Name: JRE MMA Show #96 with Justin Gaethje & Trevor Wittman
Uploaded: 2020-05-27T19:00:07.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'JRE MMA Show #96 with Justin Gaethje & Trevor Wittman' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2020-05-27. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'JRE MMA Show #96 with Justin Gaethje & Trevor Wittman' from PowerfulJRE on Comedy Buff. Published 2020-05-27. Transcript available.

JRE MMA Show #96 with Justin Gaethje & Trevor Wittman

Boom! Trainer of the Year, Trevor Whitman. You might be. You might get it. We'll
see.
You're definitely on the short list.
I got not that many athletes, so that's where, you know, when I had won it two
years ago,
that was unique to me because I went in there like, man, I don't deserve this.
I remember having 40 athletes, and the guys who have all these athletes, it's
put in so much time.
I had three athletes at the time, so that was cool.
But again, I think performing and doing good as a coach is one thing,
but also, you know, putting in that full time.
When you're running a gym and having 40 athletes, it's a nonstop 60 hours.
You're not doing anything with your children.
Yeah.
But then when I seen the athletes talking on the screen and talking about, you
know,
Rose talking about changing the world and just being good people, then I was
like, oh, yeah.
And I remember repeating to myself, when I went through a tough time and lost
all my athletes,
we kind of had to split, and it all happened through when Nate Marquardt had
that issue with the TRT.
And, you know, I had talked about the gray area.
You know, if you're going to allow someone to do that, you have that space.
He's like, he instantly got shunned for it.
And he's got children.
He had a new kid on the way.
And I was just like, man, he got shunned.
We knew about it prior.
And I'm just like, they said you could do it, but they don't know how to test
the levels.
And that situation turned into a bigger situation.
And then I ended up starting over with athletes.
And I remember repeating to myself, you're the best coach in the world.
No one's better.
And I remember just repeating, I had a new gym that was big, 13,000 square feet.
I was painting it by myself.
Wow.
And I just kept saying it over and over and over.
And then when I was sitting there that night, I was looking at him.
And we won like seven awards that night, with just the three of us.
And I was like, man, that's super cool.
That's when it kind of hit.
And I was like, oh, man.
There's something to be said for having a small stable of athletes versus, like,
there's some of these super gyms where a lot of guys wind up complaining.
A lot of guys wind up saying they don't get the attention they deserve.
They feel like they're staggering or they're stagnant there.
And it's just, it's not, I don't think it's the right way.
It's so different.
I'll tell you, it takes it back to my boxing days.
I only had three or four athletes at the most.
And I was running with them and had them at my house.
And I was feeding them and they were at my house for camp.
And it was one-on-one for everything.
For the psyche.
I mean, that's such an important part when it comes to fighting outside of
Justin Gaethje.
Justin Gaethje, I learned from this guy when it comes to mental.
Like, he's just ingrained with, like, the strongest mental.
And I love that part.
Like, that's why I love working with Rose, because the mental part.
But one-on-one is key.
That is key to being able to be with your athletes.
And I'll tell you, it's like a hobby again.
It ain't like a job.
It's like passion, you know.
And you never really want to do it for the money.
You need to pay your bills.
But the key is, it's the athlete.
It's about them.
Justin, when you came to Trevor, like, how much striking experience did you
have?
Zero.
Zero.
That's hilarious.
Yeah, no, I had five amateur fights.
I had never been in a street fight, a one-on-one street fight, a couple of big
brawls.
Never thrown a punch, never been punched.
And I got hit hard in my fifth fight, almost got knocked out.
I was like, man, I need to find, if I'm going to do this, I need to find a
coach.
So you had five amateur MMA fights with zero striking training.
Zero.
I would just take, so right after wrestling was over, I would just be like, I
want to fight.
And then I was in the best shape of my life after wrestling season.
Right.
So I was a machine still, but I just had no, no skills.
It was go out there and wrestle, take them down, slams.
I was, you know, I got my nickname, the highlight, before I ever knew how to
strike.
And that was from throwing, tossing people.
Wow.
I'm going to tell you when he came into my gym.
So I met him at one of the fights and I thought he was a Japanese guy because I
was traveling
to Tokyo a lot with Dwayne and his name, Gaethje, for some reason, just I
pictured a Japanese
guy.
Yeah, it kind of sounds like it could be Japanese.
And I was like, oh my God, it was spectacular.
The way he was throwing people and putting them on their head, I was just like
amazed.
And I talked to him in the locker room.
I was like, dude, I'm a huge fan.
Like your fighting style is so unique.
And then he's like, I'd love to come to your gym.
So he comes down, he comes in, he's like, I'm here to fight.
And I was like, cool.
And I'm like, all right, well, we're sparring today.
And he's like, cool, yeah, I want to fight.
And I'm like, all right, cool, let's go back there.
And I said, well, we're sparring today.
Let's get back here.
And I was like, do you have any gear?
And he's like, what gear do I need?
And I'm just like, oh my God.
I take him to the equipment and I was like, all right, get some gloves, get
some shit guards.
What year was this?
This is 2009?
Yeah.
Imagine, imagine that moment.
If someone told you 11 years from now, you're looking at one of the baddest
motherfuckers on
earth.
I'd say it took me a week or two to know, like his mindset and the way he
trained, like
this first session that he had was one of the most unique.
So I tell him about this equipment.
I'm like, get your equipment on.
I was like, get one of those headgears.
And he goes, he jumps up at me.
He's like, well, I got to wear a helmet.
Like no one else is wearing helmets.
And I'm like, no one's wearing a helmet.
Why the fuck?
I'm like, who is this guy?
So he's sparring with this guy named Vinnie Lopez, and he gets hit with an uppercut
while
he's hitting Vinnie with the overhand.
And he turns around and goes, ooh, and I'm like, oh, shit, he's hurt.
You know, so I go over to him.
I'm like, you good?
And he's like, that felt so fucking good.
He's looking at his fist.
And they both cracked each other so hard, like KO shots.
Like it was, it was nice.
And from that time, I was like, dude, you are super unique.
I was like, I've never punched somebody like that before.
I was like, I know that fucking hurt, dude.
He's like, you know, Vinnie looks like a mean.
He's all tatted up, neck down, Mexican, you know, looks like he's straight out
of prison.
He's Puerto Rican.
I don't want to say that for Vinnie.
He's Puerto Rican.
He looks mean, dude.
He's mean.
He looks mean.
And yeah, I was like, I got to go with him.
They're like, yep.
I was like, all right.
And then I hit him.
I was like, oh, shit.
Real quick before I forget, the one-on-one thing.
I was saying, you've heard like five, six guys,
as we've been going through these fights,
say how they appreciate the one-on-one time.
And that's going back to what that was.
I don't want to miss that earlier when you were talking about that.
That's the biggest thing for me.
He's at every single one of my training sessions talking to me like he was
talking to me
in my fight for sparring.
When he needs to throw the towel in or call the fight, he knows.
He watches me every day.
And this one-on-one thing is what these guys are understanding.
It's so important.
It's everything.
When it comes to fighting at the high level.
It's having that unique relationship with a trainer.
Having a trainer where you and the trainer are tight like that.
Like DJ had it with Matt Hume.
You know, there's a lot of guys who have that kind of one-on GSP hat.
It would for us a hobby.
That relationship is so critical.
It's so important.
Because you're going in there together.
Like, you're helping each other.
You understand.
You know his whole process from beginning.
I mean, literally, with him, you know his entire fighting process from the
beginning,
the first time he was there.
Like, that's invaluable, man.
These guys that are jumping into these super camps and the person is just sort
of giving you
random general motivation in between the corner, telling you to keep your hands
up,
work the jab.
You know, that's not enough.
It's not optimal.
I really feel like the optimal relationship is a trainer that really knows the
athlete well
and is with them in every training session.
100%.
I think there's a huge issue.
First off, big training camps are key just because of the partners.
I mean, you will get champion level fighters out of there because you're seeing
all different styles.
You're seeing wrestlers, grapplers, southpaws, all different sizes.
So it's great for that.
And you adapt to different athletes.
The hard part with that is most of the guys train jiu-jitsu somewhere else.
They go somewhere else for their conditioning.
They go to all these different places.
And all the coaches, they mean well.
They're all like, oh, man, you're six weeks out.
We've got to train hard.
And you're going from one hard session to the next hard session to the next
hard session.
And when you're with them all the time, I pull back a lot on him.
And that's the key to peaking.
Like a lot of times, people just push hard, push hard, push hard.
And that's another huge issue in the sport is overtraining.
Yeah, guys get flat.
I mean, it's, again, that injuries in the sport are common all the time.
And most injuries are happening in training.
When you pull back, are you doing it based on just your general feeling of how
he looks and how he's performing, what he's saying?
Or are you using heart rate variability, using like a whoop strap or a heart
rate monitor or anything?
No, a lot of those are tech.
When it comes to those types of things, my intuition has always played best for
me.
And knowing each athlete, each athlete is different.
Some athletes need to fight at a different heart rate than another.
They perform better at a steady high heart rate.
Some need to spike.
Like in the beginning when he loved to fight, he loved to see people drown and
their eyes open.
So we trained like that.
He wanted to be the most exciting fighter.
So I'm there to make sure I'm hitting his goals, not my goals.
Like I'm there for the athlete.
I train every athlete differently.
And it's all about purpose.
Like what's your purpose for fighting?
What do you want to be?
And his has changed in the last four fights.
Four fights ago, he actually said he wanted to be a world champion.
And before that, I want to be the most exciting fighter in the world.
And it was about going out there, causing those wars.
And in the gym, he was sharp and could box and could really do some athletic
stuff.
But he loved to see people drowned.
It's just amazing how technical your striking is, considering the fact that you've
really been only doing it for 11 years.
I mean, you're one of the best, if not the best striker in the 155-pound
division.
That's a fact.
And it's that clean sharpness of your fucking left hook, man.
It's one of the best I've ever seen.
It's so fast.
And so there's no fat in there.
He's been telling me, one day, you know, your left hook is going to be your
best punch.
And I was like, what are you talking about?
Dude.
And, yeah, man, I'm just – I played all sports.
You know, growing up, I was a pitcher.
I was a quarterback, punter, kicker.
Do you think there's a benefit in that?
Yeah, I mean, throwing a right hand is throwing a baseball.
You know, my kick does not necessarily – I'm just kicking them as hard as I
can.
Now it's placement timing is the most important thing there.
But those mechanics that I developed through those playing other sports, I
think, has helped me so much.
Just my athletic ability.
And then once I found – you know, this man is a genius.
I can't tell you how – the process that he started 10 years ago.
You know, I had no idea.
I still don't know what the heck we're doing.
I'm telling you, it's just –
You j