Some translated bits of
Warrior Talk #17.
This was released on November 18th.
Chico Kwasi
- As a kid always fought his brother Fabio after watching
DragonBall Z. Getting tired of them breaking stuff in the house, their father signed them up for kickboxing classes (after kicking their ass lol).
- Chico was a bit of a clown as a kid and the classes weren't really for him so he dropped out pretty quick initially.
- A few years later after watching the anime
Hajime no Ippo he decided to give it another shot.
- Mike's Gym wasn't his first gym, but it's the first one he did fights under.
- Thinks it's weird Anwar is getting an instant title-shot for winning
House of Glory.
- Still is working his way toward the belt and believes he'll conquer it in 2024.
Tim Reedijk (Journalist/Podcaster)
- When he started as a sports journalist at AD (major Dutch news outlet), he wasn't really part of the fightscene.
- Used to cover Football (soccer) for a long time.
- Around the time of Rico vs. Badr 1 started paying more attention to fightsports and slowly, but surely became a fan.
- Now he also does fightsport coverage and a podcast with Remy called "In the ring", both for AD.
- Things while football is a better organized sport compared to Kickboxing, feels Kickboxing is more accessible from a journalist's perspective; it's easier to get a hold of people, do interviews etc.
- Feels (some) fighters should promote themselves and their fights better.
Faldir Chahbari (Former fighter and now trainer)
- Got a stick in his eye when he was 2 years old, which is why he is on the left side.
- Came to the Netherlands at 4-5 years old as - in his words - a fat little boy.
- They were the only Moroccans/foreigners in the small town they lived in, which caused him to get into a lot of fights as a kid.
- Used to get bullied a lot as a kid and now works with a lot of kids who are being bullied.
- Got into fightsports at 10 years old to be able to defend himself.
- At around 13 he started Kickboxing and realized he had above average potential.
- Never thought being blind on one eye was an impairment or hindrance.
- Says opponents naturally tried to attack his blind side, but his reflexes were too sharp.
- Has had 127 fights and never got counted, thanks to his reflexes.
- Saw the gym as his second home.
- Had his first pro fight at 18.
- Coming up as a fighter when there weren't social media meant he often barely knew anything about his opponents.
- Trains Peter Aert's kids now that Peter lives in Japan.
- Prepared former Football player and now social media start Andy van der Meijde for a fight, but it never materialized.
- After doing a TV show together with Right-wing politician Thierry Baudet, van der Meijde brought him in for a training session once and knocked him down with a body shot lol.
- Also trains (or trained?) Michael Duut.
- Feels Touchassie shouldn't have fought Abena.
- Says his cousin (also a Chahbari) is an up-and-comer.
Roy Martina (Doctor and mental coach)
- Was an unruly child an started doing martial arts for discipline.
- Was inspired after seeing a Bruce Lee movie.
- Has a background in Kyokushin Karate.
- Says people have only recently started to take importance of the mental aspect of not just fighting, but life in general more seriously. Mental issues are not a taboo anymore.
- Used to live in L.A. and one day ended up in a gym after seeing an ad for "Ninja Training" lol.
- This was when he already had trained in Kyokushin.
- Found out that the class was being taught by none other than Frank Dux... Yup, the one from
Bloodsport.
- Dux was impressed with Martina's skills.
- At one point they travelled to Mexico together train a some local fighters.
- Martina ended up teaching the class, because Dux got sick.
- The fighters trained by Martina ended up becaming Mexican national Kickboxing champions lol.
- A few years later, Martina was invited back to Mexico to train the champion's rivals, because they were too dominant lol.
- Feels like in a way he introduced Kickboxing in Mexico.
- Thinks visualization is extremely important and can make the difference between success or failure.
Pretty good discussion concerning the added value of mental coaching for fighters. Some good - respectful - back and forth. The show took a big left turn when Martina started talking about Frank Dux and I would have loved to hear Martina's full story about it, because I find it a highly fascinating topic. Alas, we only got the cliff notes version of it.
