JRE MMA Show #60 with Forrest Griffin, Clint Wattenberg & Dr. Duncan French

1. 0:00 – 15:00

   From wild pig. …

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:00

      From wild pig.

   2. FGForrest Griffin0:00

      Or a boar or something, yeah.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:02

      Yeah. My buddy from, uh, Australia gave me those and that head. It's a Asian water buffalo. It's an invasive species, and-

   4. DFDr. Duncan French0:10

      We are live. Yeah.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:11

      Are we live?

   6. DFDr. Duncan French0:11

      Yes, it worked.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:11

      Oh, it worked. Jesus Christ. Ladies and gentlemen, the UFC Performance Institute boys.

   8. DFDr. Duncan French0:16

      Hey, hey. What's up?

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:17

      Right, Duncan, Forrest Griff- hey, Forrest Griffin. Good to see you.

   10. FGForrest Griffin0:20

       We've already talked over each other, so-

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:21

       Yeah.

   12. FGForrest Griffin0:21

       ... we've already blown it.

   13. DFDr. Duncan French0:22

       Geez.

   14. JRJoe Rogan0:23

       No, we've got it. We, we've got it nailed. Um, well, I'm really glad you guys are here because I've, I was blown away when I went to visit the, you know, you hear the Performance Institute and you go, "Well, what is this going to be like?" And you go there and you're like, "Oh my God, they thought of everything." It's like the ultimate state-of-the-art facility for training, for recovery, for, for nutrition. It's fucking amazing. I mean, I was, I was so happy that-

   15. FGForrest Griffin0:44

       All right, we're, we're s- we're posting, we're posting a link to that shit right there.

   16. JRJoe Rogan0:45

       Say it.

   17. DFDr. Duncan French0:46

       (laughs)

   18. JRJoe Rogan0:46

       Dude, I mean, it's, it's amazing. When, when we went on tour and checked that place out, uh, I think, was it with- DellaGrasse was with me?

   19. FGForrest Griffin0:52

       Yeah.

   20. JRJoe Rogan0:53

       Yeah.

   21. DFDr. Duncan French0:53

       Yeah.

   22. JRJoe Rogan0:54

       We were like, "Holy shit." Like, can you imagine? You have access to this fucking place?

   23. DFDr. Duncan French0:58

       Mm-hmm.

   24. JRJoe Rogan0:58

       Like, you guys have really created something special. It's very interesting and, and, and I don't know much about other sports, but I know this never really existed in combat sports before. Something like this that's... I mean, you guys have athletes from all sorts of different walks of life come through there. When I was there, there was many, many, uh, top level fighters-

   25. DFDr. Duncan French1:13

       Mm-hmm.

   26. JRJoe Rogan1:13

       ... that were training out of there. It's really, really interesting.

   27. DFDr. Duncan French1:16

       Yeah, cool. Well, well, we appreciate the kind words, obviously. Um, I mean, ultimately, yeah, the, the, the vision of the UFC was to build a Performance Institute that was truly a, uh, a world-class high performance center that had everything that fighters would, would need. Um, but not only are we trying to, uh, align ourselves as the leaders in mixed martial arts, but certainly leaders, uh, in human high performance. So-

   28. JRJoe Rogan1:37

       Yeah. Duncan, tell people what you do there. Like, explain around-

   29. DFDr. Duncan French1:39

       Yeah, so my, my role is the Vice President of Performance. Um, I essentially, um, direct the, the, the philosophy of how we're going to interact with the fighters, how we're going to support the fighters, and obviously manage n- our, our world class staff that are, that are working within the performance facility.

   30. JRJoe Rogan1:55

       Right.
2. 15:00 – 30:00

   This omega wave technology,…

   1. DFDr. Duncan French15:00

      class. So that's one of the most powerful benchmarking tools you can create.

   2. JRJoe Rogan15:03

      This omega wave technology, can people buy that? Is that-

   3. DFDr. Duncan French15:06

      Oh, yeah. It's just a commercial product off the shelf, yeah.

   4. JRJoe Rogan15:08

      And it w- itled like it worked off an app? Like, you, you put an app on your phone?

   5. DFDr. Duncan French15:11

      Yep, yep, yep.

   6. FGForrest Griffin15:12

      It does everything.

   7. DFDr. Duncan French15:13

      Yep.

   8. JRJoe Rogan15:13

      Seems like it.

   9. FGForrest Griffin15:14

      (laughs)

   10. JRJoe Rogan15:14

       Seems like that's the future.

   11. DFDr. Duncan French15:15

       Yeah. Uh, but again, we, we use many different types of technologies, you know?

   12. JRJoe Rogan15:18

       Yeah, sure, sure.

   13. DFDr. Duncan French15:18

       You know, things like force plates-

   14. JRJoe Rogan15:20

       Mm-hmm.

   15. DFDr. Duncan French15:20

       ... can, can look at neuromuscular responses, um, some of our nutrition variables-

   16. FGForrest Griffin15:25

       Mm-hmm.

   17. DFDr. Duncan French15:25

       ... will change across time. So it's not just one tool that is giving us all the answers. The, the windows of trainability concept is something that really helps us on a day-to-day basis to understand, can you go into a strength or power type session today and really maximize the opportunity to create the adaptations? Another day, your endure- it might be an endurance emphasis. So what it allows us to do is just give, give kind of kudos and credence to the athlete to understand where's the best approach and where you're gonna optimize your responses.

   18. JRJoe Rogan15:50

       Mm-hmm.

   19. FGForrest Griffin15:51

       Every other sport is easier to train for than MMA. If you think about it, I was a defensive end in high school. Every defensive end needs the same physical abilities.

   20. JRJoe Rogan15:59

       Mm-hmm.

   21. FGForrest Griffin15:59

       You think about the, uh, combine, the NFL combine, for instance. They've figured out over a million years what they want to test for. And like, the, the guys that, that, you know, they, they run the same, they jump the same, and per position, right? So quarterbacks don't need to necessarily be that fast if they can throw, right? But for everybody else, the numbers are kind of the same for our sport, and they've collected, I don't know, I don't know how many data points at this point.

   22. DFDr. Duncan French16:23

       Oh, over 100,000.

   23. FGForrest Griffin16:23

       But it's a lot. So they're anonymized, normalized, so you know what average looks like, what... You know, so you can give a guy like Anthony Smith, say, "Hey, look man, if..." And I bring him up because he's mentioned it before.

   24. JRJoe Rogan16:35

       Mm-hmm.

   25. FGForrest Griffin16:35

       He's been outspoken about, you know, working with the PI. "Hey, you know what? Your force power measurements, eh, they're pretty average for 205. You're not, you're not a weak guy, you know? You, you could think about going up a weight class." So it's just objective information so the athletes, and hopefully their coaches, can make those choices.

   26. JRJoe Rogan16:54

       Do you think they would benefit from more weight classes?

   27. FGForrest Griffin16:57

       Oh, that's a great question. I, I... So, I, I thought, ah, 65, you know? Look at the percentages. And then, you know, I was talking to actually Dana and Sean, and I was like, "Well, this guy's gonna go to 65, this guy's gonna go to 65, everybody's gonna go..." So, are, is it gonna help? I mean, there needs to be a percentage difference, but I, I don't know. I think people would just say, "Well, shit. Now I have to do an extra five pounds." But again, so from a PI standpoint, w- that's not really a decision we have to make. What we need to do is collect as much data-

   28. JRJoe Rogan17:29

       Right.

   29. FGForrest Griffin17:29

       ... as we can on that and-

   30. JRJoe Rogan17:30

       For individual fighters, trying to figure out which weight classes.
3. 30:00 – 45:00

   Now, in terms of…

   1. CWClint Wattenberg30:00

      that can support or limit that athlete's g- performance in the cage. In terms of, you know, how, how they, all those things work together, it's really vital that if somebody's working on their strength and power, they're not feeding their, their body in a way that's actually limiting their ability to perform at the high-intensity training, right? Because then that limits the, the adaptation that we're looking for as a response to that training. And that's, that's a really critical point where nutrition-... fills, it really f- is a foundation that supports the development of all the other adaptations that, that, that are, are required to become that complete m- mixed martial artist. So as the strength and conditioning plan is being laid out, as the, uh, physical therapy plan, as the recovery plan, all of those are, are coming to fruition. The nutrition, obviously, is really s- near and dear to what I'm doing, is really critical at supporting the adaptation so that we're not pulling the b- you know, the, the athlete in two different directions in terms of the adaptation.

   2. JRJoe Rogan30:57

      Now, in terms of when you take fighters and athletes into your Performance Institute, have you guys ever worked with young, junior, like amateur mixed martial artists? Kids that are coming up, and d- do you ever do stuff like that? Show them, like give them a peak at what it's like to see like the world-class fighters?

   3. DFDr. Duncan French31:17

      Well, w- we don't at the Performance Institute in Las Vegas, because we're very much aligned to supporting our current roster.

   4. JRJoe Rogan31:23

      Right.

   5. DFDr. Duncan French31:23

      Um, and it, it's a facility and a philosophy that's been designed to support our current roster. What we're doing in June of this year, however, is opening up a facility in Shanghai, China, um, which will have a completely different business model in terms of that will be very much a developmental program for guys that aren't in the U- currently in the UFC.

   6. JRJoe Rogan31:41

      Mm-hmm.

   7. DFDr. Duncan French31:41

      So obviously we're trying to improve the talent standards in, in China, and, and develop that market and break that new territory. But the mechanism to doing that is gonna be very much through talent development in the Performance Institute. So over there, we will have, um, MMA coaches and grappling coaches and striking coaches. We don't have that in Las Vegas 'cause we're currently working with the guys that are already on the roster.

   8. JRJoe Rogan32:00

      Mm-hmm. Well, it's such a unique sport in the fact that even though it is one thing when you get into the UFC, the paths to get there are so-

   9. DFDr. Duncan French32:08

      Yeah.

   10. JRJoe Rogan32:08

       ... widely different. And you really don't know what the right... Well, you, is the Cro Cop path the right way to do it, or is the Daniel Cormier path the right way to do it? No one can say.

   11. DFDr. Duncan French32:17

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan32:17

       And different fighters will win on different nights with different styles. It's the, one of the only sports where your pathway in, you could say that if someone is an elite kickboxer or an elite grappler-

   13. DFDr. Duncan French32:28

       Mm-hmm.

   14. JRJoe Rogan32:28

       ... that going in with that one major advantage in that one skill set could, uh, p- could take you very, very far versus an overall game approach that some guys have where they're really good at everything.

   15. DFDr. Duncan French32:40

       Mm-hmm. Right, and the true specialist, if you look at the day, the true specialist, the GSPs of this world, still hasn't necessarily risen to the top in the sport of MMA. You still see guys that are stylistically... They have a stylistic emphasis, and that's their X factor that keeps them at the top of the game.

   16. JRJoe Rogan32:54

       Yeah, and, and then there's execution-

   17. DFDr. Duncan French32:56

       Mm-hmm.

   18. JRJoe Rogan32:56

       ... with the, which is creativity and their ability to perform under pressure, their ability to maintain their cool during camp where they never overtrain and they, they stay in a good space-

   19. DFDr. Duncan French33:06

       Right.

   20. JRJoe Rogan33:06

       ... they stay in a good head space, don't have girlfriend problems or boyfriend problems. And then they get to the final night of the competition with the most in the tank. And that's a, that's an art in and of itself, right?

   21. DFDr. Duncan French33:16

       Mm-hmm.

   22. JRJoe Rogan33:17

       Some, some, when you first asked about, you know, something I've seen that I love, uh, training partners, right? So bring your training partners to the UFCPI, and we've had, I don't know, six, seven, eight guys that came in as training partners and are now on the UFC roster.

   23. DFDr. Duncan French33:32

       Mm-hmm.

   24. JRJoe Rogan33:32

       So that's, that's why I'm not an asshole to anyone.

   25. DFDr. Duncan French33:34

       That's beautiful.

   26. JRJoe Rogan33:35

       'Cause you never know. (laughs)

   27. CWClint Wattenberg33:36

       It's also you, you get the chance to see these... I mean, every guy has to start somewhere, every girl has to start somewhere. You get a chance to see these people that may- maybe never get this invitation there, and they see the holy ground. They're like, "God, damn, I'm at the UFC Performance Institute."

   28. DFDr. Duncan French33:49

       Well, to your point, too, about the facility, world-class facility, the, the services, we would argue, are even better than the facility. But training partners, coaches, those that are on the Contender Series, those that came through for The Ultimate Fighter-

   29. JRJoe Rogan34:02

       Ultimate Fighter, yeah.

   30. DFDr. Duncan French34:02

       ... they've all been able to use and to access the facility in short periods. Training partners can come and access the facility, eat on campus, um, strength train with the UFC athlete, use the facility upstairs and, and, and train in the MMA space. And when they get the chance, th- when they get the shot, then they tap right into services. And, and, and it, it's an opportunity for us to o- you know, essentially influence the community even before we're working with them directly, which is, which is a really huge component of our, our philosophy and, and really what we're looking to accomplish.
4. 45:00 – 1:00:00

   When you look back…

   1. FGForrest Griffin45:00

      years actually. And, you know, I didn't have that many fights. I broke down, I fell apart. You know, it's pretty average. You know, I was like, "Woe is me," and then when you look at the data, it's like, "Oh no, I'm, I'm, I'm just average." 35, that's, that's when you start to fall apart.

   2. JRJoe Rogan45:13

      When you look back now with what you know now and all the athletes you've worked with at the UFCPI, do you think you would have done anything different in terms of the way you prepared?

   3. FGForrest Griffin45:21

      Oh my God, I can't even think about it.

   4. JRJoe Rogan45:22

      Oh, really?

   5. FGForrest Griffin45:23

      I don't even wanna think about it. Oh yeah, yeah.

   6. JRJoe Rogan45:24

      (laughs)

   7. FGForrest Griffin45:24

      It's so, it's so dumb.

   8. JRJoe Rogan45:25

      (laughs)

   9. FGForrest Griffin45:25

      Like why, why, why would spar eight rounds? Why would you spar eight rounds?

   10. JRJoe Rogan45:29

       (laughs)

   11. FGForrest Griffin45:29

       There's no eight round fights, Forrest.

   12. JRJoe Rogan45:31

       Right.

   13. FGForrest Griffin45:31

       What, what, what are you doing?

   14. JRJoe Rogan45:33

       (sighs)

   15. FGForrest Griffin45:33

       Oh, you're literally just getting slower, Forrest. You're already slow. I don't, I don't...

   16. JRJoe Rogan45:37

       (laughs)

   17. FGForrest Griffin45:37

       I don't know, man.

   18. JRJoe Rogan45:38

       It's s- uh, again, being a pioneer like you were, there wasn't really a whole lot of guys before you that were operating-

   19. FGForrest Griffin45:46

       I, I, I had the other pioneers like the Randys and the Chucks.

   20. JRJoe Rogan45:48

       Mm-hmm.

   21. FGForrest Griffin45:48

       And that's what they were doing.

   22. JRJoe Rogan45:50

       Yeah.

   23. FGForrest Griffin45:50

       So I figured, "Well, I better be tough. I better do what they do." (laughs)

   24. JRJoe Rogan45:53

       That's the craziest thing about MMA-

   25. FGForrest Griffin45:54

       They're champions.

   26. JRJoe Rogan45:54

       If-

   27. FGForrest Griffin45:54

       I'm not gonna question them.

   28. JRJoe Rogan45:56

       Mm-hmm, boxing had already figured out you shouldn't beat the fuck out of each other every day. They had already kinda figured that out.

   29. FGForrest Griffin46:00

       Well, and the other thing they figured out is, uh, we would work with people... I would spar with Wanderlei, Chuck, uh, Randy. In boxing, they don't spar with people that are equals.

   30. JRJoe Rogan46:11

       Mm-hmm.
5. 1:00:00 – 1:05:38

   Now, when you vary…

   1. CWClint Wattenberg1:00:00

      and tying in the workload.... in, into our own system as well as the, the training load that they're engaging with, with their s- skill-specific training.

   2. JRJoe Rogan1:00:08

      Now, when you vary the diet that you give them in depend- dependent of the workout, what is, what is that based on? Is that based on, uh, a hard accepted science of, n- carbohydrate versus protein versus essential fat, essential fatty acids? Like, how do you determine that?

   3. CWClint Wattenberg1:00:22

      So, w- we, we use a, a philosophy, a system called metabolic efficiency. You could call it metabolic flexibility, I've heard it called as well, and essentially, the body will use different substrate at different intensities. And at low intensities and at rest, the body, uh, can and, and likely should be adapted, uh, for our, for our sports athletes to, to fat at rest. Now, it depends on the sport type. Again, if we're a shot putter or if we're a 100-meter d- sprinter, then we're gonna be much more dependent on carbohydrates and, and, and really the creatine phosphate system. We're not even getting into the glycolytic system, and Duncan could talk a lot more about the energy systems. But essentially, we're, we're reliant upon glucose and ATP for energy at the lower intensity bursts. Right? So to hit repeated max or sub-max efforts, we require blood sugar. And without it, we, we will deplete our, our initial stores and then we can't, we can't, we can no longer hit 90 or 95% of our max. We start hitting 80 and 70 and 60 and, and diminishing our ability to do these high intensity efforts.

   4. JRJoe Rogan1:01:25

      Now, do you guys see anybody come in and try to fight on a ketogenic diet? 'Cause I know quite a few guys were doing that for a while.

   5. FGForrest Griffin1:01:31

      No.

   6. JRJoe Rogan1:01:31

      I know Brian Carraway did it.

   7. FGForrest Griffin1:01:32

      Matt Brown.

   8. JRJoe Rogan1:01:33

      Matt Brown? Yeah, that's right. He has fought, but he, he varies it, I think. I think there's-

   9. FGForrest Griffin1:01:37

      Yeah. He, he, yeah. Well, I talked to him. I think he did one pretty pure, and then he did, you know, he did the one where you, you know, you might take in 60 or 80 carbs, but then you work them off-

   10. JRJoe Rogan1:01:46

       Mm-hmm.

   11. FGForrest Griffin1:01:46

       ... to stay ketogenic. I don't-

   12. JRJoe Rogan1:01:47

       Mm-hmm. Some of those guys, like, uh, Zach Bitter, um, he's a w- ultramarathon runner.

   13. FGForrest Griffin1:01:52

       Mm-hmm.

   14. JRJoe Rogan1:01:53

       He, he var- he does eat ketogenic most the time, but then on days of big races, he'll consume a lot of sugars.

   15. FGForrest Griffin1:01:59

       Yeah.

   16. CWClint Wattenberg1:02:00

       And, and-

   17. FGForrest Griffin1:02:00

       Yeah.

   18. CWClint Wattenberg1:02:00

       ... and, and again, I'll, I'll-

   19. FGForrest Griffin1:02:02

       Insulin sensitivity too. Right.

   20. CWClint Wattenberg1:02:04

       Yeah. So essentially, the, the more we can regulate blood sugar at rest and low intensities, then we can expand and, and to support the development of that kind of aerobic oxidative system.

   21. JRJoe Rogan1:02:14

       Mm-hmm.

   22. CWClint Wattenberg1:02:14

       And by adapting to use fat as a primary substrate, we're, we're doing a number of things. One, we're balancing blood sugar at rest so that we can really, uh, limit the insulin spikes and, and, yeah, essentially adipose development, um, in addition to really driving the body towards the oxidative an- or the oxidative aerobic system. And then as we increase and, and what we do is we assess how the body adapts throu- through the training intensities, and we'll repeat that kind of on a monthly basis to see how the athlete changes. And then as they increase in the intensity of a training effort, then we will adjust the ratio of fat to carbohydrates as, as the s- as the fuel substrate.

   23. FGForrest Griffin1:02:55

       I thought it was gonna come up organically, but it didn't. Uh-

   24. JRJoe Rogan1:02:58

       (laughs)

   25. FGForrest Griffin1:02:59

       ... the Trifecta fight prep system. You guys on your team are going to 22 events this year.

   26. CWClint Wattenberg1:03:04

       Indeed.

   27. FGForrest Griffin1:03:04

       Take, take it away.

   28. CWClint Wattenberg1:03:05

       All right.

   29. JRJoe Rogan1:03:06

       What are you doing? (laughs)

   30. FGForrest Griffin1:03:07

       (laughs)

Episode duration: 1:49:56