you had a very unusual start your mom
was a fighter
right and she taught you a lot about
fighting when you were quite
young she even taught you your famous
the armbar move isn't that right
yeah my mom was actually the first
american to ever won the world
championships in judo and
she has a phd in psychology so she's
really great at
really messing with the mind of someone
young to make them into a champion
so she would randomly attack me around
the house
seriously your mom would randomly how
old are you at the time
um like 11 or 12. oh that's fine yeah
so like watching tv i would always have
my back up against something because she
would sneak up behind me and like throw
me over your naked choke
and go always be ready like i had like a
chick wait a minute yeah
this is this is how you grew up your
mother attacking you and choking you
whenever you're not looking yeah and i
don't know how to do laundry she skipped
that part
that's incredible but i guess it worked
you're an amazing amazing fighter
thank you uh you're you're training for
your big
title fight next week and you're getting
close and it's against cat
zingano and i'm just are you excited
about this
are you like what mental state are you
in right now because this is a big fight
i'm excited for every fight i'm excited
like like it's an olympic games i've
been to two olympics already
so um every time i walk out there i feel
like it's another chance at another
olympics and
i'm actually really glad that i ended up
getting the bronze instead of the gold
because it always feels a little
unfulfilled
right and every time i'm going out there
like like it's another chance to get a
gold again and so yeah it's
there's no other feeling like in the
world so motivation clearly not a
problem
for you but we have a you guys have a
stare down you and your opponent ufc
have have
stand downs uh stare downs i'm sorry you
have stare downs where you stare at each
other
and uh you had one with cats and gano
and we have the
the picture here she got her fist in
your face
and i was first of all i thought you
were kissing i wasn't sure
that's what the hair is for for doubt
yeah but i but she got her fist in your
face and i wondered are there rules like
is she not is she allowed to put her
fist in your face yeah too aggressive no
my fist was up there too is just
shielded by all this hair yeah but um
yeah it's fine as long as i don't
actually hit you
i had one girl once actually try to put
her forehead on my forehead trying to be
tough
oh she like leaned in and put her head
against your forehead and what did you
do i pushed her back as hard as i could
and she wasn't expecting it and she
ended up with a big red welt in the
middle of her head
and asked her i was like the commission
should find her for head-butting me and
da-da-da but
whatever i broke around the next day
it's okay
[Music]
what a delightful story
[Laughter]