IN DEPTH | EPISODE 03 | ALEX O SULLIVAN

Ringkasan

David sits down with veteran amateur MMA fighter Alexander O Sullivan. Alex talks about his career so far and what's next for him, balancing coaching with competing, and much much more.

Transkrip (youtube_captions)

[Music] so i'm here at cmac today with alex alexander sullivan the og of the amateur game how are you alex doing great yeah absolutely tough to be on the podcast now or the this uh this interview because it's getting getting us all used to the uh media sort of things that will be so important when i go pronoun um so i'm looking at the debut soon so this is a you know really important to me to get this kind of practice in going forward you know get to get the profile out there as well build the support that i'm looking for at going on probably the fan base and that kind of thing get the publicity so i really appreciate it perfect i really appreciate your time uh you've been in the amateur game for a long time now the big question of everyone was when you were going pro um but i actually want to take you back to the start of your career um when did you start mma why did you start when and why basically so the to take honor right right back to the very start kind of my first involvement with the combat sports was in georgia and my second one when i was known in local kilmoyen a gm runway a guy called caron fowley and he was a he was an olympian and that was a big big deal i kind of you know for me that he had made it to the highest level of sport and he was just a local going from blanchetto and so that was kind of my first and he was a great coach and that was my first point of entry into combat sports and i ended up being a blue belt in judo i never got my went down for my brown and black belt because i stopped doing it to pursue however may whenever when i was about 15 i stopped doing georgia completely i wouldn't mind actually going back at some point a little bit later maybe and getting that black belt because it's just something that you know would mean it would mean with me you know i'm just kind of it's good it's good credential as well i think to have the black belt you know because i do like i do like each other i do incorporate into my game in mma would be nice to have that full black belt credential so basically i did shield up just for the two years before i started on boxing and i boxed literally next door to this gym in my holder boxing club i used to be saint bridges and then it's caramel hunter now mba and that got me into destroying sort of things then and that was it that was a great experience i had a few had a few votes for them and i had another few votes for dumb boying then which is the the next village down from ranchers town it's just in made and before i actually boxed the lc macdown as well once we had a boxing license available so in the end i had about 35 30 30 35 boxing flights um when i was in my teens and i won a i won the lancers and the dublins and the dublin leagues and i came second in the islands twice until consecutive years and i was unfortunate i didn't manage to get there it's going into the team of my career you know i get to get to the final of the tournaments and then i haven't managed to get the goals all the time you know nearly like the irish craig jones when it comes to that you know and i ended up coming to runner-up twice in the auto unboxing um but it's incredible to get there because you have to win the the dublins to get down into the dublin you're the dublin representative to fight against the representatives of the other provinces and that kind of thing in the auto and so you know it's always you always get a good few fights in the lead up to the all launch every year so that's how i ended up having a 30 like over the course of four four years or so i was going to get a box in the high performance team as well and that was you know incredible kind of brought get to see the high level training that they were doing hopefully thousands go on to be like in the olympics and that kind of thing so that really brought me to a higher level of training and so then i pretty much boxing and giorda um together from my early teens and then training mma up here we had uh the first go to start that started the gym that was it was his wolf that he had on him he was the jesus coach at the time and then he was gone so then we were just kind of trying to make on the gown through learning as we go for a while um and training in very training we're trying to a lot of the labs in the amazing i'm quite friendly with a lot of lads that people would know and that's always picked up so much stuff and then basically i started doing k1 when i went when i was 15 and to try and try and add kicks into my game from the boxing that gave me the hands and the gioda and judith i've been training for grappling so when i went i did k1 i had six k140s and i went six now and i won an adult total an adult oska belt when i was 16 and i think it was 60 kg and that was one that was my last uh k140 that's all i did like i went six and i got the amateur belt and then went into mma and i've never really looked back i've never really um you know wanted to go back to k1 i need that but i still i still had like you know six on our record before oh yeah transitions kind of fully to mma and then when i was 16 then i had my first amateur fights um against adults because i was coming to spell for now i was 18 at the time so um i went i went um so i thought first flight was unreaction that's a show that's not around anymore um and we won that boy tko and the third round i think it was and then i fought on rumble and rush which was also also not around anymore and i won that really naked chalk in the first round so that i was kind of showcasing like i had that hands and my my grappling was getting gold as well so and i was only 16 at the time so i was a big duck i had like i was very into it you know i was like this is this is what i wanted the other side and i was racking up a good few fights because in this first year fight and i think i ended up with a lot of voice actually in that same yeah so it's my third fight by far um right option again and uh against tom murray on the one by armor in the first round and then my fourth flight was martin zambala and it was i think i won the second round and he's gone pronoun and he was fighting there last weekend this was great to see dallas lads still involved still doing well and then hopefully i'm going to get to that level as well like you know my own my own pro career kicks off soon like you know it's great seeing him doing well um so after martin then i had my first loss against the undrum girl on battlezone so that was a that was a tournament format so the four man in the tournament was me own and all went on to win i think it was a silver medal in the imax he was a solid for her and i think he moved abroad then i don't know now he's up that mouth and then at the other guy the other two guys know rhys mckay and he was obviously being in the ufc and all now so i was counted it i was i was probably a little bit ahead of where i should have been uh myself i kind of probably wasn't ready for reese as it happened they didn't fight rhys because they lost against arm and then reese b his opponent and then dallas still fought in the final tournament on the card and and reese won and then reece actually went prowl after after that tournament so that was it like he was ready to go pro i was obviously still 16 so i had a lot more ground to do and but it was great to be like involved in with such high profile athletes at that age so that was my first loss and um you know it it didn't really you know affect me too much i think you know i just knew what i had to do was trying to change my game uh more so really like i had one on my first four fights kind of comfortably like they're all boy stoppage and i was kind of when i was in that fight i realized i needed to you know keep it killed i had when things weren't going my way and that kind of thing so i know that was that was good as a 16 hour to try and you know change that like how you know just kind of i have to be winning at all times you know just kind of you know breed relax ease into it that was that was my fifth flight and then after that then my next fight was my next video next time i thought was a little bit later before aaron devlin um from taurus um on chaos which is a great child i was a great child that was a great noise i thought it would be him he was majority decision it was tough for you very tough fight like clouds for you i ended up getting the win but uh it was a great it was great noise because it was dekey macalena was the main event i think obviously was the call main or maybe the third last week and decking machine and james gallagher was the main event and it was just a crazy crazy so much support like in the in the venue and that was that was you know incredible to see you know james has gone on to have big teams in bellator and then deku as well um is serious about the pro experience now because he that was there about our product deals and he's fought in cage whereas i think he's doing well at the moment so that was another uh you know always cloud like it was a few votes before him so it's good to see hopefully my level is like you know with those with those last that's that's the idea i'm gonna get to their level now you know i'm old enough kind of with the i've grown enough to attempt it now i've finished college as well which is another reason why i pulled off um for a few years i've got my degree and now i'm ready to pursue the full mma career the pro career so yeah after then uh after that then i was fighting a fed away at the time i didn't really know how to cut weight or anything and so it was quite small for the weight so i was five and one haven't been four enough fed away so i decided to move down to bantam for the first time then and i fought for my first toil then uh first i'ma try and make oil against darren tomlin he was also a partner and and i won the decision that was my first toil on a kiln and then after that then oh yeah i ended up getting a kind of a string of toilets together after that because i was six on one and when you get that kind of record at amateur it's usually like good enough that promoters will try and like put a toilet on for you yeah you know so as a six on one i the next fight i thought was on headhunters in scotland and there's a great choice i fought a guy um of a scottish girl over there and i ended up winning decision as well and that was my second toil and then uh my boy after that was also a phantom on shinobi uh i think nowadays shall now be is uh changed its name to cage warrior southwest or south east or something like that and we've got taken over with a cage whereas franchise but it was a great shot of it's own way and i think it's wrong with the same people yeah so still it's still a top shelf done it was it was very very one of my favorite shows to play on to be honest and the one that built as well i found them so i was three belts in three flights um in quite a three-month period so that was pretty um pretty impressive and then i think so it was about eight and one then the next fight i fought down i believe was i moved up the federal way again to fight on adrenaline which is a well shot in swansea and i won that i won that belt that i was four belts and it was i think annoying in one or so and i uh like that i always think it was the calming or the third last one again and the main event was charlie ward for him he was also that was in the ufc and now he's on bellator so i was another like i've always been looking up to those guys that just ahead of me and i've been hanging around and i'm hoping that i'm able to get to that level when i when i go pro soon enough so that was another that was another belt and then that was my 66 belt so i've tried three phantoms out of three mountain belts 166 belt and then after that then i fought for my first lightweight belt on um i think it was a cage ring championships i think it was called at the time i think it was catering championships it was in the right venue which was kill and i won um i won that end decision as well at 17 it was the same day 70. um so it was at the time when i when i wasn't able to i didn't really like i didn't have any idea about nutrition or anything so like i was just walking somewhere around about sixty eight or six months out to me making the same day like at 70 was fine and like to just walk in the incoming area on the way and that worked i did win the belt so that that's why i have the belt at three bites so i have the phantom three bantamweight belts one feather at this point and then the one loyway belt so after that then i went to defend my 66 toil on adrenaline and then i got my second loss because oh yeah i lost against rory evans from wales and he's on cage warriors now he's doing well but uh he he won't i lost a decision klaus no football i didn't get the decision so then i think it was ten and two or eleven and two at that point when i went to the first oil master so i was still only 17 at the time so i had to spoof my age a little bit to get onto the um um so i went over and at this point there was no junior categories because they hadn't added them into the into the format so it was just it was just it was just open senior 18 years so it was just about 18 so uh you know it should have been fun it was fun i went over and my first vote was against the turkey road american wrestler or something and that just you know really i i beat him and then my next boy i fought at that time was a against a romanian um boxer with great hands i ended up beating him as well because i was able to keep l pointed them a little bit on the feet got the decision and then my third fourth in the semi-final then in prague this was a prague 2016 tournament i i just got held down and i just got taken i couldn't stop the takedown against the bulgarian for you and it was after that then when i really put a lot of effort into like grappling and wrestling trying to bring that on you know it was so important in the game i just i completely couldn't couldn't do anything against this good it didn't stop me i went to three rounds but just i couldn't get up so that really put focus on my grappling honey or made me want to focus on that so uh at this stage i think i was 13 and two and i just i'm off meddled and i had my five belts so i was in a you know i was in a strong position going forward and like you know i still am i took it it took us about six months off fighting them because my i saw you had like well so it always been bad i needed to wear glasses yeah and i started to like get where like i was nearly failing the medicals like on the reading the uh letters off the board kind of thing okay so i end up getting laser eye surgery then in the december so the the the november was the imaps and i did the laser surgery and i couldn't fight them for a while while they recovered and even now to this day they're still a bit more sensitive than they should be that they were pretty yeah because they kind of put like um new nerves in to to replace the ones that are like damaged or like faulty um and those new nerves are hypersensitive because they're like not really supposed to be in your away yeah you know i thought when i do one and you'll get yeah touch the pokemon it's it's worse that really pops are bad all the time but it's worse than it should be so i also have i've had to deal with since then but it's okay i know hopefully i don't get touched at the top you know the head movement enough but uh then when the next one after that was lee hammond in ireland on battlezone so that was the main event that was a big fight because he was the silver medalist in the same way category as me and oya had lost in the semifinal against the sangoi that had beaten him so always the bronze he was the silver in the same way this was kind of like a fight to say he was the best order for her um of that prague medal trip in the 70 category look um and he beat me in the first round handy enough flick took me down melt amber kind of job look you know so that was another thing i was going to need to stay focused on this i need to get better grappling with and lee's grappling his top top quality i was top-notch um it i wasn't ready to do that i had always felt but at the same time that's where i need to focus on so i've just been staying on it um and i was about yes i was 13 or three or so i saw something like that my record was i feel 15 16 points halfway through my amateur career but yeah like the the level of grappling and the oil mass is a big deal you know so that's where that's why i hit up another trailer after that then yeah to keep on that kind of wavelength you know um so after i fought lead and i won it i think it was an interim title at 70 second day um against leon hill owned by amber in the first um and i think carolyn clark was the actual champ at the time but was injured so i never actually got the belt because it was just like it was an interim toilet yeah and kieran still had the belt so i never actually got it i don't really count thousand belts but i think it was for an interim toilet or something at the time so i won that and then i went to i went to scotland to replace as like a light replacement for a boycott chris duncan who uh the problem 150 probably yeah so yeah he's a top pro for i think he's eight in one maybe yeah in a white container yeah he's great for it he's yeah he's great for so he fought him and the main thing was i fought him at 74 kg day before weighing um and like when i go pro i'm hoping to debut phantom so i was very undersized and because they took it kind of late and i knew chris was a good guy but it was probably a bad decision and because um the soyuz and and chris's scale as well meant that i couldn't win um after the second round with uh from uh lekki he actually ended up like breaking machine bomb from me uh uh checking his leg kicks real like real uh focused methodical for her like you just you just chopped me down um over the tail rounds in scotland as well the amateur fights i don't think this is always the case but for the two times only fought in scotland the amateur fights are forming around yeah oh really which is interesting the tale turns over there yeah so when i first won my belt i found them on headhunters it was 12 minutes to for the forty four was twelve minutes long and then it was the same in the chris for you i did eight minutes with him and yeah so i ended up building that one that was it that was a tough one though because chris was top class and obviously small as well and it was good experience to kind of like put yourself into the forum line sometimes and like you know it's really down against you and you can hang in there for as long as you can i mean yeah it shows you you have the heart you know um so then i went for the 66 kg toil on cage legacy next against jack mcguire and uh once again you know he is he proved his wrestling proof too much you know he took me down i think every round most of the most advanced position probably most rounds and you know just just was it was a clear decision win for jack and so there's a child with the same same thing we need to keep working on you know but it was getting better and you know it stuck to me because i then went through the image in rome after that i just i did it at 200 so there was a general category and i was still i think it was 20 now um and i went to rome and i got a silver i went i got to the final i had a few votes leading up to it um i beat the previous uh european champion in the semifinal stop uh filled me with confidence and i fought at a top kazakhstan and i lost a split i was close you know i thought i was beating him on the feed and it was just a little bit of a bit arresting changes he got a bit of better now but it was much better wrestling challenges than had been so it was a split in the end but i didn't get the decision it was unfortunate that i didn't get the gold um because that would have been nice to put come away with the gold so that was my second only math metal level 2 and that that was another incredible achievement i think you know for me for teal medals though too so the next fight after that was against alex yankov on the kilmer and he was gone he's gone proud now he's doing well the great fight there against martin the other week and i won in the second round and then like that was me that was my 66 i got six six belts that i was if that was my second 66 belt three bathroom and one lowly and again on a kiln with them that was uh against alex um i said after alex then i went to bahrain in 2018 i think it was yeah 2018 bahrain was i came third i lost in the semis again against the russian floor and the second one of my day just the the russian wrestling was so strong like first two rounds i was on the feet fighting and then he took me down saying the third round really shot on him thinking maybe you can put him on his back see if he's as good and wrestling up and yeah as i shot he he hip throw me into the air straight away look that the upper body clinch is so strong so i ended up coming end of bronze there so i was another medal as well so i got a medal three out of three at this stage so that wasn't an illegal thing to take away same kind of uh ending you know with the with the russians being too strong the wrestling being too strong but uh it was it was nice to take take away another medal from the tournament and that was a that was that gionee yeah that was a genre as well so i had to join and then my next on my tournament was at senior so i think the next fight i had was in he was in the imf then again at senior in the bahrain the following year and uh like that i won the two until one two or three fights in the leader to the to the semi final and then kazakh for you uh out wrestled me then klaus enough for you again but it was on my back for total and that was uh that was my another plot so four uh metal one silver three bronzes of four on enough competitions and look it's incredible because like i was only thinking about it recently on offline or you have over a hundred minutes in the olympic cage so wow one hour 40 minutes so yeah or something the only page i was never stopped and in my flights and i won more than fifty percent of them um i won nine of 13 or something like that and i've only lost four times so i'm like yeah maybe eight nine and thirteen somewhere yeah yeah i can't think of it i can't do the massive dude about knowing wins or something like that um so it was nice to have all those men have a lot of voice but the main thing was like this was the highest level of amateur competition you know in the world and you really see like it is because the only maths like a lot of the ownership goes so many imaf alumni alumni have ended up in the ufc and look looks about our top um organizations that pro like mohamed mockery was literally fought on the oimfs the last time we fought on it and he's in the ufc already yeah so you can make you can make that transition quick because the level is so hot so having fought in the highest level four times i meddled every time and been in there for about an hour and over an hour and 40 minutes with the best in the world and never been i've never really been in any danger of being stopped later like just in levels and positions that eventually the judges went against me when i did lives and then i have my stoppages of one by amber one with two ambers tko over there kind of thing and so i thought i took a lot from that i think just like you know going into other points it's like you know i've done an hour 40 minutes plus with the best in amateurs in the world like you know this won't be the amateur vote where i get stopped either either yeah so um i thought i take a lot from that as well i'm not sure enough from the i found the urge for it with the most omf cage though i'm not sure it's a possibility i guess so i'll check today as possibility because you don't want that like leigh did about four as well and he meddled he got the gold medal as well that that was that was a big deal winning that in the 70kg category as well when the mouse stacked that was a big deal for lee obviously he's still well probably he's training out when he's fighting i think next week you know yeah he's on is he is that so wet centurion with kiefer oh i think he's on a german show i think centurion is malta i don't know oh no yeah he is is it the heroes league or something like that i think i think he's on the german show but that's that'll be his fourth prophet and then he he won the gold but uh yeah i do i might have i might have more case on i i'm not sure though and maureen's plan has i think two goals in the olympics and here's a lot of times though so i'm not sure if that's correct but i do have a lot of time in the okay journey so that makes me feel confident kind of now and i've competed at that level for so long yeah and being fine you know and and held my own every time you know so that's it that's always like something like that's been in my mind you know kind of driving me on like you know makes me feel confident going pro and then after that then cover the road i was supposed to fight solomon in march um 2020 and that fell through i think it was the day before the fourth then i supposed to play parliament on because i said i felt true and sean mcconnell on clown wars that fell through so it went through that at least it was at least a year and a half and i was actually nearly two years i think where there was no fights happening from even though i was strong at the cafe it's trying to try and trail the um the restrictions i'm not going to think as best as they could but it didn't cover less than until i went to foyer and clown was then against turin and that's my last amateur for in august there um 20 21. it was good it was good for you know um klaus i lost display um i was impressed i was pressing over my performance that i still was like i'm going to go pro off this 34 such a round number um i found a few mistakes a bit of ring rules as well probably the thing was strong but uh i was impressed enough for my performance i was like yeah absolutely i got prayer off this and so then basically i could have gone proud immediately then after that in my own head you know i was ready to go with 34. it wasn't going to have 31 and i wasn't i'm not going to the owner my match because i'm kind of sick of like coming up second and third at this stage um but if the four of them were really the four they were really beneficial but i was like that's enough now i'm ready to ready to go basically like what happened was after the turning for you i put my head down to focus on my college career my college my final year in college and trinity to get the degree out of and then i got the degree there in may just gone so i'm ready to debut now um and while i was in college then because i wasn't fighting because i wasn't having any fights booked it allowed me that extra time then to focus on the rest of the lads in the gym and as a coach and kind of really embrace that couch and roll well i knew i wasn't fighting for about a year um and i thought that went really well because we've got a lot of a lot like we've been just extremely active like over the year on all the shelves we've won we've won belts um keith's one belt table belts so i defended them we've had jordan on the silver club team to keep our key and jordan joined uh won the nationals as well at their weight at 66 which was a big deal we've got ross back for you know as well he's had three fights since he's back and he he fought he last fought five years before he out everyone yeah he was out for that long and it was great to have him back because he's top top lad to train with top latte and look i was saying i was telling you it was earlier and that when i fought that at home for that belt in 2016 it was ross it was in my corner you know that's six years ago you know so he's been going a long time he's very skilled and you've seen a lot of things from him hopefully now going forward he's pointing for the orders team and with keith and jordan in two weeks time less than two weeks time now on uh on the the foreign action championships in liverpool so i will be going there uh with them as a coach and that's another great experience well also being an orlando team coach and this year so i went to before turning in august and then focused on my college and coaching i got my first organ team coaching gig in then in prague in september when my sister won the world cup and i was able to coach her and i was in the corner for a lot of lads catching passion and back on the team it was great you know being in the corner with the looks of andy ryan and and uh i was in the corner with john in abu dhabi when he was over there and i was in the corner with lee moog and um i'm not sure if we got on the corner with uh here on but just training and seeing how they couch it was incredible just to see you know from what i want to do where are you here at tmac yeah and to learn off them all those top coaches look so i got the couch in prague and then i got the couch in abu dhabi with the one team and then i'm going over the couch in liverpool with the rest of the orleans team back around there so as well as my pro career account kickoff i think the couching and cmac in general have been doing particularly particularly well this year we've got a good few lads like that kenny was wales for his whole amateur career and then his first two um proud floyds where he was trying he was trying more with us but then now we're for this fight he's just spg um for his next battle for it but like you know he we we've we came up with him the hallway yeah so the fact that he's able like he's going to be on bellator it's just such an inspiration kind of for the rest of the lads like that's where we want to be tournament and myself can't pro and then the rest of the lads gone hopefully in the years after like because they're quite quite young you know even keith he's known and now now which is a great attractor but he's still only i think he just went 21. so he's got time you know to really round out his skill set and got proud in a few years time to look to jordan as well and we're all still young um and they're gonna like be solid solid for us when they go pro you know um in the furious time like myself i'm gonna take the i'm gonna take the the leap now and be proud of myself now with 30 votes but the rest of them will follow so and yeah the gym is just really coming on in general like you know i think it's a great atmosphere here and we've got a few lads that are just cracking the amateurs saying now that are going to be top quality in the next few months and years you'll see coming from cmax so um yeah we we've got our beginners classes uh coming on here recently as well hopefully that was us we'll be sticking at it and we'll have an even larger team going forward now as well so just a lot of a lot of kind of a momentum i think i've gone with us at the moment personally in my personal career and also as a coach of cmac the gym in general is flowing along so it's it's it's obviously to be involved in it and see like that like the looks of kenny on bellator now i was training with for so long really came up with us like um all his career like so seeing that skill set skill same skill set he's gonna use on the top level is incredible um and like i was saying earlier all the phones i fought as an amateur like cow man and i like hold up the card close to these lads looking instant and that kind of thing that i've gone on to the ufc and knowing that like i've been up near that level as an amateur and then fighting in the ui maps at the highest level that gives me a lot of confidence now to for pro knowing that like i'm going to be able to you know hopefully get to the highest level looking for you hopefully that's uh top top um organizations like the ufc um and i haven't have no actual debut set yet so i'm still it's still a little bit um up in the air where i'll actually debut what time was hoping the end of the summer maybe late august early september that's what i'm looking for as i like put that pro pro camp in properly um you know proper proper shape as well and also i'm moving back down to bathroom for the first time in um four years five years or so like i have the three mountain belts i'm undefeated i've had them as well which is which is a good sign because i feel big at that weight you know as well as technical and and skillful and that kind of thing whereas usually i'm a little bit understood as maybe still a lot feather um and definitely at low weight and even 74 which was a bit mad but i think bantam is going to seal me a lot and now i've kind of i understand you know the nutrition and the weight cuts and that kind of thing much better i have i think i'm pretty sure i have that almost down now so and i'll be getting involved should be constantly improving as well so like i'm looking to really yeah hit the ground running now late uh summer start of autumn uh with the proud view and then just go from there hopefully rack up a good few fights you know i'm not looking to hang around because i don't feel i need i don't i don't think i really need to like take the pro career very slow if you know what i mean because the 30 amateur fights the reason i did that was so that i'm brought myself to a level that we can hopefully compete with pros quickly you know yeah and hopefully the kind of progress through the program quicker than if we have had less amateur fights and then kind of learning as we go pro yeah you know so hopefully i kind of have the skills to kind of rack up a few wins quick and look to get on a major organization in the near future you know um you know 20 23 gonna avoid like hopefully and if everything goes well so but yeah that's kind of the journey um that we've been on obviously uh my uh my mother deborah also loves him is uh runs the gym with me she's uh ruins everything that's like ruins every all the logistics of the gym you know everything that's i don't want to have to do it's not just not to deal with fighting while she takes all that and then uh like that she's fought in the oil mass she's fought in scotland um on headhunters herself she has mma for each other m experience she's also a kickboxing black belt and she's an osk ak-1 champion as well same belt as me which is another kill thing as well yeah the tank we might be the only mother stone combo in the oil mass as well and she volunteered us for him as well and we're probably the only mother-son couch in combination as well in the world at the moment as far as i'm aware of so that's pretty cool too yeah but she's a big she's a big deal in the public you know without her it wouldn't be able to ruin the hall to be honest like i just don't have the head on me yet to do all the logistics properly and one much more kind of you know coaching tech yeah you know that kind of thing rather than all the rest of the stuff that's involved in running james and management and media and you know all that kind of stuff but you know it's very there's more to it than you'd imagine yeah you know as you as most people find out whenever you get involved in something and there's a lot to it so yeah she's absolutely crucial and then having having my sister involved as well so closely for him all the whole time is great the whole family's involved looking at brother uh as well hasn't had any amateur fights but he's been doing levels and stuff like that as well he might he might even have an amateur footage he's actually very good and then all the lads in the gym that i've come up with in the area like the whole gym is just local like you know we've just come up together and so with that like kind of bond it's very easy to get things flowing or like make sure that everything runs well because even if i'm not around today or something comes up we'll have like the likes of ross he's been here for years keith been here for us forever uh jordan all those lads all the likes the senior team in the club have been here for ages so they know the way it's wrong they they now help like the atmosphere the void of cmak as well as we do so having that in the class every every night it's just a you know essential to the atmosphere that we're looking to propagate up here look you know and like that the younger lads coming through like ryan he's at taylor fights but he's looking very promising because like that that like we've been really trying and uh seriously you know um focused on developing our younger team and i know with him since calvin because that kind of setback the year where we we lost just allowed us like a lot of if some i feel like some people didn't manage to come back after it at all like i think the faces some of the mma scene has changed a bit some of the old faces might not be there at all anymore but then there's loads of new faces and the people that did come true have come back refocused you know it's like now they've seen what life was like without mma you know when you couldn't do it so it's like let's not take off for granted anymore and everyone's head is down everyone's trying and we're fighting like seymour on pretty much every show every every week so coming up we've got we've got liverpool and with the three of our lads on the orange team and then we've got um at the same at the same weekend now unfortunately on the way and so are all the other senior lads we've got six lads in the novice national mma leagues up in satori yeah so we've become quite close to the story recently as well and we were training a little bit together because they're so close there's no reason not to and they have uh like um that your man jake who won at the weekend he uh he's on your own team too so like that we've become quite close with them training look on it you know d15 nearly as a whole um entity of mma yeah so that's that's been good too but like that opens the torii they run the national melees which is essential for the foyers because the face of warrior may know with the knowledge and like the high level culture like you've got every gym has top couches really in it at this stage you know i mean experienced cultures so every fire that's coming out with amateur pretty much knows every healthy deal not everything they need to know so like if you just come straight into that if you if you just travel out straight into that it's very tough so kind of getting to learn the basics or learn what it's like to be in the couch because that's that that you know that void is is different you know someone is different inspiring like you can't replicate inspiring yeah because someone is actually trying to hurt you in there they're trying to get you out there trying to make it hurt you enough put you in a bad position enough that the ref is going to stop it you don't really get that void in training because even at the heaviest bars it shouldn't be trying to knock the rail and if i was too heavy to couch myself whatever it's going to step in and stop it so there's never really that kind of intensity that like it's going to actually get knocked out where i might actually get injured here because it's going to be stopped calm down and separate if anything goes too heavy and you are you already know that when you're sparring whereas when you're fighting you know you're going in there into the low and stand or whatever it's going to it's just you and him only the refs going to stop it when you're when you're done you know so there's a different voice of getting kind of used to voiding and it is very important so the national mma leagues just up there out there that that's tutorial are really beneficial so we've got six and i've run office photos on it like that lads that were just about to go amateur some of them some of them are only having their first novice flights and some of them are um nearly on the amateur and it's doing well so it's tiered just like beginner intermediate and beginner novice intermediate kind of way so if you've been training a year or so you're a beginner if you're trying longer like right basically ready to go armature you're in your intermediate category haven't they kind of slicing it out before you kind of fight on the local shelves yeah where it's a bit more intense so that's very beneficial we have them we have six clouds on that um next week or two weeks time yeah but not this weekend the one after and we've got three lads in liverpool and then only two weeks after that then we've got one of our last vote on case legacy and then we've got four lads voting on cage conflict after that that'll be a big card for us as well and then we've already got last matches in august on premiere and that kind of thing so we've pretty much got lads on almost every show coming up so and that's why it has been since we've kind of reopened from calvary because like that there's no reason hanging around because before like covered with such a curve but you know just came out an hour yeah show everything down but uh like i think that was kind of the lesson to not take things for granted enough like things might not be the way they are for forever or even for that long so it's time to when it's when it's available when there's loads of shelves happening when there's training available you know do it you know and like like that if you say if anyone's watching who wants to get in time with me you know do it you know what i mean you might not be able to do it at some point in the future like because we couldn't do it for about two years there and it hit a lot of people hard so yeah you know it's killing out the same map we've got our beginner classes going on if you're local if you're not there's just gyms everywhere at this stage and there's top couches and literally every almost all of them so you'll get the good technique you'll be able to follow you from all the gyms like orange mma you know covered put it through a bit of a of a time when it wasn't able to it wasn't able to function but at the moment without me especially amateur man really like all the lads coming through are it's in one of the best shape it's ever been you know like that it's it's stringently safe the safety everyone's getting mris i'm getting and my primarily on friday for my day for when i debut i need to have that done everyone's uh all the code all the ambulance skills the code teams you've got your your blood's taking your medical stun everything is all above boards it's just it's it's safe as it's ever been to get involved and it's absolutely hopping at the moment to shout out every few every weekend which is just great for the lads coming through like i was always managed to have 30 flights and that was that's very that was really rare like i'm the only one that's just done it and um that record won't last you know uh at the way it's gone people fighting so so frequently um there's gonna be people more than three before we know it you know yeah and that'll become the norm to have at least 20. you know what i mean it used to be the norm to go pro almost after you've had a few wins amateur you know back in the day um but it's going to be the nominee with the whole tournament former with the oma format with the national championships that happens they'll they'll be happening every year now yeah they'll get three fights in a week i really like that that before you get to go there you actually get to fight the best in the country first absolutely prove yourself and then go and then so you're getting another two three fights yeah then you go there like you another two three four four four foot and you've and you've you're you're the strongest representative from orlando because you've won your way to it you know there's no there was no like oh there was no there's no ambiguity anymore you know if you've won your nationals that's that's your beating everyone who entered the competition that you're away you're ready you're ready to represent orleans you know i think that's really the nationals that happened in i think it was february where a big deal you know they were they were so good because even you know usually you're in that in that shot and that's shell feeling like being at a show where there's the crowd and everyone's drunk and screaming it is good for replicating what it's going to be like when you're pro because that's what's going to be like when you're probably going to be on those big loads but at the same time for gaining experience like the nationals i think we weighed in something like 7am or something maybe even earlier and then most of the fights were over by like 10 like see they just we just went in fought there was no crowd only other fours and couches but it's full-on full-on so you're getting proper technique you're getting proper fight experience but just quick you know and without the whole hassle of like a build up on it publicity and the crowd and all that just just just technique because then when you go to the other half that's what it's like there's no crowd there to support you it's only the rest of the oil team really you know people don't really bring supporters over for the most part they'll always actually go to the super cup we had like media teams like yourselves yeah raz went over um i can't remember his name but fighter 365 he went and documented their journeys which is like oh that was incredible just wanted it because it is interesting to see what it's actually like over there it is it is almost like an olympic kind of void um but because because mma is not in the olympics but if it is if if it is ground to the olympics or it would say its most likely it will go through the imf body that will become the olympic body so we'll keep this similar formula and it is it's it's well-known it's highly running you know there's even drug testing and all that and it's all above board like it's it's top class really is all the teams from around the world and it was an incredible experience for me to deal for meddling for it gives me that confidence as a prouder i'm going to be well able for whatever comes at me especially in the start of my career you know and that's me next time so hopefully pro elbows knees to the head 40 minute rounds like that's it back in the day there was actually i've got need in the head before because back in the day there was an ease to the head and when i first started fighting i'm trying to you know i needed to head anymore but it was like like i remember specifically darren thompson hit me in the head so that was 2016 ourselves like you know you could get either head still in so i even have that i think a little bit as well like you know i used to praying for it you know sorry i'm ready for this pro to be honest maybe even i've already but the same time i'm only 23 i've got a college degree as well if something goes wrong to fall back on which i personally i just think i want to enjoy mma because i do i enjoy the sport so i want to be able to enjoy the journey without having the the pressure of the ultimate success or otherwise there's nothing yeah so i can kind of not only have that degree in the back pocket just kind of approach it with a bit of it you know and i'll be like looking forward to it like so i mean if a car was great the car was great if it doesn't there's something else there for me so i'm really interested i'm i'm ready to ready to hit the ground running to be honest now putting a lot of work in over the last few weeks getting in shape i had a holiday there in italy with my girlfriend after everyone after i got my degree to kind of settle after the year of hard work couching and college and now i come back just refreshed and ready to go so hopefully you'll see me in proud glows now um by the the end of the summer early september yeah for sure to be honest that should happen yeah perfect that's that's the question everybody wanted to ask it was the pro because you've been around for such a long time so congratulations first foremost on your degree thank you on your career today and to start your closing career um once actually i want us to circle back to one or two points that you mentioned uh your amateur debut obviously you'd fought uh and won best and been in uh the boxing hormones what did it feel like to make that first mma walk how did that feel what was the feelings can you can you even remember yeah no i do remember it was it was it was a difference like um it was kind of interesting um in that i've done the k1 shows and those shows are quite similar as in there's a crowd of uh kind of drunk people down the usual yeah for saturday night venue it was the same it's similar at the k1 shows it's not quite as intense when i found but it's similar enough however the difference for me really was just like in your when i was doing my amateur my amateur okay one voice you'd be there in your you know your big shin guards boxing gloves and pull like going off my first amateur for you you know now shin guards just a little mma gloves nothing else that was i just i think you feel a bit like exposed nearly like going out and knowing that you know this can this is so much more till this for you know i can go to the deck there's something like yeah there were so much in my mind like what could have gone wrong to know or like what what what i'd be showing up in like what aspect of the vast game of mma or lacking you know this guy's going to take me down he could saw me triangle me he could knock me out he could need me in the head at the time he could do something there was so much options and i just was going in there thinking how much how much things could go wrong nearly you know but then kind of reassuring me was the fact that i had done boxing or dawn k1 i was successful in battling i don't chilled off from such a young age and i don't get to that i'm actually capable of what i'm doing i went out there and i went by tk out and then like that i just built on that and as i won as i was successful as i continued to do well like that i've only been stopped and in my 34 so i only stopped with a boy amber and duncan boy leg kick retirement that's the only times i've got stuff in my career of 30 foots and about them like you know i wasn't in my danger myself of getting like you know knocked out or anything they were just the leg kicks and the armor i felt kind of safe i could just tap or my leg couldn't stand up anymore so i've never really been in look down i've never felt like proper in dangerous situations and all there so i did be quite confident going in and my confidence built like that over the three dimensional fights and that's the point of having them it went from that first fight like is this like you were saying what it felt like to go in there with doubts but like mma is such a such a vast game the sandwich you know it's the mail set of someone's someone's much technique to it how many do i not know how much am i gonna like lack when i go in there but then after 30 points that's gone now you know oh yeah i feel like confident i feel whatever area of the game it goes though i should be able to give a good account of myself you know so that's gone out so it's kind of it's become a little bit more like you know just enjoy the experience out there at the same time you know when you're proud you want to be putting strings of wins together to get onto bigger promotions yeah those become important that victory does become important so that's that and game planning and making sure you come out with that w for the most part is very important that pro but at the same time i'm confident i can do that because of all my amateur fights i've changed like that from that first walk out so hopefully the prowl walk it won't be the same you know it won't be the same for sure not walking yeah um when you had your first amateur fight did you envision did you plan that you were going to have a lot did you plan you were going to 30's i don't think you would have planned to have 30 or did you but like did you plan on having 10 20 or were you just gonna take it and go i'll see when i'm ready is that what was that you're thinking i was going to see you when i'm ready yeah that's it like i i like i pretty sure i had pro offers coming at me since i was about uh like eight foot in you know i had one like i was saying earlier i had one of those three belts i've had them there was people saying oh you're gonna go prowl up anthem now like uh there's fights there for you know that kind of thing you've got three belts or eight in one or something you look great um but i was still only 17 so i was always kind of something that was like you know what russia jonathan yeah like that i would have been tempted especially when i was like like that on such a streak when i was like 10 and when i was on the 640 win streak and then put was the bulgarian guy's name that beat me and didn't die oh my gosh like convinced him to tell them i was like okay i've got so much more to learn i'm still on the a-10 take my time when i go pro i want to be able to be comfortable in there that i can go at any range and win you know i don't want to be going out there learning suspect just basic stuff that i should be known at amateur at pro and i'm going to be doing that i want to make sure every fundamental is covered yeah and obviously that's like it's constantly improving i have to constantly be improving i have to be constantly improving as i'm proud how much because improvement right now as a couch and a player and that's what i think that the coaching benefits me as a fire because the owner technique is you know doing it for yourself to make it work in a void is a way is is you know works everyone does that but i do think that breaking a specific technique down to be able to coach it efficiently to other people how you have to understand it a little bit more you have to be able to properly understand how it works to be able to coach it so in that way i feel like the coaching over the last few years um has kind of really brought on my own game my own technical game my own ability to like game plan and uh approach fights from a tactical um perspective as a coach has really allowed me to do that because i need to do it for my four years but but for myself i've feared i've got a better in-depth kind of knowledge of a lot of the the game really from couching that i wouldn't have i don't think i would have like gone so in depth that like look took such a like a focus on things if i wasn't the on the floor at the same time so i do think that benefits me that way obviously couching comes with the other responsibilities of couching all the lads and making sure they're how they're getting on as well as myself so brings on some added stuff but i enjoy it to be honest so yeah a benefit i think it benefits me in depth knowledge of the stuff yeah as long as i you know can really fit it but dumbbell in which i find i am no problem at the moment um it's hungry to be honest how did you find that transition because obviously as a high level amateur fighter and then to go you've got this responsibility of coach now you and your coaching good lads like ross jordan key uh ryan you've got the normal brothers you've got a heap of good fighters here to then you're in control of their train and their destinies as such like how did you find that transition at such a young age and then also you had your college you have a job you have everything else you got how did you transition and how did you find a balance for everything yeah so i mean like this this last year um has been hectic because college fourth year college uh in trinidad's own history just there's a lot of writing involved and in the dissertation that kind of thing there was a lot to do a lot of study on that at the same time it's i know how important it is to heal the lads to train properly to give themselves the opportunities to win to take the roy fights so to be honest that was always more important to me even in college and so i had to make sure i got through college when i got the grades i wanted i got my degree but i was always a little bit more focused on the training really and then i have this job i work in the local weather skills um that just you know keeps the income coming in make sure that i can actually live while i do this passion you know and so it was hard to balance that's why i couldn't take a profile in this year and so now everything is coming with the degree gone i've got much more time i feel like we can focus as a coach because like i say it brings me onto the foyer but yeah having the responsibility of the lads like top labs themselves already is is um is interested in that like i feel like i can we can couch them to it to a high level at amateur because i fought at the highest level say four times in the olympics against the top lads and i always held my own and like that that gives me the confidence to coach these lads till that level and but at the same time there's aspects of the game that the lads are already better than me individually at least at different aspects of the game so i'm improving often they're improving with me so we're going to we're going to come up together look um and yeah look in that in that way like it's it's great it's very interesting as in like say on on teach i'm teaching obviously i'm teaching them techniques and that kind of thing and then it comes to sparring and they're using those techniques against me and like i'm not holding anything back like yeah but i'm showing them exactly what i know and how to deal with certain things so like then they use against me and it's like you know this is hard to get past yeah like first of all that makes me think okay the techniques are working because like me with my 30 foot so i'm a high level amateur an experienced amateur at the on the horizon i'm ready to go pro so if they're able to if they work against me then i know they're working as other amateurs yeah and so that's the idea anyway you know so yeah it's it's average because it brings me on again then because i'm like okay they're dealing everything i've told them that they don't everything i've taught them in this in despair so i know i'm struggling to to against my own stuff yeah and they're doing it properly and then whatever characteristics they bring themselves you know like keith's incredible flexibility ross is uh is incredible at toyman and reaction point with his shots ryan is obviously six foot five and everyone brings their own thing jordan's incredibly quick um everyone makes their own thing so when they're the one i was like stand up it brings me on because then i have to think of myself how would all you get around this now so first of all like that brings my own game on thinking about how i'm gonna help how i'm going to like get past my own defenses to things but at the same time if we do uncover it like a way to to get past that it exposes a weakness then that we can then try to fix so it's constantly like it's all your laboratory like really like you're coming in here dealing like experiments nearly on a mma trying to figure out different ways around things different different techniques that work techniques that did work but it's not working in a certain way how are we fixing that or something nailed i was like oh this this was really good help let's bring that on like so we just because we've been training for so long to get it it just it builds that way you know and you can see i think a lot a lot of lads deal for it in a similar style so you can really see where that comes um where like kind of the team is like the core fundamentals are coming true but like that everyone has their own individual uh characteristic style like like that as a couch you can't force everyone to fight you exactly the same because like that one 40 foot eight running 645 doesn't the same techniques don't work yeah in his way category for his build you know like oh if i want to shoot double legs all the time he's six or five he probably shouldn't be on double legs you know he should be using his friends his range and that kind of thing about example very polarized but like it's even with people that are more similar appeal to me they can't afford the same as me so i'm never going to couch them devoid same with me i'm going to give them techniques to use they're going to build it into their arsenal and find out what works for them and then we go forward with that and it was working so hard it doesn't come around incredibly like um just there's lots of lots of progress but lots of momentum i think it's the key word at the moment for the gym like that we've been trying to be trying my compound because he was right with alex said he wrote as well we were crosstalking the compound and hopefully going to deal with a bit more of that as well and even crosstraining oral gyms as well like a good few uh laws i want to want to train with the couch i want to train with pick their brains like anything bring it back to here bring the lads over today crossbar and everything that's all going forward now hopefully look that the mma scene is i think the most cohesive um it's ever been like like as in like gyms not exactly training together but everyone is like on a similar wavelength of point yeah i think the reason for that is is the oim oil team kind of wood everyone goes away we're all on the same team we stay in the same hotel and you still you have to train together for the team so you just you get closer and i think that's brought the whole scene together like uh it's quite it's quite annoying i wouldn't enjoy it anyway i enjoyed the whole uh oil container system like i was saying he was a little bit uh prior to this i was over in um yesterday i was i was doing a couching course in spg hq with danny core about the um basically issues that we need to take proper care of in mma at the moment in order to make sure that everything is running properly that we get hopefully very soon and recognized as a sport and this kind of thing so there's no more ambiguity to uh rules and that kind of thing um we need to be a proper sport and then we can get government funding and that kind of thing because like that we go to the imaps and the russians and they're going to take a massive massive amount of money in the sport from there they're actually paid salaries to go over yeah and then it's all out of our own pocket really until the super cup um it's all been over on a pocket transfer over there so it's fundraising it's working extra hours that puts into your training time to try and get to afford floyd solver and hotel accommodation yeah whereas the russians full-time job and bahrain older team a lot of other teams start a job so and despite that we're always meddling up there like the reason we're in the super couple because we're in the top eight yeah there's only eight only top eight and orlando's still there despite never mind getting now funded look i think i was talking to i think it was the finnish coach and he was complaining about how his uh finnish team only got given a 20 grand government society and i was like well you know if we got like 20 quid it would be sound yeah because we're not even a sport you know so uh yeah like that's that's hopefully going to happen over the next few years but it's so important that we follow all the rules and that's what we're doing with danny yesterday and so that's what we have to do as college and courses but at the same time as the course going on with danny there was a danny neal um the pro female 45 spg for bellator she was taking the irish like cadet class and which was like all the orange cadets from different clubs who are going from between the edges i think it's 12 and 17. we're going to be going to the oil maps and training together as a as a national team and i think they do it like maybe once once a month on a sunday and we don't have any cadets here at the moment so that's why none of our labs are down there we're all adults at the moment but hopefully we don't have you know more kids for the local area and i think so but at the moment we don't have any so it was just interesting for me to watch and just see all the kids training together like they're gonna grow and it's gonna be like the high performance in the boxing team that always expels them when i was 14 15 and that kind of thing where you're all training together the best athletes are gone and everyone's gonna be there's gonna be a healthy competition between them going for their spots yeah and there won't be that kind of won't be the same kind of like going to gm rivalry more so it's going to be like royalty from in between in individuals from each game but they're trying to get it they're friendly at the same time they're going to be bringing each other on and then making sure that all the oil and team are getting couched by someone who's as credentialed as danny neal and make sure all the kids are at a similar level getting under the same techniques is unwield will be and when we're recognized by the government will be like those russian teams like everyone going over it with the proper caution since they were a young age um you know proper philosophy and hopefully you know going forward government um endorsed hopefully you know i mean with a bit of a bit of money and it will make it even even better you know so uh there's lots to lots to work on and that's why another thing that i've really picked up this year was the fact that i was on the orlean team couch and staff from the last two the last one off instead of it was interesting to look at it from the other side like haven't done having fought on the team four times and then having couched on it twice yeah i've actually done six on us two as a couch and four as a uh before it's interesting looking from the other end of the spectrum you know but uh i love i honestly really enjoyed it i'd love to you know even pursue that as well as my own pro career i'd love to be continue as a coach hopefully maybe as an oil team coach hopefully someday in the future as well like look what danny's doing yeah imparting my knowledge to the younger generation and also that's another goal of one to be honest a little bit of a solid goal because the pro mma is going to take so much focus to be successful but at the same time the council is going to be continuing cma's going to be continuing so i'm hoping to continue in a similar way the coaching and the forum and maybe you know in order to staying on your own team helping out being an olympian publisher says no it's not a kind of another dream of mine really yeah um i want to ask you a question actually what does being a coach mean to you if i say what is it called what does being a coach mean to you what what does it mean to you being a coach and how does it make like obviously you said you've seen lads obviously you want to do it to give back so you just explained to me what i called yeah it's certainly uh to give back and just kind of impart my own knowledge so there's no point keeping all of myself really like you know i'm not going to be able to compete for um you know 50 years i'm only going to pay for like one million point 20 23 now you know it won't you know but in my late 30s usually like the toilet of your career so i want to be able to continue being involved in the sport of mma because i do have a passion for it hopefully um after that then still couching so i'm couching i'm couching now and i'm like building that at the moment but uh like first of all being able to to coach people and watch them improve is incredibly rewarding but even just the fact that like it gives young people uh stuff to do to like because obviously obviously we're all local seeing about ever all of our lives in the local area like and what and even what culvert is looking at true cover when people don't have that kind of structure and that passion that they want to do it's hard to be motivated in life in general so just given access to people who all have a passionate rma me you know my passion um enabling them to grow as foyers and individuals so like um it was actually at the college course yesterday i think it was liam oak uh that was le mans said to me his goal as a culture is to create an atmosphere in a gym like a gold atmosphere in a gym that people can come up to and enjoy and have fun while also learning that's like his kind of goal as a culture i agree with that you know it's first and foremost like having that kind of atmosphere you can hope it try and have a good time while you're improving and obviously it's going to be difficult does private star have to be hard to know because it's mma it's a tough sport yeah but the same time it doesn't have to be super hard and horrible yeah every every few minutes you know atmosphere the goal atmosphere i think is that so important and like cultivating that in the game like that because we've been that's all local as we've been together for a long time there's a lot of uh there is that quite familiar kind of aspect to air gym and there's like that in a lot of games to be fair no i'm not ivy gym but a lot of them do have that core core group that like are almost like a family and we have that going on here but at the same time you don't want to be clannish and like have that core group and then not really be um you know yeah welcome to order so you kind of have to balance that and i think we do a pretty good job and we have new people coming in quite a bit now joining the team fitting in lovely and like i say hopefully you'll see a lot of the sema lads that haven't been on the average or saying come and train out in the next few months and years and you know hopefully doing well you know that's that's another thing that i want to be you know as a coach you want to be successful and how how you gauge success is it is it simply to win or is it held it performed that's that's up to you you know i think it's as long as you can see progression even if they don't win is it you're going the right way you know yeah it's only when you see under the the force you need to be stagnating like even myself or you i want to be constantly improving you know even if even if i don't get the result i'm looking for but if i see the improvements in my game i'm like okay i'm going on the right path and you can continue on it's only when you're like i don't know how to improve yeah that's when it starts to be daunting and i haven't i've never really had that my career to be honest and i hope that nonetheless the team might have that because the idea is that we're constantly growing and that's so important to growth as a coach just constantly improving um new aspects of your game improving your fundamentals at all times and when that happens if you are constantly improving you will be winning you know you will get the wins will come anyway yeah so rather than focus on the results itself focusing on the program i think the wins will come anyway like i say a pro it's a little bit more important to actually get the result i think because the big shows want you with that winning record but how much you're like you're going if you're going to go power calls back to zero zero anyway like my 30 damage our flights are great but we're going to be i'm going to be back to zero zero to hit my first yeah hopefully now obviously my skill level is still through diameter votes or whatever but as my equal looks yeah it's back to zero so record amateur it's it's more important to some people that soldiers if you're not going to go pro then you can always look back on your amateur record like there's a lot of amateur boxes out there that yeah oh my amateur boxing record is decent i'm incredibly proud of it so it is nice to have like your amateur record and be proud of it as well but at the same time if you're looking to go pro it's not it's not going to stay it's a tool for learning over learning for the most part so like people can approach it in different ways and depends what it means to you and as a coach look up and saying tailoring your coaching approach to different individuals is very important so some people who are even maybe they're older and they they know that they're not going to be able to pursue a professional career anyway but they love having a few amateur voice perhaps their amateur fights and their actual results for them are much more important to them so it's important to match them properly unfortunately you know they have a chance to win um obviously i wouldn't planning for any chance that if they have a chance to win yeah you know you could say that you could do that you could say that's good to just learn the experience but i do think every losses a little bit tomorrow and you don't really want to be having that yeah so for the most part you want to imagine with your lads in good matchups that they're going to be tested yeah but at the same challenge that they have an opportunity to win so it's that delicate balance where like you don't want to overmatch your fortress but you want to match them where they're going to be pushed and touched uh yeah and shown to haven't have a chance to shout their improvements you know and uh yeah that's what i'm on learning and improving on as a coach as you know as we speak and hopefully we'll continue to do so as i progress to pro i'll be looking them back at the amateurs maybe one more into my perception will change i do think that's important as a person as well as just the coaching you know that you're open you're malleable and you're open to uh changing your perspective on as you learn because first of all the world does change and second of all you're just wrong thousands of times you can try to accept that you where you have to pretend that you were never wrong yeah like it's better than because you can prove you can change and you can be better straight away so that's why i'm trying my best uh you know as everyone is to you know be open-minded and learn as i go you know at the same time also having those fundamentals that i believe in and as my core tonight yeah hopefully not letting them weigh everything watching my fundamental beliefs yeah you know and i think it runs through i try to kind of run that true cmak and a lot of foreign kind of follow a lot of them i think you know yes good to have the core values but then have interchangeables that are on the outside i've really enjoyed this chat and especially you've brought us through a journey of irish mma as well where you can actually see how it's evolved and how like it went from back then how hard it was to get fight like and then like you've you've said as well the fast improvements like of the guys now and then what you're talking about to cadets for the future like what we're seeing now is more kind of people who came around or started when conor so they would have started their late teens and now they're starting that occasion so it's going to be unbelievable it's going to be better there's nothing it's it's nearly you know tragic for me because like there's no there's no doubt that these kids are training that we've seen training yesterday at the national training for 12 or all them a4s like they will be better than me by the time they're 23. you know if they weren't it would be a shame yeah because the work they're going to put in and it's going to be correct work it's going to be focused work for like a national team going to world championships and that kind of thing like they should be better than me if they're not it's a and hopefully that's how i'm saying as a couch oil make them better than me yeah you know if i keep my my oh my god one of my goals is to keep my foot in as a couch and as an oil team coach hopefully going forward look i have been on the team and i'm going over with the last now next week keep that in because i they'll enjoy it you know and the cadets are like i say they should be better that they should be better than us so the next generation should be better every time yeah so it's a little bit tragic because like you probably know knowing my theories one of those young lads will beat me you know but at the same time i want you want that to happen yeah but look maybe i'll just be so good i'll just keep involved with it hopefully hopefully myself up and you know open-minded enough that i'll just keep getting new techniques and just be good going into my 40s and stuff you know that's another interesting thing as well i just muay touch on i think the the youngest ufc champion at the moment is something like 32 i think it might even be charles oliveira and he's a territorial tree and i just think it really highlights like how long it takes to actually cover enough aspects of the vast game that is mma with so much different techniques and that you have to actually be a champion and look at top organization like ufc you need to be almost need to be like almost 30 years old 32 years old because like that child has gone through some when he fights ups and down ups and downs and he's learned and improved and now he's top top class he's the champion he deserves it and he's 32. yeah and but like if he wasn't able to evolve if he at any point in his career was like no i'm happy with the way i'm a great foyer already like you know if you're industry you're already a top four yeah at that point it's it's easy for you to say oh no look i'm not listening to my couch anymore i already know everything coast really yeah and just house but no these lads are improving the whole time and that's the way you need to be you need to be improving in your 30s and then you'll be a champion of your 30s that's what it seems to be so i look down on 23 now give me 10 years time hopefully i'm improving for all those 10 years and maybe you'll see me at the at the top of the game that's the plan anyway going to start that journey you know that pro journey uh but you know the summer and hopefully it takes me to the to the top of the game over the next 10 years or so yeah perfect we're all looking forward to it i'm going to let you go i've really enjoyed this conversation i have one question to ask you and it's uh what's well two questions one what is your favorite fight your favorite finish or your favorite fight that you've won and what's a fight that you lost or maybe you didn't lose but it was tough and you learned from the most yeah um my favorite our favorite finish um my most the most like my most elated fight i had was probably my last oi math win um actually it's my last man yeah so it's two four to go um i thought a guy from sweden called alexander luff and he's gone on to deal greater probably he might be four and oh no i'll knock out this one uh he's doing really well anyway um but i i ended up on him and it was just a it secured my last medal because i kind of noticed when we last knocked him off so in my head it was like a medal in four or four yeah he was a top lad like at the previous fight or he had watched it so it won the day before and then went up to the crowd straight away to watch my opponents fight and i actually assume that he's going to be fighting the german guy it was the german in sweden tweeting my phone and then the german guy was the previous champ and the swedish guy knocked the mail called in about 30 seconds and i was like oh and they ended up ironing him in the second round and that was that was a big like it was it just felt top class felt like it was all coming together i was like yeah i'm meddling again like i am this level it doesn't matter um you know i fell short three times before i'm gonna i'm gonna meddle again here you know that was i know that kind of after that i was going to go i'll probably see him anyway i just decided territory was such a nice number yeah and after calvary as well having not been for you i had to get that last foot in on cameras because the ring rust i didn't want to be out and then they were a year in college and then go pro yeah i mean l three years i needed that one fight to kind of reorientate myself and then i felt ground in there after the cover i felt i didn't really fail i actually ended up coming out on the wrong side of a split decision but inside but like you know i didn't feel rusty really like a few tactical decisions i should have done differently but i was enjoying myself out there i felt like this was where i wanted to be so i was like great i'm going to go pro after so even that last fight was it was important for me and that's when i lost to be honest yeah okay actually i lost i lost that by split and to be honest it even though it lasted we split i came out ready to go pro so you could i could say that was another one that was um very important to my career really that last one but uh yeah like lilzington lee really made me focus on my grappling more and then just the only loss in general they're pretty much put the same format so i don't want to be arrested as a pro so yeah wrestling is so important to my trainer at the moment and so that was one of the things that i was influenced by my career to be honest my favorite part of fighting still is boxing because that was my first combat martial art i mean judo jodo is available like being able to actually hit someone judo was nowhere because it was charles and i did enjoy that aspect of boxing and i do enjoy it in mma as well um so hopefully you know what pro if you see me my hands and letting loose again now and um doing some you know some bits in the program hopefully moving on up the ranks now over the next years or so up to a major organization that's the plan and yeah i mean like you said any particular fights that stand out in particular finishes dallas deal and there's allows them i've got belts uh trailer amateur career and all them in the moment seem amazing you know even yeah they lost the same pushing in the world yeah but after a while the elation and the and the uh disappointment of the losses they just fade and merge into to one thing over time after 30 46 so i suppose in my case maybe there's not a particular 40 put my turkey amateur fights of my career kind of blended together to give me that confidence now to tackle the program yeah hopefully now all goes well and i'm gonna you'll see you'll see me hopefully on a bigger stage that's the plan yeah no and i can't wait to see it's been an absolute pleasure to talk to you thank you so much