How would a kangaroo attack a human?
Knock them down, and then they choke them.
The kangaroos do?
They choke each other, yeah.
They don't choke each other.
You don't believe me?
You wanna watch a video, they choke each other out.
I've seen this, yeah.
I mean, probably the most annoying one
was obviously the one where I had Gordon Armbar
I was like, tap, bro.
And he wouldn't tap, so I let him out.
I didn't get surgery, I didn't do essentially any rehab,
I just have no ACL in my left leg.
So what's it like having no-
The surgeon goes, you've got two options.
Surgery, rehab only.
Nikki goes, I'll do nothing.
Yeah, I mean, what could possibly go wrong
if you're the world's best grappler, hates you,
and you're gently provoking him behind the scenes every day?
Well, I mean-
In Texas.
And you've stolen his brother, held him for ransom.
It is like a story of a shitty Westerner.
The last part of a difficult wake up for me
is I try to find a sad movie and at least cry,
about a pound out.
That really gets me over the line.
What are the rules in the streets?
Do you think if you're on steroids,
you would have finished the choke?
I mean, for sure.
Who knew that the cure to the Dagestan-y wrestling
were the Aussies?
The following is a conversation with Craig Jones,
Nikki Rod, and Nikki Ryan,
who together with Ethan Krelistan and others,
make up the B-Team,
a legendary jiu-jitsu team here in Austin, Texas.
It was formed after the so-called Donahur Death Squad,
the team headed by John Donahur split up
into new wave jiu-jitsu and B-Team jiu-jitsu,
both located here in Austin, Texas.
There has been a lot of trash talk back and forth,
including accusations of greasing and steroid use.
And I, as a practitioner and fan of grappling jiu-jitsu
and martial arts in general, am here for it,
to see the best grapplers in history go at it,
both on the mat and on Instagram.
I like the people on both teams, and train with both,
and am really happy to see the exciting,
rapid evolution of the sport
that these athletes and coaches are catalyzing.
This is the Lux Freedom Podcast.
To support it, please check out our sponsors
in the description.
And now, to your friends, here's Craig Jones,
Nikki Rod, and Nikki Ryan.
Craig, can you introduce everyone?
Yep, so we got Nikki Rod here,
Brown Belt, two-time ADCC silver medalist.
Nikki Ryan here.
That's it.
Okay, who are you?
And I'm Craig Jones, also two-time ADCC silver medalist.
Silver medalist, so the number one loser.
Number one loser.
And maybe a little bit more, your bio says,
widely known as the Black Belt Slayer,
hails from New Jersey, the land of pizza and biceps.
Yes, that's pretty accurate.
You also do carry a gun on you a lot?
Yeah, I keep it loaded, you know, keep it on me.
You have one today?
In the car.
That was a mistake, that was your first mistake.
Yeah, I think you're too close.
And you are Nikki Ryan, what else is there?
What else do we know?
Gordon Ryan's brother.
Gordon Ryan's brother.
All right, so and you're all together,
part of the leadership of the B team here in Austin.
Let's just get out some introductory questions.
What in general accomplishment of the things you mentioned
you're most proud of?
I mean, I'm proud just to not have to work a full-time job
just to get by on the bullshit I've done so far, honestly.
Just making money off a thing you love.
Exactly, yeah.
When was the first time you made money
on a thing you love?
Oh, probably a jiu-jitsu tournament.
I think maybe an Abu Dhabi where I won $1,000,
thought I was rich.
Yeah, yeah, what'd you spend that $1,000 on?
Probably something bad, probably drugs
or something at the time.
Maybe blew it at the after party.
That's a good introduction to Craig.
So what about you, when's the first time
you made money on jiu-jitsu?
Or what's, actually stepping back,
what's the thing you're most proud of?
Is it a similar kind of thing?
I think I'm most proud of is,
for sure, two ADCC silver medals,
which hurts because you're so close to getting that gold,
but it takes time.
I'm understanding that the sport of jiu-jitsu
takes quite a while to be at the tip-top
to be the absolute best.
So I'm just being consistent in my training and my craft
and I'll get that number one spot one day.
What failure or loss is the most painful to you?
I don't know, I probably have a pretty short-term memory.
So my losses, I just forget about them.
For sure, my loss at this past ADCC in the finals,
that one stung a bit
because I definitely thought I was going to win.
It takes a while to produce the skills or the reactions
more so that you need to have
to be that number one pound for pound guy.
Pre-ADCC, I was coming off an injury,
so it took me a little bit to find the right mentality
and physicality that I needed
in order to get the wins that required gold.
So yeah, it's just process.
Interesting, you keep saying process,
like it takes a while to build up.
So you're not like thinking of a loss,
like ADCC is like a specific failures.
You haven't gone long enough in a particular process
to being a champ.
Well, I mean, for me, I'm closing in on five years
of specifically jiu-jitsu training.
I'm about four and a half right now.
And yeah, you constantly have these ups and downs
in training where like, as long as you stay consistent,
you'll have a gradual raise,
but it's still, you'll have these peaks and lows
and just trying to get better every day.
I'm definitely not where I will be in a few years from now,
but I'm striving to get there.
Are you actually a brown belt or was that a joke?
Brown belt, yeah.
You're a brown belt.
Like how many stripes?
No stripes.
No stripes?
Stripeless.
Okay, is that part of the process
that you're working through?
Definitely part of the process.
I think a black belt is just based upon
how much knowledge you have.
Obviously, if you're talking competitive wise,
from when I started, I was able to beat most black belts.
That's just kind of how I was gifted
from my wrestling experience.
And the time will come when it's right,
but I'm not in a rush at all.
I'm continuing.
I just kind of take every day for what it is
and try to improve upon that.
I mean, I want to give him the black belt.
Nikki Ryan says he's not ready.
What is, are you guys, like as NOGI folks,
do you take that seriously?
Like the black belt?
Or like how much does it come into play into?
Yeah, I mean, it's like Nikki Rod said,
it's based off of knowledge,
not just what you do out on the competition mats.
Cause you know, like he said,
he had years of wrestling experience
and obviously he's very physically gifted.
So we grade based off of the amount of knowledge
that you have.
Like how do you measure knowledge?
I think teaching is a good measurement of it.
Like how well you're able to show the moves
and really make sure that you have an understanding
of what you're doing.
Yeah, it's an interesting rank.
It's like, it's something that takes many years
to accomplish.
And for a lot of people, it's truly meaningful.
It's like it represents a particular step in a journey.
But for you guys, it's almost like different
because you've been so focused on competition
that I guess if you take it seriously,
it is a big step for you too.
Like as martial artists,
that's bigger than just being
like top of the world competitors, right?
So I thought it was a joke.
You guys are actually taking it seriously.
That he's a brown belt.
That he's a brown belt
and you're taking seriously the rank of black belt
and like, it's part of your journey.
I think by the time I get a black belt,
I'll be no more pound for pound.
I think it'd be pretty nice to accomplish that
as a brown belt.
And then maybe toss a black belt on top.
Maybe get promoted on the podium.
What do you guys,
do you love winning or hate losing more?
I definitely don't hate losing.
If it pays the bills, I don't mind.
Oh really?
Yeah, but honestly, if I win,
I feel more relief than anything
rather than like excitement and stuff.
I'm like, oh fuck, thank God that's over.
I hate losing for sure.
But I understand that it's necessary
to get to where you want to be.
And then winning is like,
I mean, what I think winning is probably
the closest you can get to like heroin or something.
Cause I mean, we're on a,
like if you have extreme success in a tournament
that you've been adamant about training for
and competing in for a while,
and you end up winning it,
I mean, I feel like you're on that high
for days at a time afterwards.
Heroin's going to be better.
You think so?
I'm going to stick with no, but.
I'm not going to suck dick to win.
You suck dick for heroin?
Okay.
I guess that's a good point, yeah.
But you know, like,
because you come from a little bit of a wrestling culture.
One of the things I really love is at the end of the match,
when they lose, they just, there's no, they just run off.
They're like almost pissed off.
It's like some mixture of anger
and frustration at themselves.
I think sometimes the people like freak out on the mat.
And I think that's just to show everybody,
like they're acting like they cared a lot
and really maybe they didn't work enough
to get to where they expected to be.
And they lost and then they had this big boost of emotion
like after their loss.
But yeah, I mean, I shouldn't,
I think you just cry in the mirror
and not to everybody else, you know.
Have you ever cried watching a movie?
I don't think I've ever cried, period.
Okay. Have you cried watching a movie?
Not yet, not yet.
The notebook?
I try to avoid those movies.
I lie, actually.
Titanic?
The last part of a difficult wake up for me
is I try to find a sad movie and at least cry,
about a pound out.
That really gets me over the line.
Low energy cutting.
The tears.
There's other following liquids I could talk to you about,
but let's just continue on.
Low energy.
What about you, Nikki?
Love of winning versus hate of losing.
I'm a very competitive person,
so I for sure hate losing more than I like winning.
I do think it's something that's kind of held me back
over the past few years,
because it makes it so that I'm not as active
as I should be.
Because it's like, I really hate that feeling of,
you know, after a match that you just lost.
So it kind of prevents me from competing.
So it's definitely something I need to work past.
So like, when you think about a competition,
the possibility of losing,
which is always there in competition,
is the thing that weighs heavy on you
in the months and weeks leading up to it.
Yeah, my whole life, you know, my financial stability,
everything depends on, you know,
my ability to go out there and compete
and my ability to teach.
So, you know, it's a huge hit to the brand if you lose.
So, you know, leading up to matches,
that's definitely something that's in my mind.
I know, so you guys are like world-class athletes,
but for me, more like a hobbyist competitor,
I compete a lot.
The thing I was, because I really wanted to win,
the thing I was probably most afraid of
is not just losing, but like embarrassing myself.
Yeah.
And then actually winning by stalling.
That was the thing I hated the most about myself
in terms of crying in the mirror,
is like being too afraid to take risks
after I'm up on two points or something.
I think you got to, in competition,
sometimes it's good to take the emotion out of it.
It's too easy sometimes to like,
think about all my girls in the crowd,
my family's watching, like I want to win
because they're there.
But at the highest level, if you're emotional at all,
no, that's affecting you.
Yeah, that's tough though.
That's tough, especially like leading up to it
when you're on the mat maybe, but leading up to it.
I think it's okay to be emotional prior.
Like, you know, if we know ADCC is coming up
and we have a big match,
like definitely I'll go out in practice
and I'll visualize, I'll put myself in that competition.
That way when it's game time,
it's like I've been there a thousand times already.
So not the actual competition, but even leading up to it,
like stepping on the mat,
like all the walk towards it, all that.
All that stuff, like I'll do the same exact warmup
for weeks on end until my competition day comes.
That way, you know, when I compete,
I'm just like, oh, it's another Tuesday at practice.
What about you, Craig?
How do you prepare mentally for a tournament like ADCC?
I push it completely out of my mind.
Don't even think about it.
Try to avoid any visualization, any rituals, warmups,
anything like that.
Block it out until the last second, yeah.
Try not to think about it.
I just go to training to have fun, learn a bit.
So I try to approach competition the exact same way.
I don't warm up at training,
do very little warmup for competition.
Uh-huh, and you just step on the mat?
Step on the mat.
My philosophy is there's no warmups on the street.
We're so vastly different.
All right, so you legit don't warm up?
No, I probably should now I'm 31,
but I would just like in the gym,
take it easy the first round.
If I look around the room and Nikki Ryan's down,
I might go, all right,
we'll have an easier first round today.
Jump.
So even for the most high stakes matches,
you try to push it out?
Yeah, I didn't even think about it.
What about all the social Instagram posts
you have to do about that match?
You just make a joke out of it and kind of-
Yeah, I mean, it's all kind of pretty silly.
We're just wrestling each other.
We put the meaning into it,
but to someone that doesn't follow the sport,
it looks stupid.
Well, all of human existence is pretty silly.
Like what are we doing?
None of us really know what's going on.
We kind of have sex to reproduce.
We get hungry, we eat,
and then we're all chasing money and cars
and whatever the hell in a capitalist society,
or we worship a dictator in a authoritarian regime.
Yeah, and then we get off on,
we let power abuse us and then we just murder others
because we get off on it.
And then eventually all of us will die
because the sun will run out of energy
because colonizing other planets is very difficult.
So none of it matters.
It's a good philosophy.
It's pretty good.
That's exactly what I was saying.
How does the sun run out of energy?
Well, you caught me there.
It's burnt out.
It's a nuclear fusion engine that eventually burns out.
Like when you get tired of training.
Yeah, it's never happened.
I try to get tired.
I was like, dude, it's not working.
All right, cool, cool.
So you legit don't care about losing.
It doesn't weigh heavy on you.
I try not to listen.
Like if I win, I try to block out all the compliments,
all the niceties and stuff.
So I try to do the same with losing.
It's happened, move on to the next ones.
Don't dwell on it too much.
And sometimes make a joke out of it.
Yeah, exactly.
Winning or losing, with the right joke,
we can make money off of the events that transpired.
That's what's most important.
Excellent, thank you.
I have a bunch of your merch.
Oh, nice.
This one's the Jordan Borrows ripoff.
All I see is silver.
The way he pronounced Borrows is very, very sexy.
Okay.
I throw lines at people and I try to gauge their reaction.
Like sometimes I'll say something to Nikki
and I'll be like, all right,
that's probably crossing the line.
You know what I mean?
We'll tone it down to the public.
Yeah, so it's not just right.
You have to think is this crossing the line.
Yeah, I get as close to it as possible.
I feel like you can't really cross it.
And then cross it just a little bit.
Just a little bit, yeah.
Okay.
Speaking of which, you said that I'm Switzerland
in World War II since I'm friends with both you
and Gordon and John.
Very rich country.
Are you a Hitler or a Stalin, by the way, in this analogy?
Would you like to be Hitler or a Stalin?
And should you make a t-shirt out of it or?
I mean, a Nazi t-shirt, I don't know how well that sells.
I think it would, you know.
I think, let's brainstorm on this one offline.
And I think since Hitler lost.
So he got second place in World War II.
That's true, that's true.
I think that makes you Hitler.
Anyway, to the degree that you can,
can you tell the story of how the time you've had
with the Donohur Death Squad and why you split up?
I competed against Gordon for ADCC and the EBI in 2017.
And I remember I competed against him at ADCC,
and then we had the EBOI event, and then I had a kasai.
I used to compete all the time, every week.
I wouldn't even do the preparation or anything.
I'd just be like trying to do seminars, make money,
and then jump in and compete.
I remember I showed up to kasai after I faced him twice,
and there were like four locker rooms,
and they put me with all the DDS guys.
It was just me and all of DDS.
And I think we had competed the weekend before.
So I thought it was gonna be super awkward,
but it was actually pretty chill.
And the kasai was in New York,
and they suggested to come train that week.
So I came trained, hung out with them a bit.
Ultimately, the goal was to move to America
and join a bigger team,
just because that flight to Australia is death.
Australia is so far away from everywhere.
It's kind of like not realistic to base yourself
in Australia when all the tournaments are in America.
And then I went and trained with the guys,
and they just had a massively deep talent pool
in that room, like show up to like a,
meant to be 7 a.m., actual 8 a.m. class on Brazilian time.
And there'd be like a hundred people in there,
maybe, I don't know how many black belts,
but a ton of elite guys.
And I was coming from Australia,
training with Lachlan Giles.
But really that room was pretty shallow,
and like most people had serious jobs and stuff.
So it was like basically me just training with Lachlan,
maybe a couple of other guys,
and then to go to New York and have access
to a wide array of training partners
and guys that are training twice each day.
I feel like that's what you really need.
You need people that can train as much as you are.
Work together.
Do you get humbled?
Do you get humbled in that room at first?
For sure, because my style at the time
was basically a rip-off version of what they were doing.
Leg locks came in.
I remember just watching Eddie Cummings nonstop
and just seeing this guy rip people's legs off.
And I was like, you know what?
That's probably a good move.
That looks like an easier path to victory
than trying to beat these guys
at what they're good at already.
My philosophy at the time was
if it's bothering old Brazilians,
it's bothering them for a reason.
It's probably effective.
And that's the path I took to try to rip off their moves.
And then obviously to go into that room,
try to do them to them,
it's going to be a bit more difficult.
All right, so that's how it started.
How did you end up here?
How do we end up here?
We're in Austin, Texas.
I mean, I like to think of Puerto Rico as apocalypse now.
John Danaher as Colonel Kurtz.
Things got very weird in the jungle
and the teams went in two different directions.
But honestly, I mean, it's not really my story to tell.
I had some issues with some of those people.
At the time of the split,
I got along very well with John.
I feel like me and him connected very well.
I don't know why that was.
Maybe it was just because he missed home.
He missed a familiar accent,
Australian, New Zealand accent.
But I mean, I basically followed Nikki, left with Nikki,
sort of that core group of guys left with Nikki.
And I mean, there was personal problems
and I just backed Nikki, basically.
Got it.
Just sticking on you for a bit.
Is there a part of you that finds it heartbreaking
that DDS split up?
Does part of you miss working with John and everybody?
Now, can you steal me on the case for that?
I mean, I miss certain aspects of it,
but I also do prefer the freedom of being apart from it.
It's obviously a very strict regime under John Danaher.
You know, obviously there's parts of it.
I miss the parts the public doesn't see of John.
The behind the scenes banter,
I feel like he's very conscious
of the image he portrays to the world.
But basically, at closed doors,
he's always making jokes, always finding, I guess,
more in line with the Australian Kiwi sort of culture.
But you don't really see that in the public eye.
So that perspective, I do miss that relationship with John.
In terms of setting aside personal differences,
Gordon was a good training partner,
definitely a good training partner to train with.
But obviously the negative things we can't really talk about
outweighed all of those things.
And we obviously had to make a decision to leave.
But yeah.
What does that happen in the jungle?
The things that happen in the jungle.
Should never be spoken of.
That I personally cannot speak of.
Yeah, but obviously I do miss certain aspects.
Like, I mean, nothing's all bad, nothing's all good.
Yeah, this goes back to your like,
everything we're doing is silly.
Yeah, exactly.
That's why I don't get it.
People take it so serious, martial arts so serious.
It's just pretty stupid, really.
Especially in the gi, it looks just, it looks bad.
And then I was-
I mean, it's pretty silly with and without the gi.
It's just a bunch of apes.
What's silly about no gi and what's silly about the gi
and just mix and match bottoms there.
You know what I mean?
Wait, which one?
Sambo, yeah.
I see what you're doing.
Brother, you come to my house and offend my people.
All right.
We're going to go to every dark place, apparently.
Nick, how did you get with DDS?
Like, what was that journey like?
Is there, try to see if there's things
that you remember fondly that you've gotten
from the experience.
All right, so the way I started training with DDS,
initially I was training for like,
well, initially I was at a bouncer, right?
I dropped out of college to pursue
this fitness modeling career.
I ended up signing with Wilhelmina Models up in New York.
And I was like, trying to get in better shape.
And while I was bouncing, kind of the talk of like,
you know, who's tougher came up between the wrestlers
and a few of the bouncers that trained jiu-jitsu.
And, you know, they convinced me to go to a practice.
And I went to my first practice over there.
And for the most part, I just controlled everybody,
got on top of them, was able to avoid like,
kind of like, you know, shitty submissions.
Cause I had an awareness of the sport and, you know,
I'm a fan of fighting and whatnot.
So, you know, I kind of understood it pretty well.
And then soon after that, I joined a school
and my second week of jiu-jitsu, I started competing,
had pretty good success.
You know, I was like subbing a few black belts
and beating everybody, like, you know,
pretty decisively with points and stuff.
And about three months into training locally,
I got connected with Gordon,
Gordon Ryan and John Danner up in New York.
And I started, I committed to, you know,
make the drive up there as many days as I could.
At the time I lived in South Jersey and it was about
two and a half hour, three hour drive without traffic.
To New York.
Where in South Jersey?
Gloucester County, Clayton, New Jersey specifically,
but Gloucester County.
Yeah, so it was about 130 miles and without traffic,
you know, about two and a half hours or so.
But on the way back, man, it'd be three plus sometimes,
you know, catching that rush hour.
What year was this? Do you remember?
This was 2018.
I forget how young you are.
I was there before, before all that.
All right, cool.
Anyway, you're doing the long drive and then what?
Yeah, doing the long drive.
And then, you know, once I won ADCC trials,
I was able to make a couple bucks.
And then, you know, I got my silver medal at ADCC
and I was able to afford to live up there in New York
and in North Jersey area.
So I lived up there, trained there full time every day.
And, you know, it just kind of sucked with the team
throughout the turbulent times and found ourself in Austin.
In the jungle.
In the jungle.
One of the things we shall not speak of.
Yeah.
What are there things that you remember that you've learned
from John Donahue from the time you spent with him?
Yeah, I mean, I definitely learned a ton from John
and the team as a whole.
Like, you know, you have to be the guy that asks questions
in that type of environment, right?
Cause there's not, you're not going to get singled out
to be that specific like star or the best guy in the room
when you have all these other, you know, stud athletes.
So I really had to seek out and figure out the kind
of questions that I needed to ask.
And once I became a bit more verbal with my training
and, you know, I'm expressing all my curiosities
about grappling to these guys.
Definitely helped boost my technique
and my career as a whole.
Yeah. Did you understand what kind of stuff
like technically you want to get good at?
What fits your body?
What like, what would be good for you?
What are your weaknesses and all of that?
So initially when I started grappling,
I had an innate ability to just get to opponent's back.
So I was like, all right, I'm good at getting to the back.
Let me get, let me perfect controlling the back
and then submitting opponent via rear naked choke.
And then besides that, I really focused on leg lock defense.
And then eventually came the Roddy Lock Pass where,
you know, I'm really good at body lock passing
my opponents now and then, and yeah,
just takes a quite a long time
cause you have to find different sequences.
And then there's always these,
an abundance of opportunities that your opponent gets
from these specific sequences.
So it takes a while.
Is there a part of you that finds the fact
that DGS split up heartbreaking?
I definitely, you know, having one person to go
to that runs practice every day, that's, you know,
consistent, it was definitely, it was definitely,
definitely a gift, but now I'm also gifted with many,
many other partners.
I have Nikki Ryan, you know, Craig Jones.
Yeah, yeah.
We have Ethan Krelisi, Damian Anderson.
So a full team of knowledgeable athletes
that I can continue to go to with multiple questions.
But yeah, definitely, definitely it took me some time
to adjust to training or to learning from, you know,
specifically my team and not just one person.
We should mention for people just listening,
because you can't visually see that Nikki Ryan
is currently terrified and Craig Jones
is currently enjoying the fact that Nikki Ryan is terrified.
But anyway, can you talk about your, Nikki,
can you talk about your time with DDS?
I started training when I was like around 13.
You know, my brother Gordon had started prior to me
and I really just went into training
just as like a means to exercise and lose weight
at the beginning, because I was pretty fat as a kid.
So I went to the first class, loved it,
and then just started training every day
at Garyshim Brunswick.
And then during the summer, when I'd get off from school,
they would take me up to New York to train under John.
And you know, I just absolutely loved it.
I knew what I wanted to do with my life at a young age.
So I ended up dropping out of school actually
after my freshman year in high school.
So yeah, 15, I ended up dropping out
and just pursuing jiu-jitsu full time,
you know, training every day up in the blue basement.
What aspect of jiu-jitsu made you know
that this is the thing for you?
It was just something I just enjoyed being,
you know, like on the mats every day.
I love that there's, you know,
a problem solving aspect to it.
So it's, you know, it's mentally challenging,
it's physically challenging, helps me get in shape.
So I just, yeah, right off the bat, I knew I loved it.
Okay, so then we'll go to the jungle.
What happened in the jungle?
Yeah.
And in general, like,
I like this, I like this,
this like shroud of mystery
that she'll never be penetrated,
that she'll never be like-
We've got a book deal, it's coming once.
Book deal?
Obviously he left high school, he's not writing it.
Okay, I'll do the Russian translation.
Okay, so what are things that you enjoy
that you remember from work of John Donahue?
Yeah, I mean, you know,
obviously he's considered
one of the best coaches in the world.
You know, very charismatic guy when you see him in person.
You know, I pretty much was, you know,
kind of raised in the DDS, you know,
that's where I spent the majority of my time every day.
So I obviously had very deep connections, you know,
with John, my brother, Gary, you know,
even Eddie Cummings and stuff back then.
So obviously I miss interacting with those guys every day.
And, you know, it's like they said,
it's good to have somebody to kind of
crack the whip at you every day.
And John was very good at that.
When you're like younger in your teenage years,
you can kind of, you like have to get humbled, right?
There's like a process to that.
Yeah, for sure.
It's a pretty good room to get humbled in, I guess.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, I started training with them
just when like everybody started to break out.
Gary was like the biggest name at the time,
just cause he had won ADCC trials already.
And he had a crazy match with Cron,
at Cron Gracie at ADCC.
But Eddie was just starting to break out.
Gordon just started winning EBI.
So I started training under John, you know,
right when everything was exploding.
What are the good things about life about jiu-jitsu
you learned from your brother?
Both me and my brother never really wanted to, you know,
work a full-time job doing something that we hate.
And he was always, you know, a very confident person.
So he just went, you know,
fully started pursuing jiu-jitsu.
So I'm very happy that, you know, he did that.
And I ended up following in his footsteps
because you can ask these guys,
I'm a lazy sack of shit outside of the mat.
So that's definitely one thing that I'm very grateful for.
That he paved the way, like you can make money
doing stuff you love.
Yeah, exactly.
And he was a big reason, you know,
why my parents eventually let me drop out of school.
Because, you know, when they were coming up,
there was no money in the sport.
It was very hard to make a full living.
Like if you wanted to actually make a living,
you'd eventually have to transfer to MMA.
And I feel like Gordon and Gary and those guys were,
you know, some of the first people to make
a very good living off of just jiu-jitsu.
At this party, you find it heartbreaking
that you split up from DDS, but also from your brother
in terms of spending time on the mat every day.
Yeah, for sure.
You know, I mean, growing up, you know,
obviously he's my big brother.
I looked up to him a lot.
So I definitely, like I said,
I'm misinteracting with those guys.
I was pretty much raised, you know, in that blue basement.
You know, John was like, you know, a father figure to me.
So I definitely, you know,
miss seeing those guys every day.
Do you have animosity towards Gordon
and does he have animosity toward you?
And what is the source of that?
And do you think you'll ever be able to forgive each other?
Definitely, initially, during the initial split,
we definitely hated each other at the beginning.
But it's definitely started to calm down.
Actually, just prior to, you know,
all this social media drama that's going on currently,
he had reached out to me.
And that was literally like the first time
that we have actually talked since the split happened.
So we didn't talk to each other for, what is it now?
Like almost two years.
And that was the first time that, you know,
we interacted again.
And overall, you know, he wasn't, you know,
aggressive towards me.
I wasn't aggressive towards him.
We were cracking some jokes.
So hopefully the animosity is going down.
There's this Godfather quote that wrote down.
I re-watched it from the dawn, from Don Corleone,
Vito Corleone, the strength of a family,
like the strength of an army,
lies in its loyalty to each other.
Is there some aspect of family that you miss,
of the blood that kind of connects you, that you can count on?
Yeah, my parents, you know, they both raised us
that, you know, like family is everything.
You never, you know, betray your family
or anything like that.
So I definitely, you know, miss him from time to time.
Okay, imagine you're like 40 years from now,
sitting on a porch with a shotgun, drinking whiskey,
looking over like all the land you've conquered.
Looking back to this moment,
is the reason you split up a bullshit reason?
Or is it a good reason?
From the perspective of the king
who has now conquered the lands,
have proven himself, have done everything?
I think it was definitely like a justifiable reason
for the team splitting.
Like it just, with the way things were going,
it just was not going to work with, you know,
all of us in the same room together.
It started, you know, affecting training.
People didn't feel comfortable with things.
So I definitely think that it was a justifiable reason
to split.
The things that happened in the jungle,
to be told about in the book.
Is it going to be an audio book
or is it just going to be,
and who's going to voice it?
It might be a play, a musical on Broadway.
How's your singing voice?
Mine's not so good, but Nikki has a beautiful voice.
Does he?
Of an angel?
I bet.
Okay.
Speaking of the social media drama,
I should mention that I've talked recently
to Gordon a bunch.
I've talked to him about talking to you guys
and he's had nothing but really nice things
to say about you, Nikki Rod.
And he has had nothing but bad things.
What were some of the things?
Well, let's just go to the social media first.
Cause the social media stuff that he said publicly
is just like a warmup.
It's like a foreplay, I guess.
So Gordon sent you, Nikki Rod,
flowers for Valentine's day posting on Instagram quote,
I've been fucking him in every round and competition
since we met in 2018.
The least I can do is buy him flowers.
We didn't get the flowers.
No, that was the question.
Did you get the flowers?
He sent it to the wrong address.
He did?
Yeah.
Where do you think he sent it?
It was close, but it was wrong.
Did you appreciate the romantic gesture?
I did.
I was looking forward to the flowers
and potentially chocolates in there,
but it was a bit of a letdown.
Can you describe your recent match against Gordon,
the EBI match?
Okay, so EBI match on UFC Fight Pouts,
it was a 20 minute match.
And immediately, no match starts.
I pull guard and then I stand up, he pulls guard.
And we have this kind of like back and forth
where he's trying to dig for underhooks,
trying to get on top of me
and he can't really find success.
And then in the midst of me trying to work my body lock pass
Gordon's able to underhook a leg
and we end up in a leg entanglement.
And then I'm able to transfer that leg entanglement
to a 50-50 position, still in the leg entanglement.
From that 50-50 position, I'm able to separate his feet
and actually get a few pops in.
And he actually said I broke his foot in that exchange.
With the toe hold.
The toe hold, yup.
And after that, we had a bit more.
I was just working on top position,
trying to get my body lock.
Time runs out and we go to overtime.
And overtime-
Can you hold on a second?
Actually, what does it mean to break a leg?
I was very confused about.
Okay, so-
Is this like a expression or what do you mean?
When you broke, which part breaks in a toe hold?
Okay, so in a toe hold,
there's a few different grades of it.
Like you could get a few pops
and have some walking issues.
And people consider that a break.
And then you could break it fully
and have your foot be like a limp noodle.
I think we'll go with the Achilles?
We'll go with the front of the Achilles or something?
I mean, probably the ligaments.
I mean, it's funny.
A lot of people say they broke something.
But to me, you break bones, you tear ligaments.
So I would imagine you probably had a grade three tear.
Grade three.
How hard do you think is it to,
I always wondered that with a straight foot lock,
how hard is it to break the shin?
Or like the actual bones versus the tear stuff?
Depends how many steroids they're on.
And obviously how much you're on.
You're one of the few guys
that have actually broken bones in competition.
Yeah, have I?
Oh yeah, Vin. Couple, yeah.
Which bone did you break?
Spiral fracture of the fibula.
Very specific. A lot of power.
Is it like a twisting?
How did you break it?
Oh, it was a heel hook.
Vinny always used to say heel hooks don't work.
Leg locks don't work.
But unfortunately, age gets the best of all of us.
I think he had some mileage on those ligaments.
Yeah.
And the bone, I guess, yeah.
So it's actually what the bone.
Yeah, his ankle disconnected from the tibia and the fibula,
but the fibula definitely snapped pretty bad there.
That's fascinating.
The dynamics of that.
Okay, anyway, it went into overtime.
What happened in overtime?
Okay, what happened in overtime?
Let's see.
Trying to hang.
Oh, okay, I go defense first.
Whistle blows, I'm able to escape in like 17 seconds.
And then immediately after I go on his back
and he gets out in exactly 17 seconds.
I'm like, shit, all right.
I thought I had a good start.
And then he gets on my back right after that.
And he's able to ride me out
for pretty much the entire round.
After that, I got back on his back.
He escapes in maybe like a minute and some change.
I think where I went wrong in the overtime
is I should have been less adamant
about chasing the submission
and more aware of collecting time.
If I kind of diverted my attention
towards acquiring time on the clock,
it would have been more in my favor.
But yeah, at the end of my overtime round,
I'm able to lock up a re-naked choke over the face,
but there just wasn't enough time to fully finish.
I got a few seconds of squeeze in there.
I didn't have enough time to adjust and go ahead.
Do you think if you're on stairs,
you would have finished the choke?
I mean, for sure, for sure.
If you're on gear,
you're changing the biology of your body.
You're adjusting your DNA.
For sure, if I adjusted my DNA,
I mean, it's a finish.
You're implying you're a natural athlete is what you're saying.
Oh, I'm definitely a natural athlete, yeah.
Heavy immigration.
Okay, so for people who don't know that the EBI rules,
it's an interesting rule structure
where the overtime you put yourself
in the worst possible position and the task is to escape
and then the other person gets the same thing.
What do you guys think about that rule set?
I like it just because, first of all,
I don't like the idea of having to put somebody on my back,
but I do like the definitive answer in the match.
Either you escaped in time or you got ridden out.
So the absolutely, you get to define a winner, that's great.
I'd much rather have that than a close decision
and it kind of goes the other way.
I mean, honestly, there's all the different rules.
When I look at the rule sets,
I just try to think of what rule set
I could beat that individual in
and I sort of gear myself towards that.
That's really the strategy there.
I think there's some guys that like,
that stall a lot,
that you would love to have EBI overtime with at the end.
They're stalling until they have to give us a good position.
But then there's some guys
that are so good in those positions,
I'm like, oh, maybe we just do a regular match.
What are the rules in the streets?
The streets, no time limit.
Yeah, that's one of them.
There's also like concrete and cars and stuff.
Biting.
Biting, yeah, bulking.
Yeah, so you don't like that rule set?
Are there some people you would prefer
in the street as a rule set?
Me, probably not.
I don't know though, EBI.
I mean, it's tricky, it depends on the opponent,
which rule set I'd want to do.
Wow, what about you, Nick?
What do you think about the rule set of EBI?
Yeah, so I think EBI is very good
from a spectator point of view.
People find it very entertaining to watch
because people want to see submissions
and you're putting the athletes in a position
where you have like the highest percentage submission
in the sport.
So obviously you're going to get a lot of submissions.
My issue with it is it is a rule set
that allows somebody that's overall worse at jiu-jitsu
to win a match.
A guy can go out there and just stall
and just get completely dominated
for the entirety of regulation
and then he gets to start on the guy's back.
So that's my one issue with it.
But also, I mean, it's interesting to see
like the best people in the world
have to be put in a really bad position
and to see how good their escapes are, for example.
It's interesting, but it doesn't feel like a realistic.
It's a fun thing to watch,
but it doesn't feel like the real fight.
It feels weird.
I'll claim it.
If I start an overtime on someone and I finish them,
I'll claim it.
But if they submit me an overtime, I'm like awesome.
You're going to deny it, yeah.
It's good.
The issue is people are like stalling
to just win the overtime.
So where you got this guy, his whole training camp
is just not get subbed and win the overtime.
It's a bit boring.
By the way, I have a rose behind you.
Somebody gave me a Valentine's flower.
So if you miss the one from Gordon, I got one for you.
Well, I'd appreciate that.
Thank you.
It's good to feel loved.
Yeah.
All right.
So what did you learn from that match?
Like a takeaway is technically speaking,
like what do you need to work on?
Well, I learned that I am pretty good.
Yeah, pretty good.
I got a few, I know exactly what my weakness is.
You know, it's the leg lock department and I'm doing,
I'm doing a lot to, you know,
get better in that specific aspect.
Attack and defense?
I would say, yeah, attack, defense, re-attacks.
Even if I wanted to offensively enter a leg, you know,
I could use some work there as well.
But I feel like once I solidify, like my,
like if I come in, I'll become a black belt specifically
in the leg lock department,
I feel like I'd be unstoppable.
If you, Nicky Rod, definitively beat Gordon Ryan,
how would you do it?
Buggy choke.
Buggy choke.
Buggy choke.
For the listener,
I don't even know how to describe buggy choke.
What's the definitive like conclusion on that joke?
Does it work?
It's a choke that you do when you're in a,
what's the opposite of a dominant?
It's not submissive.
In a non-dominant position of bottom of side control.
Yeah, just an embarrassing submission
to get caught with really.
Yeah, but does it work?
It works on certain people.
For the listener, he glanced over at Nicky Rod.
It's embarrassing, but it's also what,
it's a way to frustrate the opponent.
For sure, yeah.
It's a new part of the sport.
I feel like the Ritollos brought it back into fashion.
And even if you don't get it,
because it's one of those moves that's so embarrassing,
at the first sign of danger, the top guy abandoned ship.
And you can basically retain guard
by attempting a very embarrassing submission.
So the threat of embarrassment.
Yeah, people pull out very quick
to avoid suffering the consequences.
I think some people underestimate
how good of a submission it is.
I mean, like once you're locked in there,
there's not too many defenses for a buggy choke.
Is there an instruction on the way from you?
J-Rod actually, the little brother has one.
Oh yeah, for real.
You actually legit have, oh, wow.
That's awesome.
We'll check it out.
So I mean, there is, I mean, you're making a joke out of it,
but it is a real, like there's a system to it.
I mean, yeah.
I don't know if we call it a system.
It's a good move.
I mean, you take an opponent that was just winning
in a greatly dominant position,
and then boom, in that same position,
they're pretty much, they're losing.
You know, it's an interesting move.
What's the name of the, what's the name of it?
It's called the Buggypedia, like J-Rod really is.
Okay, the Buggypedia.
I thought there'd be something
like very Craig Jonesy about it.
Okay, awesome.
I know you don't want to sort of reveal the secrets
of what you're working on, but in general,
what does it take to beat Gordon, I guess?
Okay, it would have to be some kind of a choke.
I think any joint lock or anything like that,
he's just going to let it break and stay in the match.
So I don't even think he'd tap from like a renege choke.
I think I would have to put him to sleep.
So putting him to sleep is how I would win.
So Gordon is somebody who really hates losing.
Yeah, like he won't even tap in the practice room.
I remember like I had a toehold a couple of times
in practice room and he was just comfortable
like working there.
I'm like, I'm not really putting much on it.
Maybe because of situations like that in practice,
he kind of didn't respect my toehold's ability
in the competition.
You've done that to me in the practice.
Yeah, I have, yeah.
Yeah, I'll give you a little.
He gave me a little pop and then he let go.
And that was only 10% right there.
Hey, don't get into math.
Okay, is there some part of that you think is necessary
to be a champion as to like this almost unwillingness
in competition to tap?
I think it's definitely something to be said for people
that are just like, you know, willing to go
that extra mile or to take that damage
to secure their victory.
Is there a part of you that like would hate to tap
or hates to tap?
Yeah, I mean, all of me would hate that.
Yeah, the whole part of me.
Isn't there a John Legend song like that?
All of you and all of me.
Very romantic, yeah.
Yeah, I was thinking on that theme.
Okay, I'm sorry.
Oh, one of the things Gordon asked,
I forget how you put it because I think there's a lot
of words that would need to be censored involved,
but he said, ask them how it feels to have a 0-5 record
against me with four submissions combined.
I mean, first of all, I wasn't sure he could count to five.
Yeah, so that's impressive.
Oh, and five, I mean, I will say one thing.
Nobody beats me four times.
I love you so much.
Lex, I did have a question.
I did have a question for you.
There was some controversy on your Twitter
about a list of books.
And I was wondering why Gordon's book
wasn't featured amongst that literature.
Well, it was only the first 30 books
or like the first 20 books.
And it would of course be in the...
Something interesting about Gordon,
he's the first author that's written more books
than he's read.
Pretty good.
If you face him and beat him,
like what's your take on what it takes to beat Gordon?
I mean, you guys are kind of joking.
You go pretty hard recently on each other,
but as a fan of Jiu Jitsu, I'm all in on this rivalry.
It's just fun to watch.
I mean, first of all, I don't think I go really hard
with him.
I think Gordon is, he's pretty sensitive.
He's looking for a large insult in a small insult.
And for me, like Australians,
we just attack each other all day, every day.
And for me, if I see someone
that takes himself very seriously,
that's like blood in the water.
That's funny to me.
To me, if I can just gently provoke
and get a strong reaction, that's hilarious.
Like Aussies, we will just attack each other.
And the first person that gets upset,
he kind of loses the exchange.
So I think that is very, very entertaining.
If you were to beat Gordon,
would the mental game off the map be part of it?
I think it would be a factor for sure.
But I mean, I'm never gonna come out
too crazy direct with him.
I find that if you get too upset online
and you're going crazy, I find that.
I'd be embarrassed to do that myself.
Obviously, everyone's different.
Everyone has a different style.
But yeah, I think mental,
the mental aspect would play a big factor.
I mean, mainly because if I were to beat him,
I would send him a message every day until I died
just to gently remind him that I got the last one.
The last one is all that matters.
We're not giving-
You want him back?
Yeah, we're not giving him, go ahead.
So once you beat him,
you're going to run for the rest of your life?
I mean, run, but look back.
Yeah.
You know, look back a lot.
Yeah, run with messages.
A sidestep.
Ride your horse into the sunset, okay.
Oh, by the way, you've talked very lightly.
You've talked shit very lightly
against Alexander Volkinovsky's opponent.
Very lightly.
Have you received death threats or how are you still alive?
Like Gordon, I would say people from Dagestan
of take a joke very well.
You know what I mean?
Do they really?
Do they really?
No.
Oh, like Gordon.
Oh, like Gordon.
Sorry, I'm slow.
I went through aggressive mode in my head.
I'm listening to you.
Islam was pretty cool.
I wanted to stir it up a bit, you know?
Cause like, I felt like that was a massive fight
and it probably should have had more attention
than it was receiving.
So I wanted to just gently stir it up a bit.
I feel like Sambo guys are in the same vein
as catch wrestlers, very sensitive.
You know, like obviously there's only three people
in the world that did catch wrestling, Sambo,
maybe 10 to 15.
So I figured we could really provoke them
with that sort of jujitsu Sambo stuff.
Islam took the jokes very well.
The Russian fans, not so much, very serious.
There's not many smiles in Russia, you know?
They didn't take it as well.
I'm trying to suppress the anger,
the rage is building up inside me, slowly.
So you guys mentioned steroids.
I like that you bring that up after we talk about Russia
for the record.
Smooth, smooth segue there.
I do not condone the statements said by the Aussie,
but I would love to travel with you to Russia.
That would be a good time.
You might get killed with me now.
No, I would be like the first to turn to backstab you.
You're like, I got in there, get in there.
All right.
Are most of the top grapplers on steroids?
I mean, it's hard to say.
You know, some people look like shit
and they're on steroids.
Some people look excellent and they're not on steroids.
It's so, so hard to tell.
But that seems to be the general consensus
that a lot of people on steroids.
I'm always a little bit, I don't know.
So to be honest, I've never seen anyone take steroids.
I've never taken steroids.
I don't even know if that's the right term to use
or like TRT, any of that.
So I'm very careful to not let my naive vitae
lead me to take conclusions.
But I do feel a little bit weird
about the witch hunt nature of it.
Some people a little bit too eagerly claim
that others are on steroids just because they're successful.
But at the same time, it does seem that a lot of athletes
will do whatever it takes to be successful.
Yeah, I mean, if a sport doesn't test,
you got to assume most people are gonna do it.
And especially now, as more money comes into the sport,
you got to assume more people are gonna do it, you know?
I generally like do AGCC and like, does it just to test?
It's actually encouraged.
What's encouraged?
Oh, okay.
Just to, you get a pamphlet?
Okay.
They don't test?
There's no testing?
They test to make sure we're on steroids.
Because obviously it's a big show
for the UFC Firepass in the future.
You don't want anyone coming in out of shape.
Very nice.
Do you think using steroids in that kind of context
in sports is wrong?
Like stepping away, if it's not illegal?
I mean, from my perspective,
I like to assume everyone's on steroids
and I have to feel bad about using steroids myself.
Yeah.
Do you use all of the steroids?
I'm over 30, it's TRD, you know,
that's the medical definition.
That's the medical, okay.
I'd like to meet your doctor.
Therapeutic use, you know.
Therapeutic, right.
Like how do you just feel about it?
I mean, it is cheating for sure.
Whether they test for it or not, I think it is cheating.
Obviously some people are gonna say,
oh, fuck, everyone's on it.
I should be able to get away with it.
Makes it even playing field.
You know, but it kind of becomes rush and relax
because it's like, if one guy's taking a small amount
and the other guy is taking a huge amount,
he's gonna reap huge rewards in the short term,
probably be dead pretty early,
but die a champion, mind you.
You know what I mean?
So it's like, I don't know what that one is, yeah.
Yeah, what do you think about that?
Do you think it's worthy to take health risks
just for the glory?
I think if you're 40, about to die,
looking at a cabinet of gold medals for wrestling other men,
it's probably not gonna hit the same way on your death bed.
What, sorry, in which direction?
Like, is that a good thing or not?
No, you're probably gonna feel like,
oh, fuck, I probably wasted a bit of health on that.
You think so?
Isn't that like the glory of it?
Like you said, other men.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Well, I mean, in my opinion,
I'll maybe wrestle a woman as well.
What'd you do with Gabby on Valentine's Day?
What did you take her?
We filmed some new stuff for OnlyFans.
For OnlyFans.
We never stopped working.
So the love affair is also a work affair, okay.
I don't know.
There's something too that made like a Olympic gold medalist
accomplishing the heights, sacrificing everything.
Just everything.
The first 20, 30 years of your life
for this silly little piece of medal.
I think there's something beautiful to that
that's like inspires a lot, a lot of people.
And that's like the height of the human condition
in a way.
What if you survive?
I'm just saying if you're in your death bed early in life.
We all die.
All men die, but not all men truly live.
How many years are you willing to shave off
for a gold medal?
That's a good question.
How many?
How many are you willing to shave off for a gold medal?
What year for a silver medal?
For silver, I mean, for a silver medal,
I'd shave a few off.
I think two silvers makes a gold.
It's worth five years?
Five to 10, maybe.
Shave off the bad years, enhance the good ones.
Well, I mean, you've sacrificed.
You guys sacrificed a lot, a lot of your life.
You continue to sacrifice.
Oh, you don't see it as sacrifice.
It's fun.
I think training's fun being adamant about it.
Consistent.
I think we have a great routine, great ritual.
Definitely enjoy the process.
All right, well, do you guys know, this is bro science,
or I'm talking bro scientist,
but do you know how long steroids stay in your system?
Forever?
Forever?
Oh, because it's like, hey, once you do it,
you own it.
Yeah.
Just the knowledge.
Yeah, all right.
I think it's different for each steroid, right?
I think some of them last longer than others.
Depends if it's a urine.
You would think I would do a little research
before asking these questions.
Why do you think most athletes and coaches
don't talk about steroids?
Like, why is it such a secret?
Why is it so embarrassing?
I think they probably talk about it
amongst the team and whatnot.
Again, I mean, it's gonna be more shady
if it's like your sport is tested or not.
We're kind of in the wild west
in the grappling world, you know?
Yeah, but why don't grapplers talk about it?
Because it seems cheating.
I mean, it's kind of insinuated as a bit of cheating,
even if it's not like, if it's not tested,
I mean, still you're taking a person that could, you know,
maybe has good jiu-jitsu, good mechanics,
you're putting them on the leg
and they're subbing you with a heel hook
versus breaking your leg with a heel hook.
You know, something as subtle as that
can make, you know, big differences.
All right, this is gonna make me sound dumb,
but is it possible that steroids
are not a huge help in grappling?
I think if you're bad at jiu-jitsu and you do steroids,
you're gonna continue to be bad at jiu-jitsu.
But if you're great at gear,
I'm sorry, if you're great at grappling,
if you're great at grappling and then you also do gear,
it's gonna enhance what you're already, you know,
good at and make you much better.
But like how much is the enhancement,
I guess is the question.
How much is muscle valued?
Like if you're doing gear
and you're not changing weight that much,
like maybe it helps you a little bit,
but if you're gaining 50, 60 pounds of pure muscle
and it's like, that's a huge enhancement.
That's another human.
Does muscle, a small human, yeah.
Does muscle matter in jiu-jitsu?
I guess is the question.
Is it possible that it gets in the way?
I say muscle matters, but technique matters more.
I also think that it'll help you develop technique as well,
because obviously, you know,
testosterone helps with recovery rate.
So if you're on gear, you're able to train a lot more.
Now, that being said, if you're not able to learn,
obviously it's not gonna help in that aspect.
But if you're somebody that knows how to learn
and get good at jiu-jitsu,
and then you add gear on top of that,
you're able to do significantly more sessions
throughout the week.
Okay, and by the way, gear is steroids?
Steroids, yeah.
I also think that you don't have to be as consistent
in like your sleep and your food and stuff.
If you're on gear, you have a little bit of leeway,
but I mean, being consistent in your diet
and your sleep definitely would help the process.
Since you use most steroids of any athlete I've ever met,
do you think steroids help jiu-jitsu?
I think obviously it helps recovery
and your ability to train more,
but I think some, I've seen some guys go on steroids
and then suddenly they feel like the Incredible Hulk.
And now in the training room,
they just start to rely more on strength
than the techniques they had.
And it actually, in some respect,
hinders them and makes them gas more in competition.
Because then they're using more of the muscle
they never used to have.
So you've implied that you're a natural athlete.
You said that.
You said that skeptically.
Why are you skeptical, Lex?
Is this something you do for social media
to talk shit to Gordon,
to imply that he's not a natural athlete?
Well, I only pretty much recently on social media,
I had this rebuttal saying that Gordon's on gear.
And I only said that because after our match
in our most recent match, the EBI rules match,
he accused me of greasing,
which is like lubing up so I'm slippery during our match.
And you did not?
I did not.
I was checked multiple times
before and after our grappling event.
And he still went out and accused me of this.
So I was like, all right, as opposed to telling a lie,
I'll just tell the truth about your steroid use,
which it shouldn't be that big of a deal in retrospect,
because he kind of admitted it and whatnot previously.
So it's, yeah, I just kind of felt like I had to rebuttal
and I didn't do it immediately.
Cause I was like, all right,
I know I have this podcast plan.
So I'll wait to do it on my friend, Mark Bell's podcast,
be a little more, get a little bit more exposure on it.
And yeah, I knew he was gonna bite the bait,
but I didn't think he was gonna bite the bait that hard.
I know he's a little stressed out about the comment,
but you know.
And that was the origin of you guys going back and forth on.
Well, it wasn't so much back and forth.
It was just, I went forth
and then he kept going back, back, back.
Like I remember one of my guys, the enemy,
and they were like,
Gordon's made like 68 Instagram stories
and 67 of them were all about you.
I was like, all right, well, I'm in his head for sure.
Got us a few followers.
We appreciate that.
We did get followers,
even shouted out our B-team Wipeout program.
So thank you.
Okay.
Speaking of which, what's the B-team?
How's it run?
And why is it called the B-team?
Well, I mean, Craig was the A-team.
I would have been.
For me, B's for best.
Okay, best.
All right.
What does B stand for for you?
What does it represent?
What is the ideal?
Like, you know, Miyamoto Musashi,
philosophical foundation of B-team?
Aim low and achieve.
Well, if the bar is set low,
you can't help, but win.
Okay.
That's Nikki's philosophy with women as well.
Set the bar incredibly low, overachieve.
So what is the B-team?
How do you guys run it?
Like what, yeah, I mean,
can you just talk about the school, how you found it?
What is it, what's it like?
I mean, pretty much just a regular,
just a gym, we started as sort of a pros only,
purple belt and above team.
And we have me, Nikki Rod, Nikki Ryan, Ethan, Damien,
as coaches.
Am I missing someone?
Oh, JB.
Your memory is with your old age.
Impeccable memory, yeah.
And we've got JB coming on to teach wipeouts,
but just your stock standard jiu-jitsu team,
we focus on more,
we lean heavily towards the professional athletes
side of things.
We have a lot of high-level guys in there.
Class structure, regular instruction
and positional sparring, open rounds.
But we sort of took a heavy slant
on marketing side of things.
We really try to blow up the YouTube channel.
Obviously we sell a lot of clothing, merchandise and stuff.
So yeah, we just sort of took a modern approach
to a standard jiu-jitsu gym.
Cause I mean, jiu-jitsu gyms are full of some of the most
boring human beings on earth.
So we try to highlight-
Strong words, Grant Young, strong words.
Highlight the other side of things,
keep it pretty light-hearted.
That it can be fun.
Yeah, that jiu-jitsu can be fun.
I guess that it could be cool too.
It's not just full of steroid up autistic people.
Question from Reddit.
Quote, need to hear some of the stories about drop-ins
that led to the making of the gem of a video,
the do's and don'ts of training a B team.
Any fun stories?
Any ones that stand out?
Do you guys remember any?
Police involved ever?
We had a guy come and we had to kick him out.
He was stalking two of the members.
Yeah, well, I mean, that's just crazy people.
I portray a pretty insane image online,
and I guess I am that a lot of the time,
but at training, try to keep it while training.
Around training, I'm insulting everyone,
but while training, I try to keep it pretty serious.
But obviously the image I portray
lures in some of the crazier members.
I mean, the thing is about the gym you guys run
is really professional, it's friendly.
The lighthearted joking is there, obviously,
like shit talk and all that kind of stuff,
but I guess it's a pretty safe environment.
But the public persona might attract some.
Some maniacs.
I won't say which places I've trained in,
but it's obviously some places you walk into the room
and it's very, very serious.
There's no smiles around.
Obviously it's pretty average training room in Russia,
but no smiles, very serious environment.
You know what I mean?
And I definitely don't like that.
I don't want to show up to training
and be walking on eggshells,
not know what the coach's mood's like that day.
I want to go and have a good time.
Keep it lighthearted.
What was in the video?
What are the do's and don'ts?
Because the address is public.
Anyone can show up.
Anyone can show up, yeah.
What were the do's and don'ts?
Does anyone challenge you to a fight?
Not yet, not yet.
I mean, probably from other gyms in town,
that's probably coming down the line,
but do's and don'ts.
I'm all in on that.
I would be excited as a fan to just watch.
The love of the drama.
Not the drama, no, no, no.
A little drama, a little drop of poison is good,
but ultimately it's the best grapplers in the world
kind of going at it.
Yeah, that's fun.
Because maybe I'm wrong,
but I think there is an underlying deep camaraderie
at the end of the day
when you're at the top of the world
and you're in the same town.
What could possibly go wrong?
It's like a shitty Western,
but like an epic Western.
We're clinging east with the good, the bad, and the ugly.
Of course I love it.
I'm here just eating popcorn like that.
Stare in the pot.
I'm not staring in the pot.
I'm not staring in the pot.
These questions are from Reddit.
They don't know me.
What's up with that?
That one for sure.
Yeah, I mean, what could possibly go wrong
if you're the world's best grappler hates you
and you're gently provoking him behind the scenes every day?
Well, I mean.
For sure, in Texas.
And you've stolen his brother, held him for ransom.
Kidnap.
It is like a story of a shitty Western, I think.
You now allow white belts to train with you.
What's it like to open it up to a bigger audience?
We haven't opened it up yet,
but it'll be interesting to see.
I mean, I feel like your higher belts,
they really understand what the training room is.
You know what I mean?
White belts early.
They're trying to find their place in the gym.
Could be kind of awkward and stuff in that environment.
So I think obviously those white belts coming in
will change the dynamic,
but the white belts will have a separate
white belt classes obviously for them
because given it's such a high level gym,
it'd be tough for a beginner to be able to enter
the more advanced classes.
Well, obviously we're teaching more advanced techniques.
So yeah, we've separated a white belt program,
I believe 6 p.m.
Monday to Friday.
Yeah, maybe we'll have a Saturday one as well,
but it'd be interesting to see how it goes.
We're trying to do things different.
You know, like trying to do your traditional jiu-jitsu gym
is obviously not going to teach beginners wrestling at all.
We're trying to split it at least 33% top game,
bottom game and wrestling.
So at least create more well-rounded athletes from day one.
Whereas I feel like most traditional jiu-jitsu gyms
might have no gi once a week,
they don't touch wrestling,
very IBJF heavy techniques.
But again, the sport's changing for sure.
Just to take that on,
how does it begin to get good at jiu-jitsu?
Given that you're starting this white belt,
what's your philosophy on that?
Obviously buy all of my instructionals at full price,
not during a sale, that would go a long way.
For those of you who are Russians,
I'll send you instructions
for all the forms so you know how to steal it.
I'll share, I bought them all.
So I'll just send it to you for free.
I mean, we do have the Makhachev 50 discount code,
you know, offering discounts to help him out for the rematch.
I got the, nice.
Well, I got a hundred percent discount for you
if you need it.
But that said, your instructional
are both hilarious and brilliant.
And it's one of the most respected instructionals
out there with incredibly great names.
Yeah, it probably loses me sales, honestly,
due to removing the seriousness
of the times we cover.
Oh, because they think it's going to kind of suck,
it's going to be some funny gimmicky thing?
Oh, I mean, some people don't even know
if it's a real product.
That's a big hurdle I have to overcome as they see it.
And they're like, is that a real thing?
That's a problem.
But how does the white belt get good?
I think they just, I mean, they just have to show up,
just have to put in the effort,
try to focus on using techniques and training
rather than just fighting to the death, you know?
Although that is entertaining for us to watch,
to be able to fight to the death.
Yeah, but what are the techniques you should focus on?
Like, what's the process?
What does it mean to show up?
Like, how much drilling, all that kind of stuff?
Like, if you were to optimize the first six months
of a beginner, there's a lot of people
who would listen to this and haven't tried,
they've been curious.
I have a lot of friends who haven't,
who are like, you're just too curious.
They're constantly looking for an excuse to start.
I think it's just got to be as simple as possible.
You know, like we shouldn't be teaching
more advanced movements.
Obviously, in the grand scheme of things,
there's highly advanced techniques,
and then there's slightly advanced.
And I think trying to teach those guys
real specific positions even,
like real specific types of guard,
it's just beyond them.
I think the best way to learn is through problem solving.
And I think if you show the technique
before they've discovered that problem,
the learning is sort of held back.
So I like the idea of using kid-style games
to show them a problem and then use the techniques
to fix the problems they've just discovered.
I think that's the best way to learn.
Can you give an example of a problem to show them
before you give them the techniques?
Like what are we talking about?
All right, so say you wanted to teach posture in wrestling.
You could create a game where one guy,
the game might be get to a leg or get to two legs,
control the leg, like super simple.
But the rules, the constraint would be one guy is forced
to keep upright posture and one guy is forced,
well not forced, but he's allowed to keep
a bent at the hips lower posture.
And obviously within that constraint,
the guy with the better posture
is going to have more success.
He's gonna have a better posture to secure a leg
or secure both legs.
And therefore you've demonstrated the flaws of bad posture
without having to explain it to them
before they really tested that out.
Okay, and then the result of that,
you would realize that the bent over posture is better.
Yeah, you have that aha moment
rather than just having it spoken to you.
You wrote, Craig, I'm a big fan
of constraint-based learning,
I guess was just what you're talking about.
I love presenting beginners with a problem
before the solution, like here,
attempt to hold side control with no cues on how,
then I see how the guy got out and addressed issue by issue,
cross face and hip control and so on.
Okay, so what are some other examples like side control?
Yeah, that would be excellent one, side control.
Obviously we say, oh, you secure a cross face
so they can't turn into you.
Much easier to have them try to hold someone down
without explaining what a cross face is
and then use that technique to address the problem
they've just encountered.
So I think you could do that with a lot of areas of jiu-jitsu
like even more advanced, say 50-50,
obviously a mirrored position
where you both have access to each other's heels.
Most people will stall out of that position
and keep their feet crossed.
I think a great constraint for both of them,
you can't cross your feet.
Now you have to learn how to slip the heel hook
when they expose it and how to safely re-attack of your own.
So the constraint is you can't be too defensive
in that position.
And I think the rate of learning increases.
Why do you think the rate of learning increases?
Like why do you think that works?
Because you encounter more problems.
Say in that situation,
they're gonna get your heel a lot more
in whatever period of time you allocate the drill for
than if the legs are crossed.
I don't think the hard part splitting the legs
to get to the submission,
I think the hard part's practicing control
while they're trying to slip it at a later stage.
And then obviously trying to slip your heel
when you're in more danger
also makes you more comfortable in that bad position
if you're used to doing it with open legs.
Yeah, I think that probably that style of teaching
forces people to focus on,
because it's so easy to fall into focusing on
like memorizing a particular details of a technique
without thinking like, why the hell does this even work?
And if you don't have that,
you get to focus on like,
from like as cliche as it sounds from first principles,
like why the hell, how the hell do I get out of this?
Like, why does this even work?
Why does wrestling work?
Why do you have a bent over posture?
You get those like start to ask those kinds of questions,
which is kind of interesting
because it's not obvious to me that bent over posture
is the right posture for jujitsu, right?
I'm confused actually about that, I don't know.
About the correct posture?
Yeah, for jujitsu.
Like what's the right answer?
I think bent over posture is still good for jujitsu.
Even with the judo and all that.
Like, why are so many jujitsu people like at a high level,
the posture is higher up?
Well, I think wrestling posture is just a bit too low
because it's not necessary, right?
If wrestlers are like low enough to the ground
where your hands could touch the mat.
But in jujitsu, you know, it's kind of a mix
between like wrestling and like judo
or Greco-Roman wrestling.
So I think there's just a bit more lax
and it's bent over, but it's not upright.
And it's also not super low, you know.
Bit more room for error too,
because obviously the jujitsu guy shot
isn't gonna be as athletic or as quick as a wrestler,
especially a wrestler with shoes.
So it actually comes down to the fact
that jujitsu people just on average,
even at the top level are not good at shooting?
I think so, yeah.
I think obviously, I mean,
all the wrestlers in American stuff,
they're starting super early, super young.
By the time they get to the same age we are really,
in our sport and stuff,
they've spent much longer doing the actual sport
and the average jujitsu guy.
And then there's another level of wrestling, of course,
with the Soviet block.
That's just unachievable for your kind.
Who knew an Australian rugby?
Yeah.
A former rugby player.
Rugby, is that kind of like American football,
but much less money?
Is that what that is?
Much less money, much tougher, I would say.
But who knew that the cure to the Dagestani wrestling
were the Aussies.
Were the Aussies?
Okay, let's go there.
The, your friend, your training partner,
Alexander Volkonovski, you helped him prepare
for the Islam Makhachev versus Volkonovski fight.
Who do you think, first of all, won that fight?
That's a tricky one.
How is that the tricky question?
When all the shit talk you've been doing,
how is that the tricky question?
When I was in the corner going into the fifth,
I personally believed live that Volkonovski
probably needed a finish to take the victory.
But you have to think that way, right, in general?
Or are you like legitimately?
It's a gray area, because the judging, who knows?
Plus, I was like, wait, we're in Australia,
where's this bias, you know?
We've got some Australian judges here.
I was really hoping we'd get a bit of bias on that.
Unfortunately not, hopefully they lose their jobs.
But again, yeah, it was a close fight.
I think sometimes you're blinded in the moment,
because again, everyone counted Volkonovski out.
The crowd's behind him.
So everything he does is gonna get a huge cheer.
You're biased towards the smaller guy.
You're biased towards the underdog.
So you sort of, whatever the underdog does
has a bigger impact in your mind.
And sometimes they can bias as the fight goes along.
But yeah, super, super close fight.
I would really love them to have a rematch,
but obviously that's gonna hold up both divisions.
So I don't know if they'll be able to do it.
Do you think they'll do a rematch soon?
I mean, that was an epic fight.
I was listening to the fight companion during it.
They all thought Volkonovski.
So they biased strongly the opinion?
Round two was the tricky one.
Round two was the tricky one.
Anyway, I'd love to see that,
like run it back and do three, actually.
It was an epic fight.
What was the brief conversation you had
with Islam Makhachov and his team?
I didn't know how we'd take the joke,
because obviously Khabib tried to flying eagle kick
Dylan Danis in the face.
So I wasn't sure how my humor would go.
But I mean, Dylan must've said some worse things to me.
I was just playing around.
I mean, you can't really take anything I say serious,
come across like an idiot.
But so when he was coming up to me afterwards,
I was like, oh, I don't know what he's gonna say.
And again, maybe he would have been more upset
if he had lost, but he just received the judge's decision.
But he came up, I went to check his hand,
he gave me a big hug and then pretended to throw me.
And then I thought the interaction was over
and then he circled back.
So that's why I was so awkward.
I was like, oh, he's coming back.
He wants to say, he wants something else.
But he just said, why didn't you teach your boy
how to escape the body triangle?
Oh, wow, interesting.
What did you say to that?
I said, well, I mean, obviously you've got to learn
how to finish a rear naked choke.
Is that what you said?
Nah, I didn't say that.
No, I was just laughing, I was laughing.
But then they ushered us out.
They were like, get out of here
before the Aussie crowd attacks here.
What do you think about the body triangle position
that we're in?
It seemed like for the first time,
it seems almost like Volk was dominant in that position,
which is kind of weird.
I mean, damage is meant to trump control, MMA judging.
Damage is the number one factor.
Do you think the judges saw that?
What did they score that as?
I think they all scored four towards Islam.
Three and five, two of the judges scored towards Volk's.
One of the judges scored three for Islam.
It was 49-46 for one of them,
and the other ones were 48-47.
I think, again, the confusing round was round two.
I don't think anyone scored the body triangle round
for Volk's, which I wish they had.
Volkanovski was, and is still,
arguably, pom for pom, greatest fighter in the world.
How long have you known him?
I don't know the first time.
I met him before he was in the UFC.
When I used to live in Melbourne,
he came down and trained at Absolut.
And then we really connected on Ultima Fighter.
One of his guys he was going to bring to Ultima Fighter,
Robert Del, pulled out last second.
So he called me when I was in Puerto Rico,
and he's like, do you want to coach on TUF for five weeks?
And like I said, Puerto Rico was apocalypse now.
I was like, yeah, get me out of here.
So I jumped on that opportunity,
and we were in Vegas five weeks together.
Because he was meant to fight Ortega,
and then he got hit with COVID real bad.
Got stuck in, I think he was in hospital
for maybe one to two weeks.
And then before he flew back to Australia,
they were like, all right, maybe we just do you guys
as the Ultima Fighter coaches.
So I jumped on board with that.
And that's really when we've become close.
Obviously I was useful in the Ortega fight,
helped him get out of submissions.
He fought then Korean zombie, Max Holloway.
I basically just held the bucket at that point
in the corner, a couple of striking fights.
And then again, yeah, we had to tackle the Islam problem.
So I did spend five to six weeks down there
preparing for that.
How did you tackle the Islam problem?
How did I tackle?
You, somebody who barely knows anything about wrestling,
obviously doesn't take much,
especially wrestling.
Did the beard help or like what, in all seriousness,
what were some of the key ideas that you worked on
with Volkanovski to prepare for it?
I had the help of Frank Hickman.
Hickman was down there too.
One of the Hickman brothers wrestling coach.
So we were sort of like problem solving.
And I mean, basically we were confident in Volk's
fence wrestling, his cage work.
He's super good on the cage.
Super like a under respected in that position.
And we knew that if we were able to take the scrambles
to the cage, he would be effective against Islam.
Cause again, Islam is background in Sambo freestyle
wrestling, but I mean, honestly,
he's probably got the same experience on the cages Volks.
Obviously some of those wrestling skills
will translate very well to the cage,
but the cage is still somewhat of a gray area and equalizer.
And Volk's again, incredible ability to stand up,
incredible defense on the cage, which you saw.
We worked on strategies to get up and a ton of submission
defense, Islam loves Kamuras, obviously rear naked
from the back, armbars.
Those are sort of in arm triangles, dominant submissions.
But again, the guys he submitted, not Grapplers,
apart from Charles Oliveira.
And again, Charles Oliveira was basically knocked out
at that point.
So it was still impressive he submitted him.
But again, I always told people this,
they thought it was crazy.
So I was like Charles Oliveira versus Islam
in a grappling match, Oliveira is gonna win that match.
Like submission Grappler?
Submission Grappling, yeah.
So in a pure grappling skillset,
I think Oliveira is a more dangerous Grappler.
So we didn't even come into it thinking Islam
was this unstoppable boogeyman that people make him out to be.
So we approached it from that,
just focused on the techniques, ability to get back up,
using Turtle to get back up, using Turtle to scoot
to the cage to get back up and hand fighting from there,
keeping it pretty safe.
But what makes Volk so special, I think is his gas tank,
gas tank and his willpower.
He's just unbreakable.
The Dagestani guys, Khabib, Islam,
they are good at submissions,
but they break guys mentally and they fatigue them.
And then they take the submission that's offered.
Oliveira is a guy that can jump on submissions
and have an incredible technical ability
to finish those submissions,
whether you're fresh or you're tight.
And then you combine that with Volkonovsky
who, incredible willpower, never gets tired.
You're never gonna break him.
And as you saw, he only attempted one submission
the whole fight.
Is that learned?
Is that trained?
Or are you just born with that, that mental toughness?
It's a good question.
I mean, he's like an anomaly,
like the entire fight camp, not nervous at all,
supremely confident.
The whole fight week, completely confident.
He just has an attitude like,
oh, everyone cast me out, we'll see.
You know what I mean?
Islam, he's like, let's see.
No doubt.
No doubt at all.
Super relaxed, up until about five minutes before.
And then he starts damping himself up.
He's like, you are not taking this belt from my family.
He gets into that sort of mindset.
He actually says that out loud?
You can't teach that survival.
He didn't even take a fight.
Have you guys ever been pushed to the limit like that
or broken in a grappling match?
I'll do it in practice.
I'll push myself to like,
I think it might pass out or die or something.
As far as like how tired you get,
because like in a match.
They try not to ever get close to that in a match.
Yeah, you try to,
because it's important to understand
where your exhaustion point is.
But yeah, if you have to push to that limit in a match,
you're probably doing something wrong.
Like you see in matches where guys sprint the last minute,
they try to win the match the last minute.
And it's like, you definitely had some mistakes
leading up to that.
You have to kind of go balls to wall.
Okay, but has there been ever times in competition?
Especially like early on,
cause you're like, you wrestled pretty hard
and wrestling is pretty exhausting.
Like not wrestling, but wrestling style kind of thing.
Going against the best people in the world.
Yeah, I mean, I definitely,
again, I think in practice is important to do that hard work
that where competition is much easier.
I think if you red line in practice
and you really push through like death's door,
then once you're in competition and you're working with,
you're being fresh in a comp, I mean, it's much better.
Have you ever been to that thing
where Dan Gable talks about always wanting to be
to a place where you can't get off the mat?
Like you work so hard in the training room,
you can't get off the mat.
I think he says he's failed at that in his career.
He was always able to at least crawl off the mat.
Yeah, I definitely never like actually died on the mat,
but I felt like I was gonna die, you know?
Sure, sure.
What about you?
Do you quit all the time?
I get a light cramp.
I'm like, you know what?
You got me, man.
Let's do this against the bar.
That's it.
Dude, if I'm asking Craig for a role,
he's in the bathroom somewhere.
Do you see the value of pushing yourself
to that place where you're knocking on death's door?
Yeah, but within safety,
because obviously the most serious injuries occur
when you're tired over training and stuff like that.
So I think like taking a page out of what
those MMA fighters do, especially Volk's with his training,
like he's not necessarily pushing crazy in each round,
but he's doing extra conditioning, assault bike stuff,
crazy workouts outside.
And he does do some crazy training workouts,
but all safe, very safe.
Like when he's redlining like that in the training room,
it's a very controlled, safe setting.
I think to do that in jiu-jitsu
against some of these lunatics out there
that are trying to kill you,
especially when you have a name, can be dangerous.
So your approach to jiu-jitsu is don't warm up
and don't try too hard for safety.
No, for safety though.
Longevity.
And talk shit about Russians.
I got it, I got it, I hear you.
Oh, you mentioned cage work.
What's interesting to you that you learned
over all this time about cage work?
What's interesting about the dynamics of that?
Are you talking about both like the control
in the dominant position,
but also getting up from the bottom
while you're against the cage, all of that?
The added dimension of that cage, that wall being there
changes a lot of stuff, right?
So obviously in some ways it's a much lower impact
wrestling style because you can't be sprawled on.
You can shoot, the cage is going to block their feet.
You're going to be able to chase down their hips.
It's just a completely different fight.
And again, because of Islam's judo skills,
that upper body controls,
you see he's able to use against the cage,
like the inside trips,
sort of the YouTube artist style, Harai Goshi throws.
So obviously those skills do translate,
but yeah, I think the cage is a great equalizer
for a lot of things like athleticism and stuff.
It takes away a huge speed advantage aspects of the fight.
So he's really good at standing up.
What is, is there, I assume he learned all of that
from you and your instructional just stand up.
I mean, we were so confident.
I was like, you know what,
why don't we put this thing out a month before the fight?
Yeah.
Maybe the illegal download hasn't made its way to Russia yet
but it was there for him.
Can you explain to me
what's in the instructional just stand up?
Like what are the ideas?
I mean, the old school way to stand up,
people talk about the technical get up,
the old Gracie put the hand,
but I mean, that doesn't work.
It hasn't worked for 20 years.
If you look at everyone that gets up at MMA,
they're using turtle to get up.
They're using wrestling to get up.
You know what I mean?
Which is a counter to what pure jujitsu says.
They say, don't expose the back,
don't ever expose your back.
I think jujitsu is a terrible way to get back to the feet
because if you were to retain guard
and go half guard or close guard,
super hard positions to get up.
You're basically putting yourself in a leg tuck for wrestling
so I think you need to borrow from wrestling
to learn how to get up in an MMA fight.
So basically how to safely expose your own back
while not allowing them to get hooks
and use that to get back up
or at least not allow them to get two hooks.
And that applies for MMA especially?
For MMA especially
because obviously striking is a factor
but if they are striking,
they don't have locked hands around your body,
means you are able to move.
You are able to make an attempt to get back up.
They have to choose between control, submission or strikes.
Post from Reddit,
why does Craig Jones push so hard
for a bottom is bad jujitsu?
What is so bad about playing bottom guard
such as half guard or delahio?
Those are the two options.
No one likes a bottom.
Why would I want to get up?
It's the question for all of you.
Is the bottom a bad place to be?
The bottom is bad if you don't want that guy on top of you.
That's why I look at it.
That sounds like something a cowboy would say
but I don't know if that has much meaning.
I think the point of jujitsu is both are dangerous
being on bottom and on top.
I think the longer the matches
probably favorites the top guy more
just because every movement the bottom guy makes
is probably carrying your weight,
carrying that gravity on top of you.
So I think it's a bit more efficient
passing from the top as opposed to sweeping from bottom.
Bottom's reactive, top is active.
The top player decides how to engage,
how to approach the guard.
They can use angles, they can use footwork,
they can throw people, throw the legs by.
So it's an active position.
Bottom's reactive.
Reactive, you're gonna get fatigued.
Yeah, I think it's very difficult to gas somebody out
while playing guard
but I think it's very easy to gas somebody out
when attempting to pass it.
Well, you guys are talking about gassing people out
but is there more dangers from the bottom
in terms of submissions
and all that kind of stuff or no?
I'm back and forth because I'm a top player
but I understand the value of being on bottom.
When I do play guard on bottom
I feel like the submissions come much easier
and when I'm on top they come also pretty easy
but maybe I just take a different route.
Talking to two cowboys talking about shit, sir.
Top on the straights, bottom in the shades, that's nice.
What was the hardest part of the training
camp for Volkowksi?
You're just experiencing world-class MMA fighters training
and giving your approach to jiu-jitsu
of not trying too hard no matter what.
I mean, from my perspective there's a lot of pressure
for that.
That's a lot of pressure for me to go in
and think that I could possibly figure out a way
to help this guy, address this guy
that's basically never been beaten.
I think he got knocked out once
but basically not really even been put in bad positions.
That's a lot of pressure on me
especially because Volkowksi is such a great guy.
Jiu-jitsu is different.
You coach a guy who loses, he has time to tap
but in MMA you could get severely hurt.
There's a lot more weight in what you need to do as a coach.
You have a greater sense of responsibility
to their health and wellbeing.
Obviously I know Volk's kids, I know his wife.
They're putting faith in you to not just win the fight
but keep this man safe.
From my perspective, a hell of a lot more pressure
coaching him as an MMA fighter.
So almost like the psychological aspect
of doing the best you can for him.
Exactly, yep, yep.
What was hardest about the actual training?
Was it the technical aspect of trying to figure out
the puzzle of Islam or was it being a good training partner
in figuring out how the grappling would work?
Basically playing your best impression of Makhachev.
Were you trying to actually impersonate him?
Not just visually but in style?
Yeah, definitely, definitely visually.
You're not as good looking but go ahead.
A little taller but in terms of the training,
Islam's known as incredibly strong guy
so obviously I'm heavier than Islam.
So theoretically I should be able to replicate
that strength difference.
And then in terms of grappling, targeting those submissions
that Islam does, focusing on those in the training room,
focusing on the way he holds half guard
and really in the grappling sense,
trying to replicate him on the ground
and then yeah, I wrestle with him on the wall a ton,
trying to replicate, obviously to the best of my ability,
a lot of the stuff he does on the wall,
body lock heavy, inside trip, uchi matas
and just constantly putting the work on vox,
you know what I mean?
Like constantly chaining attacks against him,
really replicate that.
As he's trying to get up and escape
and all that kind of stuff.
So submissions, like both judo and submissions,
just attacking and attacking.
Exactly and there's only so much you can do really
because obviously he's been,
I think he's been fighting a long time.
So it's like you're trying to polish
what he already is good at.
You can't just completely create entirely new game for him
in the space of six weeks.
So you're trying to take what he's already effective at,
add to it.
And luckily a lot of the stuff he's already very good at
was easy to add to for the fight.
Question from Reddit.
I'm very curious why other MMA fighters
don't employ high profile grapplers from B team
and new wave to improve their grappling.
That's from the subreddit.
By now it's clear that they are levels above almost everyone
in MMA simply because fighters there
don't specialize in grappling,
but it doesn't seem like fighters,
even champions get training partners
from the most successful teams.
Why is that the case?
From your experience, why doesn't it call you?
You might now.
Put in a good word for me.
Oh, I will.
That's all right.
He takes a joke pretty well.
Yeah.
No, no, you'll be welcome with open arms.
I think your average Jujitsu coach,
MMA fighters have bad experience with Jujitsu guys.
Jujitsu doesn't have a massive place in MMA.
Obviously rounds, standups, it's hard to submit people.
Your average Brazilian Jujitsu black belt
doesn't know anything about holding a guy down,
doesn't know anything about how to stand up.
So I think if you overly utilize that Jujitsu guy
that hasn't had experience in more modern no-gi
or training MMA fighters previously,
it's going to be a complete waste of time to them.
I think they're smart enough to realize that.
Do you have, and do you guys,
do you have interest in MMA at all?
Just not even like,
well, certainly just competing yourself,
but like just understanding the puzzle of MMA.
Yeah, I mean, I've been a fan of mixed martial arts
for a very long time before I trained jits.
Personally, I'd much rather coach than fight,
but I mean, I'd fight somebody for a good check
and I get to pick the opponent and have a proper camp.
Okay.
I can think of a good opponent.
Who's that?
All right.
Who do you think is the greatest MMA fighter of all time?
Craig, I'm going to start with you.
Just as a fan of the sport
as somebody who's been deep in it.
I mean, from my perspective, after that performance,
I'm going to say Volkanovsky
because he was able to decisively out-strike Max Holloway,
one of the greatest strikers in the sport.
And he was able to hang with the wrestling
of Islan Makhachev.
And in terms of Ortega, he was able to survive Ortega
who has some of the most dangerous missions in Jujitsu.
So I think in my opinion, technically he's the best.
So even though he technically lost, he still has the crown.
He's proven himself. I believe so.
Given the size difference, given he's moving up in weight,
I think all those factors really.
The underdog, everything, the pressure.
Did you think he would be able to hang
in any of the wrestling exchanges with Islan?
No, no, no.
I was really surprised.
That's why in my eyes, it's kind of funny,
winning at the end of the day,
I feel like judges influence that.
Although I did think Australian judges
would rob the other way, but I was assuming
they kind of, somebody paid somebody and not enough maybe.
But in general, I just thought he won
sort of in the eyes of what martial arts stands for.
Like sort of go into the fire and survive and thrive
and finish the last round strong,
which is kind of like spiritually is what a victory is.
So I wish we kept going.
One more round.
Yeah, exactly. That kind of thing.
What about you?
What do you think?
Like who are the fighters you admire?
Like who do you think is the greatest of all time?
I think the fighter I paid most attention to was John Jones.
You know, he has a great ability just to mix
the high level striking, high level grappling.
Although his, you know, jujitsu by itself isn't, you know,
probably isn't like, you know, super high level,
but his ability to mix everything together,
I would say he's the best.
And he's a fellow, you know, heavier guy,
heavyweight now.
So it's nice to see, you know,
how those guys move at that weight.
And a fellow natural athlete.
See what I did there?
What about you, Nicky?
Yeah, if I had to pick a goat,
I would probably have to say Khabib
just because he was undefeated
and he had a very, you know, high finishing rate, you know,
very few of his fights actually went to a decision.
So he just overall,
he dominated almost every single opponent he went against.
The dominance.
I mean, we've been joking about it, but Craig,
what do you think makes the Dagestani fighter so good?
Like from this small region of the world,
so much dominance has come.
I mean, obviously the amount of freestyle wrestling
champions from that region probably puts their wrestling
above and beyond the best in all of MMA.
And obviously a lot of, even in the Olympics,
a lot of champions out of there, right?
So I think that skillset combines with them
adding effective pin controls on the ground
and jiu-jitsu submissions.
But again, I think it's that hard training.
Those guys like Khabib would maintain that pressure
throughout the entire fight and break guys down.
Their ability to fatigue guys to a breaking point,
I think is something they do best.
I wonder what that is.
Was that technique, what is that?
What is it about their upbringing?
Because it's just that part of the world.
With the Satir brothers on the freestyle wrestling side
to all the mixed martial arts people.
It must be part of the culture also.
They must be doing something.
I don't think, I haven't seen a convincing explanation
of why yet, of what's specific about their training,
what's specific about their culture that creates that.
Okay, what do you think about like the flip side?
Do you admire somebody like Conor McGregor
who knows how to create a spectacle?
You, Craig, who likes spectacles?
Spectacles, yeah.
I mean, I really admire early Conor McGregor
because I found him absolutely hilarious.
I felt like that was peak banter.
I feel like he just took the American world by storm.
Aussies, British, Irish, Kiwis.
I believe we have a way better level of banter
and attacking each other.
And it's almost too easy to pick on Americans
that take themselves very seriously.
I mean, I could believe in other parts of the world too,
the far East of Europe.
But that's the tricky thing with Conor.
I think he was, I feel like you could have gotten
in the same kind of trouble.
Because the Russians really took everything very seriously.
They weren't joking around.
Yeah, that's the problem.
It's like, it's a bit of,
I mean, some things he definitely takes too far.
But I felt like early on he had the right balance
where he wouldn't really cross the line,
but he would do enough.
He just took it to another level,
obviously later in his career.
But I think early on, a bit of innocent banter.
It gets a lot of eyes on the sport though.
It's probably by far the most popular combat athlete
of all time because of that.
I feel like you have to cross the line.
I don't think enough people appreciate the values
he's brought by crossing the line.
He's making a sacrifice crossing the line.
That's gonna affect him for the rest of his life.
I see, I don't think so.
I think he'd always walk back.
Because I think unlike people who might disagree with this,
I, well, yeah, I thought he always radiated a respect
for the opponent afterwards and underneath it.
It felt like the same way you do.
When I hear you shit talking,
I don't see a person who really means it.
I see a person who's having fun with it.
I always saw Conor McGregor the same way.
I don't know.
But people took it extremely seriously.
But I saw the respect, the common respect
the martial artists have for each other
that felt like it was always there.
If you don't like that individual,
you're gonna perceive what they say more negatively
than if you obviously were.
So I feel like if you like someone,
you're gonna never think they really crossed the line.
That's true.
So you're saying, I like you.
That's why I'm perceiving you.
You're bullshit in a positive light.
Are there people that hate you?
I mean, some of the family members at this table.
People that really get to know you all hate you.
The fans love me, the friends hate me.
That's a good place to be.
Keep your enemies close.
All right.
What do you think is the most important muscle
for just the biceps?
I think a strong back.
I think back one, core second, and then biceps.
Okay, biceps.
Do you legitimately think weightlifting helps jujitsu?
It's kind of the discussion on the steroids.
It's like the muscle mass and strength and power
and explosiveness, all of that.
I think sometimes when we're at that upper echelon
of competition, there's like little minute battles
that you have to win.
And if you're relatively close in technique,
then a lot of times a stronger opponent pulls it out.
But it could be also just the limitation, right?
You hold position too long.
What about for hobbyists, do you recommend weightlifting?
Like when you've seen people in the gym?
I always recommend weightlifting.
I almost see muscle as the body's armor, right?
The more armor you have, the more damage you can kind of
take and maybe recovery is a little bit better.
And I've always seen weightlifting as a means
to stick to my routine.
Like there's no point in lifting if you're not eating right
and you're not sleeping right.
So if you kind of put it all together,
then it's beneficial.
What about you guys?
Do you go to the gym?
I go to the gym, yeah.
Do you go to the hotel gym to use an elliptical
and that butt machine or?
Yeah, I focus on the glutes heavily.
All right.
What about the injury prevention and so on?
How do you train to minimize the risk of injury?
You guys have all been pretty beat up.
You've gotten a major injury with the ACL.
Yeah.
So how do you train to minimize injury?
Probably help the right guy to ask, eh?
Yeah.
Definitely.
Actually, can you talk through your injury?
Yeah, so about one week prior to this last ADCC,
I was wrestling with this guy named Kenta
who was also competing.
And I went to go lift him from like a rear body lock
and he hooked the outside of my leg
and we just felt something pop.
He felt a shift with his leg.
And when it first happened,
it hurt for like the first 30 seconds.
And then I honestly debated.
I was like, maybe it was just some freak thing.
I literally thought about continuing the session.
Then the next day, I woke up and I was like super sore.
I was limping around, couldn't do a full squat.
So it pretty much killed all of my training
for the entire week leading up to the event.
So I couldn't train or anything.
Messed up the cut.
Obviously, there's added nerves with that too.
You're not in the gym every day
leading up to the competition.
I went out there.
I wasn't really able to pull guard
because I couldn't get full heel to butt connection,
which is inevitable with playing guard.
And I was very hesitant to shoot as well.
So I came out with the idea
of just trying to use hand fighting
to tire my first opponent out
and then mainly look to get to under hooks or over hooks
and do mostly upper body wrestling.
In the beginning of the match,
I successfully got to an under hook.
I got to a rear body lock.
He tried to roll and I ended up in top position.
And side control.
But it was during the no points period.
And then as the match went on,
I gassed out and eventually he ended up taking me down
and then scoring with two hooks on the back.
So what's the injury?
Yeah, so I got an MRI actually after the event.
I didn't know-
Wait, wait, you waited until after the event?
Yeah, I waited until after the event.
Because like knowledge or ignorance is bliss?
Yeah, exactly.
I was like, honestly, I don't even wanna know what's wrong.
I was like, I just go out there compete.
I knew it was like the biggest event to date.
And I really wanted to do it.
Did you think about not doing it?
It definitely was a thought in my head,
especially that the day after,
it's always the worst day whenever you have
like a serious injury is the day after.
And I was like, man, I really can't do a full squat.
I was like, I don't even know
how I'm gonna be able to do this.
It got a bit better over as the week went on.
But I was like, man, I have to go out there and compete.
I was like, it'll always be in the back of my mind.
What if I ended up pulling out?
What did you think about this whole-
I thought he was just being a pussy.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Just slap him around, just yell at him.
I didn't think we pressured you.
We just let you make your own decision, right?
We're just like, yeah.
Is that a tricky thing to do
with a heavily, like a serious injury like this?
We don't know.
Well, we didn't know.
That was the thing we didn't know.
Honestly, initially I thought it was,
I tore my lateral meniscus,
but that ended up not being the case.
It ended up being a full ACL tear.
I was actually super surprised when I got the MRI results.
So yeah, we didn't know how bad it actually was.
What do you think about that situation?
I think Nikki's a tough kid.
And I mean, when you're so close to that competition,
there's not many, you don't get many opportunities like that
to compete in front of 15,000 people.
It's like, props to you for pushing through it
and getting it.
And man, he had a close match
and he's one of the best grapplers in his weight classes.
A few adjustments here and there,
and especially if he was able to train previously
leading up to that match, I think Nikki pulls it out.
So some of the things you mentioned is nerves.
So there's extra nerves just because you're underprepared?
Yeah, I mean-
Or feeling underprepared.
You want to go into a competition with the confidence.
I did everything that I could leading up to this event.
I trained as much as I could.
And then when an injury prevents that,
you start to doubt yourself more.
How do you guys think about injury?
How do you train, you know,
training with the best in the world,
training to be the best in the world and avoiding injury?
As you've gotten, you tore your bicep?
Yeah, I tore a bicep.
Girls or?
Dude, honestly, I was bodybuilding for like seven years.
And no lie, I trained biceps like most days,
like almost every day in those seven years.
Pretty much I injured myself.
That's so Jersey, man.
Anything else or just the biceps?
Just, I mean, yeah, I injured the bicep.
Pretty much I, the day before a wrestling practice,
I had like a killer arm day.
And by arm day, I just mean training biceps,
very rigorously getting a sick pump.
And I go to wrestling practice the next day, you know,
pretty late, I should have been there.
I didn't get a proper warmup in.
And the first thing I do is I shake hands
and I go to shoot a single leg and boom,
I just blew my arm out.
That was the first movement I did.
So just not being warmed up properly,
in addition to, you know,
having of every vigorous arm day, a few hours prior.
You hear that about warmup?
So like, what are some lessons about avoiding injury
and training?
I would say number one is warming up properly.
Making sure your body's hot before you do hot stuff.
Okay, and what does warmup look like for you?
Is it jujitsu or non-jujitsu stuff?
Yeah, just for a warmup in general,
I'll do something like a, if I'm talking competition,
something like a jog walk back and forth a few times,
then a sprint jog a few times to get that heart rate,
you know, up and down.
And then I'll grab a partner.
I actually just filmed a DVD or instructional
specifically on the pre-match ritual.
In addition to that, I'll grab a partner,
I'll drill some movements.
Typically I'll drill some bad things.
Like I'll start from bottom mount,
bottom side control, work out from there.
And in pretty much like 20 minutes in,
I'm hot and I'm ready to go for rounds.
Well, what about you, Craig?
So what's the way to avoid injury?
What's the worst injury you've had?
What's the worst injury?
I don't even know.
I'm pretty good, pretty healthy.
Whenever you quit practice, I'm gonna have some mental ache.
Has your heart ever been broken?
Many times, many times.
But there's a thing I notice,
people that spend the most time warming up,
often the most injured.
It's a strong correlation.
All right, you can't argue with science.
I remember training with Oliver Tuss.
Oliver Tuss would have a 60 minute warmup.
Surprise, surprise, always injured.
Very common.
I find that very common in the training room.
No, I think people, it's how they train.
Like if you, like me, first sign of discomfort,
backpedal, you know?
Push through that stuff.
Go too hard, go when you're too tired,
you know what I mean?
Get too emotional in the roll.
I feel like those are the times that I've been hurt
where I just like, oh, I can't let this guy get me.
When I have that attitude and I believe it's how you train
and sort of obviously-
So what does this come from?
Like positionally too?
Because you're training against some killers.
I mean, you're training with him
and going probably pretty hard.
Craig gets a little tired.
He's like, yeah, I'm good for today.
Once a month with Nicky, right?
That's it.
And then you quit like 30 seconds in.
Just saying, okay.
Yeah, you know, you gotta be safe.
What about you?
What have you learned from the ACL?
Tara?
Do rehab, yeah.
Yeah, rehab definitely would help.
Oh, so you haven't been like-
I didn't get surgery.
I didn't do essentially any rehab.
I just have no ACL in my left leg.
So what's it like having no-
The surgeon goes, you've got two options.
Surgery, rehab only.
Nicky goes, I'll do nothing.
Yeah, definitely should pick up on the rehab.
What's rehab for that look like?
Like twice a day of doing some weird-
Like bands or something.
It's good he's learned some valuable lessons
about taking care of his body.
What's it like just training with no ACL?
So at the beginning, it was definitely a little iffy.
You know, I would have an occasional buckle.
Like I'd just be wrestling with somebody
and go to step back and it buckled backwards a bit.
But honestly now,
like I haven't had a single buckle instance in a while.
It feels a hundred percent normal when I train.
It feels better than my other knee, to be honest.
Like I've had my meniscus taken out in my right leg
and that one gets sore more often than the no ACL leg.
Okay, all right.
So putting that aside,
is there wisdom you've learned from that experience?
Yeah, definitely should be doing rehab and prehab.
You know, I think that, you know,
especially if you're a hobbyist or professional athlete,
you should be lifting, you know,
whether you're rehabbing an injury
or just for injury prevention.
So I'm actually closer to Craig
because I've trained my whole life, like pretty hard.
Obviously he's just a hobbyist, but like twice a day,
did judo, wrestling, all that.
Never broken anything, never injured,
kind of like similar philosophy,
except like last year, I guess a year and a half ago,
I got a tiny like groin pull injury
and it still hasn't healed.
And I've been using your approach of not giving a shit.
Yeah.
And like, all right, surely this is going to heal.
It'd be fine, but it hasn't.
But of course, if I was like an actual athlete,
I would like probably still train through it
and just fuck it, figure it out.
But when you have other stuff going on,
you just kind of wait it out.
Yeah.
But no, I think probably rehab, especially as you get older,
you have to do that kind of stuff.
I think it's important for people to, you know,
determine whether what they're going through is an injury
or they're just hurt a little bit.
Cause injury, you know, for sure take time,
rehab it and get better.
But a lot of people like they'll stub a toe or something
like you're out for a few weeks, you know, so.
Well, that's the problem with the injury I have.
It feels like a stubbed toe.
So I was like, I'll just wait a couple of days.
It'll be fine.
And then a couple of days later, it's not fine.
And you wait.
And then I never got an MRI, never got any of that.
It's like, I'm sure I'll be fine.
Yeah. So it's hard to know sometimes like what,
it's hard to know.
I feel like a lot of people will just not check it out.
I'll be fine.
Well, cause there's several failure cases.
There is a failure case of where everything is a stubbed toe.
You're like, fuck it.
Like you're bleeding everywhere.
Yeah, that's fine. Whatever.
So you have to be careful.
A lot of people can fall into that too.
I think I'm in that category.
Go to the doctor.
Why do you go to the doctor?
Your best approach is typically wait until something else
gets hurt so that you'll forget about the grain.
Yeah, exactly.
That's what I was hoping.
I was hoping to get hurt.
Waiting for the broken heart maybe.
Okay. That was very helpful.
Oh, you mentioned you're doing a whole thing
on the pre-match ritual.
Can you kind of preview like what kind of,
what's involved in your pre-match ritual?
It's pretty big in the wrestling culture
and the fighting culture,
like kind of what to do before your competition.
But I think a few of our,
a few people are just kind of missing out exactly,
you know, what to do.
I break it down for them.
I break it down to people like four weeks in advance,
how you should prep, you know,
your training and your nutrition
and your sleep for competition.
In addition to that,
I break it down even like to a smaller scale
of like how early you should get to the event,
when you should be visualizing your competition,
what to do like 30 minutes before,
20 minutes, 10 minutes, five minutes,
and the kind of mentality you should have
throughout those times
before you actually step onto the mat.
When are you visualizing?
Like how much are you visualizing?
When you say competition,
you're talking about the tournament
or the actual people you might be competing against?
A little bit of both.
I'll spend time just visualizing the crowd.
Like if it's going to be, you know,
an arena with 15,000 people,
I'll spend time in practice and whatnot,
like putting myself inside that arena
and visualizing, you know,
stepping on the mat and hearing the crowd scream
and whatnot.
That way, you know, when competition time comes,
it's kind of the same deal.
I'm accustomed to it.
In addition, when I get to the arena,
I'll step on the mat.
I'll kind of look at everything.
I'll expose my senses to what it's going to be.
And then I'll kind of shut everything off.
Like a lot, some people, you know,
scroll through their phone and can treat it like normal,
have this normal conversations.
For me, I like to limit my sensory intake
before I go out and compete.
I just feel like sometimes,
I feel like sometimes we only have so many decisions
you can make in a day.
And I want all of my best decisions to be made
when it counts.
Oh, what about you?
What's, do you limit your sensory input?
On game day?
Honestly, no routine.
Nothing, eh?
I don't know.
Yeah, I don't do anything.
I'm just like-
This guy's a double silver.
We're both double silver.
You should get it.
You should buy as a structural.
It might help you.
I'll get another silver.
No, honestly, nothing.
Hey, I just try to relax,
treat it like it's before training.
Visualizations or no?
No, no, no visualization.
So the opposite of visualization.
You just avoid it before thinking about it.
Yeah, I don't even think about it.
I'm just like, yeah, we'll have a good time.
Try to appreciate it, but I can do it.
By the way, when you visualize,
are you visualizing tough positions
or you visualize winning mostly?
Definitely visualize winning.
I visualize how I'm going to get
to my most dominant positions
because in comp, I want to do what I'm best at.
And I also see my opponent in his best positions
and how I'm going to escape those if necessary.
But most of the time, I'm just visualizing
exactly what I'm going to do in that match.
And I go out there and do it.
Okay, so when your teammate, Craig,
is another world-class athlete,
has a fundamentally different philosophy than you,
do you visualize being frustrated at him?
No, not frustrated, but I'll definitely come into practice
with solutions to problems that Craig gives me.
If Craig's catching me at something or giving me issues,
I'll go home, I'll watch a match that he lost
for motivation and I'll come back and I'll put it on.
Just DM him like a highlight reel of him losing.
What about you?
Does it affect you that you're a bit of an outlier?
Usually before I compete, right before I go out there,
I go, why am I doing this?
Do I still need to do this?
And I think if I hopefully don't embarrass myself,
it affects my instructional sales.
That's the last thought.
But I don't even put too much thought
into the whole competing thing.
I'm just like, you know what, train hard,
hopefully have a good time out there.
What about the motivation aspect?
Like that voice that says like, why am I doing this?
That voice can break a lot of people.
Like in a weight cut, it can break a lot of people.
Like, why am I doing this stupid, silly sport?
Like you said, a bunch of dudes just rolling around,
like, what's the point?
I'll call someone with a nine to five job
and I'll be like, yeah, that's why I'm doing this.
Avoid that.
It's all those DVDs, man.
Yeah, I don't get too deep on competing.
Yeah.
We're so polar opposite.
It's like almost uncomfortable to be around you.
Obviously, one of us is a clean athlete.
You should do a DVD on that.
What about you in terms of preparing for competition, Nikki?
The day before, the day of,
are there rituals that you follow?
Honestly, like the few days leading up to it,
it's different for me every time.
Like sometimes I'll warm up before I compete,
sometimes I won't, sometimes I'll fast, sometimes I'll eat.
So I literally, it's just completely random.
I don't follow any specific thing.
But in the training room leading up to the competition,
I'll definitely, you know, like Nikki Rod visualized
that I'm walking out onto the competition mats.
You know, I'll pick somebody that's, you know,
similar body type to the person that I'm competing against.
And then, you know, we'll start out
with some distance between us.
We'll come out, smack hands and, you know,
act like everything's a real competition.
I'll even sometimes have, you know,
corners that will yell out times and things like that
just to replicate it as much as possible.
That's funny because I've talked to a lot
of Olympic gold medalists.
They used to do a podcast with like athletes
and they all sound like Nikki Rod.
The two of you are outliers.
I don't know, sometimes I'll do this, sometimes.
But that's also just a culture, I think.
Maybe the chaos of not taking things too serious
is actually really, really helpful.
Sometimes the pressure of taking everything
way too seriously can break you.
I mean, it's just, I think it's the biggest sport, really.
You know?
I think if I compete every day in practice,
it just makes competition much easier.
So I just put the pressure on there.
On the competition, yeah, yeah.
On the, sorry, on the training,
on the competing and the training.
I don't know, Olympic sports aren't
that big either financially.
And people take it extremely, extremely seriously.
You don't really get that much money from judo.
I mean, I just don't take jiu-jitsu that seriously
because I was just partying and having a good time
until 21 and then I was like, oh fuck, do I get a job?
Although I pursue professional sports.
And I feel like if I made a career in jiu-jitsu
with a decision at that point.
And now you just stumbled your way somehow
into being at the top of the world.
Yeah, that's what I feel like.
I just walked into it.
I feel like I couldn't just do that in wrestling, boxing.
I couldn't do that in other sports.
What was the toughest match you ever had
that pushed you mentally, physically, technically?
This doesn't have to be the best person you faced,
but was there like a moment in your career
that was like really defining for you?
I mean, I would say like the toughest mentally
was just this last ADCC.
I just had a big injury leading into it
that kind of screwed the whole camp
and way cutting everything up.
So yeah, I would say the last ADCC.
Are you proud of your performance there?
Like you stepped on the mat
that you pushed through all of it?
Like I said, I'm a very competitive person
and I hate losing.
So definitely not, yeah.
You had a collapsed lung.
Yeah.
Can we elaborate on this?
Oh, man.
He was so physically exhausted afterwards,
couldn't breathe.
We had to get medical intervention.
He thought he had a collapsed lung.
So he goes-
I was the most tired that I've ever been in my life
in that match.
I actually popped the blood vessel in my eye.
I was trying so hard.
He comes out, he walks off of the ADCC mat backstage
and I'm like, I'm kind of getting warmed up for my match.
And Nikki run and comes, he walks over huffing and puffing.
His mom's right next to me.
He looks at her.
He was like, I think I need help.
I think I was called a lung collapse.
That's not true.
No, that's not true.
My mom's the one that called for medical help.
I was just laying on the warmup mat, fucking dying.
Well, we're happy you're fine.
Too working long.
Laid it all on the line.
What about you, Craig?
Defining all toughest matches?
I mean, they're all pretty tough, you know?
I don't know.
I can't really pinpoint one.
I mean, probably the most annoying one
was obviously the one where I had Gordon Armbar.
I was like, tap bro.
And he wouldn't tap.
So I let him out.
Mentally, I was like, I shouldn't have done that.
Do you ever have a thing in your brain where it says,
should I shit talk now or not?
And you say, no, I'm going to be respectful.
I just can't be serious about some of these things.
I don't know.
It's just silly.
It's just, all of it, the whole thing.
What about you, Nicky man?
Dude, honestly, most of my toughest matches
are in the training room, right?
Cause I started with these guys.
I started training under them.
Like, you know, started training at DDS
when I didn't have any knowledge.
Like, I knew wrestling.
I knew like a knee cut in jiu-jitsu,
but I started training with them
when I knew almost no jiu-jitsu.
And then I had to really work my way up.
So definitely in the training room,
like having one of these guys on my back,
or like there's a stretch of like a few weeks or months
when COVID first hit.
And there was just like four of the best grapplers
in the world.
And we just did drilling and live rounds
with these four guys.
And it was just, it was hard.
It was very hard.
Every round doing six rounds,
seven days a week with the best grapplers in the world.
And it's like, you get no break
and you're forced to learn on the go.
So I think for me in the training room,
that was definitely my toughest matches.
And that's where I built those mental calluses.
There was a period where I drew with Nikki Rod
probably what, nine months, 12 months.
And typically speaking, like I said, no warmups.
The first round, we usually take it pretty easy.
First round, you start in mount.
The whole room, the rest of the training room,
they take mount very lightly.
Me and Nikki Rod would be fighting to the death every day.
I felt like we did an extra round every day.
It was very grueling.
I'm very mean when I'm in the midst of drilling or live.
Like we would do, we would drill wrestling quite a bit,
like stand up and in the drilling,
like I just wouldn't like Craig taking me down.
Like we're not going live.
We're just drilling,
but I just wouldn't let him put me on the floor.
So things like that, you know.
I knew it would escalate.
Yeah.
So you mentioned mount,
like so you do positional training.
Would that be the hardest versus like live training open,
like starting from guard?
I would say mount and turtle definitely,
definitely made me very tough
because you've spent all this effort
getting off of bottom mount.
And then you got to get on top of a guy
and at the time I'm not that good at holding guys down.
So they escape quick.
And I'm like, fuck, I just tried to hold them down.
Got to go back down.
Same thing with a turtle.
It's like you start bottom turtle,
you're trying to explode, get out, get away.
And then you switch and this guy gets up pretty quick
and you're like, damn, I got to go right back down.
It was that constant circle, man.
It's very tough, but definitely, you know,
build some character on the mat.
What do you think is the value of positional training
in general in jiu-jitsu?
Actually this one, just interacting with you guys,
it's not commonly done in just like regular jiu-jitsu gyms.
What do you see?
Cause probably it's not commonly done
cause it's so, most of the experience is just frustrating.
Like if you're evenly matched,
you're basically frustrated the whole time.
If you're doing it right.
There's a psychological battle that happens
in like the mountain turn arounds.
It's like, you know, cause you,
maybe you get close to subbing a guy
and, or maybe you do sub them, you know,
when you start on turtle and you're on their back,
you finish them and then you get this high point.
And then immediately you got to go back down
to defensive posture.
It's very like, it's emotionally like up and down.
So it's hard to deal with.
Super important if you're one of the better people
in the gym, because it just puts you in positions
you don't find yourself in, in regular training.
So I think like a lot of,
if you're a big fish in a small pond
and you don't do positional sparring,
you're probably going to get exposed in competition.
You might even look silly in those positions.
So you really have to force yourself to do it.
Despite the fact that you're giving someone worse than you,
a position where they might catch you.
So you have to sort of put the ego aside.
Yeah, that's one of the things
when I was training regularly,
of course, training with you guys, it's like trivial,
but I didn't work on putting myself in bad positions
when you get better and you regret it.
Cause the big negative thing it has,
consequence it has on competition
is you don't take as many risks
cause you're kind of afraid for your back to get taken,
all that kind of stuff.
That was me before I went to DDS.
I remember I showed up there in that old position.
I was like, fuck this, you better earn this position.
Yeah, exactly.
I didn't really have escapes.
That was a learning curve for me, for sure.
Do you see the value in positional training
or is it just the source of tremendous frustration?
Yeah, I definitely think it plays a big part
in your confidence when you step out
onto the competition mats,
being confident that even if you get put
in the worst possible situations,
you know what to do and know how to work out of them.
So I had a long argument with Haja Gracie when you visited
and he thinks Mal is the most dominant position,
even Noggy versus Beck.
Is there a case to be made for that or no?
I think all of your opponent's utensils,
their tools are in the front of them.
So if you're on mount,
they still have, there's a few ways to get out of mount.
I think if you're on somebody's back,
I'd personally much rather be on somebody's back than-
Flattened out.
I'd rather have someone's back and then flattened out.
Boots in, flattened out, yeah, yeah.
Boots in, flattened out.
So not even body triangle, but just flattened.
Just completely flat.
Almost like the position I'm in where you see guys
get finished because they can't get out.
I think that position is probably
the hardest position to escape.
Can you see what Haja's talking about with mount
or is he just that good at mount that he says that?
He might mean the gi, cross collar, you know?
I don't know.
Or did he mean-
Well, he says controlling-wise,
he just believes that you can complete,
that there's, he actually thinks there's more ways
to get out from the back than there is from the mount.
Prior to the-
Getting up, including like physically.
Prior to the kipping escape,
I'll probably agree with him.
But that kipping escape's so difficult to manage.
It's the funny looking escape where your legs are wiggling.
People have a lot of trouble.
It's like super hard to learn how to do,
but then once you learn how to do it,
the effectiveness is just huge.
Yeah, it's a weird one.
When did that come to be a thing?
Is that pretty recent?
I mean, I saw DDS guys using it first, I think.
Yeah, yeah.
Who's the first guy to discover something like that?
This seems like a ridiculous thing to discover.
Yeah, like what if I just wiggle?
Yeah.
I thought it was a joke at first.
I was like, you guys really doing this?
Yeah.
All right.
I remember somebody showing me like a technique where,
like if you just like walk your hand on a mat
or something like that.
Make an arm triangle or something?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Walk the arm on the arm high.
And it's just like a funny discovery.
Like as opposed to like trying to like shove it in,
just like walk it.
I like doing that to people,
but with things that aren't true.
You know what I mean?
I'll just tell them this is a technique
and watch him try to work out if I'm being serious or not.
Yeah, that's what you do when you achieve guru status.
They'll just listen to you like you're Steven Seagal.
See what they'll believe.
Speaking of which, how do you balance,
you have to travel all across the world.
How do you balance that with running a school
or being a world-class jiu-jitsu athlete?
I mean, the secrets of travel for me are two drugs,
Xanax and Midafinil.
That's how we time adjust and we hit the ground running.
But-
What does Midafinil do?
Xanax puts you to sleep.
Yeah, I mean, I have narcolepsis.
It's a narcolepsy medication.
But-
How does that work with the steroids?
I mean, they work well together, you know?
Focus and physical recovery.
But in terms of traveling and training and stuff,
it is, I mean, we're lucky
because we've got so many high-level guys.
So we can travel and they're still in good hands.
I mean, it would be a problem if me,
Nikki Ryan and Nikki Ryan left and the gym had Ethan,
that would be a problem.
But we've got to make sure it's not just in that.
Although everyone says they're happy when you're gone.
So that's the moment I heard.
Happy when I'm gone, but they do miss me.
Yeah.
For sure, until I get back.
All right.
What about you?
Just like balancing,
do you try to stay completely focused on competing?
Like for some of the big matches you have coming up,
are you able to kind of diversify?
Well, I like to diversify my training to where,
if I don't have a competition scheduled,
I'm more focused on skill development and getting better
and broadening my tool shed.
But if I'm like six weeks before comp,
I really start amping up the intensity
that I bring into the mats
against bringing some of that visualization
towards practice.
And maybe I train less volume pre-competition,
but higher output per session.
Yeah.
What's a perfect week of training look like?
If I'm not in competition mode,
I would say Monday, Wednesday, Friday, twice,
every other day, just once.
If I'm pre-comp, just Monday to Sunday, once a day.
So that's on the mat.
You're doing the full like positional training,
live training.
Bicep curls.
Oh yeah, I do a lot of bicep curls.
Yeah, I lift a few times a week now.
Yeah.
Cardio or no?
Cardio is all mat stuff.
Cardio is all mat stuff.
I do do some CrossFit workouts,
like CrossFit, I'll do like some EMOMs
or some AMRAPs or CrossFit terms.
That's for Instagram?
Yeah.
But yeah, CrossFit is a good way
to kind of like push that threshold.
Sometimes on the mat, because I'm so good,
I can't always get that like full red line.
So I'll hop in across the gym
and I'll do some workouts that bring me closer to death.
What about you, Craig?
What is a perfect week in training look like?
Like when you're back home training?
I try to be in the gym twice a day, every day,
when I'm back, just because I travel a bit more
than these guys.
So I try to be there eight and 12 every day,
hang out in between.
Definitely, usually train both of those sessions,
depending on how my body feels.
So doing positional, doing every technique,
positional, live?
I should probably do more positional,
but because I'm just trying to work on wrestling and stuff,
and especially leading up to the Volkanovskis last fight,
I was trying to wrestle more and focus on those areas,
even before I traveled over there,
just some experimentation with some stuff.
But yeah.
How do you experiment with stuff?
So there's regular positional stuff,
but when you have ideas,
do you do it during the training sessions
or do you do it outside of that?
Do you get together with somebody?
Usually every session,
I show up with something I'm thinking of,
usually something from top,
maybe something from bottom,
and then I just try to maybe pick the right people.
Some people, obviously, I'm just fighting to the death with.
It's not a good time to experiment.
And then others, obviously,
you can play around with ideas on.
Okay. What about you?
What's a perfect week look like?
Maybe, well, you said you're 100% now.
Yeah.
So yeah, honestly,
I have pretty much the same schedule as Nicky Rod.
So Monday, Wednesday, Friday,
I do twice a day, every other day, once a day.
And then normally,
noon practice is like our biggest class.
That's where all the pros go in.
So I tend to do more open rounds there.
And then we have a 7 p.m. class as well,
which is more hobbyist.
And that's where I'll do my positional rounds
and force myself to be put in bad positions.
So you have what you do 8 a.m., 12,
like in terms of what B-team has,
8 a.m., 12, and 7 p.m.
And the hobbyists are more 7 p.m.
Yes.
Okay.
Do you believe in over-training?
Do you think you can over-train?
I used to not believe in it.
But then I got hurt.
I was like, all right.
Oh, you attribute that to over-training?
Dude, I'm telling you, I trained,
I lifted like a bodybuilder for like seven years.
And by lifting, I mean, I was lifting seven days a week.
And I trained arms most days.
Like almost every day I would do like four or five sets
and get a pretty good bicep pump in addition to my lift.
I think I had to contribute somewhat towards my training.
Fair enough.
Well, what about on the actual mat over-training?
Like spending too much time on the mat?
Psychological, physical over-training?
I think you can definitely over-train,
but it's more of a, like as your body's healthy,
you have to make sure your mind is sharp.
Like sometimes maybe taking a day away
or even diverting your attention
in a different aspect of training
can help you be a little bit sharper overall.
Sometimes it can be like, it can get a little stagnant
because you're doing the same stuff over and over.
But I think if you just keep like over-training,
then your overall baseline just gets higher
and you become accustomed to that.
What about you?
You don't seem like a guy that over-dr...
I've heard of it.
Never been close to it.
No, I think controlling how hard you train
is definitely, protects you from injury.
You know what I mean?
Like if you're redlining yourself
and then you're fighting to the death in the gym,
that's 100% when you're gonna get injured,
gonna get sick.
So I try to make sure I've had enough sleep.
I've had obviously enough food post-training
and that sort of helps me to train a bit harder,
but still try to avoid redlining myself too much.
I think established also,
like what days are gonna be your peak days?
Because throughout the week,
if you're training seven days a week,
you're gonna have ups and downs.
Like for me personally, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
usually my best days.
And besides that, I also have other great days.
All my days are great.
But Monday, Wednesday, Friday are also great.
You're like unable to admit
that some days are rougher than others.
I'm always on, bro.
Okay, what advice would you give
to people who are not always on, hobbyists?
How to get better?
Like people that are already there, I don't know,
Purple Bells, Brown Bells, Black Bells,
they're just like doing like a couple of times a week
or something like that.
Like how to get better?
I think being consistent,
like find a schedule that you can consistently train.
Maybe it's like three, four times a week
or even a little bit less.
Just be consistent over the years.
I think too often people are like,
oh, I wanna get really good really fast.
And it's like, definitely takes a long time
to get to where you wanna be.
What about what you're doing during,
like while being consistent,
what kind of stuff you're working on?
So honestly, I think one big thing for me,
which is something I actually started doing
once B-Team was formed was filming all of your rounds
and then watching it every day.
Cause then you can see what specific problems you're having
and then you can base your positional rounds
around those problems.
That's really interesting.
It's kind of depressing though.
Yeah.
Like sometimes I have to,
I edited this podcast for a long time.
I still do in part and I hate the sound of my voice
and like what I look like and stuff,
but it does make you better.
Yeah.
And I also hate the sound of Craig's voice.
That's what he looks like.
So editing this podcast will be especially difficult.
This will be doubly difficult,
but I'm glad the rest of you are here.
I don't know.
Do you watch competition footage of yourself?
Like do I analyze like-
Oh yeah, it's my confidence.
That's fucking good.
While you're doing curls.
Yeah.
I'm trying, I'll still watch it to base my confidence.
Is there advice you, Craig,
would give for hobbyists to get better?
I mean, just not every round
has to be a fight to the death.
I feel like you're going to get injured,
but it's out that way.
You're not going to learn as much.
It's tough.
I would say just as a black belt
who took Jesus very seriously for a very long time,
basically when you become a hobbyist,
your skill is basically slipping,
your age and your skill.
And so not taking stuff seriously
is actually its own psychological skill of like,
it's tough.
It's tough.
Like it's tough in a way that is different
when you're like a blue belt or something
that if you work hard and you train correctly,
you're going to get much better.
Here you're kind of-
You're looking downhill.
You're looking downhill and you're like,
yeah, I guess I'm going to enjoy the art of it.
Reframe the victory.
Like if it's a young upcoming guy
and he comes to meet you,
you're like, well, that's a moral victory.
Yeah, but then that has to happen.
You have to be able to not do that
to avoid the injury sometimes.
Like if you want.
So yeah, it's a different thing.
Plus with me, just because some people recognize me,
you have that probably.
You guys definitely obviously have that-
I've solved that problem.
How did you solve that problem?
Travel around, you do a seminar, anything like that.
It's believable that you could get submitted once.
But if they catch you, give them a few.
If people tell their friends
they submitted me in a seminar one time, believable.
They got me four or five times.
You've robbed them of that.
Okay, that's pretty funny.
But it's also, they have this energy,
like they think they're coming in hot.
And I usually like to just basically
get submitted quickly twice.
And just, it changes everything.
It makes it more fun.
I've noticed that.
Let them submit you twice?
Yeah, just like very quickly.
What are the options?
Make it last longer.
Hold off.
But then it's like, it's very hard to like,
yeah, if you're a very serious competitor
and so on, you take it seriously, then yes.
But then people go, people, what they try to do,
this probably is what happens to you guys.
They try to impress you by going super hard.
I have people every day come to my gym, try to take me out.
Yeah, I just stay sharp.
Come to practice, let's get it on.
Do you feel that energy?
I feel like I need to talk to Craig here for a second.
Like at a seminar, somebody is coming in really hard,
like a brown belt will come in
and they really want to impress you
with their technical side, they're a big fan.
They've been watching your DVDs.
What do you do with a guy like that?
Try and make a complete joke out of the role.
Give them the pass, mess with them, do stupid shit.
Like rob them of the realness of it.
Because it's stupid, I'm not gonna roll hard with strangers.
I feel like you should roll
with a circle of people you trust.
Injuries happen rolling hard with strangers
because that's the same way you get injured in competition
because you don't have that relationship with them.
And I should also mention,
that's probably not a good way to impress somebody's big,
just going apeshit, going 100%.
Oh yeah, that's not at all.
I think the beauty of jiu-jitsu
is like the camaraderie of it.
Like as you get to know each other,
it's like technical, like different ideas
you have and all that.
Yeah, okay.
Do you think gi jiu-jitsu is dying in popularity, Craig?
Yeah, it's long dead.
I think it's just, I mean, it just shows like,
I mean, I have heard some numbers on the viewership
for the gi world's finals
and they don't even compare to the undercard
of like who's number one events.
So I think like when I was coming up
and competing in the gi all the time,
you looked at those guys that won
black belt championships and you were like in awe of them.
It almost had that ADCC champion feel,
but now that's not the case.
You know, I just feel like that,
the younger generation aren't looking
at who's winning black belt, gi worlds.
I personally don't think,
and I don't think they're like,
they want to be that guy.
They want to be like a Ritolo, Gordon, you know,
those are the people they want to emulate.
So you think like the gi,
like IBJJF gi tournaments will just keep
declining popularity?
Oh, I think people will still do it.
I mean, it's easier I think as you're over 30
cause the gi is a bit of a slower thing
and the masters participation is bigger in the gi
cause obviously you know gi
is now hitting in a wrestling direction.
Wrestling and heel hooks, you're over 30.
That's a terrifying prospect, you know.
What's terrifying about the gi?
Less.
So I think in a participation rate,
the IBJF will still be good,
but I just don't think people are as interested
as they used to be.
Well, why is wrestling and heel hooks terrifying?
Like heel hooks I can vaguely understand
if you don't understand heel hooks.
If you work a desk job and you've never wrestled
and a guy double legs you,
that's gonna probably break your back.
You know, I think the older guys are scared of wrestling.
It's hard to wrestle at 40.
To learn wrestling at 40.
Yeah, I mean, I think it's even just hard in general
to do wrestling at 40,
but it's easy to pull half guard in the gi at 40.
I think it's hard to do judo at 40
and people still do it at 40.
Judo hurts more.
Judo's scarier than all of them.
Yeah.
I think, does wrestling really hurt at 40?
I don't know.
I don't know why I'm looking at you.
It does.
Interesting.
I agree with what you were saying
that judo looks like the most dangerous.
Like even their practice partners,
they're just getting slammed flat at the bueno.
Yeah, I mean, I did judo for a really long time.
There's a lot of people that are 40, 50, 60, do judo.
And they get-
They're the ones that are still alive though.
It's true.
Survivor bias.
You do a little bit of judo, right?
Me, I'm a yellow belt.
You're a yellow belt in judo?
I should be an instructor.
Promote you to orange.
I got a yellow belt in the sixth grade.
I believe it was the sixth grade.
I did it for about, I don't know, six months.
But you're also using judo in a competition basically.
Aren't you doing like harai type throw?
Like you're doing-
Yeah, I don't know where I learned that.
I just started doing it.
You just started lifting your leg in various ways
until the work?
Just figuring it out, yeah.
Okay, doing different kinds of trips.
I looked at the sand boat guys doing it.
I was like, can't be that hard.
Yeah, gave it a crack.
Well, they looked at your foot locks and they said,
that can't be that hard.
They said, can't be that hard.
Ban it from the tournaments.
All right.
What do you think is the best take down in no-gi jujitsu?
Like what, like if people were trying to train
for competition and so on,
like where you see the trends heading?
I think the foot sweep is like catching fire nowadays.
See a lot of foot sweeps, foot sweeps and arm drags,
I would say pretty, pretty popular in our sport.
Arm drag, just go arm drag to the, okay.
Arm drag either to get them, like get to behind them
or even just to cause reactions,
make them pull away and we can start reattacking.
Are you talking about it in a context
of what's the best take down to score?
What's the safest take down to mitigate the risk
of guillotine submission or most effective in general?
Yeah, most effective combined, yeah, yeah.
I mean, ultimately it's about scoring.
I think any sort of body lock, you know what I mean?
Locking your hands around the body,
you've been able to put them to the floor that way.
I feel like that's most effective,
safest, might even have arisen out of a leg attack,
a leg entry, upgrade to the body.
What about like foot sweeps, like outside foot sweeps?
What do we?
I would say, yeah, you know,
foot sweeps from outside foot sweeps
or even like something like you're tossing an opponent by
and you're sweeping the foot.
Yeah, those are all pretty safe.
See, why is that scary?
I don't understand.
It's not scary at all.
I think it's the lifts that are scary.
The lifts, yeah.
Who's lifting people?
I like a good lift.
No, not you, I mean, in master,
like we're talking about older guys doing no geeks.
Some of those old bosses take it very serious, you know?
They just start lifting.
TRT Worlds.
TRT Worlds.
They're coming to impress.
Grab or lift, all right.
Just for the gram, okay.
What about submission?
What's your favorite submission?
And what do you think is the most effective submission
except the buggy choke?
I would have to say the rear naked.
It's definitely the one that's hit the most
and the highest level of competition.
Was that, that was pretty interesting
to see you escape all that and to put it on.
That's the cool thing about EBI,
to see like the world-class athletes.
I was surprised that it's possible to escape
with you on his back.
Gotta try some B cream.
Oh yeah.
B cream, as it helps.
What's in the, what's the formula or is that a secret?
That is a proprietary blend, for sure.
Okay, but that's what you use for greasing.
That's what you greased before, allegedly.
This is either other application outside of grappling or-
I'm sure you can get creative.
All right, thanks.
Asking for a friend.
Is that R&C for you as well, rear naked?
Rear naked choke.
I mean, overall favorite for solidifying a finish
because you can put somebody to sleep, right?
Even if they don't want to tag, put them to sleep.
But as far as something I've been working on now
that I'm now starting to implement in competition,
Yoko Senkaku side triangle is a beautiful thing.
You have multiple options.
You have the triangle to finish.
If that fails, you have the komori.
You could break the arm.
You could also just transfer and take the back.
So Yoko Senkaku, I'm a big fan of
and I continue to progress and get better at it.
Have you ever broken anyone's arm?
Oh yeah.
I mean, the first few competitions,
cause I was like, you know, pretty athletic wrestler
going against like local black belts and brown belts.
Like one of my first matches, I broke somebody at Komora.
Pretty much every time I've got a heel hook,
which is only twice I've broken an opponent.
If I have a joint lock, it's probably going to break.
Like a lot of times it breaks before they tap.
Yeah.
You seem like a really friendly fellow.
How hard is it to break an arm?
Or break a joint?
Well, I don't think it's that hard.
I think like, if you're talking about an arm bar,
we have this position to where like,
people are kind of holding on, holding on,
and then it slips and their arm starts going.
And then it just breaks before they even, you know,
get a chance to tap.
I love this point.
My knee bar had a guy and he didn't tap one time.
And it was actually, it was surprising.
I had to put a lot of force into that.
I suppose the arms, shoulders,
and the ligaments in the knees and ankles,
but to fully, this kid, Sambo kid, fully let it go.
And he tapped.
And I think the angle is like up here.
They're built different.
Hopefully he can be reconstructed different.
Yeah.
All right.
What about a straight foot lock?
You've ever, do you guys do straight foot locks at all?
Or no?
Yeah, I mean, I'm learning them now.
We had some kid come, come into practice one day and like,
all of us straight for like, straight for like,
just this little like Polish kid.
Not only did he footlock everyone,
but he told the entire world he sent out emails,
called his friends and family.
We practically put a hit out on him in practice.
And he just stopped everybody.
Yeah. It's always interesting when you get like, yeah,
people that specialize can surprise you that this could be
effective stuff.
Do you think there's other stuff that could be still
discovered in jujitsu?
Like what, what areas do you think are ripe with techniques
to discover?
Like wrestling is really interesting now.
There's a lot of innovation happening in wrestling.
I think there'll be more innovation when we get people that
are more adamant about standing up from bottom position.
I think if we get more of the community, they're like,
all right, I want to get off the bottom.
I think.
Just stand up.
Just stand up.
How jujitsu doesn't work.
We actually changed the name.
How Samba doesn't work.
If you just did.
Did you really?
Yeah.
All right.
I'll change it to jujitsu when I pirate it and send it for
free to the entirety of the Soviet block.
Hey, Nikki Rod.
Do you think ego is useful for martial arts or does it get
in the way?
Okay. I think you need to use it in both ways.
For sure. Have an ego, like if you're,
if you're training competition mode,
but also it can prevent you from learning and progressing.
If your ego is too high,
like you really have to shut the ego down when you're in the
mode of learning and trying to develop skills.
Cause you're going to put yourself in these bad positions.
You're going to have issues with training partners that
aren't necessarily, you know, up to, up to your skill level.
But because you're in these bad positions,
you have to make these certain sacrifices.
And for sure, ego can be a good or bad thing.
But if you're able to shut the ego off and learn,
then that'll have huge progression.
When it's time to put the ego on into use during
competition.
When's the last time you put a shut the ego off.
It's been a long time.
What about you Craig? Do you, do you, I mean,
you seem to be super easy going. Is there like,
is the ego just not part of it?
Oh, for sure.
I just don't want anyone to know they've damaged my ego.
You know, you have to suppress it deep down.
There's a child underneath all of it, crying always.
For sure.
I think ego is good for a bit of perseverance, you know,
like it will help you stick it out against a tough battle
with a training partner.
For sure.
A bit of ego is on the line.
Plus the bands are back and forth.
We're trying to like stir each other up a bit.
I think that helps hone, sharpen the ego a bit.
Oh, what about you?
Do you try, do you seem like a super humble guy?
Is there like a monster underneath?
It's a total act.
Who's in the basement?
Ego's a big motivator.
You know, I think it's very good to have in the aspect
that it like, it'll drive you to help,
to want to be one of the best in the world.
But like Nikki Rod said,
you need to be able to turn it off in the training room
and, you know, force yourself into bad positions
where you may not be winning.
Are there like, you know, Donna Hurst mentioned Boris.
Are there like grapplers, like Boris,
this is a question from Reddit actually,
Boris-like characters,
anybody you've trained with in the past who doesn't compete,
but is just an absolute beast in training?
Like people you've met that are just like.
Well, somebody that I think has probably
the best like submission grappling in MMA.
I think like Gilbert Burns is a,
his submission grappling is very, very good.
I trained with him early on in my grappling career.
And I was really impressed by his ability to move,
hold down opponents that are trying to stand up.
And as a whole, you know,
he can get submissions and put people away.
Have you, when's the last time,
have you trained them recently or no?
No, it's been a few years.
Which is so impressive ability to submit you're saying?
Yeah, like, I mean, you know,
you would see, I'd see Gilbert go against a few,
like pretty decent black belts in the room and farewell.
And, you know, maybe he gets to their back, puts a choke on,
and it's like Gilbert's super high level grappling
or submission grappling.
Yeah, but he's pretty widely recognized as a monster.
So I don't know, you didn't really answer the question.
I think you're not even listening anymore.
What was the question?
Doesn't matter.
All right, well, is there people,
like you've done all these seminars,
especially in the Eastern Bloc that you've seen,
like you went to Kazakhstan,
is there killers out there that-
Oh yeah, there's tough guys out there.
Obviously I don't remember the names,
nor could I pronounce it if I did,
but definitely some tough guys out there,
obviously carrying skillsets over from wrestling for sure.
Not Sambo, but wrestling.
But yeah, are there just people that surprise you
that just don't compete, that are really good?
Have you met those?
I feel like it's less so today,
because there's so many more athletes in the sport,
but definitely when I was coming up
back in Australia and stuff,
there were guys I'd train with that wouldn't compete
and that would be super tough rounds for me.
Yeah, and there's so many more avenues
for competing in general, so yeah.
What about you?
Have you met some monsters?
Yeah, one guy I could think of in particular is Jason Rau.
He trains up in Long Island, I think, right?
Opened up his own gym out there.
Vanguard.
He used to compete, but he would never be able to compete
at the same level he would train at,
so now he's just focused on mainly opening up a gym
and teaching his students.
But he was a guy that was extremely good
in the training room, world-class.
I still think to this day he's legitimately
one of the best in the world,
but just doesn't compete anymore.
Who wins in a fight, a lion or a bear?
Polar bear?
That's for you, right?
No, not a polar bear.
It's a good question.
See, the polar bear is pretty impressive.
No, grizzly bear.
Grizzly bear.
I think a grizzly bear wins.
Well, who was the most threatening predator in Australia?
Well, I mean, it's a tricky question here
because everyone's scared of the animals in Australia,
but I mean, you get bitten by a snake, bitten by a spider.
That's not that bad.
Bear, America, bear would just hold you down to eat you.
That's a much more terrifying prospect for me.
Even sharks.
Shark's going to be quick.
No one sees the shark coming.
The shark's just going to bite you in half.
Bear will take a bite and chew.
A bear just holds you down and eats you.
So that's frightening for me.
Australia's a bunch of just weird shit that can kill you.
Did you see Cocaine Bear, the movie that's coming out?
I saw the trailer, it looks good.
Yeah, yeah.
So there's not every bear,
there's like black belts and there's black belts,
there's bears and there's bears.
So I think that's what they often don't talk about.
Everybody puts lions and bears in the same category.
I think there's just some weak bears.
A lion would kill a black bear, I think.
Not every black, again, I'm trying to tell you,
there's difference.
But grizzly and polar bear, I'm betting on those.
Yeah, no, I think grizzlies have the size,
but actually every video I've seen of grizzlies,
they die out within like 20 seconds.
They get bored.
That's the gas tank?
Yeah, the gas tank.
That's a Nikki Ryan gas tank, right?
Yeah, that's all they got.
Dream old.
And they try to just take a breather.
Like there's these crazy fights between bears
in the last like 20 seconds.
I heard this story about a Russian family
that was attacked by a bear in Russia and killed the dad.
And it took so long to eat the daughter,
she made three phone calls to her mom while I was eating her.
And the first call, the mom thought she was pranking her.
That's crazy.
That's way scarier than what we've got today.
Give me a snake bite any day.
Yeah.
You know what, let me change the question,
is like if you had to fight a bear or a lion,
how would you try to defeat it?
Do you think you have a chance at all?
Well, I think I'd attack a lion a little bit differently
than I'd attack a bear.
What would be the difference?
Okay, well, I've seen this video where a lions are eating
and you have three like scrawny guys walk up behind them
and kind of scare the cat off of their food.
I think maybe I produced some props,
scare the lion away, right?
But if I have to fight it straight on,
I mean, the thing is that even if you take the back,
like you can't like bite it or choke it,
the mane is too big to lock your hands around.
You know?
Are you sure about that?
Because the mane is just hair.
Yeah, the mane is just hair.
It's thin hair.
It's like matted hair, right?
I don't know.
So I think-
Do you think you can beat James back a draw on a lion?
Maintain, yeah, yeah.
But getting there, I think I fake how I go low.
Make them think I'm going for the foot or something,
and then I take a little pause sweep and I take the back.
What about a bear?
I feel like they're easier.
That might be easier to take, to hold back control.
Yeah, maybe the thing is if the bear falls on its back,
it's just going to crush it so big,
substantially bigger than a lion, right?
Like a full-grown grizzly.
And they're also like terrifyingly loud
with their rewards and stuff.
Yeah, I think so.
First of all, if I saw Grizzly,
I'm like, all right, he's going to attack me.
I try to yell a little bit louder than him.
Maybe the term a little bit, like give him a huh, you know?
And then, yeah, for sure, I try to get behind it.
I probably go like something weird,
maybe like pull the eyes out or something, you know?
For sure, I mean, I'm going for the vital organs, you know?
Play dead.
Play dead.
And then oil check it.
There's no pride in that.
Wow, pride even matters.
See the ego, the same advice you gave,
you got to put the ego aside with a bear.
Even then, even then.
How would you fight a bear or a lion?
Just play dead?
Play dead, yeah.
Could you beat a kangaroo?
A kangaroo.
Oh yeah.
Kangaroo?
I'd beat the shit out of a kangaroo.
You reckon?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, are we boxing gloves?
We just like...
How would a kangaroo attack a human?
Try to kick them with the claws.
Knock them down and then they choke them.
Stand on that tail.
Do the kangaroos do?
They choke each other, yeah.
They don't choke each other.
You don't believe me?
You want to watch a video?
They choke each other out.
I've seen this, yeah.
Help?
Yeah.
Is it real?
Yeah, yeah.
With which?
They do this.
Headlock or what?
Yeah, they knock them and just grip like this
and hold them.
What's the grip?
Just a little pause.
How are they gripping?
I promise you.
I'm not lying to you.
Pretty sure I've seen the video.
They also do strange shit.
Like if there's a predator around,
they'll wait in a pool of water
and then if it comes to attack it, they drown it.
They're pretty smart.
Okay, speaking of which,
what's the most effective martial art
for winning a street fight?
You talked about rule sets and streets.
I think you've talked about being a street.
Have you ever been in a street fight?
Yeah, just one.
Yeah.
Nothing special, nothing crazy, hey.
Yeah, you don't talk about that time.
Like for self-defense purposes,
what would be a strategy on the street?
What's the advice?
I feel like whoever wins the street fights,
whoever's willing to take it the furthest, the fastest.
You know what I mean?
If you're thinking that you're going to box
and he's biting you, poking your eyes,
that guy's going to win.
He wants them more.
You know what I mean?
The track heads fight,
they go for the kill straight away.
So I feel like it's more about
who's willing to do the most
that's going to win that fight.
Fastest, the most fastest.
Who's got the least to lose, you know?
Okay, we could also define winning differently
because you could also run away.
But in terms of technique-wise,
wrestling, judo.
I think if it's a one-on-one,
I'd go wrestler wins,
but if it's like multiple people,
you got to go Muay Thai,
stay on their feet.
Can't go down to the ground if it's more than one person.
Yeah, big double leg maybe.
Yeah, double leg, put them asleep on the impact, right?
Forehead to the ground.
Yeah, what's the goal here?
Is to win the fight and not go to prison?
I haven't thought of it through that way.
Yeah, certainly, yeah.
Yeah, not to kill the person.
You got mutual combat here in Texas, we're good.
Is that in Texas?
Do you know what the paperwork for that looks like?
Do you have to actually sign something?
Or can you just say?
I hope I don't need to find out.
I did hear a story where guys were on Sixth Street
and they looked at a cop.
They were like, mutual combat, mutual combat.
And just got the cops to say yes and just duked it out.
But it could be false though.
That sounds crazy.
I kind of admire that,
but I've also been playing Red Dead Redemption recently.
So I've internalized the cowboy a little too much.
Just to return to gym stuff.
No, because it's a business,
because you're running a business, there's money involved,
but you're also friends, but you're also training partners.
Is there a tension that money creates
that threatens to destroy friendships?
That's something I always worry about with money.
I try not to go do any kind of business
with friends or family.
I think if we're all very clear and honest and open
at the start, it makes it much easier.
I think people have issues when there's kind of like,
things are written in fine print
and nobody knows the exact answers.
And a lot of judicial guys can't read.
That makes a change as well.
We're learning that today.
Yeah.
Hey.
No.
Definitely complicated though.
Yeah, I mean, it's not always obvious
how to be transparent and stuff.
About everything.
Have you felt that tension?
Because in the digital world, money's not really unlimited.
Just running a school, what's that like?
Because this is the first time you're running a school,
running a gym.
Yeah, I mean, it's just constantly updating people
about what's going on, what your expectations are.
You know what I mean?
We've had some problems with coaches who I feel like
think the pie is bigger than it is.
You know what I mean?
They feel like maybe we're getting rich out of this
and they're missing out on things.
So it's like even amongst managing staff
that can be challenging too.
So yeah, I mean, it's a constant work in progress
to make, not only to make sure everyone's happy,
but to make sure they're comfortable enough to reach out
and tell you they're unhappy.
But I feel like those challenges are common
amongst any small business.
Still, it sucks.
Just to mention, I'm clueless to this,
but I'm just not learning this.
Somebody I met and talked to and I really like is Isaac.
And he just learned.
Because you're also active on Reddit.
What's your name on Reddit?
My name is John Belushi's mom.
As undercover as possible, you know?
Oh, it's not you.
It's actually John Belushi's mom, right?
So I've done my research, I guess.
And I guess you guys had a falling out and have split.
I just want to say that, I don't know,
the few interactions I've had with him,
he's a beautiful human being.
And that just shows to me-
Visually, maybe not internally.
And sexually, just the experience.
No, he's just a kind person, I don't know.
I liked him a lot.
Like, to me, in a business setting,
yeah, tensions are created and it sucks.
I don't know.
I mean, I suppose money,
all the stuff that happened in the jungle aside,
probably money had a role to play to create extra tension.
Money and egos about who was the leader,
who is not the leader, it's tough.
It's tough to manage that kind of stuff.
I've seen it happen with jiu-jitsu schools a lot.
I don't know exactly what,
because it's like, there is also a hierarchy
inside grappling jiu-jitsu schools,
like people that are better or not.
There's literally ranks, black belt and brown belt.
There's like competitors that are better.
I mean, it's a weird dynamic in which to operate.
Because usually there's more politeness in humanity
layered into the way a company works.
But here there's just a bunch of,
I mean, it's like violence laid on display plus money.
It's crazy.
Is there something you could say to that?
Like how you try to minimize?
Or something you want to comment on, Isaac?
Yeah, I mean, it was unfortunate situation,
but it just didn't work out.
You know, like there's going to be personality clashes.
Some people-
I can't imagine anyone having a personality clash with you.
With me?
It's hard to imagine.
Yeah, surprising.
You know, I mean, I didn't even know what to say on that.
I don't want to touch on it too much,
but obviously his expectations about his role in the gym,
obviously different from ours,
led to some personality clashes that were sort of unresolved.
You know, some things happen that can't be resolved.
He can't fix those things.
You know, obviously a lesson, I hope for both of us,
definitely a lesson for me from a management role
to try to address these things sooner.
But also sometimes I came up in a different time
where there was no money, no opportunities.
I had to pave that way totally for myself,
especially coming from Australia.
Like being a professional athlete in jiu-jitsu was not,
I think so I had to pave a lot of opportunities for myself.
And I feel like sometimes,
I don't know what the right word is.
Sometimes people don't appreciate
some of the ways you help them.
And they just think, feel like almost they deserve
or are entitled to certain things.
And that is very difficult to manage.
But I think again, like we both see the situation different.
I do hope he finds a better,
a more comfortable place to train.
But yeah, obviously I've known him for a long time,
sort of like a brotherly relationship.
So that's gonna really make personal problems a lot worse
when you're that close to someone.
I just hated that, like I've seen in jiu-jitsu especially,
but in other places where like close friendships
were destroyed because of like gym stuff,
like people running gyms.
And it just, as a person who is in this case, just a fan,
but in general just like a student, it's like sucks.
But again, in my position, sometimes I wonder
if there really was a friendship or mere opportunity.
I have to be careful of that with some people in the sport.
Is it a sincere relationship or like,
I mean, it's difficult for me to tell
or am I a means to an end?
Sure, but I think it's actually a trade off
because I think a lot of close friendships we have,
like even relationships we have, like when tested,
like can break if they're not properly communicated.
Some of it could be just misunderstanding
for a long period of time.
It's not explained through just like a lack of integrity.
It's just like you have to like talk through that shit,
like just be honest with each other.
Take some MDMA and really get down to it.
Drugs solve everything.
You've already heard it from this conversation.
I've actually haven't done MDMA yet.
People say that that's something I would enjoy a lot
because my brain is, I think, natural on MDMA.
I'd recommend it for sure.
For sure.
Is that what you did with Gabby on the outside?
Okay, nevermind.
She drugged me.
In general, why is there always seems to be drama
in the jujitsu world,
like outside of what's going on here?
Or is that just a-
I think it's universal to anything.
Drama is everywhere and then drama rises to the surface.
Drama makes the money.
Yeah, I wish there was a little bit less.
You have a bunch of, like we mentioned some of them,
you have a bunch of instructionals out.
What are some interesting things
that you're looking forward to exploring
in terms of teaching?
So Just Stand Up is your most recent one, right?
Yeah, you also have one called Power Bottom,
an Inclusive Modern Approach to the Guard.
Yep, yep.
What are some other ones?
False Reap Allegations.
False Reap Allegations, yeah.
By the way, people talk about Power Bottom,
again, hilarious title,
but they say it's a really good instructional,
unlike The Guard.
Yeah, I try to at least be innovative,
like everyone else,
I feel like is ripping off John and Gordon,
putting some sort of slant on that.
So I'm trying to take sort of a different approach.
I think you can actively influence the sport
with what you release
because people are going to try to emulate that.
So I think that's those type of instructionals,
Just Stand Up, Power Bottom,
like approaching the sport differently,
I think definitely has a positive impact
on how people play the game.
Yeah, are you working on something now?
Probably a fundamentals course,
just because we're bringing out,
we're doing the wide belt program coming in.
So I'm trying to develop a fundamentals course
along the line of the constraint-based learning stuff
we were talking about today,
like a way to approach learning as a beginner
to sort of speed up the process a bit
and not make it as so technique dense,
at least have it a bit more fun.
And focusing in on just like examples of problems to solve.
Exactly, yeah.
Approaching judiciary learning that way.
Like, I mean, kids learn quick through games,
I think adults are capable of that
to a certain extent as well.
You're releasing that instructional
on pre-match preparation?
Yes.
What other stuff?
Do you have a thing on a body lock pass?
Yeah, I have a body lock or a riding lock DVD
or instructional.
Yeah, I have the pre-match ritual coming out.
I also have, I'm filming how to build athleticism
for grappling.
Just really trying to capture different angles,
kind of like the same with Craig Zone,
try not to do the same thing that everybody else does.
There's a ton of wrestling,
ton of jiu-jitsu instructional, so.
And the steroid results are coming in.
Oh yeah, yeah.
More plates, more dates, you know,
Derek that runs that hit me up for a blood panel test,
like an impromptu thing.
And I did it a few days ago
and I believe the results will come out shortly.
Oh yeah.
Do you know the results?
What are you betting on, Lex?
What do you think?
It's hard to believe.
Yeah, it's very, very impressive.
You're putting me in an awkward position here.
Do you think you'll face Gordon soon?
I'm open to it.
I don't know how soon, maybe in the next six months.
I could see me facing him before ADCC Worlds.
I think that's a great rivalry.
I think it's a really interesting one.
It's fun for me.
Is there any chance that the two,
the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany get back together?
That DDS under whatever name gets back together?
No, absolutely not.
Highly unlikely.
I mean, we kind of did this to, you know,
to back up Nikki Ryan and we're sticking with our guy.
So what do you think?
Yeah, I think there's just too many personality conflicts
for it to really ever work again.
Do you think there will always be war in the world?
War?
Yeah.
Oh yeah, I think from the beginning of time,
it's been some kind of war, some kind of battle.
Controversy is what helps people evolve.
Until AI, super intelligent AI
becomes way more powerful than humans
and humbles all of us with its power before it destroys us.
Oh, until it runs out of batteries.
You guys are screwed.
I'm really fortunate to be able to hang out with you,
to train with you.
And thank you so much for talking today.
This was the best ending.
Thanks for listening to this conversation
with Craig Jones, Nikki Rod, and Nikki Ryan.
To support this podcast,
please check out our sponsors in the description.
And now let me leave you with some words
from Miyamoto Musashi.
You must understand that there's more than one path
to the top of the mountain.
Thank you for listening and hope to see you next time.