Joe Rogan Experience #1797 - Josh Barnett

Joe Rogan 0:00 (drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music plays) And we're up. Joshua, talk to me.

Josh Barnett 0:14 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:14 What's happening?

Josh Barnett 0:15 What's happening is I've, uh, I've wandered into some sort of a strange portal that's transported me here to this, this wooden, galaxy-filled, uh-

Joe Rogan 0:24 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 0:25 (laughs) I don't know, I mean, bunker, star ship, uh ...

Joe Rogan 0:29 It's just a studio but you brought with you War Master.

Josh Barnett 0:31 You're damn right I did.

Joe Rogan 0:33 Yeah, I love this stuff. How did you ... So you helped develop this with this, uh, company?

Josh Barnett 0:39 Uh, yes, to a degree. Um, first off-

Joe Rogan 0:43 Did you like give them like taste parameters?

Josh Barnett 0:45 Uh, we were ... Yes.

Joe Rogan 0:47 Cheers, sir.

Josh Barnett 0:47 Hey, cheers. Skol!

Joe Rogan 0:48 Good to see you. Mm. Whoa. I told myself I was gonna take a while off of drinking after this weekend.

Josh Barnett 0:57 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:58 Guess not.

Josh Barnett 0:59 Today ain't the day. Um-

Joe Rogan 1:01 It's not today.

Josh Barnett 1:01 Basically-

Joe Rogan 1:01 You smoke cigars?

Josh Barnett 1:02 What's that?

Joe Rogan 1:02 You smoke cigars?

Josh Barnett 1:03 Yes, I do.

Joe Rogan 1:03 Oh. ............................

Josh Barnett 1:03 Yes, I do.

Joe Rogan 1:03 ......get some of that. ... da, da, da, da.

Josh Barnett 1:07 You c- ... Actually, uh, part of the development of the whiskey prior to doing a single barrel product was, um, doing a lot of tasting with cigar clubs-

Joe Rogan 1:20 Oh, really?

Josh Barnett 1:20 ... by our original head distiller. So this ... Part of the, the creation of this was also what would be the best bourbon to go with a cigar.

Joe Rogan 1:29 Oh, this is perfect because it's got smoky, like a smoky essence to it. What ... How do they do that? Do you know how they do that? I saw a video.

Josh Barnett 1:35 Yes. Well, what we do is we take ... Why thank you.

Joe Rogan 1:38 You're welcome.

Josh Barnett 1:38 We take, um, 75% of our 75%, uh, corn mash bill, and we smoke it, uh, in a ma- ... In a big, uh, shipping container-

Joe Rogan 1:52 Sure.

Josh Barnett 1:53 ... on these racks.

Joe Rogan 1:58 There you go. There you go. Now you're up.

Josh Barnett 2:01 And then after three days, we then take all that smoked corn, take it back to the, the distillery, and then we will mill it with, um, the 25% roasted corn out of that 75% corn mash bill, and then we mill it with also a, um, 25% malted barley or malted rye.

Joe Rogan 2:22 Damn.

Josh Barnett 2:22 And we mix it all together. We get our mash going and, uh, then starts the process of fermentation.

Joe Rogan 2:30 And the company, Warbringer, had they been around for a while? Like, uh, did you know them and then you decided to do this with them or how did-

Josh Barnett 2:37 I did not know of them. They reached out to me.

Joe Rogan 2:39 Ah.

Josh Barnett 2:40 And, uh, I was actually-

Joe Rogan 2:41 Perfect dates.

Josh Barnett 2:41 ... in the process of, um, of trying to, to work with a, a distillery to do whiskey because, you know, I started to see a lot of this stuff popping up with celebrities slapping their name on all these different things. And I have, uh, been someone who's a connoisseur of whiskey for a long time, and I wanted to do it, but I wanted to do it in a, in a way that I felt was legit.

Joe Rogan 3:02 Yeah, it's hard because people come with you, t- to you with, uh, whiskey that they've made, and they're like, "Here, I want you to try this." And you're like, "Ew."

Josh Barnett 3:09 (laughs) They're-

Joe Rogan 3:10 "This is not good."

Josh Barnett 3:11 Yeah. Well, there is, there's plenty of that. Whiskey has been a, a, an incredibly fast-growing market at this point, and the shelf space right now is getting pretty full up.

Joe Rogan 3:21 It's also ... It's, it's hard to make. It takes a long time to do it right.

Josh Barnett 3:26 It does.

Joe Rogan 3:26 Like, like Buffalo Trace ages their shit for eight years.

Josh Barnett 3:29 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 3:29 It's one of the reasons why it's so good.

Josh Barnett 3:31 Well, and the thing is Buffalo Trace has a rickhouse full of thousands of barrels to choose from-

Joe Rogan 3:36 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 3:36 ... to do whatever they want with. When you're a startup or, uh, let's say, say a craft distillery like us, if we have 30 barrels sitting around, we're pretty happy. (laughs) You know?

Joe Rogan 3:48 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 3:49 It just ... It, it, it takes a lot to get this stuff going. It takes a lot of little subtle things, which yeast you're using, you know, how long your fermentation cycle is, and then as it all goes to that distillation run, the low rine, the low wine run, the stripping run is, is important, but that's pretty much full tilt. You're not really looking for anything in particular other than just watching what the level of alcohol you're getting out of it is and what that yield is. But then on that second distillation run where the, where the real juice comes from, y- y- you gotta make your cuts at the right place. You wanna avoid getting a bunch of heads, and you don't want a bunch of tails. But you don't want no tails because some of those volatiles or higher esters will interact in the barrel in ways that come out really pleasant.

Joe Rogan 4:34 Oh.

Josh Barnett 4:34 But as you initially taste it, it might, you know, put a little what you feel is like some slight taint to what you're doing. But no, it's all, it's all a process. And the thing is you can't rush any of it. I mean, there's-

Joe Rogan 4:45 Is whiskey like, uh, like wine where you wanna like let it sit open for a while? Does it change the flavor?

Josh Barnett 4:52 It does. And in fact, I tell people if you really like it smoky as shit, add water to it or ice. That brings the, that essence of smoke ... I believe it brings some of the oils up to the surface, and it makes it even smokier. If you want it less smoky, put no ice in it, no water, and then before you drink it, let it sit for five minutes.

Joe Rogan 5:13 Huh.

Josh Barnett 5:13 And it opens up a little bit. And as you're sitting there, it will generally tend to get creamier, a little buddier, more buttery, less smoke hit in the front. It never loses all of its smoke because this is really smoky stuff, but you know, uh, as it sits, as it gets t- ... As time gets to it and oxygen gets to it, it will change the nose and the palate.

Joe Rogan 5:34 The nose and the palate.

Josh Barnett 5:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:36 Mm.

Josh Barnett 5:37 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 5:38 I, uh, got into-

Josh Barnett 5:38 Sitting here, you know, getting punched in the face-

Joe Rogan 5:40 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 5:40 ... all the time talking about noses and palates.

Joe Rogan 5:42 Your nose is in remarkably good shape.

Josh Barnett 5:44 (laughs) Well, I mean considering-

Joe Rogan 5:45 If you think about it.

Josh Barnett 5:45 ... it looks like Mulholland Drive.

Joe Rogan 5:47 It doesn't look that bad.

Josh Barnett 5:48 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:48 I mean, there's a lot of guys who have way more jacked noses than you-

Josh Barnett 5:52 This is true.

Joe Rogan 5:52 ... with such a long career fighting.

Josh Barnett 5:54 I will, I will let them have that. They can, they can have that title.

Joe Rogan 5:57 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 5:57 You know, this nose is e- Uh, when the, when she, the gal was swabbing me-... uh, I'm, I'm thinking, "Well, try- don't try to go up in this one 'cause it's all broken up so bad you can hardly get a, a swab up that thing."

Joe Rogan 6:09 Are you ever gonna get them fixed?

Josh Barnett 6:10 Yeah, I think at some point.

Joe Rogan 6:11 Dude, it changed my life. I got, I did it when I was 40. I had my, uh, deviated septum fixed, and all I could think of was, "God, why didn't I do this when I was younger?"

Josh Barnett 6:20 W-

Joe Rogan 6:20 It's so much better.

Josh Barnett 6:21 I know why I haven't, and that's j- just simply because I figure I'm just gonna bust it up again.

Joe Rogan 6:25 I'm sure, yeah.

Josh Barnett 6:26 And, uh, even though, um, you know, fighting really is winding down, it ain't completely over yet with me. So I wanna try and get every last drop of opportunity out of that-

Joe Rogan 6:37 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 6:37 ... and then walk away from it because it's not a kind of thing where you're like, "Oh, you know what? Actually, I feel like..." No, you don't. Too late. It's gone.

Joe Rogan 6:42 Right.

Josh Barnett 6:42 It's over with. So...

Joe Rogan 6:43 How old are you now?

Josh Barnett 6:44 44.

Joe Rogan 6:45 How many years you think you got of scrapping left?

Josh Barnett 6:48 Uh, I don't know. Maybe, eh, two, three, but I ain't gonna spend two or three probably. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:54 It's, it's so much different for heavyweights. You know, heavyweights, uh, traditionally physically mature later.

Josh Barnett 7:01 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 7:01 Whereas, like, if you were a flyweight at 44, ugh.

Josh Barnett 7:04 Y- yeah. You, you're, y- the, the fact that you've probably slowed down quite a bit is gonna make-

Joe Rogan 7:10 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 7:10 ... a huge difference to you. Whereas a heavyweight, you, the last thing you're gonna lose is power.

Joe Rogan 7:14 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 7:14 And lack of speed is not inherently gonna, um, cost you out there in the ring. George Foreman-

Joe Rogan 7:21 Right.

Josh Barnett 7:22 ... big example.

Joe Rogan 7:22 Yeah, perfect example.

Josh Barnett 7:22 But even a heavyweight, there's not a ton of guys who are 40-

Joe Rogan 7:27 Right.

Josh Barnett 7:27 ... plus that were able to relaunch their career and go out there and win a world title.

Joe Rogan 7:33 George is really the only one, if you really think about it.

Josh Barnett 7:35 He's, like, the number one.

Joe Rogan 7:37 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 7:37 But, but even Holyfield was still competitive, um-

Joe Rogan 7:40 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 7:40 Al- although not now, obviously. Um...

Joe Rogan 7:42 But that thing now, when he did with Vitor was real weird.

Josh Barnett 7:46 Yes.

Joe Rogan 7:46 'Cause first of all, he took it on short notice, which is a terrible idea when you're almost 60.

Josh Barnett 7:51 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 7:51 You know, and I know Evander had been training and gearing up for a fight with Mike Tyson. And he, you know, he looked half decent on the mitts, but much better later than he did earlier.

Josh Barnett 8:01 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 8:02 You see him early in the first few videos that he posted, it looked like he really hadn't worked out in a while, and he was really knocking the dust off and getting the old engine lubed up again. And then as time went on, he started looking pretty good. But then to take a fight, an actual fight, on, I think it was, like, two weeks' notice, right?

Josh Barnett 8:21 Y- uh, that sounds about right.

Joe Rogan 8:23 Um, because Vitor was supposed to fi- who was he supposed to fight?

Josh Barnett 8:27 Uh, Roy Jones, was it?

Joe Rogan 8:28 That's right. So, here at... Was it Roy Jones? No, I feel like it wasn't Roy Jones. Beca- it, it was, like, Vitor is still fucking fast, man, and he still hits hard, and this is TRT Vitor.

Josh Barnett 8:41 Yes, this is, this is a, a... Really, to me, this is, is basically youth versus age, and it was such a disparity that even the, uh, technical expertise and that, that boxing experience that is far and above Vitor.

Joe Rogan 9:00 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 9:00 E- it didn't matter, like...

Joe Rogan 9:02 Well, Vitor's always been a fairly decent boxer, though.

Josh Barnett 9:04 Yes, for sure.

Joe Rogan 9:04 For, for, for MMA, he's been an amazing boxer.

Josh Barnett 9:06 Yes. And this isn't to diminish Vitor, but-

Joe Rogan 9:08 No.

Josh Barnett 9:09 ... you know.

Joe Rogan 9:09 He's gotta do everything.

Josh Barnett 9:10 If you're Evander Holyfield-

Joe Rogan 9:11 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 9:11 ... you've been in the Olympics.

Joe Rogan 9:12 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 9:12 You've only boxed your entire career. H- h- his knowledge of the sweet science is gonna be at an- an- an extreme level.

Joe Rogan 9:21 Oh, that's right, Oscar De La Hoya. Oh, this is-

Josh Barnett 9:23 Oh, right, he caught COVID.

Joe Rogan 9:24 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 9:24 Yes, yes.

Joe Rogan 9:25 He didn't just catch COVID, he caught a case of bad acting.

Josh Barnett 9:28 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:28 It j- like, w- you know, that was nuts when he was, like, in the hospital really quickly. All of a sudden, like, "Oh, what are the chances-"

Josh Barnett 9:35 Tubes coming out of everything.

Joe Rogan 9:36 "... of me catching COVID?" Like, "Hmm."

Josh Barnett 9:40 Hm. Maybe he just has a catheter fetish. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:43 Is that what they do? They give you a catheter as soon as you get in there for COVID?

Josh Barnett 9:45 I don't know. Maybe, maybe he was hoping for it.

Joe Rogan 9:47 May-

Josh Barnett 9:47 He's like, "You know what? COVID has, has made my urethra, uh, swell so that I can no longer urinate."

Joe Rogan 9:52 I'm trying to-

Josh Barnett 9:53 "Can you please jam something up it?"

Joe Rogan 9:54 I'm trying to think if I've ever had a catheter. I think I must have since I've had a, a few surgeries.

Josh Barnett 10:00 I have never other than a roll-on one for doing the Baja 1000.

Joe Rogan 10:05 Oh, really?

Josh Barnett 10:06 Yeah, you just basically put it on, like, this little condom, and then you roll the... You take the line, you run it down the side of your leg, and you put it-

Joe Rogan 10:12 Oh, nice.

Josh Barnett 10:12 ... off to the, the back end and off to the side of your, your, your shoe, your boot. So that way when you're driving, little crack in the floorboard, when you, if you pee, it just goes out the car.

Joe Rogan 10:22 Oh, wow, that's genius.

Josh Barnett 10:23 'Cause you ain't stopping.

Joe Rogan 10:24 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 10:25 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 10:25 No, that makes sense. Yeah.

Josh Barnett 10:27 You ain't stopping.

Joe Rogan 10:27 Somebody should've told that to... Well, the... Remember that lady, the astronaut, who wore a diaper to go-

Josh Barnett 10:32 Oh.

Joe Rogan 10:32 ... kill her boyfriend's, uh, wife?

Josh Barnett 10:34 Right, yes.

Joe Rogan 10:35 Remember that?

Josh Barnett 10:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:37 (laughs) She drove, like, many states, across state lines, like-

Josh Barnett 10:41 Wow, wow, wow.

Joe Rogan 10:41 ... duct tape and pepper spray.

Josh Barnett 10:43 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 10:43 And this bitch was motivated.

Josh Barnett 10:45 Oh, whew.

Joe Rogan 10:46 Just shows you, you can be an astronaut and still be a crazy fuck.

Josh Barnett 10:48 That's true. Also, um, don't fuck with crazy women.

Joe Rogan 10:52 No.

Josh Barnett 10:52 They get your ass.

Joe Rogan 10:53 But the, but the problem is they're sometimes the most fun.

Josh Barnett 10:55 Uh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 10:57 That's the problem.

Josh Barnett 10:58 Y- no, it is a problem.

Joe Rogan 10:59 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 10:59 It's a huge problem. You just, you need to realize when you gotta stop.

Joe Rogan 11:02 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 11:02 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 11:03 You gotta know what's... Like, fun is not necessarily good for you.

Josh Barnett 11:06 Yeah, you know, it-

Joe Rogan 11:07 Right.

Josh Barnett 11:07 ... it's not necessarily a bad idea if you bring someone home to take, like, a really long, convoluted, complex route.

Joe Rogan 11:12 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 11:12 So they can't, (laughs) they can't figure out how to get back.

Joe Rogan 11:14 But they can't, you can't do that anymore.

Josh Barnett 11:15 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 11:15 Girls have phones.

Josh Barnett 11:16 I know, but-

Joe Rogan 11:16 They just drop a pin where your house is.

Josh Barnett 11:18 I, I get it, but most people are not that Machiavellian. They don't, they don't think that way ahead. Now, me, I might... I would think that way. But, you know... Hey, and look, maybe if you find a girl that that's, that, that, that is that Machiavellian, ah, maybe marrier. I don't know.

Joe Rogan 11:32 Well, the crazy ones are the ones that are gonna drop the pin.

Josh Barnett 11:35 Yeah. O- w-

Joe Rogan 11:36 You know?

Josh Barnett 11:36 Y- generally.

Joe Rogan 11:37 Generally.

Josh Barnett 11:38 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 11:38 They're gonna make sure they come back.

Josh Barnett 11:40 Ah. Well...

Joe Rogan 11:40 They're gonna leave panties behind and shit.

Josh Barnett 11:42 Oh, man. No, no, no crazy people in my life anymore.

Joe Rogan 11:45 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 11:45 I mean, MMA and pro wrestling is crazy enough, but, uh-

Joe Rogan 11:48 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 11:48 ... no, no. I, I decided that it was probably better for, for my health and sanity to, to be with someone that's just plain awesome-

Joe Rogan 11:55 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 11:55 ... and calm, and, and is, is not interested in dropping pins and doing crazy shit.

Joe Rogan 12:00 Your girlfriend seems very nice.

Josh Barnett 12:01 She is.

Joe Rogan 12:01 It's like you, you've got a perfect one.

Josh Barnett 12:03 Awesome. I'm-

Joe Rogan 12:04 Perfect.

Josh Barnett 12:04 I couldn't be happier.

Joe Rogan 12:06 Oh, that's nice to hear.

Josh Barnett 12:07 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:07 So, y- how many times have you done the Baja?

Josh Barnett 12:09 ... just once. Bud Brutsman hits me up-

Joe Rogan 12:12 Oh, that's my buddy, Bud. I love Bud.

Josh Barnett 12:13 (laughs) Oh, yeah. So Bud hits me up on short notice and he's just like, "Hey, what are you doing?" I go, "Uh, actually I was at 10th Planet in, uh, downtown working with, uh, Amir, um, I think it was."

Joe Rogan 12:26 Renouardie?

Josh Barnett 12:26 Amir Allam. No, Allam.

Joe Rogan 12:28 Oh, Amir Allam.

Josh Barnett 12:29 And, um, 'cause, uh, for a while there, all the bigger guys from Eddie's school were training a lot with me and I was cornering them on a lot of the things they were doing.

Joe Rogan 12:38 Hm.

Josh Barnett 12:38 So, uh, I'm sitting there and I get this call from Bud and he's like, "What are you doing?" I'm like, "Uh, I'm just training." And he's like, "You wanna do the Baja?" I'm like, "Uh, yes."

Joe Rogan 12:48 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 12:49 By the way, I've never done any off-road racing. Only, only like road racing and drag racing. And so I'm like, "But I know that this is a completely different animal, but yeah, sure, why not?" "When?" "Oh, Thursday."

Joe Rogan 12:59 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 12:59 It's Monday.

Joe Rogan 13:02 That's such a butt phone call.

Josh Barnett 13:03 Where do I gotta be? (laughs) You know? And, uh, it turned into a fucking adventure and a half. Uh-

Joe Rogan 13:09 Explain the Baja for people that don't know what-

Josh Barnett 13:12 Go ahead.

Joe Rogan 13:12 ... what's involved, 'cause it's a crazy race.

Josh Barnett 13:14 There in the Baja Peninsula, there is the Baja 500 and 1000. And the 1000 being the granddaddy of them all. It's one of the most, uh, prestigious off-road races in the world. It's also one of the most dangerous. And they have two ways of doing it. One is they do a circle or they set it up where you start off, uh, in Ensenada, uh, generally, and then you'll, you'll head down south and you'll make a loop and you'll come on back. And then the other aspect they have is it just goes in a meandering line all the way down to 1000 miles from where you started. So for the time I did it, I was part of a team and, uh, I think I jumped in the car second or third. Me and, uh, and, uh, Jesse Combs, rest in peace. So we... Ours went from Ensenada to, uh, I believe La Paz in one, you know, off-road shot all the way down there. And basically, you're off in the wilderness, in the wilds. I mean, there are... You can see the remnants of courses and things like that, but some of the stuff just gets made as it goes. And, uh, there's also a lot of people that do what's called pre-running. So they'll go out there and they'll, they'll map out the track and all that, and they will mark all the hazards and they'll get used to it because, you know, there's a lot on the line with the Baja 1000. And you have, if you've got the money especially, you'll have a trail team that'll travel down the highways and they intersect with you at different points to do your driver change-overs.

Joe Rogan 14:48 Is it a thousand kilometers? Like, what is it?

Josh Barnett 14:50 I think it's a thousand miles.

Joe Rogan 14:51 A thousand miles?

Josh Barnett 14:52 And, uh-

Joe Rogan 14:53 Wow.

Josh Barnett 14:53 ... um, you, you get out there and you're in the middle of nothing. And you could be... I remember we jump in the car at four o'clock in the morning, pitch black, lights are on, slap you on the helmet, put your shit on, "Bye." And we're already going 50, 60 miles an hour in the middle of nowhere in brush. And I'm looking at a GPS and looking up ahead. There's no windshields in any of this stuff because that would just get dirty and then you'd get blind. So you wear your helmets and you sit on microfiber, like, mitts and things to just clear your face off as bushes, cacti, whatever, dust, dirt, silt is flying through that into the cabin and hitting you. Uh, you've got electrolyte drinks that are in a, in a little, uh, uh, like a camel set-up that you can go and, you know, take a drink while you're need... uh, while you're in the car. You've got your catheter set up to, to, to urinate, uh, and away you go. And it's pitch black. All you can see is what the lights are showing. And I'm just going, "Well, you know what? Tight butthole, I guess, but there ain't no turning back now." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 16:00 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 16:00 And, uh, and we were in a class six vehicle which was... It was like a dune buggy with, um, a Subaru Boxster motor in it. But the thing did top out at like 98 miles an hour (laughs) on a back road.

Joe Rogan 16:15 Wow.

Josh Barnett 16:15 Just going straight, just hauling ass, four gears. And it's, it's pretty hairy. I mean, when you... When the sun starts coming up, though, and you're on... you're going 30 miles an hour along the side of this rock ridge on this cliff with like a 40-foot drop-off to your right, but you're seeing the sunset coming up, uh, the sunrise over the... uh, the Mexican skyline, and it is just insane. But also, people like to do things like create hazards on purpose and then film them for YouTube. So put a jump where one wasn't, put a hole-

Joe Rogan 16:47 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 16:47 ... where one wasn't. Uh, put a cactus right in the middle of the course, perhaps. (laughs) I mean, it's just crazy shit.

Joe Rogan 16:54 Yeah, that's what I kept hearing about.

Josh Barnett 16:54 And, and stuff like this happens. Uh, I can tell you from experience, I've, uh, I rolled our, our vehicle over. Not that bad, thankfully. Someone came by, pulled us over, away we went.

Joe Rogan 17:04 Really?

Josh Barnett 17:05 Yeah, we just blew all the oil out that had spilled, uh, you know, in, in through the exhaust and just ran it, smoke, boom, bye.

Joe Rogan 17:12 Wow.

Josh Barnett 17:13 Away we went. And then-

Joe Rogan 17:13 You call those trophy trucks? Is that what they're called?

Josh Barnett 17:15 Now, the trophy trucks-

Joe Rogan 17:16 Wow, look at that. Oh my God. (laughs)

Josh Barnett 17:17 ... you hear them before you ever see them. And those dudes are going 150 miles an hour, a hundred and s-... I don't know how fast they get, but, you know, they're all like 10,000 RPM small blocks and shit, just fricking flying. And you will hear them from... You can hear their engine, and then as they start coming up behind you, they start hitting these sirens and stuff to tell you to get the hell out of the way. And if you don't, they will come up, run up to... right behind you, and then bump you right out of the way.

Joe Rogan 17:47 Jesus Christ.

Josh Barnett 17:47 Just shove you right off the road and keep going. But you watch them hit these whoop-de-whoops and the suspension's just going... Where we are... We're doing this kind of thing, right? We got to go over them, let up, get on, let up, get on as we're going, and we're going... And the trophy trucks just run like right over the top of them like they were nothing there. And, uh-

Joe Rogan 18:05 Is that a trophy truck?

Josh Barnett 18:06 Yes.

Joe Rogan 18:08 Wow. Look at that thing go.

Josh Barnett 18:09 BJ Baldwin, uh-... another dude who loves shooting like we do, but is an insane-

Joe Rogan 18:14 I met BJ. I met him at Tara.

Josh Barnett 18:15 ... trophy truck, uh, uh, racer.

Joe Rogan 18:17 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 18:17 Yeah, he's badass.

Joe Rogan 18:19 Those, those trucks look insane.

Josh Barnett 18:21 They are absolutely nuts.

Joe Rogan 18:21 Those are stupid expensive, too, right?

Josh Barnett 18:23 And they're, they're automatics, too.

Joe Rogan 18:24 Oh, wow.

Josh Barnett 18:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:26 Wow. So was yours a manual that you were driving?

Josh Barnett 18:28 Ours was a manual with a four-speed Volkswagen, uh, four, four in reverse.

Joe Rogan 18:32 (laughs) Four in reverse?

Josh Barnett 18:34 Four and a reverse. That was it.

Joe Rogan 18:35 Oh, and a reverse.

Josh Barnett 18:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:36 I was like, "Why would you need four gears in reverse?"

Josh Barnett 18:38 Yeah. Yeah. Although our reverse died on us at some point.

Joe Rogan 18:41 Did it?

Josh Barnett 18:41 I don't know why. Yeah. It decided, like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 18:43 Well, I'm sure the beating of just the pounding and, like, th- they, they, they can't s- last.

Josh Barnett 18:51 Uh, no. And funny enough, the most durable vehicle t- uh, that I've been told, are the ones th- th- that make it through the most are stock Bug. Stock-

Joe Rogan 19:01 Volkswagen?

Josh Barnett 19:02 ... Volkswagen Bug.

Joe Rogan 19:03 Really?

Josh Barnett 19:04 Yes. So there's a limited amount of things you can do to it, but they just soldier on and get through it. But, uh, I hear i- it is just brutal on the body.

Joe Rogan 19:13 Yeah, I mean, I can only imagine. Th- those are tiny, light vehicles.

Josh Barnett 19:17 They make it.

Joe Rogan 19:18 Maybe that's it, right?

Josh Barnett 19:19 Yeah, it could be.

Joe Rogan 19:19 They're lightweight.

Josh Barnett 19:19 You know, I, I think that by being lighter, you're obviously going to r- um, have less impact, uh, amongst travel because it's gonna have less kinetic energy.

Joe Rogan 19:28 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 19:28 It's got less weight bearing down on things and releasing and bearing down on it again. But, to the life of me, maybe they're just really well-made. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 19:36 Bud, Bud does that every year.

Josh Barnett 19:37 Yes, he does.

Joe Rogan 19:38 He's so fucking nuts.

Josh Barnett 19:39 And, and he, his team won the class that we were in that year. Him and, uh, uh, Kyle, um, uh... Oh, what's Kyle's last name? Uh, he used to, uh, run Detroit Speed. W- a, an absolute, uh, gem of a man. You know when you meet that person, you're like, "Wow, you are probably, like, the most pious person in the whole world." That's Kyle. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 19:59 Really?

Josh Barnett 19:59 Yeah. He's just such a nice dude. Just so cool.

Joe Rogan 20:02 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 20:02 And, uh, I met him through Bud, again, doing Optima, uh, Ultimate Street Car Invitational when I competed over there, um, at SEMA. So-

Joe Rogan 20:11 Yeah, Bud is a s- successful television producer with a beautiful wife and family-

Josh Barnett 20:17 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 20:17 ... and risks his fucking life every year for a goof.

Josh Barnett 20:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 20:21 I'm like, "Why are you doing that?" (laughs)

Josh Barnett 20:22 He is just driven to go out there and just compete. The guy is just such a competitor at everything. And he's such a, a seriously intense person when it comes to, uh, competing.

Joe Rogan 20:35 He, he's just-

Josh Barnett 20:36 And he still trains jujitsu and everything.

Joe Rogan 20:37 Yeah. No, he does that with... His whole life, he's like that.

Josh Barnett 20:39 Yeah. And, uh-

Joe Rogan 20:40 He's a strange guy. (laughs)

Josh Barnett 20:42 Well, yeah. He is, but in, in, like, uh, the best way.

Joe Rogan 20:45 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 20:45 You know? Um-

Joe Rogan 20:46 No, I love him to death.

Josh Barnett 20:46 He's, he's an absolute fantastic dude. Love Bug.

Joe Rogan 20:48 I sold him his house.

Josh Barnett 20:50 You did?

Joe Rogan 20:50 Yeah, that was my old house.

Josh Barnett 20:51 Oh, man.

Joe Rogan 20:52 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 20:52 Holy shit.

Joe Rogan 20:53 Yeah, he told... Well, I, I told him that I... You know, he was looking for a house, and I said, "Hey, I'm moving out of this house. Do you wanna buy it?" And it was perfect, so we didn't have to close for anybody. Just sold it to him.

Josh Barnett 21:01 Well, you know I had to have plenty of car stuff for, for everything he might need.

Joe Rogan 21:04 Back then, man, I was kinda broke. I didn't, uh, I didn't... Well, I wasn't broke, but I didn't have a lot of cars. I only had a, I only had a couple cars back then.

Josh Barnett 21:11 You didn't have that, that sick... Was it C2-

Joe Rogan 21:14 Sick fish?

Josh Barnett 21:14 C2 Corvette?

Joe Rogan 21:15 Oh, yeah. No, I didn't have that.

Josh Barnett 21:17 'Cause I saw that one-

Joe Rogan 21:18 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 21:18 ... up at, uh, Home Dudes, uh, Shop.

Joe Rogan 21:20 Yes.

Josh Barnett 21:20 Um, in the valley.

Joe Rogan 21:21 Strope?

Josh Barnett 21:22 Strope.

Joe Rogan 21:22 Steve Strope.

Josh Barnett 21:22 Steve Strope.

Joe Rogan 21:23 Yeah. Yeah.

Josh Barnett 21:23 Don't get him talking about Star Wars. He'll-

Joe Rogan 21:25 (laughs) What? He's a Star Wars nerd?

Josh Barnett 21:25 He'll never get over... Oh, he's a massive Star Wars fan. Like, he'll-

Joe Rogan 21:28 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 21:28 ... he'll be like, "And then Jibber Jabber, I can't believe he was just left out of the canon." I'm like, "F- okay." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 21:33 What? Whoa. Slow-

Josh Barnett 21:34 I mean, he's, like, into it, man. He's (sniffs) deep.

Joe Rogan 21:37 Bud wears only black.

Josh Barnett 21:38 Only black.

Joe Rogan 21:39 For people that, like, you go over his house. You open up his closet. It's like a crazy person. Like, what are you... Where is your colors?

Josh Barnett 21:46 None.

Joe Rogan 21:46 You have no colors?

Josh Barnett 21:46 Z-zip.

Joe Rogan 21:47 He's just serious.

Josh Barnett 21:48 Nothing but black.

Joe Rogan 21:49 He's like Johnny Cash.

Josh Barnett 21:49 Johnny Cash, right. His cars are black, too.

Joe Rogan 21:51 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 21:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 21:52 Yeah. Yeah. He's got a beautiful 69 Mustang. Have you seen that?

Josh Barnett 21:54 Yes, he does. That one i- has a four six dual overhead cam motor in it, too.

Joe Rogan 22:00 Mm.

Josh Barnett 22:00 I think.

Joe Rogan 22:01 It's a gorgeous car.

Josh Barnett 22:02 Oh, it's badass.

Joe Rogan 22:02 He's got a lot of good cars. He, he was, uh, the producer of Rides, that show where I had my Barracuda done.

Josh Barnett 22:07 Ah, right, right, right, right, right.

Joe Rogan 22:09 Yeah. He also produced Overhaulin' and...

Josh Barnett 22:11 I had my buddy on Overhaulin'. That... Bud, uh, I wrote out to him, and I go, "Hey, my, my buddy's got this '67, uh, Firebird." And he's a comic artist, Dan Panosian. Amazing dude, great guy. And he would love to get this thing really... I mean, it drives and everything, but, uh, he would really, really love to get it all done up. And so, of course, you know, this whole elaborate scheme gets put together.

Joe Rogan 22:35 Right.

Josh Barnett 22:36 It's Overhaulin'.

Joe Rogan 22:36 For people who don't know the show, they pretend to steal your car.

Josh Barnett 22:39 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 22:39 So someone'll steal your car. So, like, say, say if Josh had a Charger, they would steal his Charger, and then they would do it all up and then bring you somewhere under false pretenses and then unveil your new car.

Josh Barnett 22:51 Well, in this case, they didn't do any of the stealing. No thievery. Uh, but the deception was, "Oh, hey, uh, Dan, they, the UFC, the magazine, is gonna do this photo shoot on me, and they would love it if I could bring, like, a muscle car or something, so could, could we use your, your Firebird?"

Joe Rogan 23:07 Uh...

Josh Barnett 23:07 Yeah, it's awesome. They're like, "Yeah, they'll give you, like, $500 for the, for the time and all these other thi-" Sounds great, amazing. And so I'm standing there with, uh, it's me and Arianny. And at this moment, Bud or whoever is directing the photo shoot, he just goes, "All right, and action." And Arianny throws, like, a whole bucket of red paint all over the car, and then I swing a sledgehammer through the front windshield.

Joe Rogan 23:30 What?

Josh Barnett 23:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 23:31 In front of the dude?

Josh Barnett 23:32 In front of the dude.

Joe Rogan 23:34 Oh my God.

Josh Barnett 23:34 And the whole... Obviously, the idea was, oh, we're gonna get this great TV moment where this guy just, like, melts-

Joe Rogan 23:42 Right.

Josh Barnett 23:42 ... in one way or the other. And instead, he just kinda goes, "Hmm." And he kinda laughs and, and so we bring him over. And Bu- and, and Bud's saying like, "Well, no, I mean, you got paid. I mean, it, it... The contract's not gonna take care of this or whatever." But the whole time, we're trying to get this rise out of him, and he, he doesn't really budge.

Joe Rogan 24:04 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 24:04 And, okay, then we, we let him on that, you know, it's Overhaulin' and all this.And-

Joe Rogan 24:09 Did you tell him before they fixed the car?

Josh Barnett 24:11 Uh, yes.

Joe Rogan 24:12 Oh.

Josh Barnett 24:12 And, uh-

Joe Rogan 24:13 Did he have to fake it when you unveiled it?

Josh Barnett 24:15 Uh, no, no. He knew, but he didn't get to see anything we were doing. So, he knew we took his car. He knew a bunch of stuff was going to be done to it, but he had no idea.

Joe Rogan 24:21 Oh.

Josh Barnett 24:21 It was just like, "Your car is gone. It's got a sledgehammer through the windshield and a bunch of red paint on it, and bye, you'll see it when we're done. And we're not telling you shit." And... But at the time, he... So, Bud's just like, "Dude, why are you so cool about this?" (laughs) And essentially, Dan just was like, "Well, I really trust Josh, so I knew he would... It would... He wouldn't... There's no way he would let my car just be fucked." And I'm like, "Goddamn it."

Joe Rogan 24:44 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 24:44 (laughs)

Narrator 24:46 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 24:46 I need... We needed-

Joe Rogan 24:47 This is a-

Josh Barnett 24:47 We needed it to be-

Joe Rogan 24:48 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 24:48 Yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 24:49 Look at him. He's like, "What the fuck?"

Josh Barnett 24:50 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:52 Wow. What a beautiful car.

Josh Barnett 24:53 And, uh, I came, I worked on this a little bit with them. I did some of the deconstruction. I, I helped Lucky-

Joe Rogan 24:58 Oh, my God.

Josh Barnett 24:58 ... with a little bit of the electrical. I worked with, um, um, Andreas a little bit on some of the other touches. And me and Chip sat down to do just the, like the rough outlining and designing about what kind of a car-

Joe Rogan 25:13 Just-

Josh Barnett 25:14 ... in terms of purpose we wanted to build out of it. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 25:16 And this dude had no idea.

Josh Barnett 25:17 No. No clue. And, uh-

Joe Rogan 25:20 Wow.

Josh Barnett 25:20 ... you know, we're in there just working away, getting it done. And Lingenfelter supplied this sick, um, uh, LS3 that makes like 600 horsepower. Detroit Speed did a whole deal for the front-

Joe Rogan 25:32 Vroom.

Josh Barnett 25:32 ... and back suspension.

Joe Rogan 25:33 Wow.

Josh Barnett 25:33 Centerforce is helping us with the clutch. And, uh, uh, uh, the car turned out to be incredible. He... It's like one of the... I think until his son was born, and maybe even a little while after, his, his wallpaper on his phone was this fucking car. So that's how much he loves it.

Joe Rogan 25:51 (laughs) Does he still drive it?

Josh Barnett 25:52 Oh, yeah. And I make him take it out when I can too, or, uh, we'll do stuff like, um, uh, there's this quarantine cruise thing that's still going on down in, uh... That, that got started during the quarantine, but it's, it's still going on, this cruising around Pacific Coast Highway and all that kind of stuff. And so I brought my GT500 out, and I made him come out with the, with his car, Mitra. And, uh, I mean, man, you, you see, here- here's the thing, if you ain't driving the cars, what's the fucking point?

Joe Rogan 26:19 Oh, yeah. No. Uh, that, I firmly believe that. I don't, I don't understand people who have cars and they just... It's just like gonna be in a garage forever.

Josh Barnett 26:26 Ah, no, there's no point. Like that just-

Joe Rogan 26:28 A lot of people do that, though.

Josh Barnett 26:29 I, I know, and I understand if you wanna build something museum quality, but then I'm like, "Well, then just put it in a museum. Why the-

Joe Rogan 26:35 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 26:35 What the, what's the fucking point?"

Joe Rogan 26:36 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 26:36 But, uh, but the... In, in terms of what's the fucking point, at SEMA this year, there's always some trend that is trash, in my opinion, that always seems like it... Maybe it got started in an interesting way, and then it just like runs the gamut of s- just like every copycat version of it, that's just like, "Oh God, we don't need any more of this." This year, or last year, I guess, it was turning your classic car electric. And I'm like, "Fuck."

Joe Rogan 27:07 Oh. I have a problem with that.

Josh Barnett 27:08 I have a massive problem with that. I'm just like, why would you take the soul and spirit out of a machine and replace... Make it even more material, more mechanical-

Joe Rogan 27:22 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 27:22 ... and less engaging?

Joe Rogan 27:24 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 27:24 Like... And then it's so bad now that even with, uh, EVs for all kinds of aspects, there's people selling you... I, I don't know how they, how they put it together, but it, it's a thing that makes car noises for you.

Joe Rogan 27:39 Oh, no. (laughs) No. No, no, no. Like a vroom vroom?

Josh Barnett 27:44 But that's how far I'm... Th- yes. This is, this is-

Joe Rogan 27:46 Does it pretend to shift gears? 'Cause there's no gears.

Josh Barnett 27:48 I, I mean, I'm fam-

Joe Rogan 27:49 I think a Porsche Taycan has two gears.

Josh Barnett 27:51 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 27:52 For whatever reason. But a Tesla is zero. It's like one gear. So what do you... What do they do? Does it just rumble-

Josh Barnett 27:59 Uh-

Joe Rogan 28:00 ... when you hit the gas?

Josh Barnett 28:00 ... I, I guess.

Joe Rogan 28:01 No, no shifting?

Josh Barnett 28:02 I... (laughs) Dude, I, I have no idea. This is-

Joe Rogan 28:05 What are they doing with their fake noises?

Josh Barnett 28:07 Uh, I, I guess they just add that to the rest of other fake shit that they're doing in their life and the way that they're doing things. And, and, uh, you know, hunky dory, you know?

Joe Rogan 28:15 BMW started doing that back in the day with, uh, their turbocharged engines. They started putting like, uh, pumping in fake exhaust note through your stereo.

Josh Barnett 28:26 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 28:27 Yeah. And that... It was an option, I believe, I believe you could shut it off. But, um, I had a couple of M3s back in the day. I had the older ones though, with, with the V8.

Josh Barnett 28:39 Oh, yes.

Joe Rogan 28:40 And it was, it was really nice. It was like a high revving V8 engine.

Josh Barnett 28:44 Great car.

Joe Rogan 28:44 Oh, it was great.

Josh Barnett 28:44 Great car.

Joe Rogan 28:45 Yeah. I... It was so good, I got two of them in a row. My lease went up and I got another one 'cause I loved it. It was just a real high re-... It wasn't the fastest or the most handling, but it was very engaging.

Josh Barnett 28:55 It's a, it's a, it's a car that has a driving experience to it. It's quick, it's fast revving, um, but it's also easy to drive everywhere you wanna go.

Joe Rogan 29:03 It was a great commuter car.

Josh Barnett 29:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:05 I loved it. I loved taking it to the comedy stores. Just a great... Shifting paddles, you know, which I generally don't like, but when you're in LA traffic... That's one of the things I always admired about you.

Josh Barnett 29:15 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 29:15 In LA traffic, you still drove a stick shift.

Josh Barnett 29:17 Yeah, yeah. No, I, uh, I actually sold my, my SRT8 Challenger and replaced it with a diesel GL, GLK Mercedes SUV. And I was so proud when I put a trailer hitch on it. (laughs) Like, you know, I've turned a fucking new leaf when I'm like, "Hey, look, it's a diesel and I've got a trailer hitch."

Joe Rogan 29:36 Yeah, that's a new leaf.

Josh Barnett 29:37 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 29:38 You know, you-

Josh Barnett 29:38 But at the same time, I'm still like with Victor Henry, who you just saw in UFC, we're building... Uh, he bought, uh, a 70 Cutlass S off of me, and we're building this thing up. Um, Fitech is giving us fuel injection to do on the whole car. I'm, I had a, a 455 with aluminum heads, roller cam that I had sitting around, put in it, tunnel ram. Uh, it'll be like 10, 10.2 to, to 1 compression. It's gonna be, you know, funny shit.

Joe Rogan 30:05 He talks about that. We tal- we actually talked about that during the fight itself.

Josh Barnett 30:09 Ah, yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:10 ... which, by the way, was fantastic, and I really wanted to talk about that, 'cause Victor Henry was super impressive. It's so rare that you see a guy enter the UFC, um, you know, kinda unheralded, but, like, with a good reputation.

Josh Barnett 30:23 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 30:24 But, you know, not a lot of hype behind him. But performed that way against a guy like Rani Barcelos-

Josh Barnett 30:29 Yes.

Joe Rogan 30:29 ... who's a top-of-the-line fighter.

Josh Barnett 30:32 Yes.

Joe Rogan 30:32 I mean, he is so good. Rani is so technical and so high level. And Victor just put on a fucking clinic. He put on a clinic. It was amazing.

Josh Barnett 30:44 Uh-

Joe Rogan 30:44 He's so good, man.

Josh Barnett 30:45 And it's like Victor said to the press afterwards, where, you know, they, they usually ask a bunch of, like, just rote questions, like, "Well, you know, what, what did you think about, uh, being underestimated," or whatever. And he goes, "Look. You guys are UFC people."

Joe Rogan 31:00 Hmm.

Josh Barnett 31:00 "You know about UFC, you know about people in UFC, and you don't really know anything else."

Joe Rogan 31:04 Right. True.

Josh Barnett 31:04 "And so, what you don't know about, I'm not surprised that you're not acquainted. Like, that you wouldn't really understand how to, how to, how to, uh, put this on some sort of metric." But-

Joe Rogan 31:17 Right. That is a very good point, because I think at this point in time, that's silly. It used to be you would look at the UFC and that was like the NFL.

Josh Barnett 31:26 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 31:26 There was the elite football players, the UFC was the elite fighters. But there are guys in other organizations now that are top of the line. There's a bunch of them.

Josh Barnett 31:35 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 31:36 There's a bunch of them that are fighting for ONE FC, there's a bunch of them that are fighting for these other organizations. You know, Kayla Harrison-

Josh Barnett 31:43 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 31:43 ... who's over in the PFL. There's top-of-the-line fighters that are-

Josh Barnett 31:46 There are killers.

Joe Rogan 31:47 ... killers.

Josh Barnett 31:47 All over the world. And that was, you know, one of the things that I like to do with my athletes is I want them to see the world.

Joe Rogan 31:53 Mmm.

Josh Barnett 31:54 I want them to fight all over the place. And so, I've, I was taking Victor to Russia, and he's over there beating guys. Uh, he was undefeated in Rizin, he was the champion for DEEP, he had fought for the title in Pancrase before, early in his career.

Joe Rogan 32:06 Hmm.

Josh Barnett 32:06 And so he'd gotten to see all this different stuff and fight in all these different places, different rule sets. And so, when it came time for the UFC and, during the pandemic, it's just, okay, can't get to Japan, no one's getting visas, uh, fighting in the States is really limited. But, um, uh, the amazing, uh, George and Steve Bash, they took, helped Victor out, got him a title shot against, uh, uh, Albert Morales in LXF. And so, we were able to keep him busy, and it's like, "Hey, guys." And I had been talking to the UFC, but I, I'd get the response like, "Well, well, you know, Dana White's Contender Series." I'm like, "No. This kid's 20, 20-5, 21-5, he's got two world titles." Like, "I'm not doing it." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:53 Right, right.

Josh Barnett 32:53 "I'm not putting him in the Contender Series for a maybe."

Joe Rogan 32:56 Right.

Josh Barnett 32:56 "This kid's legit." And eventually, this opportunity with Rani came up, and we just said, "Yeah, yeah, we're, we're good to go."

Joe Rogan 33:03 That's a good example, because most people are not gonna take that fight with Barcelos on such a short notice.

Josh Barnett 33:08 Right.

Joe Rogan 33:08 Because he requires a lot of preparation. He's got-

Josh Barnett 33:10 This is true.

Joe Rogan 33:11 ... crazy endurance, super skillful. But God damn, I was impressed with Victor. I was impressed with how composed he was-

Josh Barnett 33:18 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 33:18 ... and how technical. He never wound up once.

Josh Barnett 33:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 33:22 Everything is coming from the chamber, uh, there's no telegraph, he's constantly moving, he's constantly feinting, lots of head movement. Fuck, he was a-

Josh Barnett 33:30 Well, it-

Joe Rogan 33:30 He was impressive.

Josh Barnett 33:31 ... it was, it was us putting our game plan fully, uh, in- in- into implement- in- into implementation. Because Rani is such a tough guy, very physical athlete, great wrestling background as well.

Joe Rogan 33:43 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 33:44 Um, and a, a diehard heavy striker. So, our thing is, well, you know, all right, we're not gonna wrestle with him. Like, there's no point. Um, I don't, I don't feel that Victor couldn't, or couldn't submit him potentially, but why, why put it in places where we feel like, not be giving something up, or putting it in a, in a, in a place that he wants to be. But we also know he loves fighting on the feet more than anything else, for the most part. And he really believes in his striking skills. So, you could get into a big fight with him about that, but now you're kind of putting yourself in the position to kill or be killed and, and why? So, the idea was, keep tearing apart at his body, keep him fighting on the back foot, um, don't let him fight moving forward, and con- use constant feints, uh, feints, uh, keep tagging the body over and over and over again, getting our chip shots in, hitting first and always hitting last, and watching out for his right uppercut, his, um, his right hand, and how he loves to pull with his head movement, and then throw a punch behind it.

Joe Rogan 34:50 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 34:50 So not getting too extended, letting that guy get his work off at times, but, but pulling with a half step, getting right out of range so that we're not behind or right, running into any of that stuff, and continue to chip away at that body and take away his endurance. And bank on our cardio and scoring and scoring and scoring. And if the opportunity presents itself, we had a few things in our, up our sleeves for potential fight-enders, but also, we knew that if you keep pulling a guy apart, eventually they're gonna start, if they feel like they're losing in any way, they're gonna get bigger.

Joe Rogan 35:20 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 35:20 And bigger and bigger. And the bigger they get, the more openings they're gonna leave behind.

Joe Rogan 35:24 Right.

Josh Barnett 35:24 And there was a couple times, um, it seemed like, you know, Vic had him rocked, maybe he could have taken him out, but you know, Rani's so tough. So we're not gonna just blindly run into anything. And so Vic just kept pouring it on, pouring it on, pouring it on, pouring it on. And, you know, in time, we just were able to pull Rani's tactics apart and, and leave him exposed to our, our opportunities. But, you know, the guy never stopped fighting the whole fight. You know, even in the third round, whenever he got a chance to get off, he was trying to take Vic's head off.

Joe Rogan 35:56 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 35:56 Which is why he's so dangerous.

Joe Rogan 35:57 It was very impressive in that he, he had that kind of endurance given that it was such a short notice. Did he have, uh, a fight lined up anywhere else or was he just-

Josh Barnett 36:07 No.

Joe Rogan 36:07 ... always in the gym?

Josh Barnett 36:08 But as soon as that fight in LXF was over with, um, I just said, "Hey.... stay in the gym. You're not gonna crank it up to, uh, full, full-peaking fight camp, but you need to stay in the gym and stay at a certain level of conditioning-

Joe Rogan 36:23 Keep a strong base.

Josh Barnett 36:24 ... because I'm gonna try and find something for you. I'm going to be out there advocating to try and get you another fight. And if it ain't in the UFC, then maybe it's gonna be, again, for, for George and Bash in LXF. I mean, we're gonna keep you busy. We're gonna make it so nobody can deny you at some point.

Joe Rogan 36:39 And he's in this place where... Is he 34, 35?

Josh Barnett 36:43 30... I think he's 34, gonna be 35.

Joe Rogan 36:45 So at that age, especially in the lighter weight classes, as we were saying before-

Josh Barnett 36:51 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 36:51 ... that he's in a, a position where you gotta kinda get going now.

Josh Barnett 36:55 Exactly. And I knew that he had a lot left in him, and potentially, he was actually coming into his, his best era of himself right now. And so I didn't wanna let that go to waste.

Joe Rogan 37:08 Well, it certainly looked like it in the fight. You know-

Josh Barnett 37:09 I, I, I-

Joe Rogan 37:09 ... there's no way you could fight like that against a guy like Marcellus.

Josh Barnett 37:11 At the end of the day, Sean Shelby sees us in the back and he just had such a shit-eating grin. He's like, "Fuck yeah."

Joe Rogan 37:18 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 37:18 "That is exactly what we want." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 37:20 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 37:20 And I'm like, "I, I told you, but I know everyone's always telling you, but, you know, he's the real deal and he's gonna give you badass fights every single time. This kid is... doesn't know what it's like to not have heart or will. It just doesn't exist. And he's skilled and mean and he can get it done. He's great." And I was really actually massively surprised in a pleasant way about the, what the UFC was doing for him in prep for this fight. It's like, "Oh, you have this fight camp coming up? Oh, we have meal plans. We got this. We will make sure you make weight. We'll help you..." It's like, "Fuck... All right. I love this."

Joe Rogan 37:57 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 37:57 You know, uh, looking after this kid in this way where you're not gonna get that any other place.

Joe Rogan 38:02 Right.

Josh Barnett 38:02 And not to, not to diminish places, like Rizin or fighting in, uh, the places like, um, uh, uh, R, RCC in Russia. I mean, we've been taken care of greatly everywhere we've gone. But that... Having the UFC go into their, their, their toolbox of things that they could-

Joe Rogan 38:21 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 38:22 ... they could, they could put out there to benefit the fighters, I was stoked.

Joe Rogan 38:26 Yeah. No, they've-

Josh Barnett 38:26 It was great.

Joe Rogan 38:26 ... done a lot of amazing stuff in that regard. Like, first of all, uh, establishing the Performance Institute in Vegas.

Josh Barnett 38:32 Yes. That was a huge help too.

Joe Rogan 38:33 Have you been?

Josh Barnett 38:33 Yes. Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:34 It's amazing.

Josh Barnett 38:35 I was there with Travis Browne, uh, when he was gonna f- prior to his fight with Alexey Oleinik and then when we were there to originally fight at the Apex Center, you know, that was completely opened up to us and, and that was a great, great opportunity. I've been in conversation with Forrest because I'm always interested to learn about why the, the PI itself does this versus that, right? Even, uh, I was talking to the people there about their Normatec system. "Okay, well, what, what is your experiences with this?" You know, "How does this, uh, compare to..." What is it? ECG or ECGC, which is another pro-

Joe Rogan 39:11 We should explain Normatec.

Josh Barnett 39:12 Well-

Joe Rogan 39:12 Normatec is, uh, they are these awesome-

Josh Barnett 39:15 The compression sleeves, yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:15 ... boots that you put on, that... Well, they're like pants. They go over your whole leg.

Josh Barnett 39:17 And they've got ones for your arms too.

Joe Rogan 39:19 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Josh Barnett 39:19 And then, um, to me, it kinda reminded me of the, uh, ECGC I think it's called, where there's a system around heart patients, where they put cuffs around you and they hook you up to an EKG. And then i- with your heart rate and your pulse rate, it's supposed to move and squeeze in, in succession to create, um, uh, extra circulation or help with circulation. And so there's been studies that say there's a lot of benefits for this for people that have had heart issues or, um, uh, circulation-related stuff and whatever. And so I started talking to the gal there about, "How does this compare?" And so, getting little bits of information like that, getting to understand more about what the systems are and what their intention is, what problems are they trying to solve, that's great for me as a trainer, because then I can f- take that information back and then figure out how to use it with my athletes, find other complementary things to go with it. You know, anything you can do to try and give that athlete that, not just that extra edge now, but something that can keep them in the battle even further along in their career, which is, you know-

Joe Rogan 40:26 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 40:26 ... even though I'm a heavyweight and we can get away with having longer careers, to a degree, I feel that the way I was trained from the beginning had a lot, has a lot to do with me being able to stay in this game as long as I have.

Joe Rogan 40:40 Well, particularly conditioning, right? I mean-

Josh Barnett 40:42 Uh, conditioning, yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:43 Like, tell everybody, like, your, your background with catch wrestling. You were very fortunate to be able to train with some real legends.

Josh Barnett 40:50 Yes. Uh, so my initial training, uh, well, I was a wrestler and I wa- I saw UFC 2 on a tape sophomore year of high school and I just looked at it and went, "I don't know how the fuck you get into this, but I'm gonna find a way somehow and I'm gonna do this." It was just like that there's no questioning, there was no hemming and hawing, no if and ands. "I'll do it." Back in 1994, '5, '6, I mean, it's all just, like, do it as you can, right?

Joe Rogan 41:21 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 41:21 Put it all together in any way that's possible.

Joe Rogan 41:23 I saw your first fight, one of your first fights on a VHS tape. Someone gave it to me.

Josh Barnett 41:28 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 41:28 Babyface Assassin.

Josh Barnett 41:29 Very much so.

Joe Rogan 41:30 Yeah, it was back in the day, man. It was a long time ago.

Josh Barnett 41:33 And through them, I trained with Jim Harrison, uh, rest in peace, uh, one of the old school blood and guts bare knuckle karate guys.

Joe Rogan 41:40 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 41:40 You know, the kinda guy where even Chuck Norris and all of them are like, "Th- that's the dude you don't fuck with."

Joe Rogan 41:45 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 41:46 (laughs) You know, I mean, it was being at his celebration of life, uh, last year, because he died during COVID and we couldn't, you know, we couldn't really put together, like, a, a proper goodbye. And it was, like, me and Superfoot and Troy Dorsey and, you know-

Joe Rogan 42:00 Wow.

Josh Barnett 42:01 ... legends, uh, uh, a bunch of different legends. But then listening to the, like, guys that weren't martial artists even talking about him, but people from law enforcement when he did this special. He was a part of this special criminal unit in East St. Louis. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:15 Oh, boy.

Josh Barnett 42:15 And hearing the stories about, direct from these guys' mouth, about being there with him, or people in the military, it's like...... yeah, well, when Jim Harrison, you know, was paid to do some work in military action and then go over and different things, and talking about him in that regard, and you're just like, "This guy is something that doesn't exist anymore." This is like Ernst Junger-type stuff.

Joe Rogan 42:38 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 42:39 And, uh, y- y- just even I, who trained under him and knew him very well, just was sitting there just, I still had to sit back like, "Wow, what a, what a (laughs) individual."

Joe Rogan 42:48 But those guys, in the early days of karate too, I mean, that was a wild time.

Josh Barnett 42:52 Very wild.

Joe Rogan 42:53 You know, in like the '60s and the '70s, when karate was being introduced, and-

Josh Barnett 42:57 It's a lot like MMA, right?

Joe Rogan 42:58 Mm-hmm, very much so.

Josh Barnett 42:58 It, it's they're building it as they go.

Joe Rogan 43:00 Yep, very much so.

Josh Barnett 43:00 Building it as they go.

Joe Rogan 43:01 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 43:01 And, uh, when I tell people, you know, nowadays, that at one point we just, oh, we'd agree on rules as we got there.

Joe Rogan 43:09 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 43:09 Or, uh, you know, this place would allow headbutts and bare knuckles and whatever, and people are like, "What the hell?" I go, "Thi- we were just fighting," you know, we were trying to test it all out.

Joe Rogan 43:18 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 43:18 And the idea even of gloves was foreign to us because they didn't really exist, right? We had to... If you wanted MMA gloves, at one point, you basically had to buy Harbinger wrist wrap bag gloves that were fingerless.

Joe Rogan 43:30 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 43:30 And then you would have to trim pieces off and build them. Uh, uh, that's what was available to you. And then there was the Boxogenics glove came out, that was in the UFC, and then after that, you know, different people started making gloves, and then gloves kind of became a standard. But at one point it was like, "Yeah, they exist, but you ain't gotta wear 'em."

Joe Rogan 43:49 Well, wasn't the first MMA glove really th- those things that Bruce Lee was wearing?

Josh Barnett 43:53 The Jeet Kune Do ones? Yes.

Joe Rogan 43:54 W- that, was that Enter the Dragon?

Josh Barnett 43:55 Enter the Dragon.

Joe Rogan 43:56 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 43:56 Where he does a whole scene with, uh, Sammo Hung.

Joe Rogan 43:59 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 44:00 And takes him down in arm bars, and-

Joe Rogan 44:01 Gets him in an arm bar, yeah. (laughs)

Josh Barnett 44:03 Yeah, yeah. So-

Joe Rogan 44:03 That was during the days when he was working with Gene Lebell.

Josh Barnett 44:06 Well, even prior to that. My... Uh, the guy who really got me into martial arts to begin with was Fred Sato, who was one of the founders of the Seattle Judo Dojo and one of the original four. Uh, that is Bruce Lee, Fred Sato, uh, Taky Kimura, and, uh, Jesse Glover.

Joe Rogan 44:25 Wow.

Josh Barnett 44:25 That's the original four. And I remember, you know, looking through little old, old books, picture books and stuff, of (laughs) you know, Fred Sato and Jesse and all them with Bruce, and they're just in someone's backyard. I, I don't even remember whose backyard it was. When Bruce Lee is a little skinny kid going to Garfield High School in Seattle.

Joe Rogan 44:45 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 44:46 So FYI people, if you watch Dragon: The Bruce Lee Story, mostly bullshit, revisionist history.

Joe Rogan 44:53 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 44:53 Like a lot of things these days. No, he didn't go to UCLA, to my understanding. No, he didn't meet Linda Lee in California.

Joe Rogan 45:01 No?

Josh Barnett 45:01 They're all from Washington.

Joe Rogan 45:02 They made all that up?

Josh Barnett 45:03 It's all made up.

Joe Rogan 45:04 Why would they do that?

Josh Barnett 45:05 Because s- it's cooler to be from California-

Joe Rogan 45:07 But it's not.

Josh Barnett 45:07 ... than it is to be from Seattle, I guess.

Joe Rogan 45:09 But it's not. It's a historical figure. He's like-

Josh Barnett 45:11 Yeah. Leon is not. There was no Leon, it was Jesse Glover.

Joe Rogan 45:15 So Leon's a fake guy?

Josh Barnett 45:16 Fake guy.

Joe Rogan 45:17 Why?

Josh Barnett 45:17 He's supposed to be Jesse Glover, so to speak.

Joe Rogan 45:19 Why wouldn't they just have Jesse Glover?

Josh Barnett 45:21 Y-

Joe Rogan 45:21 I, I just don't understand why they do that.

Josh Barnett 45:23 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 45:23 You know, it's like in the Mark Schultz, uh, films.

Josh Barnett 45:26 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 45:26 When they had him fight a Russian guy-

Josh Barnett 45:28 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 45:28 ... at the end, when everybody knows he fought Big Daddy Goodridge. That's a part of history.

Josh Barnett 45:32 I, I know. You can go look it up.

Joe Rogan 45:33 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 45:34 It's, it's, it's the same with all the stuff about Bruce. You could even... Uh, Taky Kimura put out a book, uh, something, uh, Memories with the Dragon, whatever. It's got all the old pictures in it.

Joe Rogan 45:42 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 45:43 You know, Jesse Glover has passed away, Taky's passed away. Um, Fred, uh, my sensei-

Joe Rogan 45:48 Fucking Hollywood.

Josh Barnett 45:48 ... passed away, but, but (laughs) you know, I, I remember watching that movie and sitting there just being, just fuming about like, "Why the fuck are they lying?" (laughs) You know?

Joe Rogan 45:57 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 45:57 I mean, what's the point? I mean the guy's-

Joe Rogan 45:58 There's no point.

Josh Barnett 45:59 ... the guy's story is cool enough. And yes, at some point he ends up in LA and everything, and, and you know, the contributions to the idea of approaching martial arts from his perspective absolutely are live, live on in all kinds of aspects.

Joe Rogan 46:14 Yes.

Josh Barnett 46:14 In all kinds of ways, through all kinds of people.

Joe Rogan 46:17 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 46:17 But, you know, I mean, I trained with Guru Dan before, I, I've been around all of these folks and it's just like, I don't... His story's cool enough.

Joe Rogan 46:26 Yeah, but that's something that Hollywood producers love to do. They love to think they're smarter than the original story.

Josh Barnett 46:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 46:32 Instead of just taking the original story and putting it together in an entertaining way, in their eyes you have to add some nonsense to it, otherwise they don't feel like they got their fingerprints all over it.

Josh Barnett 46:41 Yeah, I could see that. Like a lot could be from just simply ego.

Joe Rogan 46:46 100%.

Josh Barnett 46:46 Like, "I wanna tell the story-"

Joe Rogan 46:48 Yep.

Josh Barnett 46:48 "... the way I wanna tell it."

Joe Rogan 46:49 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 46:49 "It doesn't matter what reality was."

Joe Rogan 46:50 They do that all the time.

Josh Barnett 46:52 Of course they do. But then what do they even make these days? Anything that is not, that is original? Uh, uh, good luck finding that. It's as if, um, you know, it's, it's, it's just like, "What?"

Joe Rogan 47:05 Well, I'm sure they're making original movies.

Josh Barnett 47:06 Well, uh-

Joe Rogan 47:07 I'm sure.

Josh Barnett 47:07 ... I would say that-

Joe Rogan 47:08 But the point is, it's like why would you change the, the life story of a historical figure who's one of the most important figures in the history of martial arts?

Josh Barnett 47:17 Right. I, I don't know. It, it, it-

Joe Rogan 47:20 It's so dumb.

Josh Barnett 47:20 ... there has to be some sort of reason, and it could be arbitrary on one end and it could be deliberate on another. At the end of the day, for me, it's just like a lot of things, go to the source.

Joe Rogan 47:32 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 47:32 You know?

Joe Rogan 47:33 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 47:33 And it, it may not be the most popular widespread one, but it's out there.

Joe Rogan 47:37 It's just, it's so, it's just so annoying. So, how did you get into catch?

Josh Barnett 47:41 Uh, I got into catch basically through Matt Hume.

Joe Rogan 47:43 Oh.

Josh Barnett 47:44 Who was training, who had trained over in Japan with Funaki and Suzuki, and then got to train with Sayama. And so he's training under these guys that all come from this Karl Gotch catch lineage.

Joe Rogan 47:53 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 47:54 Who also are from Antonio Inoki. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 47:58 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 47:58 So back in the '70s, Inoki, he split off from, was it Japan Wrestling, uh, Association or something like that. So him and Giant Baba, they make a split. They both were trained under Riki Dozan. And Baba goes, he makes All Japan Pro Wrestling, and Inoki goes, he makes New Japan Pro Wrestling. And Inoki's approach is, "We're gonna make this..."...the world's s- strongest martial art. That's our goal. This is, when we present professional wrestling, it's gonna be something called Strong Style, and it's gonna be the king of sports. It's gonna stand at the zenith of all things. And it's going to be incorporated with martial arts and fight skills and all these, all these aspects of reality combat. And he brings in Karl Gotch-

Joe Rogan 48:45 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 48:45 ...to come and run this gym. And so, all these guys are all getting trained by Karl Gotch, who is a-

Joe Rogan 48:51 Who's legendary.

Josh Barnett 48:51 ...catch wrestler from, um, originally from, from Hungary. And he goes and trains... Uh, he was a, an Olympian in Greco-Roman, and he, he trained in professional wrestling when it was also a much more reality-based product. But then he w- goes to the Snake Pit in Wigan, England, and trains with Billy Riley, who is one of the godfathers of Catch As Catch Can Wrestling, which the term itself, uh, comes from Wigan, England. Catch As Catch Can would, like, get 'em, get 'em any way you can.

Joe Rogan 49:26 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 49:26 Where these old, these (laughs) you know, tough as shit miners get out from the mines at the end of the day. They go and they have their pints and what have you, and then they go up on the hills and in the grass, and they, they throw bets down, and they just challenge each other and go after it. And this eventually starts to become what we know as, uh, professional wrestling. And at some point, professional wrestling is a, a, 100% legitimate sport, but then it starts becoming worked over time.

Joe Rogan 49:52 How did it become worked? Did it become worked because of carnivals? Like, what, what-

Josh Barnett 49:56 The carnivals were a part of it because you could... Like, let's say, you got Toots Mondt, and, oh, God, I'm trying to remember the rest of them. Uh, they, the Gold Dust Trio, they go around up and down the North, uh, up and down the West Coast, and they go and they put these shows together. But one of the, the tricks that they would do is they could have someone who's a ringer, like a real, like, nasty badass, who is either in the crowd to go wrestle someone that didn't know, uh, who this person was, and going in and just murk them and take all their money. Or here's... The other thing is they set it up where they have a guy in the ring doing all these matches, just smashing up all the locals, and then they say, "Well, who, who's willing, who's willing to get in here next?" And then they have a guy sitting in the audience who is their plant. He gets in the ring, he wins, and then they, uh, everybody bets against him. (imitates fail horn) The Gold Dust Trio bets on him and takes all the money, and away they go.

Joe Rogan 50:51 Oh.

Josh Barnett 50:51 And so this is also where the terminology of marks comes in, because the audience, everyone's a mark.

Joe Rogan 50:56 Oh.

Josh Barnett 50:56 (laughs) 'Cause it's a con.

Joe Rogan 50:59 So that was the beginning of theatrical pro- program wrestling-

Josh Barnett 51:02 That was the beginning of-

Joe Rogan 51:03 ... predetermine outcomes.

Josh Barnett 51:04 ...of conning stuff, and, and setting up a potential predetermine. But then it also got to the point where really highly skilled, evenly matched guys could be out there for an hour and a half.

Joe Rogan 51:16 Hmm.

Josh Barnett 51:17 And, and it's just like, "Uh, people don't wanna watch this." They wanna watch more action-

Joe Rogan 51:23 Right, right, right.

Josh Barnett 51:23 ...pack, action-oriented stuff. And so then you start working the matches and putting more, um, flourishes and things in it. It becomes more popular, more interesting.

Joe Rogan 51:32 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 51:32 And then you start... I mean, the basic premise of professional wrestling still exists, and that is you have a face and a heel. So basically, you have a good guy and a bad guy. And the good guy is trying to overcome the bad guy. And at some point, he will go through all kinds of torment and suffering and what have you, and then come out on the other side victorious and overcome the problem. It is just, it's basically the hero's journey contained in a little four-sided ring.

Joe Rogan 52:01 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 52:02 And oftentimes, pro wrestling does a great job of mirroring the sentiments of the culture around it at large. And, uh, now, this actually would be a really great conversation to have with Eric Weinstein, 'cause he's such a huge pro wrestling fan.

Joe Rogan 52:16 Is he really?

Josh Barnett 52:17 And he's got a... He's massive, and he has this-

Joe Rogan 52:19 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 52:19 He's got this great series. This hasn't been finished yet. He's got two parts where, you know, it's got clips of him talking about kayfabe on here-

Joe Rogan 52:26 Right.

Josh Barnett 52:26 ...and, and, uh, work shoots and all this kinda stuff, in terms of politics and culture, mostly politics. But, uh, but y- so the idea of it on a, on a metaphysical level, he would, he would enjoy that conversation, I think. And I, and I gotta connect with him. I was, uh, I was just talking to him the other day, and he's like, "Are you in LA?" I'm like, "Uh, I'm actually heading to Austin to go hang out with folks and go, go do some stuff, but I'm coming back." Uh, but so pro wrestling starts getting worked at some point, but then it starts getting even more and more, uh, exorbitant and outrageous. And you start getting guys like, uh, Gorgeous George, and you start, you know, people that-

Joe Rogan 53:04 Killer Kowalski.

Josh Barnett 53:05 ...yeah, that are really playing to these big, uh, personalities and cutting promos. And then you get the territories that start, they, they start branching out. And each one would have sort of their own spin on things. But at one point, pro wrestling was the way... It was like M- MMA is now, except-

Joe Rogan 53:24 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 53:24 ...it was mainly confined to straight matches of grappling with submissions. But, you know, you'd have incidents like Ad Santel, he beats this World Judo Champion from the Kodokan. And he goes, "Well, I'm the world champion at judo now." And the Kodokan goes, "Ju... What the fuck? The hell you are. Get him!" (laughs) And so all these guys keep coming after Ad Santel. They eventually have this giant showdown in Yasukuni Jinja, this shrine in Japan. And he does, I don't remember, three matches over five days or something like that. And he knocks one guy out in a jacket match, so they made them both wear jackets for this one.

Joe Rogan 54:04 Like kimono's?

Josh Barnett 54:04 Yes, and he slams the guy and TKOs him.

Joe Rogan 54:07 Wow. Wow.

Josh Barnett 54:08 Wins that match. And he... Essentially, the catch guys beat the judo guys at that point, but then it doesn't end. It keeps going. The judo guys get some wins, there's draws, there's this. And eventually Ad just goes, "That's enough. Okay, I got it." (laughs) "I don't, I, I can't keep this up. I'm not the World Judo Champion anymore. I, I, I'm shutting the fuck up about this." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 54:27 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 54:27 'Cause they were not letting it go. And of course, regardless of Ad Santel being able to come out on top-... these were no slouches. These were tough as shit dudes.

Joe Rogan 54:36 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 54:36 And in a more, in a more, uh... Yeah, look at that dude.

Joe Rogan 54:41 Oh, that's him? Wow.

Josh Barnett 54:41 You can imagine that dude was probably strong as shit.

Joe Rogan 54:43 Jacked.

Josh Barnett 54:44 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:44 And this is pre-creatine. (laughs)

Josh Barnett 54:46 Yeah. Oh, yeah, very much so. This is all-

Joe Rogan 54:48 Pre- everything.

Josh Barnett 54:48 This is all very much truly horse meat and bone marrow-

Joe Rogan 54:51 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 54:51 ... and all that good stuff.

Joe Rogan 54:52 And just hardcore working out.

Josh Barnett 54:54 Exactly.

Joe Rogan 54:54 One of the things about Karl Gotch, in particular, was, like, he was legendary for his requirements of fitness.

Josh Barnett 55:01 It's true. It is a hundred percent true.

Joe Rogan 55:03 Did you, did you get a chance to train personally with him?

Josh Barnett 55:04 I got to train a, a bit with Karl, although he wa- he didn't ask me to do all the requirements and all that. And I met him through a, a magazine interview where Gong Kok Togei brought me over to meet with him in Tampa. And I believe Jake Shannon helped set it up, in fact, uh, 'cause Jake and Karl were really close. And then eventually, Billy and Jake would be- become very close because, uh, I brought Billy to Jake 'cause Billy left Japan and came back to America and was living in Arkansas with some of his family. And I said, "Hey, um, can we do something with Billy here? Like, get him to do a seminar or something? Let's keep him active. Let's put some money in his pocket. Let's do something." And Jake structured this whole thing and got Billy out to the rest of the world, and it was amazing.

Joe Rogan 55:46 Wow.

Josh Barnett 55:46 And, and it was so incredible that Jake was able to, to do this for Billy and bring Billy to everyone. And, you know, have some of this stuff taped, do these seminars, and, and expose again what was old is now new.

Joe Rogan 56:01 What was Karl's conditioning routine that he required of students before they were able to learn?

Josh Barnett 56:06 That's a good question. I don't know exactly what it was-

Joe Rogan 56:09 It must be insane.

Josh Barnett 56:09 ... but it was something like a thousand squats and 500 Hindu push-ups and, you know, something, something. It was, it was a pretty rigorous thing. And if you wouldn't... If you couldn't complete it, he wasn't gonna teach you.

Joe Rogan 56:21 Right.

Josh Barnett 56:21 But I think a lot of that was, well, number one, he believed that conditioning is your greatest hold. That is a direct quote from Karl Gotch. But also, it showed how serious you were.

Joe Rogan 56:29 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 56:30 A lot of people always say, "Oh, hey, Joe, you know, I wanna be a comedian too. You know, what do I..." And you're like, "No, you don't. You're not really serious about it. You see my success, you see these things, and you think, 'Well, I could have that.'" It's like, you have no idea how much... You know, it's the iceberg concept. You know, you see this, but underneath it all was all this toiling and suffering and failing and all these different things to get to this point. And you can look at someone like, "You're not ready to fail. You're not even ready to fail yet."

Joe Rogan 56:55 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 56:55 "You're not ready to suck-

Joe Rogan 56:57 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 56:57 ... to get to being good." And it's the same with someone like Karl. You know, all these people will come around and, "Oh, yeah, teach me."

Narrator 57:03 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 57:03 "I, I'll be the best in the world. I'm gonna be..." It's like, "Yeah, sure you are. Can... You know? Show me some conditioning. You're, you're out of shape, you can't do it. You don't, you can't... Y- y- you're, you're garbage. You don't, you don't, you don't take this as seriously as what it needs to be to actually be successful, let alone be able to be on Joe Rogan level or Karl Gotch level, or An- Antonio Inoki, or what have you."

Joe Rogan 57:24 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 57:24 It just, it's... People even back then weren't necessarily (laughs) in for that kind of ride, let alone these days. So-

Joe Rogan 57:34 Yeah, let alone these days.

Josh Barnett 57:35 Yes.

Joe Rogan 57:35 But would... To, to imagine somebody requiring that-

Josh Barnett 57:38 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:38 ... like, a Karl Gotch type guy today before he takes on any students, what a small pool of talent you'd have to draw from.

Josh Barnett 57:44 This is true. And while it's not something I put my athletes through per se, I, uh, you know, I don't take on new students either. I just don't do it. And people come at me all the time, I'm like, "Nah."

Joe Rogan 57:56 Yeah, people like to say that, like, "You're not a coach unless you take someone from, like, white belt all the way to, like, world championship level."

Josh Barnett 58:02 I mean, there's something to be said about that, but there's-

Joe Rogan 58:03 Sort of.

Josh Barnett 58:04 ... there's a lot of different-

Joe Rogan 58:06 Sort of.

Josh Barnett 58:06 I mean, coaching isn't-

Joe Rogan 58:06 Just levels of coaching.

Josh Barnett 58:07 There is absolutely levels of coaching.

Joe Rogan 58:09 Yeah, there's elite coaching.

Josh Barnett 58:10 Yes.

Joe Rogan 58:10 You know, like a, an elite fighter needs an elite coach, and you don't need to be working with someone who doesn't understand a jab, like-

Josh Barnett 58:17 Right.

Joe Rogan 58:17 ... you don't have to. Like, this idea, like, there's a, there's a sort of hierarchy of coaching where people think that if you don't take someone from the ground up, if you don't, like, really work with, like, bottom level athletes-

Josh Barnett 58:28 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 58:28 ... and, and bring them into top sh- top shape, but I don't, I don't buy into that.

Josh Barnett 58:32 I, I don't, I don't necessarily... I mean, there are people I've started from near ground zero and brought up. I mean, Victor, when I got him, he had five amateur fights.

Joe Rogan 58:40 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 58:40 Uh, but, um, it's also something, let's say, like this. There's guys that can teach you all these techniques and how to lift and blah, blah, blah, right? They, they, they're, they're giving you all this structure and... But beyond teaching you how to throw punches and do this, there's also the concept of why. And not just why for you, why for you versus this guy, why for you at this time, why for you based on what your body's doi-... I mean, there's all these different contextual and subjective elements that come into this whole thing. And I was talking to... I had three, three, three athletes I worked with, uh, fight at LFA last weekend. You know, me and Chad George, uh, are working with these, these athletes. And so, Lou Schwenkke goes out there, knocks the dude out in the first round. Chase Gibson has a great scrap back and forth w- with, uh, Javier Garcia, who's very tough. He wins a unanimous decision. And then Ozzy Diaz goes out and knocks his guy out in the first round. And I'm talking to someone and I go, "Yeah, there's a lot of folks that can, like, get a guy all pumped up and teach him how to throw a bunch of punches and do all this kind of stuff. But can they actually break down the opponents and all their, their tendencies, all their, their... Like, being able to see through that athlete and go like, "Okay, when things are at their best, here's what they're gonna do. When things are at their worst, here's what they're likely gonna do."

Joe Rogan 59:59 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 59:59 "You know, here's their tendencies, here, here's the things that, that you can pretty much count on that they're always gonna go to, you know, when, when things get tough." When, when things are at their hardest, people are always gonna go to what they're best at. And then it's also to look at your athlete and go, "Okay, how do I need to structure this guy's fight, not just on the day, but in all the training leading up to it, so that he's able to mitigate the strengths of his opponent and emphasize his own strengths and keep away from his weaknesses?" And there's that aspect and then there's the mental aspect.... of how to get into that person's head and give them the right motivation, or the right comfort, or whatever is necessary at that moment, to get them at their best.

Joe Rogan 1:00:44 Did you ever work with a sports psychologist?

Josh Barnett 1:00:46 No.

Joe Rogan 1:00:47 No?

Josh Barnett 1:00:47 I just-

Joe Rogan 1:00:48 Do, do you read any-

Josh Barnett 1:00:49 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:00:49 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 1:00:49 I read some books. Uh, actually on, uh, uh, one of them that was a real eye-opener was one on coaching women. And there was all kinds of great little bits of knowledge that I got out of that, just for general coaching and for working with female athletes. Uh, this thing was written by, uh, a female volleyball coach, and I wish I could remember the name of it.

Joe Rogan 1:01:08 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:01:08 Uh, it was a, it was an excellent book though. And then it was just, I think, just paying attention, reading about things like psychology and philosophy and other things. I mean, it's one thing to say, to read philosophy let's say, but, um, you know, reading Nietzsche for me is not just about philosophy, it's about human behavior, it's about, it's about psychology, it's, you know, they call him like the first psychologic- psychologist philosopher, in a way. And so, just being open enough to let the world show you what it is, and for people to show you who they are. Because you'll come ... Yes, everyone's an individual, they all have their idiosyncrasies, but in most ways, we're more alike than we're different.

Joe Rogan 1:01:55 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:01:55 And we've been more alike in almost entirely the same ways since anyone has ever been able to write about what a human being is like, period. If you read about ancient Greece, if you read o- in- if you're reading the Bible or the Quran, or any- whatever, you, you get it, grab yourself a cuneiform tablet or you start reading hieroglyphs, you're not gonna get a radically new different story about what a human being is, how they think, how they feel, what are their motivations, and what it takes for, for flourishing. It's never changed. You know, you can say that we've evolved, but we're no really ... But i- on what level? I mean, maybe we still have like-

Joe Rogan 1:02:31 Society has evolved. Yeah.

Josh Barnett 1:02:31 ... the remnants of a, of a tailbone, but, but even in society and as it evolves, technology may more emphasize how we interact with the world, and things, and, and maybe the intensity at which we may, um, express ourselves, for good or for bad. But it's not new. Envy is still there, egos are still there.

Joe Rogan 1:02:55 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:02:55 Ego, ego from the point of being healthy to the point of being unhealthy. The same with envy, um, the same with resentment. All, all this stuff is all the same, same shit. You go read Gilgamesh, it's all the same shit.

Joe Rogan 1:03:06 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 1:03:06 Y- you know, we're not telling new stories, we're telling the same story over and over and over again. Um, and I think that as a coach, beyond (sighs) that, you know, deeper meaning of being and humanity, but at the same time, it's just, allow yourself to be open to see things. L- let people tell you who they are, and if you really are interested in trying to be about something, it's not always about charging headlong into it. Sometimes it's about sitting back and just shutting the fuck up and listening. Listening to someone who's telling you something, or just, (sighs) uh, listening in a, in a metaphorical sense. Just allowing things to show you something. Let, let ... Watch that footage over and over and over again-

Joe Rogan 1:03:47 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:03:47 ... and s- and throw your preconceived notions aside and just let it happen, and then see how much you start seeing that repeats itself.

Joe Rogan 1:03:55 Yeah, there's probably a great benefit in learning how to teach women because, uh, from my personal experience, women, um, learn better in a sense that they don't have as much ego in, when it comes to martial arts, and they also don't muscle things.

Josh Barnett 1:04:12 True. Um, I think that teaching all types of people is, is incredibly useful. Uh, and I liked teaching women a lot, especially because they smelled better- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:04:23 (laughs)

Josh Barnett 1:04:23 ... and took better care of themselves. Uh, but it's, it's a, it's a ... You can't go out there generally and just start screaming at a girl like, "Why are you so stupid?"

Joe Rogan 1:04:33 Right, right.

Josh Barnett 1:04:33 They're gonna take that in a whole different way. Although I've had athletes that were females that needed more tough love than they needed more gentle guidance.

Joe Rogan 1:04:42 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 1:04:42 And, and, and to that, it just came down to the individual athlete themselves.

Joe Rogan 1:04:45 Right.

Josh Barnett 1:04:45 And I feel like you need to learn how to coach women and men, and then in and amongst that, you then need to know how to coach every single woman and every single man on an individual-

Joe Rogan 1:04:56 Right.

Josh Barnett 1:04:56 ... level. Because, uh, they're not just women, they're not just men, they're individuals. And so-

Joe Rogan 1:05:00 And you gotta get to know them.

Josh Barnett 1:05:01 Exactly. And so that's another reason why I'm not necessarily very eager or driven to just start pulling in new athletes because, to me, I'm not just teaching you how to fight, I'm gonna take a mentorship role in your life. I'm gonna be managing your career, I'm gonna be helping you when you do something dumb in your relationship, or something fucks up, or you make some bad mist- I'm gonna be there for that. And, you know, I don't ... It's penny, it's, it's penny or a pound, penny and a pound, no matter how small or how severe, I, I'm, I'm signing up to be a part of this.

Joe Rogan 1:05:35 Yeah.

Josh Barnett 1:05:35 And so, I don't wanna spend my time on someone that I don't think has the right kind of character. I don't wanna bother because I don't ... It doesn't matter to me if they're gonna go out there and win a bunch of titles and give me a bunch of money, it ain't worth it because now I gotta hitch my boat to this person, and that says something about my honor and my word. And I just, I don't want nothing to do with sum- something like that if it doesn't, if it doesn't reflect the person that I wanna put out there in the world.

Joe Rogan 1:06:00 So what is the process? Like, say if an athlete wanted to work with you, like how would you even go about deciding whether or not you'd be interested in that?

Josh Barnett 1:06:07 Mm. Uh, well, at least ... One of the things I would do at CSW is people come up to me, um, and Victor even was part of this process. I mean, he was training with a good friend of mine, Jimmy Romero. And, and Jimmy was at Legends, uh, when you guys were all there. And at some point, Jimmy's like, "Man, I just can't keep doing this. T- there's just no, there's not enough money. I'm going broke, and I got stuff to do. I have a kid on the way." Like this isn't, this ain't flying. And he loves martial arts. Uh, Jimmy was just, just coming by CMMA the other day and running pads for Chad and all that. It was (laughs) awesome to see him. But, uh, I, I completely understood his position. But, uh-... but what happened is, it's like, "Well, okay, there's no more team." But he'd been bringing his guys down to CSW to come train and spar, and, and this kid Victor was, was his protege and he's a s- super solid kid. And I could see it, and everybody around him that I knew all vouched for what a good kid this dude was. And he's growing up in South Gate, which is like the Mexican Compton in, in LA. So, it's a rough-ass place and, you know, he's been shot before. Just sitting on the, on the stoop playing with his friends and someone does a drive by, a stray bullet, ping. You know, all this kind of stuff. I mean, this, this kid's got a wild life. And I'm just like, "All right." I call him up, I go, "Hey, I heard the team has, you know, disbanded and what have you. Be here on Monday." "Uh, well, you know, I don't have any money." "Just be here on Monday." He shows up, I give him stuff to do, come check in on him, he's been doing it. You know, "All right." Now I start taking a more personal approach. Now I'm really, now I'm more right beside him as I'm doing things. He gets it that, okay, if you're serious about it and I tell you something, and if you don't do it, that's your choice. If it's not that important to you, you're not gonna do it, all right. If it's not important to you, then it's not important for me to give it to you in the first place. Not important for me to spend my time on you. Vic then says this to another athlete at the school who was brought in, who was, who had come up to me before and goes, "Man, I see what you're doing with Victor and some of these other folks, and, and, you know, they're having a lot of success and, and I really like the way that you're working with them, you know. Would it be possible if I could work under you?" And I just said, "You know, let me think about it." And then at some point, I think he, this guy, a fighter under me, AJ Bryant, another great kid, heavy hitter, and, uh, he's got a fight coming up in May. He goes to Vic on the side, he goes, "Hey man, what, what does that even mean? I'll think about it." I mean, what does this... And, and Vic just turns to him and goes, "Look, if he, just, you show up, you keep showing up, you train your ass off, he's gonna come over to you at some point and he's gonna give you something to do. He's gonna tell you something, whether it needed to be done here or it needs to be done outside of the ring, outside of the gym. But he's gonna come to you and he's gonna say something. If you don't do it, if you're not, he's just gonna be like, 'You're not serious,' and that's it. Fuck off." (laughs) And so, you know, eventually I come over, I'm like, "All right, hey. Do this." I just leave. Or, you know, I start feeding him little bits and I see, no, this kid is serious. He, he really does want it. And then I, I take him under, I take AJ under my wing. I start working with him all the time. He's a part of the tr- he's part of the team. We're all going, we're all training.

Joe Rogan 1:09:20 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 1:09:20 Turning pro after, uh, his last amateur MMA fight, I turn to him, I go, "All right, that's enough of that. You've got enough experience for fucking free, fighting for free. That's it, you're going pro. Let's move on." And he's like, "Uh, okay." And then boom, I have him fighting, like, five or six times in a year. Like, right off the bat.

Joe Rogan 1:09:37 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:09:37 And it's like, if you're serious, I'm gonna get you placed, man. I'm taking, took him to Russia, I'm fighting all over the US. It's like, we're gonna do it. But what, you gotta, anything I'm gonna ask of my athletes is not gonna be any less than anything I've ever done, and in terms of severity or intensity. And oftentimes, it's, it is less. (laughs) It's like, you guys are gonna have, are gonna get the benefit of all the shit I had to do and, and all the things that have created new structure for us as athletes now to take advantage of.

Joe Rogan 1:10:09 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:10:09 And, but that same underlying sentiment about being the meanest, toughest motherfucker out there, and whether you go down or you, your, your hand is raised at the end of the day, you keep your head high the same way. And even with, you know, someone like Rani, I, I met Rani before that fight in Brazil when I was training with Pedro Rizzo and, uh, Master Roberto Leitao, rest in peace. And I remember Pedro going, "Hey man, this kid at my gym, man, this kid is dynamite. He's such a badass." And I met him, and I'm watching him, and I got to roll with him a little bit and get to see him. And so I run into him again even before the fight, and he's like, "Oh, hey. Hey, Master." I'm like, "Oh. Oh, hey, hey. We met in Brazil." He's like, "Yes. No, that was me." And it's like, "Fuck," you know? God. Well, at the end of the day, it sucks that one of you has to win and one of you is gonna lose.

Joe Rogan 1:11:00 Mm-hmm.

Josh Barnett 1:11:01 But, and you'll see this even at the end of the fight, the way Victor approaches, like, just nothing but love. Me and Pedro, we couldn't be happier for our athletes. And even though I know Rani lost the fight, e- if he had won, I'd still be happy for Rani. I'd still have a lot of love for him and be like, "Man, Pedro, that's amazing. You guys are great. I'm so gl-" And, and to have the opportunity to fight people that have that kind of respect-

Joe Rogan 1:11:25 Mm.

Josh Barnett 1:11:25 ... and, and love, uh, of martial arts. You know? All right, cool.

Joe Rogan 1:11:30 Uh, that's a, that brings up an in- interesting point, because one of the things that's happening today in, in MMA, and it seems it has a lot of elements of pro wrestling in it, is that there's a lot of shit talking for promotion.

Josh Barnett 1:11:43 Yep. Yep.

Joe Rogan 1:11:44 And, you know, Chael Sonnen was probably the best at it at one point in time.

Josh Barnett 1:11:46 He was great.

Joe Rogan 1:11:47 And then Conor came along-

Josh Barnett 1:11:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:11:48 ... and