Mark Bell's Power Project - EP. 278 - Tyler Brey

Episode Date: October 30, 2019

Tyler Brey is an IFBB Pro Wheel Chair Bodybuilder, BJJ Brown Belt under Cassio Werneck, and fitness and performance coach. Tyler Brey was born with spina bifida and refuses to let his circumstances limit what he is capable of. He is currently in his bodybuilding off-season before he begins to prep for the 2020 Arnold Classic. Subscribe to the Podcast on on Platforms! ➢https://lnk.to/PowerProjectPodcast Visit our sponsors: ➢Piedmontese Beef: https://www.piedmontese.com/ Use Code "POWERPROJECT" at checkout for 25% off your order plus FREE 2-Day Shipping on orders of $99 ➢Perfect Keto: http://perfectketo.com/powerproject Use Code "POWERPROJECT" at checkout for 15% off your order! ➢Quest Nutrition: https://www.questnutrition.com/ Use code "MARKSQUEST" at checkout for 20% of your order! ➢SHOP NOW: https://markbellslingshot.com/ Enter Discount code, "POWERPROJECT" at checkout and receive 15% off all Sling Shots FOLLOW Mark Bell ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/marksmellybell ➢ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkBellSuperTraining ➢ Twitter: https://twitter.com/marksmellybell ➢ Snapchat: marksmellybell Follow The Power Project Podcast ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/MarkBellsPowerProject Follow Nsima Inyang ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nsimainyang/  Podcast Produced by Andrew Zaragoza ➢ Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamandrewz #PowerProject #Podcast #MarkBell

I know like you know when you were doing like bodybuilding stuff you ever have a problem with peanut butter? Oh yeah yeah I binged on a whole tub of peanut butter it was pretty bad I cried a little bit. I'm having some problems over here too with some of the stuff that Perfect Keto is sending me the nut butter that they have is is unbelievable it's basically just macadamia nuts cashews and MCT oil with some salt in there all squashed up all crushed up in a jar and you can't stop eating it. You gotta be careful with that kind of stuff, man. Like you really, really, like, mm, God.

It's calorically dense, you know? Yeah, yeah, I can't have more than one of those at home. I'll go through all of them. Yeah, you gotta be careful. They made a good product, though, and it's really nice to have some sort of treat. You know, it's nice to, it's great to be on a diet, it's great to have that discipline,

but a ketogenic diet sometimes can really be tough, and then to try to find any sort of treat. You know, it's nice to, it's great to be on a diet. It's great to have that discipline, but a ketogenic diet sometimes can really be tough. And then to try to find any sort of snacks on a ketogenic diet, you really don't have a lot of options. And so this nut butter gives you a great option. I think everybody should try it. Andrew, where can people find out more about it? Yes. All you guys got to do is head over to perfectketo.com slash power project and use code power project and get 15% off all keto products, including these amazing nut butters. And see my hate to admit this, but you're looking pretty damn good lately. You're looking like a snack over there. I know you got any room for any snacks in your, uh, in your nutrition, in your diet. I know you're trying to stay, keep everything pretty clean. Well, I mean, yeah, I kind of have room. You know, I kind of overdo the snack thing, but like I do like the Quest cookies because again, they have a good amount of fiber.

Yeah. They're not, they're not something that like I really tend to overeat on, but they hit the spot like when I need something that can get me some little, you know, sweetie, sweetie. I like those. Those are good. Yeah. And for people that struggle and I have a hard time with snacks, I would recommend this is something that you do at the end of the day. And that way you go to bed, you're satisfied, you had something sweet and you can turn over to something new and start a new day. What do you got over there, Andrew? Did Nseema say Sweetie Sweetie? He did. I was losing it over here. Yeah, he did. If you guys want some of that Sweetie Sweetie, sweetie. He did. I was losing it over here. Yeah, he did. If you guys want some of that sweetie, sweetie goodness, head over to questnutrition.com. Enter promo code MarksQuest at checkout for 20% off all the sweetie sweetness.

So we're just watching a video on the sheer force value of meat because the Piedmontese meat is so tender. We're trying to figure out, you know, how are they able to, you know, make the meat like this. And the video we just watched basically just explains that, you know, by kind of slicing through the meat, they end up with what they call a sheer force value. And apparently, uh, the certified Piedmontese, they do a great job of keeping that meat super tender. So very easy to cut through, which makes it easier to chew. Yeah. I've had a lot of different types of steaks.

A lot of steaks I paid good money for that just were not tender at all. The most disappointing thing ever, right? Yes, because you're paying good money for steak. You want it to taste good. You want it to be tender. So it's impressive that they're doing all this with their meat. Yeah, it's great. They're putting the information out there too. And again, they have information on how to cook, which I think is great. Having a cook guide is really important.

And on top of it, you know, we don't want the meat to be like hard and dry. You know, there's really nothing worse than having a steak that's like that. And so they have tender meat that has tons of protein in it. And it's very lean, much leaner than a lot of the other meats that are out there. And I think they're just doing it with those jacked Nebraska cows. Andrew, where can they find out more information about Piedmontese beef? Certified Piedmontese has a crazy deal exclusively for our listeners. Head over to piedmontese.com.

That's P-I-E-D-M-O-N-T-E-S-E dot com. Enter promo code POWERPROJECT. That'll get you 25% off your order, along with free two-day shipping on all orders of $100 or more. You can hear all of that. Yeah. It sounded like the old Pepsi commercials. Like the other.

Oh, I forgot I had coffee. It's crazy how those movie preview things, like when you're watching it, it really does make you want to get a Pepsi with all those popcorn crackling sounds and the shh of the soda. Yeah, that's amazing. They're so good at that.

It's not okay. It's not okay at all. I thought you were going to cut back on cussing. I thought so too no I do I do need to be careful man you want to throw the cans on Mark it used to happen my football coach

all the time he would come to practice and he'd be like boys my wife said I need to stop cussing and he could never you know he would I don't know he would last for a couple weeks yeah or a day and then he'd slip back into it i can't slip back in mom's been watching all of our episodes really yeah why do you have such a dirty mouth like no you remember the kenny ko episode

yeah so she's like oh who is this kenny ko i'm like oh wait you know what don't watch that watch this one with bedros Kulian. I was like, do not watch that episode. Oh, my goodness. My aunt the other day. She's like, why do you poop yourself? She's got a lot of questions about the podcast. You're a grown man.

My aunt hit me with something pretty specific. And I'm like, oh, not only do you watch, but you listen. Oh. I hope you didn't catch that one episode where Mark was talking about how many dicks I suck or something. It's just not good. Oh, God. Yeah, man. My brother was listening to – I was on Mind Pump recently.

My brother was listening to it in the car as he's driving my kids to school. And then I'm talking about my kids. So they like listening they're like they didn't know like i don't think they've ever i don't think they've ever heard any podcast before um and they certainly haven't ever heard mine so then there i am talking about them and i'm like i just want my kids to not grow up to be dicks and they're like kind of you know i think they kind of liked it but they were kind of like you know kind of confused yeah and even why i'm talking about kind of, you know, I think they kind of liked it, but they were kind of like, you know, kind of confused. Yeah. And even why I'm talking about it, I guess, you know, they're like, shit, everything we do at home is not private, I guess. You know, everything's out there in the in the public.

Tyler, you've been listening to the show for a while, huh? Oh, yeah. Every time I have a, you know, always have a famous person on. Yeah. I'm always interested. When was when did you start listening to the show? Probably the last two years or so is when I really, you know, got aware of it. Cool. And you live here in Sacramento? Yeah.

I live in Roseville. And then have you been aware of like super training because you're into bodybuilding, right? Yeah. Yeah. So I've been hearing about, you know, you and your gym ever since I really started following the podcast more and I met Nsema. Cool. How'd you get into lifting?

Let's see. Originally, I did powerlifting. Originally, I started powerlifting my first year out of high school. That was for Paralympic powerlifting, obviously. I was trying to make the Paralympic team, so I went for that for uh 2007 to 2012 and then uh after that just continued with jujitsu and all the rest of the things yeah so and the uh like paralympics is like actually really hard and they're really strict on like how you do the movement and stuff right like um i'm not i'm unfamiliar with uh what you competed in, but some stuff that I've seen, they're super strict.

Like say for example, for bench press, they have the guy like on rack the weight, the guy's got to hold the weight forever. And then they say start. And then the guy holds the weight on his chest for, it looks like a three count and they say press. And then the guy presses it up and then they wait for you to to have a totally even lockout, and then they say rack. Is that the kind of stuff you were doing? So when I was doing it, they didn't have any commands.

They just went off of you. You knew what the rules were, so you followed the rules. You unrack it, you come down, you pause, and you lock it out. And then there was all the rules of did you pause long enough on your chest? Did you go up even? All the little things, and then you rack it and then you know usually there was always some debate on did you pause long enough on your chest or did you come up slightly uneven all that kind of stuff yeah because i saw there was a guy um i can't remember what country he's from but he did like

a 683 pound bench like something just astronomical i'm sure you've seen it yourself yeah it was it's crazy to watch especially when the heavyweights come out yeah it's unreal yeah yeah the guy's so damn strong but they have them like they have them strapped down to the bench i'm not sure what the deal is with his legs but it looks like he doesn't have uh full use of his legs his legs are like smaller but he has legs and then they strap him to the bench and then he's got to hold the weight there forever and i'm like this guy's got enough things going on like why are they so him to the bench and then he's got to hold the weight there forever. And I'm like, this guy's got enough things going on. Like why are they so strict on the, on the way that these guys lift? But I guess they're just trying to have like some good standards in there, huh?

Yeah. Yeah. And they strap your legs down to the bench and you can use, I think up to three straps to strap your legs down and then, then you go. So I always liked it cause I felt more secure on the bench. I just, it always made me think about less with the stability, I guess. But, yeah, they're really just as strict as everybody else. And then what were you born with?

Was it spina bifida? Yes, spina bifida. And what is that? I don't know how to describe it in perfect scientific terms, but my spine wasn't fully developed. So day one I had a hole in my spine. They had to fix that up. And then over the next three years, I had a hole in my spine. They had to fix that up. And then over the next three years,

I'd have to ask my parents. I think I had like seven, eight, nine surgeries, something like that, mostly on my feet. My feet were turning inward. And I actually had this really unusual surgery. This was 30 years ago. They took my adductors and abductors and switched them. So they flew in yeah some doctor

from like australia or something because he's one of the few guys that knew how to do it and did it work yeah it worked yep so yeah that's i have some friends who didn't have that surgery done and now their legs are really tight and i don't have to deal with that i don't have any uh leg problems or anything you know and i can drive with my legs i have my quads but um yeah so it saved me from a lot of problems down the road any idea what the thinking is on that yeah i don't know what like all the science is behind all of it but yeah that's that's fucking wild i've never heard of that yeah me neither yeah it's been cool like now being a personal trainer today and just knowing more about the body it's been cool

to find out what they did to me you know what what are some of these scars on my legs mean oh they they took my adductors and abductors and switched them i didn't i never even heard of that and then finding out you know what's what is spina bifida like what is it related to all that kind of stuff it's been really interesting what are the what were the surgeries for the surge were the surgeries to try to make you more functional or the surgeries for pain were they for aesthetics i think they're mostly for functionality just i have some friends, their legs,

they always experience cramps and they're not flexible at all in their legs. Now I am. I can leg press. I can leg extension. I can use my legs to an extent in jujitsu.

I can drive off with my quads and everything. So I don't have any leg pain. I don't have any of those kind of problems. So it saved me from all that stuff that some other people experience.

You must have some really cool supportive parents because, uh, to have the confidence to go and do these things is, is difficult enough. And then you have in difficulties and having so many, uh, surgeries, uh, at such a young age where your parents always encouraging you, they're always supportive of you trying different things or were they also kind of like, Hey, like, you know, be careful. Yeah, no i would say both they were extremely uh encouraging and they saw how much i always was into you know i'd always tackle my friends and i watched wwe when i was a kid and hell yeah i remember jumping off the table onto my friend and you know so i was always i was a you know typical guy you know like i was i was a boy you know right So I was always into all those kinds of things.

So they supported it. And then when I got into wrestling, that's when they're like, okay, we're going to let you do it, but we're nervous. You're going into fighting sports. And then it goes into high school. Okay, they hit harder in high school. And then when I went into jiu-jitsu, which is strangling each other and hyperextending limbs,

then they're like, okay, how far are you going to go with this? You know, so, but they never not let me do something, but, um, you know, they were, they were nervous along the way, but they just trusted me. And after a while they saw that I could do it. How was the wrestling? Like, like when you got into wrestling, how did that start for you? And like, how did you progress there? That was, so that was seventh grade when I started.

And, uh, mainly it started because i was watching wwf and i was wrestling with my friends in the living room all the time and then my step dad he talking like john cena stone cold the rock oh yeah oh yeah who's your favorite i loved all of them i feel like you know i was in the kind of one of the golden eras of wrestling in the early 90s when the rock was cutting his best promos. And you know, now I go back and I love that stuff. Cause it's like, dang, that was,

that was the golden era, you know? I know. I miss that too. And like with all the stuff that I see the rock do now, I'm always like, oh man, that's really cool.

But nothing will ever be cooler to me than the shit that he did in the ring. So fun. And so entertaining. Yeah. Something will pop up on social media and it's an old rock promo. That's golden. No one's going to match that. That's right. He was so up on social media and it's an old Rock promo. I'm like, that's golden. No one's going to match that. He was so on his game.

And then Stone Cold, Shawn Michaels, Chris Jericho, all of them. So I loved it back then. The Rock would come with something new every time. Just like a lot of the other wrestlers, he had his catchphrases and stuff, but he had new material every single time. And you're like, how does he do that?

Yeah, he was so sharp and he was so confident. He was so committed on the microphone. He had a $500 shirt. Yeah. He was so into character on the microphone. Like, you know, there was just confidence, you know, and it was great. But anyways, so it started off just with me watching that and I loved it. So I'd jump off things onto my friends.

And then my stepdad said, hey, you should actually try wrestling. I wrestled a little back in the day and you should try it. So I went out and at first I hated it because we did nothing but conditioning. We ran around the blacktop a million times and they were doing that for the first month. Then we finally got on the mat.

That's when I started to love it. I'm like, okay, this is, we actually get to go at it with each other. And I think I won my first wrestle off, which is fighting for the varsity spot or the JV spot, whatever. After I won my first wrestle off which is you know fighting for the varsity spot or the jv spot whatever um after I won my first match I loved it like okay like I'm not that I'm far from the best at it but I can do this like just give me some time I'll figure it out you know so that's how it all started so then I wrestled from seventh grade to my first year of college started jiu-jitsu

my junior year of high school and then eventually got into power lifting eventually got into bodybuilding it's all kind of faded together wow you started jiu-jitsu pretty young like compared to i guess most people yeah yeah i started yeah junior year of high school so wow okay how'd your coaches take to it when you uh were like trying out for the team were they pretty receptive or what were their thoughts i don't know i think about that now you know they never let me see any kind of doubt or whatever i think they just kind of yeah go for it I don't know. I think about that now. They never let me see any kind of doubt or whatever. I think they just kind of, yeah, go for it. I don't know if they actually believed in me from day one. Who knows?

But I just was kind of off in my own world trying to figure out. This is what he wants to do. Let's see if he can hang, see if he can do it. Yeah. I mean, I just do what I still do. I sit on the side and maybe the jiu-jitsu instructor or the wrestling coach teaches something. And then I sit there and think about it and like, okay, how can I modify that? How can I do that with my, my arms? Okay. This is when you do the move, this is what happens with his body. This is how the leverage works. How do I recreate that with different body parts with my

head and my hands, not my legs, you know? So I just always was just being analytical about it. And I failed a million times before I figured out a handful of moves that worked. But that's, you know, that's how life works, right? Yesterday we talked a little bit about like race and how like Nsema was mentioning in a certain part, certain area. And he was like, we're the only, him and his girlfriend, like we're the only black people within 50 miles, I think, you know. And I would imagine, you know know that sometimes that feels different or feels uncomfortable or maybe you're thinking like that other people are looking at you um you're different and and how does that feel and and do you want people to like recognize that you want

people to ignore it because i think a lot of people are kind of uncomfortable like if you are walking down the street and you happen to recognize that guy has no arm you might kind of do like a double a double take right and you're and then you're like, fuck, I just totally, I didn't mean to, I, you're like, I don't know if that was rude or, you know, or do I say good morning? Like I would to fucking anybody else. Like, um, how do you, how do you feel, uh, you know, being, you know, being different, you are in a wheelchair and there's not, not everybody else on the streets in a wheelchair. You just want to be treated, I would imagine, just like anybody else, right?

I mean, I think that responsibility is, that's the responsibility of the handicapped person. You're the one that needs to make people comfortable. You're the one that needs to earn the respect. You know, you're the one that, you know, I've seen some people like in the handicapped community where they will they'll complain that no one believes in me. No one gives me a chance, whatever. And like, well, yeah, of course they're going to doubt you. I didn't go into wrestling or jujitsu thinking people were going to believe in me. You know, you have to earn the respect and, you know, you have to show them that, you know, you can do it.

But don't like just expect them to believe in you for no reason. Of course they're going to doubt you, you know, so just expect it and you take that responsibility. Don't expect it. You know, do you think you need to go a little above and beyond then maybe what somebody else might do? Yeah. I mean, I think you just, you need to maximize yourself, you know, and, uh, set a high standard on yourself. Like, don't assume, you know, where your limit is. I mean, my dream has always been, you know, top of the top level for everything. I don't know if it's possible for me to catch up to Casio in skill level, but I'm going to find out and I'm not going to assume that I can't, you know, there's no blueprint for me to follow. There's been very few handicapped people that have succeeded against able-bodied people. There has been a couple of

cases, but you know, not a whole lot for me to follow like a blueprint, but I'm not going to assume that I can't. So I'm going to do the best I can in every single sport that I've done. Like how far can I push it? Can I catch up to an elite level with able-bodied people? And I mean, I'm just, I want to find out, you know? Is it ever, in terms of jujitsu, is it ever an advantage to? That's where, yeah, that's a really debatable one. That's an interesting one because every disability is different. And so a good example is that Anthony Robles, either of you ever heard of him?

Yeah. Right, so one-leg NCAA champion. When he was losing... Yeah, you can't do a double-leg takedown on him. Yeah, well, when he was losing, it was, oh, poor him. He has a disadvantage. As soon as he started figuring it out, it's like, that's such an advantage. That's cheating. He should be kicked out of wrestling.

Yeah. Wow. As soon as he starts beating you. Right. Really? Well, so I think the truth is, depending on what your disability is, it can be an advantage and a disadvantage. It depends on what position we're talking about. Think about using jujitsu terminology.

You're doing a knee cut guard pass and then your ankle gets caught. And then they're working a half guard. If you don't have an ankle, you're just going to slip through that. So in certain positions, if you're missing a limb or something, in certain ways it can be an advantage. And in other ways, obviously, it's a big disadvantage. So I think it kind of works out to 50 you know, 50, 50 or 60, 40, you know, probably in the, you know, the disadvantage is the 60, but yeah. So. And you have a, like, is it supports on your legs or?

Yeah, just a braces. Yeah. So with my braces, I'll put on a, up to three knee pads on both sides and then my wrestling shoes. And that's what I've always done for wrestling and jujitsu. Yeah. And the knee pads are to probably protect the other person yeah i take the other guys they'll get nicked up from them pretty bad right yeah so that's just to protect the uh the other person yeah right and then uh what about like when you get weighed in you have to weigh you wet you just weigh in the way you are uh yeah well i take everything off and i and i hop on so there's been different way in with the braces on or no uh no, no, no, no. Actually, I've had to learn the rules about that. At first I thought I had to with jujitsu because there's

the whole thing about weighing on or weighing with your gi on weighing with everything on. Then eventually one of my friends who's a black belt told me, Hey, your, your braces are considered protective wear just like a, you know, a shoulder pad or something like that. So, uh, you don't have to weigh in with that so i took all that off and that decreased 10 pounds from me i'm going down a weight class yeah like just off i didn't know that because i was a blue belt you know i don't know anything so the black belts you know like hey like that counts as protective wear i'm not sure what the rules are in power the thing but i think people have to weigh in if they have like a prosthetic i think

they have to weigh in with the prosthetic so if they had like have like a prosthetic. I think they have to weigh in with the prosthetic. So if they had like, say, like a prosthetic leg and they're bench pressing. Yeah. I think that, yeah, whatever they're going to like wear on the platform, they're supposed to like weigh with, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. So then with me, I'm like, OK, it's not a prosthetic. It's just something on my small leg, you know. So I've always had to find out what are the rules with my different sports I've done.

When did you first do your first jujitsu competition? I think when I was a blue belt. I might've done one competition when I was a white belt, maybe, but yeah, late white belt or early blue belt days. And how did that go for you? Like, were you, I mean, I know obviously you grew up before with wrestling. Yeah. I had years of wrestling before that. Yeah. So did you find that like when you entered it into jujitsu, was it like, I guess competing, was it easier for you than like, did you, how'd you, how'd you do in your first few competitions? Uh, I mean, I remember my very first one was just in this little garage, you know, it was

a little hole in the wall tournament that everybody does at some point. And I won that match and it was the only match I had that day. And, um, yeah, it, it felt pretty natural for me because I had all the years of wrestling. It was just, okay, different rule set, you know? So it wasn't a big deal. Yeah. Okay. And then also in terms of, I guess, as you progressed, I think you were the first individual

to do fight to win. Oh yeah. And like, how did that go? That was cool. That was really, that was crazy with all the lights, the production is second to none, you know? So yeah, so I was the first, um, para athlete or whatever you want to say to do fight to win.

And then we fought to a draw, I guess, or he won by judge's decision. You know, we just, we went the full 10 minutes or whatever you want to say to do fight to win and then we fought to a draw I guess or he won by judges decision you know we just we went the full 10 minutes or whatever it was but yeah that was that was crazy and that was really hard to find an opponent that's an issue is nobody wants to fight me so Why do you think that is partially like because I mean they have a lot of individuals in your weight class were people like did you have people lined up and they were just like no i don't want to do it or no well seth daniels who runs it i think he said he asked 10 to 15 people before someone said yes and i think that's really i mean because they're looking at it like what's in it for me if i win i beat a handicapped kid if i lose i lost to a handicapped kid in front of all of sacramento yeah so they're you know they're looking at it like i'm not getting anything out of this so i don't blame them but it is frustrating because you know i it was amazing i find stuff like that in sports to be really strange because like isn't it just simply about getting better you would think and so like if i go against you and yeah i would i would be pissed if i lost i'd be like

shit you know it wouldn't have anything to do with you being handicapped i would just be like fuck man the guy is more skilled than me i shouldn't have got caught in that move and then i would think like i would talk to in sema or i'd talk to a coach and be like man like watch this tape man i need to get better like what this guy do how'd this guy get me in this hole like that's all it would be about for me you know it doesn't make sense that it you know people would think in those terms i think i think it's a weird way to think i think that's that's the difference between someone who's good at any sport and then someone who reaches your level. Someone who's humble enough to just constantly keep going back to whoever they look up to and like, how do I get better?

But they get caught up in their own ego or fame or whatever. They get caught up in stuff that they shouldn't be caught up in. Are there some things when you were young that it was frustrating because you maybe just had trouble doing? Or did you always just figure out a way to kind of do just about anything that you ever wanted to? Like maybe, let's say, play baseball or football or do something that some other kids were doing that at that point you had a hard time doing?

Yeah, I mean, I think that's part of the game whenever you're with a disabled life, I guess. That's part of the game whenever you're with a disabled life, I guess that's part of the game is frustration. And, uh, you know, I've, I talked to plenty of other people in different situations, whether they were born with their disability or they're in a car accident and it's your perspective on life, you know, it's how, are you willing to be frustrated or do you give up when you get frustrated? So I've been frustrated billions of times. I've been tapped out in jujitsu a million times. I've been pinned in wrestling a million times. So that's just part of the game is overcoming that.

I'd say just like everybody else. Yeah, but we probably fail more than the average person. But how stubborn are you? So that's just what it comes down to. And eventually I've been stubborn enough to where I'm still here. And now I'm hanging in there with the brown belts. And I remember when I was a white belt or a blue belt, I didn't know how far I could take it. I didn't know. Is it possible for me to ever really hang in there with a legit purple, brown, black belt or whatever, whatever sport I was doing?

How far can I take it? And I just I just kept thinking, like, I don't want to assume, you know, I want to find out. And if that means failing, OK, it means failing. But I don't want to wonder what if, you know I want to find out and if that means failing okay it means failing but I don't want to wonder what if you know and so I guess that stubbornness and that attitude it's got me to hear and now I'm a brown belt um you know I'm never I'm not on Casio's level I'm far from it but okay how much farther can I take it I have no idea so I want to find out you bring up a really good point maybe maybe in your case if you selected particular sport or selected a particular thing that you really had a hard time doing as a kid, maybe it would just take you longer. Yeah. You know, maybe it would just take you twice as long.

Maybe it would take you five times as long or maybe it would take you 10 times as long. But if you stuck with it, you'd eventually, you know, hopefully get to where you want to be. And it would be just like a lot of other people's journey, except for they're not starting out in the same position. Maybe it came a little easier to them when they went to play basketball or if they wanted to train for a marathon or something like that. Yeah, people just don't like to do things that other people haven't done. I was just listening to you guys talk on another episode where you're talking about the four-minute mile.

As soon as somebody did it, then everybody did it, right? So I think people love to do that. They love to, you know, someone else has to do it first and then they'll believe i'm like that's how we ever going to move forward in life you know how's anything ever going to progress with that attitude so i want to find out i want to find out if i can be the first to figure out handicap jujitsu or handicap wrestling or whatever more than anybody ever has yeah and like i'd love to get on like a john donahue level you know if i could and just be like really brilliant with my uh my setups and my my systems but i don't know i mean i'll find out and ask me again in 20 years we'll see where i'm at

you know what i mean but i'm trying you know yeah that's the thing i like i want people to understand a lot of because like you enhanced my jujitsu game so freaking much in terms of like arm bars and kimuras and stuff like you've you've taught me so much and you tap me out a bunch like i don't know if people realize just like how number one good you are but also how fucking strong you are like i remember the first day i rolled with you and i was like this is gonna be different you grabbed my wrist and legit there's a little voice in me that just went, because when you grabbed it, like you engulfed it and then you fuck, I don't know. You got some beefy forearms. You absolutely wrecked me.

And I was like, oh God, this is fucking amazing. Like he's going to teach me so much. And you did. And like whenever I've like drilled with you, like when you were talking about Casio doing something and you adapt it, it's just like, it's insane what you come up with. But it's just because of all the absolute training you've done and yeah and just following concepts yeah you know don't be hell-bent on this is the way you need to do the move just what's the concept of the move uh-huh now figure that out you know i mean you can do it a different way but you're accomplishing the same concept that's

yeah right so it's just such a deep understanding like it's it's so awesome being able to roll with you and yeah and i've just tried to get as many like private lessons as I've could and seminars or whatever. I've looked up videos and just, I just try to get as much knowledge as I can so I can create, you know, with other people's knowledge, you know, just that's why I'm at Casio's too. Cause like he's the best in Sacramento, you know? So what, uh, what are the limitations of your legs if there are any? Um, so I mean, I got my quads. I can, you know, I can do leg press. I can do leg extension, all that kind of stuff. I don't really have hamstring strength. Um, I have adduction, but I don't really have

abduction. And then, uh, my lower back is okay. I don't have zero strength in my lower back, but it's not real strong. Um, I have full core strength and then from there up, everything else is normal. So something like a, like a deadlift, would you be able to do a deadlift? Uh, to an extent, like a weak one. Yeah. Kind of. Yeah. I mean, my lower back is, you know, somewhere in the middle. It's not weak, but it's not strong, you know, it's somewhere in the middle. And then, uh, do you, do you, um, I haven't seen you compete. When you compete, are you, are you standing or are I haven't seen you compete when you compete. Are you, are you standing? Are you starting on the ground?

Yeah, I'm starting on my knees. And then with your actual legs, like, can somebody put you in a leg lock? Uh, I'd say that's usually kind of an honor code system. Just don't do that. Oh, that's how it's always been in jujitsu. Yeah. Here and there, I've been at like an open mat and somebody who doesn't know me would do it. So that's always been a little awkward. So you can move your quads and you can move your hips

there's limitation to the hamstrings and then what from the knee down you can't move your feet and stuff yeah I can't can't move my feet okay uh I can I have my um my hip flexors that actually is something I've realized I've used a lot in jiu-jitsu when I go to teach other handicapped people when I go to teach uh Lisa she's another person at our jiu-jitsu. When I go to teach other handicapped people, when I go to teach Lisa, she's another person at our jiu-jitsu academy in a wheelchair, I'll realize certain muscles that are active on me that are not on someone else with a different disability. So in

fighting purposes, I use my quads and my hip flexors a lot, just for a lot of different small tactics and creating momentum, moving myself, whipping myself one way or another. And just if you needed to, can you stand? Yeah, I can. Yeah, I can walk with crutches.

I just don't because wheelchair is lazier. You got your feet kind of crossed behind you, huh? Yeah, that's always been natural to me. I can't even really tell you why. That's just something I've always done. It felt natural when I was three, so I just kind of stuck with it. And now it doesn't feel right to do it any other way yeah so shit man i'd be watching tapes of you if i was going against

you and i'd be like fuck man no he did he told me afterwards i was like because i mean you know getting down low and stuff is like a part of all this right i'd be like i'd be sweating it yeah no i'd be like i don't i don't know what to do against this guy yeah the guy at fight to win he told me afterwards that yeah i looked you up and I knew like some of your, your stuff that you've taught at seminars. And so I was watching out for that. you learned how to fight on your back or like, I mean, I'm sure, you know, each person in jujitsu has to learn the guard and stuff like that. But like for you specifically with what you have going on, what do you think was the most important thing? That's hard to narrow down.

It's just been everything. It's been just learning as much as I can from the best people that I can, just doing all kinds of private lessons and dropping into other academies and just getting everybody's input on what should I do. And I guess being very open-minded, not thinking this position is good and this position is bad. Like in wrestling, if you're on your back,

there's no way that you're winning, right? You're absolutely losing if you're in wrestling and jujitsu, you're only losing if you're tapping. There's not, not really such thing as a bad position in jujitsu. And, uh,

yeah, this guy kind of got on your back, what looked like fairly easy, but you just didn't have any concern and he didn't end up with anything. No, because any position that is seen as a bad position in jiu-jitsu, if you get good defense from there and counter offense, you're going to be fine.

But a lot of people don't even dive into that. They kind of go with traditional jiu-jitsu where this position's good, this position's bad. If you're in this bad position, you're done. And it's like, well, don't just quit because you got mounted or something, you know? And like, that's what people do. So I've kind of dove into some other positions, bottom side control, these things from my back. See from here in the video, I mean, that's not a traditional way of protecting yourself from there, but I'm not afraid if he tries to throw in his legs there and get some kind of body triangle on me or something. I'm not afraid of it because the more he engages me, the more I have stuff to work with. What I've had trouble with is people who don't want to engage me. So see here, I'm basically kind of taunting him from here. Like, would you come at me, bro? Give me something to work with, you know, but see how he's only given me like a hand. He's staying decently away from me and he was being smart with it you know he was coming with a smart game plan but um i do a lot

of stuff where like i want you to think you're winning i want you to try to engage me because when you try to engage me you give me something to work with i've seen you do this you've done this to me yeah so a lot of my stuff is i want you to think that you're winning, and then as you go to finish me, you expose yourself for my thing, and then now we can have some fun. And sometimes I lose, but it's, you know. So it's somebody that's like of equal, similar level. You're pretty counter. You're going to counter a lot of stuff, would you say? Yeah.

Is there any like holds and stuff that people can't get you in? Would a rear naked choke be normal on you? Can somebody kick your hips out and extend your hips out and all that kind of stuff? I'd say that's kind of the start of my jiu-jitsu is getting good defense from everywhere. In general, I haven't been submitted very many times in competition. If people win, they win by points. That's kind of been the start. Since I'm going to be in these bad positions,

I need to recognize what's dangerous here. What am I vulnerable to? Look out for it. Know how to stop it. And then start looking for counter offense. I try to be hard to submit no matter where I am. And then I try to look for what are you giving me try to be hard to submit no matter where i am and then i try to look for what are you giving me as you're attempting to submit me have you had an opportunity to go

into like uh schools and talk to young kids that have um that are in wheelchairs and stuff like that and and uh i mean i would imagine the response would be crazy like to see you doing this kind of stuff must be really being i mean mean, it's kind of neat because this is fighting, you know, and you're like kicking someone's ass. Like it's not, you're not, you know, shooting hoops or something like that. This is like you're kicking someone's butt, which that must be really empowering for them. Yeah. Yeah.

I've been asked to do a number of things over, you know, over the years. Sometimes it was stopping by and training with one other kid who has some kind of disability and sometimes it was speaking to a handful of people. But yeah, I've always been open to whatever you guys want me to do. If you want me to stop by and teach somebody some things in wrestling or jujitsu, or if you want me to come by and just do a little motivational speech and try to fire them up, I've always been open to it. And jujitsu, is there anyone that you try to emulate? Anyone that you watched videos of or you just had to everybody, you know, because I just I want to everybody has a different style at that top level. So I want to steal something from everybody and then create my own game.

I am a bit more of a fan of like the loose, playful game, the the Jeff Glovers, the Gary Tonins. You know, I do like the loose game. And, you know, a lot of my best submissions, they're not in traditional positions. They're in these weird scramble situations. I'll create scrambles. And then as you're trying to control the scramble, you give me a limb that I can attack, you know? So I'm not really a smasher. I'm more of a loose game guy, but I try to learn from everybody because there's nobody I can just copy. You know, there's nobody that set a blueprint for handicapped jujitsu. You know what I mean? So are there some, uh, things that you've done where you were like, Oh shit, I didn't know I could do that. Oh yeah. I

mean, that's how I've discovered half my stuff is like you're rolling with somebody and you, you just go primal at some point, you're just figuring things out. And then after the role, you're like, what the hell did I just do that worked or it almost worked and then you go back and you're like like and you stop your opponent like wait can we go back to that position what i almost had you there what what did i miss or sometimes you do get them and it was totally primal it was totally just instinctual and then you just okay i'm writing that down in my notes you know i'm gonna keep working on that and that's been a lot of my stuff sometimes somebody would teach me something but a lot of it was just discovering it in the midst of battle you know you, you think about, you know, when people are talking

about life and they're talking about somebody has like cancer or something and they use the word, they use the word fight, you know, or they use the word strong. You got to be strong going into that. And we get strength, you know, a lot of times from lifting and then fighting, you know, you're, you're doing a lot of these things right here. And people are always talking about, you know, you gotta be able to like, you know, fight through the pain or fight through this or fight through that. What have you learned from, uh, jujitsu that kind of helps you on a daily basis, just in your day to day that you carry over into, uh, maybe just, uh, getting up in the morning and, uh, getting out of your wheelchair and taking a shower and like doing all these things that you've got to do on a given day.

I'd say more than anything, wrestling is what developed my character because that was more early in life. That was seventh grade to my first year of college, so I was at a really spongy age, and I had amazing coaches. Wrestlers are always mentally strong. Yeah, those are the toughest. They're always fucking hard to break. No, we are taught.

Those are tough. If the bone is not sticking out what are you complaining about we are taught that from like i don't see a bone so shut the fuck up and get up and roll you know so that's what i grew up with and i was taught that when i was at a impressionable age so by the time i got to jujitsu um my you know first couple instructors they were complimenting me on like my mentality and like this is wrestling mentality you know and that's why they i mean skill wise they dominate the ufc but i think mentally that's also why they dominate the ufc because they're just you got to kill me you know

so um a lot of um just character things i you know i learned in uh my first couple years with wrestling just uh being determined being uh being, being a perfectionist. Some of our rules was like, you know, practice starts at three. If someone is still tying their shoes and everyone's not warming up at 301, there's hell to pay. Everybody's doing a hundred burpees, you know? So we were just taught to be like militant, you know? So like that was ingrained in me when I was young. and so it's followed me for the rest of my life you know andrew has talked a lot of trash about you before he came in today he's like man he's like i can't wait for that guy to come in i'm gonna smoke that motherfucker so

just maybe after the podcast like you guys might want to square off i don't know i don't know why i don't know i've never seen him that hostile before but yeah absolutely right no i'm really surprising i don't know why i just don't get aggressive but i'm pretty passionate about street fighter so after this we can totally get down and play street fighter that's what i was talking about i don't know what they're mentioning you know tyler when did you realize that like i guess your your strength was a strength like i don't know when you started strength training, but like when rolling with you, not only do you have amazing technique by the way, but you are ridiculously strong. So when did you realize that that's something that you had that was an advantage or

yeah, an advantage to your game? I've always thought that's what I need to develop. When I first really started diving into wrestling and like, okay, I got to, I'm really, I'm starting from, you know, behind everybody else. I got to figure out the technique portion. And since I don't have my lower body, I got to, you know, make up for it in my upper body. So there's no such thing as being too strong, you know? So that's when I first started getting into lifting and then I developed a passion for it over the years. And I always kind of got praised for my upper body strength. So I guess I just kind of, it was always something I fell in love with. First thing I ever did actually way before wrestling or anything, when I was in elementary school, I got my elementary school pushup record and that was the first time that

I got like some praise for it. So I guess that's what made me kind of fall in love with fitness. Um, it was, I asked the teacher one day like, Hey, what's, what's the pushup record since you make us do pushups every day?? And they said it's like 30. I'm like, oh, I'll do that. So I did like 35 or 40. And then some kid heard that I did that. He did 50. So then that pissed me off.

Game on. Yeah. So then it was, yeah, then you, it's war. So then I did like 70. Then he did like 90. And, yeah, it ended with he did like 90 to 100. It pissed me off. I did 110.

These are, this is like. This is a lot for kids. This is fifth grade. So there were some other little kids as weird as me. So he did like 90. I did 110. And when I did the 110th rep, I thought, I'm putting the nail in this. I don't want him to come back. So I went to 120.

On the 120th rep, I just fell over out of exhaustion. I was sore for like two weeks. I wasn't following a good nutrition plan or anything then. But I found him the next day. Like I did 120. What are you going to do? He's like, I'm done. Thank you.

So, yes, I guess that's kind of what made me fall in love with fitness at first because it was the first thing I got praised for. I don't think people understand how important that is. You know, just receive a pat on the back. Yeah. And it doesn't matter who you are. You get a pat on the back for something. It makes a big difference in your life. And you can, you know, having employees and having people that I work with on a daily basis, you can sometimes see and owning a gym and coaching so many different people over the years. I can tell sometimes when someone has never gotten a pat on the back. And those are the people that when I give them a little pat on the back and I say, Hey, that was great. Like, wow, you, you put in a lot of effort and like, that was an awesome

lift, like great job. You see them just all of a sudden they just, they're, they're standing a little more upright. They're a little more full and they're, um, more confident and they go up to that bar. And instead of being like, ah, shucks, I don't know what's going to happen, with their kind of eyes down, and they barely grab the bar, and they set up for a squat, instead they're fired up, and you can see it, and they grab the bar with a good intention. And they go over there, and they manhandle the weight

and give it everything they got. So that pat on the back is such a huge deal, whether you hit a base hit in uh baseball or you you caught the ball or you scored a touchdown or and a lot of kids um unfortunately never experience it i think maybe because um people aren't trying enough different things they're not exposed to enough different things so it's great for you that you got exposed to that and then uh you know you started the push-ups back and forth with the other kid. When I was in school, I used to race a kid in, uh, I think it was like in fourth or fifth grade and we would race all the time. Then other kids got

involved and, uh, we had, we had that battle going on. And then, uh, we did a lot of arm wrestling and it was always like a big showdown. Me and this other kid, we were the fastest kids in school and we were the strongest and we'd like arm wrestle. And it just always turned into like chaos. Like we would start cheating and like, you know, it would just turn into like wrestling, you know,

we'd always try to kill each other. But I think that pat on the back from a young age is something that I really think that parents should encourage their children to try to do as much different stuff as they can and by encourage i mean force yeah because sometimes you have to just you have to grab a hold of your kid and say hey we're going to karate why i don't want to do karate doesn't matter we're going and you put them in it and you have them try it did your parents kind of force you to do a little bit of stuff to to expose to some different things? No, but that is kind of what led me to jujitsu because I was doing wrestling

and then my little brother was doing karate. And after a year or two, he hated it. And they said, no, you're getting your black belt. After you get your black belt, you can never do it again, or you can keep doing it. They forced him to do it. And then that's when I got the idea of like, hey, I'm looking for something to do in the off season of wrestling that complements my wrestling. So I went in and I asked the head guy. There was a lot of different martial arts at this particular place. He's like, hey, what martial art is like wrestling that will complement my wrestling? He gave me three different free classes to try.

One of them was jiu-jitsu. I'm like, oh, this is like wrestling, but I can do the illegal stuff. I'm like, I love it. That's when I fell in love with it. When I wasn't wrestling, I was doing jjitsu. And then after my wrestling career ended, I just was like, okay, I'm doing jujitsu. So yeah. Before I didn't even know that you, you had your, uh, white, blue and purple blood on another school. So like, why'd you end up switching to Casio is what brought you over to Casio school? Uh, mainly just cause of how deep

the waters are over there. You know, that we have every bell, every body type, you know, you can, every single round is with somebody different. And I, I really wanted that at my old school that I was at infinite. It was a great place and a great instructor and everything, but I, I felt like the big fish there. It was, it was me and a handful of other purple belts and we were the highest belts there. There was no Brown or black belts. So it was a smaller school than Casio's at that time. And there was me. I was 130 pounds at the time. There was another kid who was a purple belt.

He was 100. You were 130 pounds? Yeah, at that time, yeah. What are you weighing right now? Right now I'm 150. But that was before bodybuilding. That was before powerlifting and bodybuilding. So anyways, there was another kid

who was a purple belt, 130 pounds. So he was my main partner. But after five, six years, we're sick of rolling with each other. Everybody else would say 160 and above, which I don't mind. You know, we roll together and I'll roll with somebody bigger than me. But that's a different game plan. You know, I don't grapple a big guy and a small guy the same way. And I got sick of always working my big guy, my absolute division game plan.

Yeah. So I wanted to go to a school where I could work both all the time. same way and i got sick of always working my big guy my absolute division game plan yeah so um i wanted to go to a school where i could work both all the time and so eventually i'm like okay i need to go to cassio's because they have the the body types and they have people that are they're smaller than me and way better than me they're going to beat me with skill not just with size and strength and that's you know so cassio's is you know the best school for that i thought so that's why i've been there ever since you You seem to have really strong, like just a mindset, like your mental health seems really, seems really good. Has it always been that way?

I mean, I've, I've gone up and down, you know, I think there's always been, you know, bouts of discouragement with anybody in a wheelchair because there is, we probably do fail twice as much as anybody else when we're trying to figure these things out. So there's always been ups and downs. I've sat in my car, especially when I was a blue belt. It's the stereotypical thing when you're a blue belt that most people don't survive blue belt. That's the frustration belt, right? If you survive blue belt, you might make it to black belt maybe, you know?

But a lot of people quit at blue belt because that's the frustration belt, and I've sat in my car and cried after jiu-jitsu before I went home because I'm like, can I do this? Am I wasting my time? Am I never going to get beyond blue belt skill-wise? Am I ever going to be able to hang with a purple belt? Am I completely wasting my time? And I've sat in my car and cried and just thought like, okay, I don't know,

but I'm going to find out. Can we all just cry together for a little bit? I think that would be good for us. I'll have to keep my eyes open for a while, get some tears going, but I can. I've cried over power lifting before and i think that i think that um just shows that you fucking care yeah you know not not everybody has to cry over their sport or whatever but like i you know i've just been frustrated with myself and it was like internal it wasn't like it wasn't like anybody was preventing me from getting it or it wasn't like it was just uh dude like you're not you're uh, dude, like you're

not, you're not really working hard. Like you should be working harder, you know, because you shouldn't have missed that lift. You know, you should be more prepared for this meat that's coming up. Like, what are you doing? Like, you need to get out of your own way. I've had many discussions of myself and lots of frustration, been mad, been sad, been depressed about it, all kinds of different things. And then you kind of shift over and you're like, all right, well, you know, the next time we do those drills and practice, I'm going to do them better. The next time I go and lift those weights, I'm going to do them better. I would, I would think about when I got done with a workout on say like a Tuesday is when I would do like squats and deadlifts and those types of things. And then again on Saturday.

So if it was Tuesday, you know i'd be pissed but wednesday morning i'd wake up and i'd be like you know what on saturday you better fucking bring it and i would think about it all the way until i got to the gym and when i and sure enough when i came in i was lifting way better because i thought about it so much beforehand i think a lot of times people are thinking like they're gonna have like a pre-workout drink it's like you know your the ultimate pre-workout is to set your mind to something the right way and and tune into that channel and be like next time we work on those arm bars i'm gonna take that shit seriously and i'm gonna take i'm gonna rip and steam his arm off and i'm gonna take it home with me yep it's easier said than done but it's okay that's a big

arm to rip. Does it piss you off that he shows up late all the time? Like he never does... That fucking guy never does the warm-up. You know, right? That's the stereotypical purple belt thing. That's the purple belt thing. As you skip warm-ups, that's how you know you're a real purple belt. Just so you know, Andrew and I hate him.

More than anybody else in the world. We can't stand him either. So if you hate him, you're not alone. Oh, yeah. You've come to the right place. Yeah. But yeah, I've always had something, though. Oh, poor Insuma.

He's just realizing. I think something that... Everything's starting to make sense to him right now. It's all replaying in his head. He's like, my god but uh yeah i mean that's something that's always kind of pushed me through those those uh times of discouragement that was just i think i i had enough motivational speeches when i was in wrestling when i was really impressionable like those i really took them seriously whenever coach sat us down and did a speech to fire us up, I believed every word he said.

I never thought, oh, that doesn't apply to me because I'm handicapped. He's talking to everyone else in the room, but not me. I took it like he's talking to me more than anybody else in the room. So I've always had this fire of I want to be at an elite level of something, be it wrestling, jiu-jitsu, powerlifting, bodybuilding. I've always had an urge for being great at anything I do. So that didn't allow me to quit, no matter how many times I cried in my car. Yeah. You know, like I can't live with myself if I quit, you know. When you were younger and you had, you went through the surgeries and stuff,

were you like a baby or? Oh yeah, I was a baby. So I don't remember any of them. Any surgery I've had now that I can tell you all about, it was because of me being stupid. It was because of me, now that I can tell you all about. It was because of me being stupid. It was because of me, you know, fighting and stuff. Yeah. Um, have you ever had to go, uh, through any sort of, um, uh, therapy like, uh, or have you ever, uh, have you ever gone into like a group setting where you communicate with other, uh, handicapped people or something like that to kind of assist you and help you with your condition? Not really. I've never, me personally, I've never had that issue. I've always kind of figured it out. And, you know, I got into lifting ever since that kid, you know, pissed me off in the pushup contest, you know, so I was, I always kind of started developing my strength. So I figured things out, I think a lot quicker than most handicapped people

would because of the, I got into fitness early, but, but I've been asked to come into different my strength so um i figured things out i think a lot quicker than most handicapped people would because of the i got into fitness early yeah but um but i've been asked to come into different settings like that and talk to them right and you mentioned you have a brother yeah i have two brothers three sisters so and i bet you that problem that's that probably helped you know seeing them like do stuff and and uh and just having like um people to be competitive against like in your own household. And you're probably thinking like, I, I can fucking do that. I can figure that out. Right.

That was another thing that like made an impact on me and got me into it was my older brother. He's what is he? I think he's 10 ish years older than me, something like that. But I would always be, you know, I was, I was a kid and I'd be watching cartoons and he'd be off in this other room in our house working out. I'm like, that looks cool. What's that? So eventually I went in there and grabbed the five pound weights and started doing my bicep curls, worked up to three sets of 50. And, you know, and then I just started chasing it because I wanted to be like him because it looked cool, you know.

So I guess that was really one of the starts of my fitness journey, too, was just like, oh, like, what's he doing? You know, does he lift still? Not really. Like he wasn wasn't serious about it but just the fact that he did it just the fact that he religiously did it a couple times a week and every time like i want to do that with him and then you know then i took it super seriously when i did it so oh yeah you want to do the big bros doing right yeah exactly so yeah that kind of made an impression on me when i was young too so you like you've been lifting obviously for a long time, but like, when did you get serious about like bodybuilding? Cause I didn't know you've been competing for a while. Well, bodybuilding, I've been on and off with that. Cause, uh, my first show was in 2015. Okay. Then, uh, I just, I didn't compete after that. I did bodybuilding training just cause I

liked it. But then my next show wasn't until 2018. And then that's when I went to nationals and won my pro card. And then right after that, I thought, okay, now I'm at the pro level. Now I'm going in there with the big boys. So I better like get more, get more just time on stage, get more comfortable.

And then at that time, I was getting ready to do a guest posing. I was doing the guest posing just to get more comfortable on stage. And then's when uh the Olympia allowed us to uh yeah that's the Arnold that's probably not a great video to pull up because like I looked like crap with that one yeah pull up another one but pull up the Olympia one even though I was small then but anyways um that's when the Olympia allowed the first ever wheelchair division. Yeah.

Not this last Olympia, but the Olympia before that. They allowed the Olympia to, the Olympia allowed the wheelchair division. And then the promoter contacted me and said, hey, you want to do it? And I thought, yeah, this show here. And I thought, oh crap, my first pro show ever is going to be the Olympia. That's crazy. Shit, dude. Biceps looking awesome. But yeah, is going to be the Olympia. That's crazy. Shit, dude. Biceps looking awesome.

But, yeah, this was last year's Olympia. I was a lot happier with how I looked this year. I was a good 10 pounds. So you're mentioning that there's not a huge blueprint in terms of jiu-jitsu. Was there a little bit of blueprint for you in bodybuilding? Was there somebody that you looked up to that was also in a wheelchair? Oh yeah, all the pros. I mean, all the guys I was competing with in this show.

I mean, I was by far the smallest. I look up to all the other pros that have been doing this forever. Harold Kelly, he's the king. He's won the Arnold four, five, six times. I don't remember. He looked great. And then he looked great.

And then he's won the last two Olympias, you know, and he's, he's crazy. And then, uh, yeah, I mean, I look up to all the other pros that have been doing this for a while. So, so they had all these big shows like the Arnold for multiple years, but why wasn't there an Olympia? Yeah, no Olympia. They just, uh, what sanctioned us or whatever the right thing to say would be, uh, man, the chair, the chair is killing your taper, bro. It doesn't go down quite low enough to see this.

Yeah, I got to get a different back on my chair to get a better taper. So anyways, yeah, there's only been two wheelchair Olympias now. Wow. But it's cool. We go on like right after the men's physique. No, it's cool. We go on right after the men's physique. No, it's classic physique. So it's been cool that we're up there on the same stage with everybody else. Have you always been pretty comfortable with being out in front of that many people?

I mean, the Olympia, the Arnold, some of these jiu-jitsu tournaments are pretty big. Not when I was younger, no. But I'd say it's totally different with fighting. I mean, you're only focused on this guy that's attacking you. You don't know what the hell's going on. After the first 10 seconds. I mean, this guy just hit me in the head and this is all I care about is this guy's attacking me. You forget anyone else's in the room. So I got over that real quick. And then with bodybuilding, I was scared out of my mind for my very first show when I was an amateur, you know, I was just behind the curtain. I'm like, why did I sign up to do this? I can't

believe I'm doing this, you know? But after the first, you know, 30 seconds, you kind of relax. And now I've done it a handful of times. Now it's, now I love it. Now that it's a good thrill, it's a positive thrill, but yeah, it took some time. Tell me about a handy capable. I like that. I like that saying that you have, you, you consider yourself handy capable rather than handicap. What does that mean to you? Uh, just not assuming anything, you know, not assuming that you, you know what your limit is because we'll know what else has done it. So I guess it's not possible. It's like, that's the four minute mile thing. Right. And be the first person to run the four minute mile, you know? So I want to see what I can do that in,

if anything. And if I don't, I don't, but I'd rather fail a million times and okay, I can look back and say, I tried, uh, you know, but I want to see if, you know, what I can't accomplish. If I can be the first person to really go deep in with jujitsu or anything else with, um, bodybuilding, you know, I can only match these guys cause that, that blueprint's already been set. These guys look incredible, you know, so I got to catch up to them. But in the worlds that, you know, there hasn't really been a blueprint, can I be that? Bodybuilding, powerlifting, jiu-jitsu, wrestling, what's been the hardest one for you to figure out? That'd be jiu-jitsu.

Yeah, jiu-jitsu is the hardest because it's just so complicated. It's so complicated. It's so complicated. It's not just as straightforward. Just do the training and you'll get the result. With Jiu-Jitsu, it's complicated. And you can't just, you know, your game has to constantly change and your strategy has to change based on your opponent. I'm not going to grapple in SEMA the same way I grapple a small guy.

Totally different. So you need to know how to adapt your game based on your opponent. If you have five matches in a day, you're not going to just follow the same script for all five matches so um you know it's different versus you know with power lifting like learn how to bench correctly and then you follow that script right so it's it's different you know so yeah there's a lot more variables in uh something like jujitsu like with power lifting it's like uh you know just focus in on being strong and get around some other strong people and, uh, find different ways to challenge yourself. And if you get stuck, try something new, try something different. And, uh, you know,

you're just working on being strong and in bodybuilding, it's like, you're working on just being in good condition. And it really comes down to your nutrition. Your diet is pretty much the main thing, how you train as long as you're training hard, probably doesn't matter a ton, right? And maybe at that high level, maybe it starts to matter a little bit more. But jujitsu or any sort of grappling, wrestling, MMA type stuff, you need to be in shape and you need to be strong. On top of that, you need to be smart with the different moves and the different approach and different strategy that you apply to each person. It's going to change immensely from one person to the other. Yeah. There's just, there's so much to learn. I mean, the way I think about it too, like the average black belt, the day he or she gets their black belt usually means

they're awesome at like two moves. So, you know what I mean? Like they're really incredibly good at two moves. Congratulations. You've mastered two moves. Now they say, when you get your black belt, start all over, become the master of some other move, you know? So that shows you how, how deep it goes. And if you're ever bored in jujitsu, you don't realize how much you don't know, you know? So you can, you can learn it forever. I like what Jeff Glover says that he'll say that every week I will try to emulate somebody different just to challenge myself. I'm not going to grapple like me. I'm going to grapple like Hoffa Mendez. I'm going to grapple like, you know, and just see if I can do their weird style.

I like that. That's pretty interesting. Yeah. And then just to challenge himself because he's reached a really high level, but he knows like, okay, I've mastered 10% of jujitsu, you know, and then this other guy, he's mastered a totally different style of jujitsu than me. So I'm going to try to do his style just because it's going to be foreign to me. And that'll up my game, at least to some extent.

Yeah, so jujitsu, there's just, it's so deep and there's so many variables. It's crazy. There's a lot of different things that people do that I encounter on a daily basis. But when it comes to jujitsu, it almost seems like jujitsu has some sort of weird affiliate program going on where people are always trying to sell you on it. You know, people are telling you because they're so excited about it. Do you think Jiu-Jitsu has some sort of like, I don't know, like spiritual transformation?

Or like what do you think is so special about Jiu-Jitsu that gets everybody so pumped up about it? I think that's anything, though. I mean, there's the hashtag Jiu-Jitsu saved my life, whatever. You could say that about literally any sport. Bodybuilding, powerlifting, I mean, there's that hashtag, jujitsu saved my life, whatever. You could say that about literally any sport. Bodybuilding, powerlifting, I mean, it's whatever caused you to turn your life around and not be a bum. It's whatever caused you to light your soul on fire.

My first thing was wrestling. That's what got me like, I'm gonna become as strong as I possibly can. I'm gonna figure this out. I'm gonna try to become an alpha. And then I fell in love with bodybuilding, powerlifting, and jiu-jitsu later on. But I've taken that same spirit into all of it. But, yeah, so, I mean, whatever you fall in love with is what's going to, you know, save your life and, you know, require you to be the best version of yourself every day because you're trying to master this thing.

So it can be something different for everybody yeah you know so you're obviously you're balancing all these three sports for bodybuilding um you said you did your first show in 2015 have you been handling like your preps have you been having somebody prep you or has it been you doing this because when you prep you also come in and do jujitsu yeah so on and off uh my very first show i had jeremy bundia work with me. He's right. Four time men's physique champ. He's an old high school buddy of mine. So, um, he helped me with my, my first prep. And then I had a Chrissy, uh, I don't know how to say her last name. Sorry, Chrissy, but she's my old, um, she's one of my old teachers, uh, when I was in college

and she's brilliant too. So, um, she helped me with some of my second prep. And then after that, just from my knowledge from them and my, my own knowledge from being a personal trainer, I just, I've done all my preps ever since. Wow. Yeah. And in terms of like personal training and fitness, did you always know that that's what you wanted to head in and do? Did you have any other things that you want to do or was that it? That was the first thing that like, you know, when I was early twenties, I was trying to figure out what do I do with my life? That was the first one that like, yeah, like that, that lights my soul on fire again. You know, I don't, I, I don't want to have a job that bores me. I don't want to sit behind a desk and, you know, do the office job thing. Like that's always been important to me is have a job that I enjoy. I'm not, I admire people who are that workhorse mentality that

can work 50 hours a week at a job they hate because they're just providing for their family. I admire those people, but that's not my personality. I need to enjoy what I do for 40, 50 hours a week, you know? Yeah. So, and then, yeah, then I, I integrate with my, my preps, I'll integrate jujitsu and I try to balance the best I can. Uh, when it comes to the cardio portion, I try to make it as fun as I can and jujitsu, that's fun to me, you know? So I'd rather just roll with somebody and okay, let's not go balls to the walls, but if we just roll and roll and roll for a half hour, I mean, that's a ton of cardio.

So I try to just make my cardio different things that are, it's burning calories, but it's also mentally engaging. So that's where, yeah, I don't do as much jujitsu when I'm getting ready for a show, but I still try to do enough that I remember what I'm doing and I'm using it for a purpose. You know? So have you communicated with, uh, other people that are in wheelchair about, um, about, you know, what lifting has done for you and what nutrition has done for

you? Yeah. I mean, anytime I'm asked to come speak at different things, I mean, I'll, I'll tell them whatever about my whole life, you know, and how, uh, just these different things have caused me to, you know, bring the best out in myself. You know, so, yeah, I'm always happy to talk to any of them about that. And, you know, I'll point out to them like, hey, if you get better at this, then this will get easier. You know, especially with handicapped people, like if you lose weight and you get stronger, getting into your chair is so much easier. Getting into the shower, whatever. Like you better be really good at dips. You know what I mean?

Just lifting your body. So that's what I encourage with any handicapped person is like, you better make your body weight nothing to you because this is all you're moving with. Right? So make your body weight nothing to you. Get really strong in your upper body. Get down to as low of a body fat as you can comfortably can, you know, and then that'll keep your independence.

That'll keep your mobility and your independence but you know as we all know like it's it's hard for some people to get into that mindset yeah it's very difficult but it sounds like life-altering because if you don't if you don't want to move you know we know what's going to happen to you you know like if you just if you're like ah it's it's too much i mean i just think about my own lazy ass and i'm like the remote's on the other side of the room. And right. And it's a lot easier now that I'm not 330 pounds. I should fucking go get the remote or I should just go up the stairs again or I should just do this or that.

And then also it's like built in, you know, over years of just trying to be less lazy, trying to be less fat, I guess you'd say. But it must be difficult for people that are in a wheelchair. Like if you have any any extra obstacle on top of it, it's got to make it harder, you know? That's where with me, the thing that's always motivated me is it was competition-based. I was always trying to beat somebody. Ever since I was a kid, beating that kid in the push-up contest,

it's always been I'm trying to beat somebody else, and he or she is doing that, so I'm going to do it. You know, same thing that I'm sure wakes you guys up every day when you're in your prime. You're like, I'm going to beat that guy. He beat me last time and I never forgot it. And, and I remember, you know, I know the guys who have beaten me by like one placing in bodybuilding or whatever. I'm like, I'm going to beat him next time. You know? So like that wakes you up every day, but someone who doesn't have that, I mean,

I can understand it's hard for you to get up with that same passion, you know? Yeah. When you were setting these pushup records and stuff as a kid, was anybody in your ear talking about diet and nutrition and stuff? So where did that, or did you even pay attention to your diet, or you were just so active it didn't even matter? I'd say when I really started learning about diet wasn't until I did powerlifting. And I had some coaches for powerlifting. I was trying to make the

Paralympic team and that's when they educated me a bit more. And then I really started learning about it when I did bodybuilding, of course, because you're not going anywhere in bodybuilding without a lot of nutrition, you know? But yeah, when I was younger, I just knew the general information. I just knew whatever the media would tell you, which then you find out 20 years later was not true. When I was, you know, real young and I first started lifting for wrestling. Oh, yeah, drink soy milk. Soy milk's great for you. Now I'm like, great. Now I hear a bunch of crap about soy, you know.

So, yeah, but so I learned, really learned about nutrition when I did power lifting and bodybuilding. So a bit later in life. But and then I dove into personal training as my career. So, of course, then I learned about it for that, too. But and then I dove into personal training as my career. So of course then I learned about it for that too. Yeah When you know when Mark went to school is a little bit of a different time than I think we're all because how old are you? 30 30. Yeah, so we're we're about the same age so it's a little bit different than when Mark was going to school, but you know he talks about how he was in like special classes and stuff and

Whenever somebody would like bully one of the kids in his class or something he felt like he had to be there to like stop them from bullying him and stuff um i don't know if like you had been like friends with other people in wheelchairs and stuff but did you feel like you know you had to be the man to kind of protect you know kind of everybody else in a wheelchair or something like that or did was there any instances when that happened not really nothing like that nothing with the bullying situations just what i see mostly in the with the you know other disabled athletes or just disabled people in general some of you know clients that i'll work with on and off or whatever is that that built-in victim mentality that they have no okay you know

and they they assume that i can't do anything because i was in a car accident and now i'm screwed life's over you know so that's what i see is this victim mentality and you know i i can't do anything because I was in a car accident and now I'm screwed life's over you know so that's what I see is this victim mentality and you know I can't get up and go into the kitchen and cook and do all this stuff and you know my first reaction is have you tried you know and that they haven't even tried they just assume they can't do it they're kind of protecting them from themselves almost yeah they're not yeah exactly like that you know not willing to try you know that's that's the saddest thing I see with, you know, with people in the disabled community. terms of like how i look at work ethic he kind of helped really mold me in that sense and i think that just goes to show and even for yourself how powerful a coach can be on a young kid's life especially in a sport because like do you think if you never had that do you think you'd be a

different person do you think you'd have the same mentality i'd be a victim i'll tell you right now i'd be a victim i'd be like everybody else who i was just talking about yeah but i had a coach who challenged me and he treated me just like everybody else he beat the shit out of me i mean he come up like i'd get hit just like everybody else i i remember sitting in the corner of the rockland high wrestling room and crying because that really hurt my head you hit me like ow and you know i'm like i'm thinking about quitting and then i came back the next day and i hit him back you know but like yeah i've you know they hit me just as hard and they would yell at me if I performed bad. You know, if you not just if you lose a match, maybe I won a match, but I didn't dominate like I should have.

Like that kid was that kid was easy. You should have pinned him, but you didn't. They'd chew my ass just like everybody else. You know, so, yeah, having that person to instill all that in me. I mean, that changed my life. Really, those four years of high school. Yeah, it's really crazy. Like every parent, like, I mean, if you can, you should have your kids do some kind of sport, whatever it is, you should have them do something where it pushes them physically and it pushes them mentally. Yeah. I've talked about that with some of my friends that like, I almost feel like it should be a high school requirement, you know, just that, uh,

and it's, I love, uh, you know, all sports are great and everything, but something about those individual sports where if you fail, it's because you failed. Yeah. You know, there's something about that that teaches you something for life. You know, there's we all know the people that are 40, 50 years old and their whole life. Every time they fail, that's someone else's fault. You're not going to cut it in wrestling or jujitsu or any one on one sport. If that's your mentality, you have to learn that you failed because you failed and you need to own that. And some people, you know, that's why they quit the sport because they can't handle that. And then some people,

you know, evolve because of that. How do you decipher, uh, feeling a certain way because you're, you're born with what you were born with versus like being a victim? Like, is there a difference between the two? Sometimes, because a lot of what you're saying, I just see it in everybody. Like I see it, you know, the people are lazy motherfuckers all the time, you know, whether they have a disability or not. So it's like, I guess, yeah, how do you how do how would you kind of decipher the two? Or is there even a reason to? I mean, I guess everybody has a choice.

You know, everybody has a choice to go one route or the other. And then I think your beginnings have a lot to do with it. What were you taught? The earlier you're taught something, the better off you are. And just luckily when I was 14, 15, 16, I had a coach teach me how to not be a victim. He didn't allow me to be a victim. So it's tough

that, you know, for some other people that were never, they never had that influence in their lives. But at the same time, at some point you have to take responsibility for your life. You can't blame your, your terrible parents or your terrible upbringing or whatever your whole life. At some point you need to be an adult and like, okay, do I need therapy? Go to therapy. Do I need a trainer? Go get a trainer, go get whatever you need because you've identified what your weaknesses are. But at some point, you need to take responsibility for your own success. It's your choice what direction you go. Yeah, you have to invest in yourself and you have to try to make yourself better the best way that you can, of regardless yeah you know regardless of of your circumstances regardless of your situation yeah but just but it's so easy to say that no my my whole life of failures is my parents fault or whatever my upbringing blah blah blah they never

get out of that mentality and that's tough it's tough to help people out of that but people just get caught in this cycle you know mentally and they you know some people never break out unfortunately it must be pretty hard to have like friends then right because you look at people like People just get caught in this cycle mentally, and some people never break out, unfortunately. It must be pretty hard to have friends then, right? Because you look at people like, oh, I stubbed my toe. My day's over. You're just like, really? Yeah.

I've gotten better over the years. I've gotten better over the years. You're more accepting maybe? How do I tactfully call somebody out in a loving way? But I'll do that with them. I also coach wrestling on my free time back in my old high school. And I try to learn the person's personality. One person loves being yelled at, and then another person, they're a bit more gentle. I'm like, okay, this person, how do I tactfully call them out?

This other person, I could say, you're being a wimp. You need to get up and go do your job. So yeah, you kind of learn how do you go about talking to different people, but still get the message across of like, you need to take responsibility for your actions. No, it's not okay to play the victim. You know? Yeah. I can imagine like being a client of yours, like if they were going to come in acting

like, or like, I guess feeling sorry for themselves, I feel like, how do you handle people like that? That's kind of the ongoing joke between me and Lisa. Lisa is one of my clients and she's also one of my teammates at jujitsu and she's in a wheelchair also, but for different reasons, but that's our ongoing joke is like, why did I pick the trainer in the wheelchair? Like, I can't get any sympathy. I'm like, no, like for someone else in the wheelchair like i can't get any sympathy i'm like no like for someone else in a wheelchair like i can't i'm like why can't you i did it yeah so i don't have any sympathy like i try not to come off like an ass you know but i don't have any sympathy especially for other people in wheelchairs like if you're paralyzed from the neck down okay that's different yeah

but most people it's like you're fine you just need to work harder. And, you know, so yeah, whenever, here and there, a client will text me and like, hey, you know, I stubbed my toe. I twisted my ankle. I can't come into train today. I'm like, we can do an all upper body workout. That's my specialty. Yeah. You know, that's what I'll text them.

I'm like, you know, I specialize in all upper body workouts. Like more than anything, that's my thing. I'll kick your butt with an upper body workout. Get in here. I'll sit you down on the bench because you twisted your ankle you'll never have to get off the bench the whole workout and i guarantee you'll burn just as many calories that's my thing you know so yeah so i'll try to not come off like an ass but tactfully like call them out and not let them get away with you know playing victim i don't it doesn't matter that you twisted your ankle okay that's

10 of your body yeah yeah you know so wow yeah there's a lot of people that uh i'll encounter just in conversation they'll say i i could never do that it's just like i catch myself sometimes saying stuff like that and then i try to i try to fix it i try to not say that anymore i try to you know not speak in such an absolute way because it really doesn't make any sense when someone's talking about like a fitness plan or nutrition or maybe they want to learn a certain skill. I can never do that. You know, maybe you're, you know, thinking about Casio and you're like, oh, I can never

be that good at it. It's like, what's the point? Why would you say that about yourself? point why would you why would you say that about yourself or um something i hear very often in terms of like nutrition is somebody's like i might be able to do some of that but i could never give up alcohol and it's like why would you you know there's no reason that there's no reason to say you could do it and you could certainly do better than like do you need alcohol every night like let's uh let's let's see if we can make some sense of this you know maybe they're addicted to it or something but i think you can make some i can never go without coffee it's like well you you could

yeah that goes that's an option that goes deep yeah like those type of problems go deep whenever you hear somebody saying something and you can tell they they're just they're locked onto that way of thinking like it's part of their identity. It's like, that's tough. And it sucks that your identity is some type of a victim. You know, that you can't go without, you know, such and such. Like, don't say you can't. Just, it's really hard.

You know, when I get ready for my shows, by the end of it, I do start getting addicted to caffeine. You know, because I feel like crap. And I'm like, where's the pre-workout? I got one more week and I feel horrible. Give me pre-workout. You know, so I start getting addicted to it. So like, I got to tell myself, Nope, you don't need it. And you know, challenge yourself to be mentally strong and tell yourself that you are mentally strong. Don't tell yourself you can't do anything. Tell yourself I can, it's just going to suck, you know, but don't ever say you can't do anything

cause then you're, you know, you're identifying as a victim. And it's difficult for everybody. Yeah, absolutely. Not eating french fries is difficult for everybody. Not eating a milkshake or ice cream or cookie dough. Yeah, you've got to get the right perspective on everything. What I'll tell people when it comes to anytime I'm doing a show or whatever, I've got to make weight for any of these sports. They're saying, isn't this hard to have you sit here what I'm eating pizza in front

of you you know isn't this hard for you I'm like no pizza I've ever had has tasted as good as the Olympia stage you know it's like that's my perspective I keep reminding myself of is like no like that's so much more thrilling when I win a jiuitsu competition or whatever. Like that's so much more tasty. Yeah. I've never had a pizza taste that good. And as soon as I get off the damn stage, I'll have pizza. I can suck it up for two more weeks, you know? So like I can have balance in my life, but if I have too much of that pizza, I never get the Olympia stage. I never win that fight to win in jujitsu or whatever. So yeah, it just, you just got to get perspective on whatever your situation is

and don't ever say i can't blank i can't you know live without this like no you can it's just gonna suck but that's okay yeah it's okay to be uncomfortable you know and then eventually it'll suck less right yeah yeah everyone should rewind that part of the podcast and listen to that several times over i mean that that really makes a lot of sense and you can apply it anywhere, you know, um, your, um, your ability to, you know, not go out on the weekends and, and, uh, you know, waste a lot of time doing things that just aren't going towards your goals. And then you end up, you know, getting your, uh, black belt in jujitsu faster, um, and you reach your goals or you end up getting your black belt in jujitsu faster and you reach your goals. Or you end up making the money that you want to make.

Or you end up in the relationship that you want to be. Whatever it is, whatever thing you're working towards. Whatever the thing is you're working towards. I think it's hard because that immediate pleasure of having that pizza or that immediate pleasure of, of, uh, just slacking off, just being like, ah, I'll just fucking do it tomorrow. And with that, I mean, with the pizza, I've had it before. It tastes good, but I've had that experience before. I don't know what it feels like that when you had your record lifts, when you put the weight down, you're like, I got the lift. I don't know what that feels like. I want to know

what that feels like that. Like I'm, I've, I'm at an elite level in whatever sport. I want to know that taste. I know what the pizza taste is like. It's not the most amazing thing in the world. So it's just keeping that perspective on it. Go get a taste you've never had before. Are there any habits you have or things that you do that you think allow you to continue to push yourself so well? Or are there things that are just staples in just terms of your daily life? I think I could probably name like a lot of them. But one of the biggest ones that I'll talk to people about is you have to be intentional about your motivation. Don't wake up and just, I'm motivated today, so I'll go kick butt today.

And you wake up the next day, I'm not motivated, so I'm just not motivated. It's a wasted day. No, every day wake up and motivate yourself. Be intentional about seeking out the motivation. So just a couple weeks ago, I got up and I intended to eat breakfast and go to the gym. As I'm cooking my breakfast, I was watching West Side vs. the World. So by the time I was done eating breakfast, I'm like, let's do this. I'm fired up after watching that.

You know what I mean? So just put on music, put on a YouTube video, put on something that motivates you. If you're not motivated that particular morning and find your motivation, seek it out. If you don't organically have it that particular morning, you know, and do that every single day for 20 years straight. Yeah. Now you're successful. Yeah. You know, don't be a, you know, don't just let life happen to you though be intentional about seeking out your motivation and then doing whatever your checklist is i like like the rocks thing you'll talk about how rents do you know like as those shirts rents do i'm like yeah

i like that you know you owe yourself you owe yourself today go go pay rent today go do it you owe it you know yeah i like that a lot because like you know a lot of a lot of times you know people or even myself you know you want to be able to motivate yourself all the time, but having something on the outside or watching some video or listening to something every day and having that be something that helps you or gives you that extra burst. It makes a lot of sense. breakfast before going to work out, I'll watch or listen to something and just the visual or just even just hearing it. If I'm not even watching it, just hearing you guys interview, you know, these great people and they'll talk about how they got there. And that gets me fired up by the time I'm done cooking. Yeah. You know? Yeah. The inputs make such a big difference. Like the things you're listening to or the things you're watching on a daily basis. Like it really, I can track, you know, the times where I wasn't feeling good. What was I putting into my body or what was I watching?

What was I listening to? It wasn't ideal stuff, you know, and then like changing that can make such a massive difference. Yeah. Just be surrounded by greatness. Yeah. Yeah. And if you're feeling unmotivated, then you can go through a checklist of things, too. Like, are you feeding yourself, you know, healthy, uh, healthy options, not just in

terms of your food, food's very obvious, like feed yourself healthy stuff and it's going to be, uh, easier to feel good and to be fit and to want to move around. Um, but like also like, you know, feed yourself, uh, positive stuff, you know, um, input, take in, um, positive messages from podcasts, books, books, you know, whatever resources they have available to you. And another thing that something that's helped me with motivation is nostalgia. So find that old song that you really like, you know, maybe just maybe just go like maybe go with something unconventional that you haven't listened to in a really long time. Think about like an artist or somebody that you really, really like. And it doesn't

really have to be like music that gets you crazy revved up, although it could be. But if it's something from like eighth grade, ninth grade, 10th grade, it's going to bring back a lot of memories for you. And it's something that can kind of lift your spirits and get you fired up. And it could be any form of nostalgia, but music is a good one and then just walking i found that walking is just you know really just going out and just you don't even have to it doesn't really matter how long you walk for just go out and just i found that like anytime i've been kind of just uh frustrated if i go for a walk it's just it gone. I worked out every detail in my head by the time I got back and I'm over it. I'm like, you know, usually it's just me being a bitch about

something, you know, me just being whiny baby about something. And I just need to work on fixing something. But once you go for that walk, it's almost like therapy. And because you're moving, I think your brain stays really active and you start to kind of work your way through it. And then you're like, all right, well, here's how i need to approach that and boom it's over with yeah do you ever look at a like old um uh like i'll pull up like a sacramento king's like intro video when they announce the the players that will get me fired the heck up big time dude like it's so weird but yeah that because they got the music cranking and the announcer's all into it. It's amazing, yeah.

That's one of my favorite things to pull up every once in a while. Yeah, I'll use that nostalgia thing all the time. With me, it's Thunderstruck ACDC. Oh. That's what we'd come out to for wrestling. So those four years that changed my life with wrestling, we would come out every wrestling duel to Thunderstruck

because we were Rockland Thunder. So I associate that song with killing someone. You know what I mean? I associate when that song comes on, that means we're going to come out and we're going to kill somebody. And we're going to come out looking badass with a spotlight on the mat and everything.

So that's always nostalgic for me. And then whenever I'm going real heavy on bench press, whenever I'm having a max out day on bench, I'll do my warmups and everything. And in between every set, I will just pace back and forth in front of the bench. But in my mind, I'm pacing back and forth in front of the mat. That's just something you do. You pace back and forth in front of the mat, waiting for the match in front of you to finish. And I just go into that like dark place and then I go and try

to max out, you know, and it just something about that nostalgia. Yeah. Really like pulls out that animal, you know? Yeah. So do you have, um you have um some things that you uh do mentally to prepare for some of your uh tournaments and for some of the jiu-jitsu stuff that you've done the bodybuilding stuff well maybe more so the jiu-jitsu uh do you kind of walk yourself through it mentally like how you're gonna do or you just kind of like go in there and do your thing when it comes to like in the gym if i'm trying to like break a record in the gym i get fired up i get really excited and fired up any kind of competition though I stay as calm as I possibly can because I'm prone to. You don't want to waste a lot of energy, huh?

Yeah, I'm really prone to adrenaline dumps. I had a big problem with that in powerlifting. Every time I would bench. I mean, my best bench in powerlifting competition was 330. My best bench in the gym, relax, just own world it's 390 something 395 you know what i mean so just it was because of the adrenaline and you know it messes with me you nearly bench 400 pounds and you said you weigh about 150 150 yeah wow but like in the gym with my own music no one's staring why you're so strong on the mat i told you but yeah so like i

always struggle with that though like when the lights are on and everything i get caught up in that and i get nervous and it drains me and i get out on the bench and then my first lift feels like a thousand pounds and i'm like crap like this was i could do this for sets of seven the other day you know because i would get that adrenaline dump then in the gym with no pressure i mean i would kill it you know because there's you know so i try to stay as calm as i possibly can before any kind of competition, bodybuilding or anything else, powerlifting, jiu-jitsu, anything. Another thing that might help people motivation-wise is we were talking about The Rock and watching some of the old footage of him. Whatever that thing is that you loved as a kid too, like again nostalgia, maybe it's an old video. Maybe it's an old video of – I always like Bo Jackson and Mike Tyson and Michael Jordan. Like if I watch any of that stuff, uh, I feel like

I run through a brick wall. It doesn't have to be much. It doesn't have to be like some emotional, crazy thing that's edited with crazy music behind it. Just them doing their thing. I'll, I'll, I mean, I could still envision, you know, I got to see Michael Jordan play. I, my dad took me to a New York Knicks, uh,ago Bulls playoff game, and it's that famous play where Jordan goes on the baseline. I could play that in my head, and I know where I was sitting and stuff. That stuff gets me fired up. That was cool.

That was watching greatness and watching one of the greatest athletes of all time. That will get me fired up and excited. When you're trying to reach for motivation there's a bunch of different things you can do to try to stimulate that yeah and just be intentional about it seek it out don't just wait for those mornings that it organically pops into your head like seek it out every morning you know what's your uh food like uh pretty traditional i'm listening to a lot of your guys's podcasts and now it's that's you know the diets are all over the place so i'm still, but right now I'm just more

the traditional, just, you know, the, you know, the slow, slow digesting carb, the veggie, the, the meat, the fish, you know, just pretty traditional, you know, natural foods. Yeah. Just natural. You know, I haven't done any of the extremes, but I'm always learning and I'm always really fascinated by the people you have on the show that are talking about one, one direction or the other, all the, the meat or all the veggies or somewhere in the middle so right yeah it's really fascinating so yeah I'm more just kind of traditional though right now just traditional bodybuilding diet you know what do you recommend to people we have a lot of listeners on the show we talk all the time about weight loss but what would you recommend for

somebody trying to put on some size because you said said that you put on about 20 pounds, and you're pretty jacked. So what would be a recommendation for someone to put on some size, put on some bulk? I mean, just something you can maintain, no matter what your goal is, whether it's bulking up or getting leaner, just something you can do for a long period of time. It's not an all-out sprint unless you're in a special situation. You're two months out from a bodybuilding show, then you got to do what you got to do. But for the most part, find the type of diet and the type of lifestyle you can maintain long term. I tell all my clients, like have a place for the candy or whatever. Have a place for your alcohol, whatever it is. If you have it too much, then no, you're never going to have abs.

You're never going to, you know, but have a place for the donut and then have a place for the kale and the stuff that you're not actually excited about eating. Have structure. Develop structure and then just follow the science. You've got to be in a calorie surplus to really put on muscle. So follow the rules but also have structure to everything you do with the play foods and then the healthy foods. Find what works for you and then what healthy foods, you know, so find what works for you and then what doesn't upset your stomach and stuff. Just try out the different methods that work for your body. Has your diet evolved over time? Have you like, were you, or has this been

the, like the premise of what you've been doing for the last few years? I'd say I've stuck with pretty much just the traditional type of diet, the traditional bodybuilder type of diet, but just getting more perfect with it over time. You know, every prep gets a little bit better. You know, you're supplementing a little bit more. You're, you know, maybe you were lazy about something, your water in the past, and now you're being OCD about get this much water in a day. And so I've just gotten better with every prep about, um, just adding more to it, you know? Okay. How about preps now? I think you said your next show is when? Uh, the Arnold in March. Okay. And when do you start prepping for that? About three months out,

give or take. Yeah. Somewhere around that range. Yeah. And it's going to be Arnold and then Olympia after that. And then, uh, I'm not sure. I mean, definitely those are the two that I want to do, but then there's a, there's a Dallas show in between that. There's a Toronto show in between that. It's really limited for wheelchair bodybuilding. Yeah. And then, um, we're kind of, we're in the, you know, the development stages of our sport. So we're still figuring out like, what are our qualifications for the Olympia? So that's really what we base everything around is, what do I got to do to get the Olympia stage? So when we have participation issues and that usually, you know, dictates what happens with our qualifications um right now though the last i heard if you take uh top four at any pro show then you're in so you know if i take top four at the arnold then i'll probably just you know bulk up all i can until the olympia yeah if i do poor

at the arnold then maybe i'll do one more show and try to qualify there and you know so it really just depends but my whole thing is i want to do the arnold because that's a really fun one and then whatever i have to do to qualify for the Olympia, cause that's the prestigious one. Yeah. Yeah. How was that like meeting Arnold? Cause I think you talked to me about that before. Yeah, that was awesome. You know, it's surreal. He walks in and you hear his voice and you're like, oh, that's Arnold's voice. Like no one sounds like that's Arnold's voice, you know? So it was surreal, you know? And, and it was cool. He seemed like he wasn't completely on autopilot with us. He came over, he shook all of our hands, he took a picture with us,

and then he did a little Snapchat with all of us. It seemed like he was present with us. It was brief, but he wasn't just autopilot. And I've met other celebrities of whatever type, and they were very just, hey, how you doing? Shake your hand and next person in line, you know? So I've been disappointed with a handful of celebrities I've met, but he wasn't one of them.

You know, he was cool. Do your parents go to a lot of these events yeah everyone they can you know of course none of them are ever you know here in sacramento but um they've gone to the last two olympias because that's the big one and then they're planning on going to the arnold this time i told them you know get ready because that's incredibly big yeah when i was i saw you there last year and like i was looking for the jujitsu area and I never found it. You know, I never, I was looking for two, three days and I never found the jujitsu mats. So you can get, you can get lost there so easy. Like it's like two of the Olympia, you know, it is pretty crazy. Yeah. So how does it feel being like the first to do a lot of stuff? Cause I mean, we've been talking about, you know, the four minute mile and stuff, but like

wheelchair Olympia, you were one of the first group to do it. One of the first people to do fight to win. You're probably going to be going into a lot of new territory. How, like what, what do you want to be able to do next? Is there anything next that you're like, I probably be the first guy to ever do that? There's a lot of things I've just, I just felt really honored and blessed to be a part of like that very first wheelchair Olympia. There was nine of us. So I'm part of the first nine on stage ever.

This last Olympia a month ago, how do I explain this? At the first Olympia, we weren't officially part of the Olympia. So I don't know how to explain it behind the scenes politically, but we were hosted at the Olympia. It wasn't the wheelchair Olympia. It was the IFBB Pro League Pro Wheelchair Championship at the Olympia. So this year that just happened, we were part of the olympia just like every other class so when we got our jackets it has the olympia symbol on it last year it didn't you know

none of our gear had the olympia symbol on it this year like we're officially part of the club so uh the promoter gave us our jackets and he said hey like the biggest thing to me is the promoter you guys have that patch on on your back right there that symbol on your back like you're the first wheelchair athletes in history to have that to be able to wear that you know so that was amazing and then yeah fight to win um i found out that morning of fight to win that i was the first para athlete to ever do fight to win and i guess if i would have thought about it i would have known that but it didn't hit me till that morning i'm like this, this is really impactful to me. You know, that in a sport that I love on a huge stage in the jujitsu community, I'm the first one to do this. Like that was really special to me. So yeah. So all these things have just been,

made me feel really blessed and really, you know, honored to be a part of. And then what I would like to do, um, you know, with the different things with different sports, but with jujitsu, I'd love to just create a whole system. I'd love to be like a John Donner, you know, with the different things with different sports, but with jujitsu, I'd love to just create a whole system. I'd love to be like a John Donahue, you know, someone who just creates a whole system that no one else even fully understands until you're in it, you know, until you're already tapping and wow, like I didn't even know I was in a, in a trap, you know? So when I'm on Casio's level, if I ever am, I want to just have this incredible system that I can teach to the world that no one else has discovered before and put together quite the way that I have. Then, you know, with bodybuilding, I want to go as far as I can.

I mean, I know genetics play a part of that and everything. So there I might have a cap, you know, but I want to do as good as I can there. If I can finish somewhere in the middle of the pack, then that's fine with me, you know. You seem really determined and motivated. then that's fine with me, you know? Yeah. You seem really determined and motivated. Is there kind of a footprint that you're trying to leave behind? You know, because you're mentioning that, you know, there's not a blueprint. And maybe you're the blueprint for other people.

I want to set the blueprint all I can in these different things, you know, especially in jiu-jitsu. And then just in attitude, you know, the best I can. Whoever I'm around, if I can, you know, especially in jujitsu. And then just in attitude, you know, the best I can, whoever I'm around, if I can, you know, leave a positive impact on them, if I can inspire them, you know, whatever I can do to leave as much of a blueprint as I can, because there's not that many, especially in the sport world. The only one I can think of really, that was really successful was Anthony Robles. He was the only one to really kill it. And he won, you know, he won the NCAAs in wrestling with one leg. Um, there's been others that have been successful, but not like world champion level. You know, there's been Kyle Maynard. He's a, you know, he is, he's a purple belt under Andre

Galvao. He has elbows and knees essentially. He has, he doesn't have hands. He doesn't have feet. He's just here and he's done, he's been the first to do a million things wow he's got a crazy story but um yeah so there's been a people that i've admired over the years but very few that have been extremely successful but yeah so i just want to be as successful as i can be and leave as much of a blueprint as i possibly can for those who come after me yeah i'll say this though man like i mean even rolling you've transformed a massive part of my game like every single time i roll there and you're watching me you always give me new things that i do that i implement and works amazing so that blueprint aspect of things you're talking about i honestly

don't think you're that far off because it's just it's just crazy how well you understand the game you know so and that's like that's the the coach side of me is whenever i'm watching you roll i'm like i feel like i'm playing a video game. And I'm like, look at this I got to work with. And I'll see you rolling. I'm like, if he did this, he would throw the guy out the window right now. So I always try to teach you something here and there. Because dang, if he saw this opportunity, you'd be winning worlds all the time.

Because of your physique that you have. I mean, this is a hell of a sword you're fighting with. As we've talked about, why wasn't Brock Lesnar undefeated? He should have been, right? Why wasn't he? If he was more technical, look at the sword he was fighting with. Then Cain Velasquez comes in. He doesn't have a sharper of a sword, but he was just better.

So yeah, when I see you, I'm like, damn, dude, you got a sharp sword. Now the better your technique is, you'll be unstoppable one day. You know? So, yeah. I was really, really fortunate to hang out with Mark over the weekend with some amazing people. Mark called it the Meathead Millionaire Summit. It was incredible. Everybody around the room, they kind of spoke and they gave a little bit of background about themselves.

And it seemed like there was some sort of bad thing that happened to them. And they, you know, use it as a springboard to do literally everything that they're doing now. Um, would you have anything any other way? No, I mean, uh, you need challenge to bring the best out of you. No, I mean, you need challenge to bring the best out of you. You know, how else does it ever come out? No one ever really, I don't think people really bring the best out of themselves for no reason. Something happens to just about everybody that brings out that animal in you or it defeats you. You know, and that's what we see in the world.

One person is defeated by a situation. Another person has the same situation or a worse situation and they become an animal because of it. So it's your choice. But yeah, but that's, I think that's, that's something that happens in everybody's lives. You know, the difficulties you go through build more muscle, you know, your challenges build more muscle or they break you down. Right. But you, but it starts with that bars over your chest and is it going to build more muscle or is it going to crush you? You know? Yeah. So, yeah, that's everybody's choice. And that's what determines the successful from the unsuccessful.

Kind of sounds to me like everything in your life might come full circle. Mentioning you had a mentor in wrestling that probably really helped steer your life in a really positive and strong direction. And it sounds to me like through personal training and through helping people at jiu-jitsu that you're going to end up being that mentor for a lot of people. So I think that's really cool. And I think that that would be something that would probably give you a lot of, probably fill you up, make you feel really good. Yeah. I've always loved coaching and that's where, you know, I've, I coach at a Rockland high school with wrestling every chance I get. And that's also one of the things that made me realize I want to be a trainer. Cause I do like that one-on-one, you know, just helping people,

you know, it does, uh, kind of come natural to me. And I do like when I'm sitting on the side of the mat at jujitsu in between rounds, I'll watch people roll and I'm like, Oh, he doesn't realize that's wide open. I got to tell him, you know, I got to show him this was, this was wide open. It was staring you in the face, the whole role and you didn't take it. I got to like the, the coaching me does come out and like, I got to show you cause like I take that all the time. It's, it works easy. Yeah. So where can people find you? Um, Instagram and Facebook on Instagram. That's a Tyler Bray underscore IFBB underscore PT. And then on Facebook, just my name. You have any jiu-jitsu

tournaments coming up? I enter every one of them that I can. I'm not really big on IBJJF because of the point system and everything. I like more the submission-only tournaments because then there's no such thing as a bad position. You know, you just... It's a street fight. You just roll.

So I try to enter all the submission only as I can, but most of those are what exhibition fights or whatever you want to call them. So the other person has to accept and nobody wants to fight me. So, you know, I enter all of the, uh, submission pro tours and the fight to wins and all the other ones I can find, but it's rare that I get the call, but I'll keep entering them until, you know, I get the call. And then otherwise I'm just focusing on bodybuilding competitions. Cool. A big shout-out to our sponsors.

We've got Piedmontese Beef, Quest Nutrition, and Perfect Keto. Andrew, give them some hookups on how they can get a discount on some of that stuff. Absolutely, yeah. So wherever you're watching this or listening to this, everything's everything's in the description, but, um, head over to Piedmontese.com. That's P I E D M O N T E S E.com at checkout, enter promo code power project for 25% off your order. And if your order is above $99, then you get free two day shipping. And then our boys at perfect keto, that's perfect keto.com slash power projectject at checkout. Enter promo code powerproject for 15% off your entire order.

You guys know we go nuts for the nootropics and especially the bars. But actually, my fiance, she texted me. She's like, can you get more of the nootropics? Because we killed our second tub. But it was really good because she had a bunch of stuff she needed to do online. And she got everything taken care of, cleaned the house. It was insane. And then, of of course we go nuts over all the quest bars um head over to quest nutrition.com enter promo code mark's quest for 20 off your order and i highly recommend the uh the taco flavored chips i had those with my monster mash and

unfortunately that's the last time i'm gonna have him because Mark pulled away all of the actual little cheats that I'm having. We've got to get serious. It's going to get serious. Shred Again is a real thing. And I'm pretty fired up after listening to Tyler. Andrew is trying to get abs by Christmas. Yeah. Awesome.

That's what he's working on. Awesome. Yeah. So yesterday I was like, oh, this is fine. I'm going to cheat. And then Mark walks in and he's like, chips, huh? I'm like, I mean this is fine. I'm going to cheat. And then Mark walks in and he's like, chips, huh? I'm like, I mean, so he said it's just going to be a little bit more drastic than a normal person. You can look at it like this.

This is the bad thing that's happening to you to allow you to springboard and pivot from here. Yeah. The quest bar, like this will be your story 10 years from now. Like, how'd you get abs? Be like, my buddy, he took away the quest bars and he really upset me and i got frustrated but then i just did it man and i got jacked and tanned yeah but what he explained he was like you know we're doing something a little bit more dramatic right he's like you could still have them and you're gonna reach your goal but let's make it impactful let's let's get you abs by christmas and i'm like all

right i can get with that. I'm down with that. You know what I mean? It's nice to be a little Christmas gift to yourself. Oh, yeah. That's what I'm hoping to open up on Christmas Day. Yep. People don't bring out the best in themselves for no reason.

One of the best quotes I've heard in a really long time. That was fucking awesome. Strength is never weakness. Weakness is never strength. Catch y'all later.