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It isn't always the funnest feeling, sparring three days a week, getting punched in the face at 38 years old, it might not always be the funnest feeling but it's better than a lot of other things. I love it.
Robert Easter Jr. is a tough fighter who I have to take very seriously and I do, and that's why we did a nine-week training camp and got the great sparring, got the right training, the right diet, everything.
I did more weight training for Dimitrenko - we saw the big difference in sparring: everything felt stronger; it felt like the movement was much better. We were able to execute the plan in the Dimitrenko fight.
I like Roose. He was very good to me. Look, how can you remember Roose Bolton? He was a cold, callous, heartless man. He was a good baddie, I think, and there was a lot of great sparring with Ramsay in those scenes.
What I remember most about the 'Road' movies is my enjoyment at watching the two characters sparring with each other. But more important than that was my feeling that Hope and Crosby were enjoying the sparring, too.
I have my coach, Urijah Faber. He's watching me do everything pretty much all the time. I'm training or grappling or sparring live. He's over there making adjustments. He's really hands on, so that makes a big difference.
I train for at least two hours, three times a day - weights, bench-press, push-ups, running, sparring, boxing sessions - so I must be burning off a lot of calories. But I don't weigh myself too often - just once every day.
What people have to realise is that it's not the fights that are really hard; it is the training camps. It's living away from home for 12 weeks. It's sparring with guys who are told they will get £1,000 cash if they can drop me.
I had to get up run in the morning for 2 hours, go to the gym and also get good opponents as sparring partners because I'm a big believer in that how you train is how you will fight at least when it came to me that's how it worked.
For my training camp against George Groves my main sparring partner was a 6ft 7inch cruiserweight who fought nothing like George. It was just wrong. Wrong preparation. I was as fit as could be, but strategically I didn't prepare right.
As an amateur, I trained in some real hard schools of knocks. In Cuba, they would have judges on three sides of the ring just for sparring sessions. They train under exactly the same conditions as they fight, and it was a great experience.
I was nobody; I showed up to sparring in a white wife beater and Hawaiian shorts. I had plimsolls; I didn't have boxing shoes. It just shows you don't need to have fancy equipment or experience: you're either a good fighter, or you're not.
I get more relaxed. I get looser. I get more technical, I get faster, and you get to see way more of my game in the later rounds. In sparring, a lot of my best rounds are my third and my fourth. My fifth rounds are sometimes my best of all.
I sometimes look on YouTube and see people label videos 'Anthony Yarde sparring his trainer Ade' but that is not sparring, that's just practice. We practice getting attacked, countering and attacking your opponent back, in intelligent ways.
Not a lot of people or pros in this game know how to train correctly. That's why they don't have a long career. Their body gets banged up. They get into a rhythm of heavy sparring and heavy work, but through that, they're limiting movement.
I'm a very good coach... because I see the way the kids react once they get in the ring and start actually sparring. I see that they are calm, relaxed, and they're working like we work in the gym, and they are doing what they've been taught.
One of the things I like most about Roufusport is, really, the culture. A lot of times, you're training in fight camps and running and hitting mitts and sparring. Those things get old kind of quick. I like the fact that they allow fun into the room.
Have I been overly aggressive in some sparring sessions? Yes, I have. There's things, there's punches and things I've thrown that's been too aggressive and I've gotten to where I've had to tell myself, yeah, I shouldn't have done that, kind of thing.
People think hard sparring will get you sharp. And you do get sharp in the gym. But anytime I've trained that way, I've actually been a little bit flatter in the fight. And the knockout shot hasn't come. It's almost because my training has been too hard.
At Grudge, we just push each other. Whether it's sparring five rounds or rolling and doing drills, I do most of my cardio at practice. As far as running outside or riding a bike? That's not fighting, so I only do things that are going to help me in the Octagon.
I don't want to be knocked out. But the contact and the focus and the energy I get from sparring gives me energy to make movies, energy to be a dad, energy to be a friend, and, you know, makes me feel, probably, a lot younger and behave a lot younger than I am.
I used to be so aggressive, but after a while I started learning. It's not that I know how to adapt, but I know all styles of fighting so I can change my style of fighting to whatever it needs to be. That just comes from years of training and a lot of sparring partners.
When I was part of McGregor's sparring camp, I struggled to find words to compliment him; I knew he couldn't fight from the first moment we sparred. It's very hard to find nice things to say about his skills. Perhaps his best attribute is his intensity, but he has to do it cleanly.
Now I am training with sparring partners who are nice people, sure, but not my friends. These are sparring partners who want to knock me out in sparring. In the Croatian media, they said it was 'life and death' sparring - it was not quite life and death, but it was all-out fighting, very hard.
When I was competing, I would run daily 20 kilometers, and in addition to that, I'd put in many hours of fighting and sparring. That's why I was always able to keep the speed in the ring. I would train so hard that sometimes it was not only hard to stand up, but it would also be hard to lay down.
Even after you win the championship, the work doesn't stop; it probably only becomes more. I'm just basically focused on what I need to do. There's a lot that goes into this - diet, preparation, assembling the right people around you, sparring partners, coaches, etc. - so I'm not enjoying anything.
When I first got into the sport it was all about who could cut the most weight, who could be the biggest on fight night. That's the same era when you're sparring 10 five minute rounds, new partner every two and a half minutes, that era of just really hard weight cutting and really hard full contact training.
We'd always said boxers shouldn't lift weights. Now I realize some champion boxer started that rumor. I noticed if I did weights a couple of times a week, I would be able to hit that jab a lot longer. After sparring, everybody's gone, and I sneak into the weight room. Spend 40 minutes in there lifting weights.
I am the world's most appalling martial artist. I am so bad. I've studied jujitsu, kickboxing, t'ai chi. Once, I was sparring with someone, made a mistake, and managed to knock them down. I was so shocked that I dropped to my knees to see if they were all right, and then they knocked me out cold. From the floor.
People like to talk a lot about me, about how I have anxiety or social disorders. I'll admit to anxiety, but it has nothing to do with media or being in front of a camera or being around people. It has to do with dealing with the sparring that I'm going to have or the workouts that I'm going to have from day to day.
I could be sparring mates and you're meant to hit 'em, but we'll be sparring and usually I try and stop at the face, or I don't really try and follow through, but sometimes they walk into them and I say 'oh sorry mate.' They get angry and say 'we're sparring get into it,' but I dunno, I think I'm so used to saying sorry.
I run, but boxing conditioning is different, so you have to get used to running in the ring. Boxing movements are very different. Swimming is one of the best because every single muscle is working. I swim a lot. I train very hard at things that mimic boxing. I have to do mostly sport-specific training, such as lots of sparring.
I got thrown into the lion's den when I got to Alpha Male. My first sparring session was with Joe Benavidez, Chad Mendes and those guys, just bleeding from my face, its not like they took it easy on me. It was one of those things where we sparred 3-4 days a week, and we got thrown in there and that's what made me as tough as I am.
Getting hit is part of the job. You don't want the first time you're getting punched to be in the fight because there's a lot of shock and awe and you won't react well. I like to get hit in sparring. I don't want to get concussed, or I don't want to be getting knocked out, but I want some shock treatment to prepare me for the fight.
As the fighter, you're the one getting in the ring, you're the one risking injuries, you're the one risking your life - not only on the day of the fight, but in training camp. You're getting punched, you're training, you're sparring. You have to make sure that it's worth the risk - the compensation, the terms, the fights that you want.
I actually take karate and tae-kwon-do. And so I love sparring and grappling and all that physical stuff. I studied a hybrid form of grappling, sparring, and self defense; it's more of a 'get yourself in shape,' and if you want to take it to the next level, so you're really learning valuable skills with self defense, and I really enjoy it.
I train twice a day, and I make sure I eat right. I'm an avid tea drinker, and I enjoy the benefits of drinking MateFit. It gives me energy, speeds up my metabolism and helps me shed excess water weight. I also do everything from MMA sparring to strength and conditioning. I make sure to do a combination of different things with my training.
I always have my group of friends at the gym. We used to go hang out somewhere before. Now we're just hanging out at the gym. We have sparring parties where everyone beats each other up, but then we all eat my dad's cooking, and I hire a massage therapist, so everyone is just kicking back and having a good time. I just keep the environment great.
