understands that and she's okay with it.
That's why she can watch my fights.
But I'm not only going to bring her because that is victorious.
I am blessed right now with an opportunity to show my daughter that, look, you can fall down and look how you can get back up.
And so it was to see people like, and someone like Connor, who actually does have children, to say something like that, it was like, man, you're missing the mark big time, bro.
You're missing it big time because I am blessed.
How often do you get an opportunity like that to where you can give them an example of how it is to rebound at the highest level?
And so when I see her now, it's like moments I try to really fight that and stay in that place and not spend too much time with her because she's going to get affectionate.
And I don't want to make her feel weird for being affectionate.
But at the same time, I understand what I am feeling and the mental state that I'm in.
So no, by the time I walk into the cage, I'm already that person.
When they come and get you from that back room and they say, alright, it's your time.
So I pace back and forth in the backstage before I do the walk and I'm starting to slowly climb into the Nigerian nightmare when I step inside that cage.
So when I'm there, I don't even know, I don't feel, I don't see, I don't hear, I don't care that they're there.
I have a task, I have a job to do and that's what I need to do.
I feel nothing except for the bump on my shin for kicking his elbow and I feel nothing.
So I want to go back, but the doctors are like saying, which I have to listen because they're supposed to be experts.
And they're like, yeah, even though you might not feel anything, there might be some bruising back there that you don't know that could cause some type of harm later on.
But, you know, I'm already, you know, thinking about what I can do, push-ups, sit-ups, to do this or that, to just stay in shape because I already feel like, you know...
I'm addicted to that burn of that workout, the burn of physical activity.
I mean, you talk openly about this so I can bring it up, but it's amazing how well you can fight and how well you can train with your knees the way they are.
I just go.
Your mental strength in that regard is really extraordinary because you've got some fucked up knees.
So you have to wait a few weeks before you can train again, and then once you start training again, then do you get an assessment of when you'd be able to compete again?
There is a thing that happens to fighters, and I'm not saying this is going to happen to you, but when they've been knocked out more than once, oftentimes, they lose their chin.
The way that I compete anyways is I try not to take punishment.
I try to use my brain.
I want to outthink the guys when I'm in there fighting.
And I think I do that pretty well.
But I'm listening to the experts and the guys that have experience.
You know to have the knowledge of what this is and they're saying if they saying okay, you need to wait a month and not take any hard training or heavy this Yeah, of course.
I have nothing but time I mean the only logical thing that makes sense is to fight this guy again.
Of course, I want to be rewarded for the time that I put in.
But for me, the main thing is representing the work that I put in.
That's the biggest thing for me.
I fucking, I give everything for this.
Like I've sacrificed a lot.
I sacrifice relationships.
I sacrifice time with my daughter.
I think this kept, I was gone almost like a six week stretch.
Like this is, this is time that I won't get back.
All these things that I sacrificed.
I sacrifice time with friends.
For me, I just live this.
I'm in camp and even my nutritionist, the chef, she'll make me food.
Some days I'll come in and I won't even talk.
I'll just eat.
The food's there ready and I'll just eat.
And I know in her head she wants to have a conversation or she's wondering why isn't he talking.
I just want to eat.
I'm living in my head and I'm going through this experience.
And maybe that day Trevor put me through a workout that was just super tough that I was fluctuating with dealing with it mentally while I was doing it.
So I'm reflecting on that the whole time.
So I might sit there and just stare off into space while I'm eating.
And I know she probably wonders, like, why isn't he talking?
Why isn't he...
But that's it.
I sacrifice all of those things for what I am doing right now.
And so, yeah, I have to represent that.
Each and every time I step in there, I want to represent that to the fullest.
You know, I don't spend as much time with my mom and dad.
You know my dad's out now and you know I'm sure he's having a blast you know now seeing where we all are in life But I would love to spend more time with them, but I sacrifice all of that to go and try to be great at this So in an ideal timeline When would you like to have a rematch?
I think what makes more sense is to go to London or go to England somewhere.
I think that makes sense.
I love the idea.
I love it.
And so I think they're already booked all the way up until January.
That, that, I... I thought 18, like I walk out of Salt Lake City, which is big shout out to Salt Lake City, big shout out to all the guys that took care of us there, Sean and all those guys, the AG and they did a fantastic job taking care of us.
They were very hospitable.
And so I'm thinking, you know, I love it, because I went to school in Colorado and Iowa and the Midwest, so I'm like, okay, Salt Lake City, and I live in Colorado.
I'm like, I don't know what to expect here.
And I walk out.
I'm walking out.
I'm like, holy shit, these people are on top of me.
And, you know, if you have a career that's 40 fights, you have 40 of these wild-ass moments in your life, and then everything other than that is preparing for the next moment.
It's like celebrating the victory of the moment, rebuilding from the defeat of the moment, training, and getting ready for the next moment.
And then, no more moments forever.
It all goes away.
And for some people, that's hard.
Some people find something cool to do, and they find a crazy hobby that they really enjoy, and they find something that really they can focus on.
But I think for a guy who chases excellence his whole life, like yourself, it's very difficult to find something to do with that energy.
Because what you're doing is, you're not just chasing excellence, you're chasing it globally.
You're trying to be the most dominant person at 170 pounds on planet Earth and you're succeeding at it and you put forth this immense amount of concentration and determination and discipline and effort and thought and just focus and the process over and over again day in and day out with incremental improvements and then you have these moments and then Boom!
You land that right hand on Masvidal and he goes to sleep.
That's a very good way of putting it because, like I said, I try to learn from the guys that have done it before.
And that's one of the things.
Whether you win or lose, you're gonna go up and down.
You're gonna have a come down.
And there's just moments where you feel the depression kind of setting a little bit.
And obviously worse when you do lose.
And I recognize those.
And I've been, you know, over the years now, I've been, you know, trying to kind of branch out and learn different ways and get into different things to be able to do that.
And, you know, I've taken up, which I would love to have a conversation one day, you know, hopefully being in the same setting as Michael Jordan.
I would love to have a conversation with a guy like that.
You know, in the Tiger Woods and all these guys and have a conversation with them and just...
So I listen I listen for a while and then he just somehow uses my friends people around me to get to me so All in all we get a group the guys of us he gets us for like half a million and You know he sells us the restaurant like one of the business and he got them because they were in for another location so he got them for like over over a million and So The one I invested in was a different location and he got us for half a million,
but he turned around and sold it to a Same time so that tells it to another couple like page and I forget her name page and Paul someone got them for like half a million Turns out sells it to another one like this is all like he sells the same restaurant to like three or four different people Oh my god.
And I remember sometimes he would talk to us and he'd say, you know, I just, I don't like these people down here in South Florida.
They're a bunch of scammers, you know, I don't like these people.
And when people talk about scammers, chances are they are the scammers.
The smart individual, the smarter individual that I am now, probably nothing.
Because that's just an opportunity for him to get more money out of me.
Like if I go up and let's say he decides to, I'm gonna get brave and talk reckless to him because he knows he's gonna provoke me and try to get in my face and do this.
What am I supposed to do?
You know, people like that, I can't hit him.
I can't, you know, like I'm a boy, I'm a man.
At some point I'm gonna want to get physical.
You know, I can't do that.
Because if I do do that, it's like, yes, now I get more money out of him.
Like, the next day, she's like, oh, I gotta go to school.
Hey, can I go to this park and play?
Can I go do this?
And...
My daughter doesn't care.
Yeah, I have to live with it, but I get a rare opportunity to rebuild, to work myself up and show her that, look, it's not the end of the world.
You could still get back to this point.
You could still do something.
And so, yeah, that was weird to me that, you know, people would speak on that and negatively about that and Connor would say something about, yeah, that's why I don't bring my family or I wouldn't bring my family.
I guess the idea is, like, get in early, and then if it is very valuable, you got in early, so you got this virtual real estate before it, you know, the price skyrocketed.
But, you know, Ali wanted to just buy her something.
I was like, bro, it was such a thoughtful and special gift.
So I buy it, and he buys it, and I give it to her.
And she loves him.
And she's like, oh man, these are great.
And I remember as soon as I gave it to her, and I said that to her, and I said, hey...
Don't wear this to school because I know when she goes to school, she's just going to play.
Recess, they have recess twice a day.
She's going to wreck those quickly.
And I'm like, you don't want to wear them to school because you don't want to mess them up.
So I said, and I'm going off of the experience that my parents would tell me.
And so I'm gone.
I think I go out of town for something.
I had to go do a show or something.
And I come back the next week and I see the shoes.
They were like wrecked.
I was like...
Samir, did you wear your shoes to school?
Instantly, I caught myself.
I'm like, I have to be careful how I approach this with her.
I was like, hey, did you wear these to school?
And she's like, yeah.
I was like, you see how dirty they are?
She's like, yeah, but we can just clean them.
And she kind of talks to me like that, like it's a little smart sass now.
And I'm like...
I'm like, okay, yeah, we could clean them.
So we clean them.
And at this point, I was just like, fuck, who cares?
She's just going to wear them anyways.
So she's wearing them.
Then the next week, she goes to gymnastic practice.
And I didn't know I was somewhere.
I think I was in Denver.
And training.
And so she calls me.
She FaceTimes me.
Some random number FaceTimes me.
And it was her at gymnastics.
I don't think her waiting to be picked up.
Her mom was waiting to pick her up.
And she was with one of her friends.
She calls me and she goes, Hey, Daddy, can you...
And we're talking.
I'm like, Hey, what's up?
What's going on?
And she's sitting next to another girl, little girl.
And she goes, My friend...
I forget her name.
My friend loves my shoes.
Can you buy her a pair of shoes?
And I remember in my head, and I was just like, in my head I'm like, fuck, what?
Fuck no, I didn't even buy those for you.
You know how much those cost?
In my head I'm thinking this, but then I had to snap into, very quickly, I had to catch myself, and I'm just like, She doesn't know and she doesn't care what those shoes are.
We put value on it.
We as adults have put a value that those shoes are worth $700.
She doesn't give a shit.
She doesn't know and she doesn't care.
All she cares about, the value that she cares is making her friend feel good for wanting to have the same shoes that she has.
That's all she cares about.
And in my head, I'm like, those are fucking $700.
I'm not buying those.
I didn't even buy you those ones.
I'm not doing that.
But she's just like, hey, can you buy these for my friends?
She just wanted to make her friend feel good.
And I had to catch myself.
Me and Eddie Alvarez, we talked about, had a conversation about this.
And I was just like, wow.
So crazy how, it's like kids got this shit figured out mentally.
They don't care.
There's no attachment to that $700 pair of shoes.
They don't give a shit.
All they care about is the experience and how their friend is going to feel when they give them this gift.
And I remember I had caught myself and was like, holy shit.
I can't.
I have to approach certain things differently.
Like this little girl is teaching me so much and enhancing me so much, even with my relationships and how I deal with them now and deal with maybe a loss of a relationship or gaining a new one, how you deal with them.
I'm learning so much so fast.
It's almost like, and I still feel like I felt when I was 12, but I'm fucking 35. This is probably how...
You know how we see 60-year-olds that are doing young things and you're like, act your age.
If you're an athlete, if you're a person who works out all the time, sauna and a cold plunge.
If you're a person who values your immune system, wants your recovery to be better, you want to reduce inflammation in your life, sauna and a cold plunge.
Get those two motherfuckers back-to-back.
Do 20 minutes in that sauna and And to do like three to five minutes in that cold plunge, you get out, you're a different human.
You're a different human.
And then if you do it all the time, your body has so much more resilience.
Trevor's such a, his mind is always, he builds everything.
Builds everything.
Fixes everything.
And that was the biggest thing, is he wanted to, because you know, fighters, we always hurt our hands, we always break our hands, and he was like, man, his mind's always going, how can I create something that's better?
For your hands, that can enhance it and enhance it.
And so his gloves, even the big, the 16 ounces, the X Factor gloves are amazing.
George Lockhart was explaining this to me, and he was saying that people with a lot of muscles, like yourself, it's actually easier for them to cut weight than skinny people or people that have fat.
Yeah, I've tried that and I think when I fought, I didn't fight actually.
The most muscular I was was when Tyron Woodley fought Darren Till in Dallas.
I weighed in as an alternate for that, for that fight.
Because in my head, I was going to be, I was going to fight for this title.
Whether Darren Till made the weight or whether Tyron Willie made, whether Darren Till did make it or Tyron Willie didn't make it, I was going to step in.
I was prepared to step in.
And I was, that was the most muscular in that camp.
I prepared for two different styles, two different guys.
And I was really muscular and I got 13 off in two hours.
I think that was, that was a video that Will did that was out.
But for me, the best way is, like now, oral hydration.
Knowing when I put in the sodium, the magnesium, and certain things step by step.
Big shout out to Clint and the guys at the PI. You know, they have a whole protocol and a process to getting those fluids back in you, the electrolytes, you know, the carbohydrates and the certain things back in your body that's going to hold that water.
Yeah, I've watched certain people get on the scale, and you see them shuffling to the scale, and you're like, I can't believe this guy has to fight in a day.
I'm saying, like, imagine if you just weighed in, and what you weighed in, and you fought, like, you weigh 195, fight 195. Oh, yeah, that would be great.
I've, you know, you compete against those guys, you know, and I'm, you know, I wrestle with them and I train with them and I'm bigger guys to where it's not that big of a problem.
When he was at the top in the flyweight division in the UFC, you would see guys trying to solve this puzzle of this guy who's here, and then he teleports to here, and then he's kneeing you in the body, and then he's over here, and then he's got your back.
Like, now that he's gone and he goes to another organization.
But it's still, the fights that he had in the UFC, like when they show that whole, you know, when they play The Who, they have that music and they have that compilation.
How the fuck do you not have Mighty Mouse in that?
I mean, if it ends now, it sucks that it ends on that fight.
That's what sucks, because it's not like it ends on the Joanna fight when she KO'd her, or when she KO'd Zhang Weili, to lose on that fight where it was so perplexing.
And I... He said that to me between the first time I fought Masvidal, right after the fight, because I remember I was just so mad at myself because I felt that I could have done better.
I dominated the whole fight, but I was just like, no, that guy wasn't as good as I. I made it up to be in my head.
No way.
I want to fight him again.
And Trevor, and I was just upset with myself backstage, and Trevor was just like, Bro, you're the fucking champion.
You have to be the smart one here.
Because it took a lot of work for you to get here to the title.
And it takes a lot of work to be able to defend this title.
You have to be the smarter guy.
And I heard every word that he said.
But the Dark Kermit, the gangster in me, was like, what?
It's also, for me, it's nice to see Jeff Neal back in form.
Because I was...
Jeff Neal, like, when he knocked out Mike Perry, I was like, that guy is the dark horse of division.
Like, he is so technical.
So clean and the way he lands his strikes is so efficient and like he's someone to watch and then he had a Rough time of it for a while like you where it didn't really and he has some personal issues And it seemed like he kind of lost his focus, but now it looks like it's a hundred percent back Yeah, and he's calling fools.
Yeah, I don't know if that's for sure because I'm hearing now, like, all this week they were saying, oh, Masvidal is pushing to fight Leon Edwards for the title.
I think DC, I think he called for the Masvidal fight and said, oh, he will.
I think they asked Leon, would you fight Masvidal?
And Leon's like, I mean, yeah, I have the opportunity to say, but, you know, I've been wanting to fight this guy for three years and he just ignored me and said that I was a nobody.
But now out of the woodwork, he wants to fight me.
And then I think DC had commented and said, if I was Leon, I would just completely ignore this guy because that's what he did to you.
He ignored you when he could have fought you.
You guys were both in a certain situation where you could fight each other.
But now that...
You know, you are the champion.
He wants another crack at the bell.
So he, of course, he wants to fight you now.
And so I think that's what Masvidal and his camp got upset with and they started going to DC. And DC did the most savage shit, I think, to do.
And he posted a picture of his titles stacked up.
I remember saying, I was just like, well, the argument's over.
You can't really say shit to that.
I mean, I think he had, what, like seven world titles just all stacked up on the table.
And he posted a picture of it.
I was like, yeah, I mean, you can't argue back with that.
I don't want to speculate on it because I didn't know the whole file of everything, but I know he has good days and then some days he has some bad weeks.
Anthony Johnson was one of the purest athletes I've ever seen because he had the feet of a lightweight and the power of a heavyweight and he carried it all the way through.
I hope he does get it, but to do something, to do what he's done, what he just did, To come from where he's come from and stay in England and yeah, and I don't care how he did it he did it yeah,
you know I I would that's kudos to him and and what he is stands for you know that victory because he's now he's intertwined with the inner city and helping kids and you know stay out of the gang life and things of that nature so it's commendable and I and I'm I'm glad for him For what that you know being able to achieve that and But in my head, it's not like I feel like I'm a loser.
No, I know I'm the best in the world.
And when given that opportunity again, I will prove that.
But I'm glad he's getting the things and doing what he's doing right now.
For him the only fight that would make any sense marketing wise I could see you could say the Masvidal fight if you couldn't fight in time and they offered him a headliner fight and Masvidal took it I kind of could see where that would maybe But I don't think they would risk the rematch.
Definitely just try to prolong this as much as possible.
I'm doing everything I can.
I'm trying to spend the time and money On my recovery, you know, making sure that I'm healthy, I'm warmed up before and stretching after and getting some physical therapy, some body work done.
So I'm doing it all.
And of course, it supplements, you know, as far as the, you know, turmeric and the ginger and the different things that the natural herbs that you can put in your body to help reduce those inflammations I'm doing.
And You know, I used to say, oh man, maybe a couple more fights and I'm done.
But, you know, with the newfound hunger that Leon has sparked, it's like, we'll do this a little bit more.
Well, they say they're going to have to replace them in 20 years, but they were going to have to do something new in 20 years anyway if you're going to work out.
I think also biologics are going to advance to a point where they're going to be able to regenerate tissue in a way that they're not going to have to replace your knee.
They're just going to be able to regenerate all that cartilage tissue, meniscus.