If your ambition is being a world champion, you’re going to end up disappointed

‍

I never saw tournament results or belts as the end result, the journey was always perfection. Once you are on that train there is no end, there is no final destination. If you set out to be a world champion, that’s your final destination – but once you get there you’re going to be disappointed because what’s after that? 

I think life is kind of boring once you reach your objectives. The point of life is not to reach objectives, it is to always be striving for more because the second you get complacent, you stop growing. 

But, that depends on how you look at things, whether you want life to be comfortable, sit by the beach, drink pina coladas or sleep all day, then you shouldn’t have objectives. 

If your objective is to grow then the only objective that’s permissible is perfection, and I always had that in my mind. I would never settle. 

I wanted to be the best in the world which is a huge responsibility when you think about it. Being the best in the world, let that sink in. Seven billion people on the planet and you want to be able to choke everyone out at will – for most people that’s very ambitious when you think about it. 

To me it didn’t sound ambitious, it was second nature - like waking up in the morning. The ultimate challenge is not the one you face in competition, it is the one you face against yourself. You will win some battle and lose some, but as long as you are moving forward you are fulfilling your role in all this. 

‍

‍

I sucked at Jiu Jitsu but worked until it became my thing, and I won the biggest tournaments in the world

‍

I have some memories of growing up in California, but at the age of five or six we moved to Brazil and most of my childhood was spent there. It cherish that time a lot, it was a good childhood and I had a lot of fun.

I did get picked on a lot but that was mainly down to being different. I stood out. I was an American in Brazil. I think it shaped my childhood in many ways as I didn’t have many friends. I was known in school, but no popular in the traditional sense of the word. 

Overall it was a good childhood. I tried a multitude of sports, obviously growing up in Brazil soccer was one, and I sucked at pretty much everything. I sucked at Jiu Jitsu too. I just had to work really hard on it and at some point it became my thing, but it was an uphill battle.

I started out at 16-years-old with a style called Mugundha Jiu Jitsu, which ironically is probably the only traditional Japanese Jiu Jitsu style in Brazil – that’s the one I walked into because I didn’t know there was a difference. I was with them for six months, until they closed, and I went to a traditional Brazilian Jiu Jitsu school – this was the beginning of 1998.

At the end of that year, I came to the US because I had finished high school and my plan had always been to go back to the US and attend college. I ended up mostly training. I went to community college for two semesters but that wasn’t really my priority. I was really involved in Jiu Jitsu at the time and was pretty sure that’s what I wanted to do. I was immersed in the Jiu Jitsu scene in Las Vegas and Southern California, it was very small at the time – maybe two or three tournaments a year, and primarily because of that I decided to move back to Brazil. 

I wanted the completion that was in Brazil. There were tournaments pretty much every weekend and I wanted that experience. 

Things started going pretty well and I was winning the tournaments I wanted to be winning. Once I won the world championships in the Gi and the ADCC, the two biggest tournaments in all of Jiu Jitsu, I felt there was nothing left for me to do in Brazil and it was time for me to grow, and that’s when I moved to Las Vegas to train and fight MMA. 

It has been a good journey, it is the life I chose. It has had its ups and downs, but I wouldn’t trade that experience for anything else in this world.

‍

‍

Fighting is alien to my family, I don’t carry regret, and think there is even more to come from me

My father was a tennis coach, and my mother a very successful swimmer who held records in Brazil and came very close to representing them in the Olympics at one point. No one in my family does martial arts, I think they find it kind of odd. I grew up in a Mormon family so me choosing this career was seen as somewhat odd. I don’t think they thought I was going to take it seriously, but I was pretty sure about it. At one point my dad was trying to talk me out of it and goes ‘Rob you gotta stop playing Karate Kid and get a real job.’  But I wasn’t even listening to people at that point, I was just too immersed in my purpose.

There were a couple of times in my life I thought about quitting Jiu Jitsu. I am not an easy person to deal with and see things in a certain way. I don’t budge on things I feel right about. I have butted heads with a lot of coaches in the past. 

There’s a part of me that wonders what would have happened had I not gone the MMA/BJJ route. 

There’s part of me that wonders what my UFC career would have been like had I not failed a drug test and been kicked out of the organisation. 

But, deep down regret is not something you should not carry. Regret is for someone who is profoundly unhappy. If you are happy with who you are then you shouldn’t regret anything. The mistakes you make are what led you here. I am content, but I do not feel accomplished. I don’t think I have even peaked yet. I have a lot more to do, and I have no doubts in my ability to do these things.