Robert Valentin
Age: 29Record: 10-3Nickname: “Robzilla”Division: MiddleweightOpponent: Ryan LoderPath to last: First-round TKO of Giannis Bachar, first-round submission of Paddy McCorry
On attending to the UFC
Rob Valentin
“To be sincere, I didn’t think about something. I used to be simply wanting ahead for the sensation and the sensation is indescribable. It looks like I’m in the best place. I wouldn’t name it strain. I might say it’s extra pleasure. I like the cameras. I like the present. I like the lights, and the larger the stage will get, the extra excited I get to go in there. I’m so f*cking pumped.”
On his TUF expertise
“I beloved each single day. I wakened each day with a smile on my face. It was the proper surroundings for me. I really feel like my complete life ready me to be in (‘The Final Fighter’) home and to carry out to my greatest. I simply had this sense each day that I’m a person on a mission. I don’t wish to lie: Everybody has doubts earlier than the fights and stuff. I had these doubts. However I might all the time – for instance, within the morning, I’m going for my run and I might inform me nothing’s going to cease you,’ to ‘OK, you’re going to vary your life immediately. That is your time.’ And I might say this for 5 weeks straight, each day to myself, and I feel it manifested. So, yeah – I didn’t wish to depart. I instructed the producers it’s not about the home. You don’t care about something. You get meals, you get each all the things you want and also you simply prepare, battle and yeah, I miss it. I miss it.”
On opponent Ryan Loder
Ryan Loder
“I’m actually excited to get in there with Ryan. I pictured that we might face one another within the last as a result of he’s a really disciplined athlete. He’s a really sturdy man, and I feel we had been each possibly favorites. I feel I’m a horrible matchup for him, and I’m the man that may make this battle entertaining, and I feel I don’t wish to take something away from him as a result of he has methods to win fights. However his type shouldn’t be very fan pleasing, and I even have the talents to make this a fan-pleasing battle. I’m simply wanting ahead for each of us getting within there anticipating the perfect form of the opponent and placing all of it on the road. I wish to have a protracted battle. I don’t wish to have a first-round end. I wish to give the folks what they want, they usually want extra air time of ‘Robzilla’ within the cage as a result of the final efficiency was too quick. I wish to give them extra. I wouldn’t sit right here. I actually would nonetheless be house if there’s not an opportunity to make somebody bleed. That’s why I took the flight to Vegas: I don’t go to jail for splitting somebody’s cranium. That’s why I’m right here, and that may by no means change.”
On a current mushroom incident
“2023, I’ve a fairly essential battle arising. I traveled from Thailand to Switzerland like three weeks earlier than, and in my headspace I used to be not proper as a result of I used to be battling staph infections. I had a really unhealthy relationship at the moment. So I’m going to the mountains. And I take a sh*t-ton of mushrooms. I’m alone within the forest, within the mountains, at nighttime, and I spent the night time there. … After a few hours, the tree began bending. The timber had been bending and the gods confirmed up they usually actually instructed me, ‘You’re the man. We want you to carry us blood violence. We wish to have one thing to cheer for and also you’ve bought to make your ancestors and the previous gods proud.’
“This night time, I felt so sturdy. I bear in mind I took my shirt off. I began shadow boxing within the forest and I felt like my toes would develop roots into the soil. Nature gave me a lot energy and power going into battle week after that. I might have these voices in my head on a regular basis … That is my supply of energy and that’s why I all the time, earlier than fights, I search for a reference to nature and to connect with house soil if doable. But when not, even like simply hook up with nature as a result of that’s the place I I acquire a lot power from. That’s the entire base of Nordic paganism is the connection of man and nature. That’s principally the story of my journey within the mountains.”
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