نص حلقة: Khabib Nurmagomedov: Dagestan, Fighting, Wrestling, UFC, Football & God | Lex Fridman Podcast #500
Lex Fridmanنُشر منذ أسبوع
Khabib Nurmagomedov: Dagestan, Fighting, Wrestling, UFC, Football & God | Lex Fridman Podcast #500
Overview
Topic: Khabib Nurmagomedov's Life and Career
Lex Fridman interviews Khabib Nurmagomedov about his life, training, and career in the UFC.
Minute by Minute (90)
[00:00 - 00:00:59] Minute 1
- The following is a conversation with Khabib Nurmagomedov, one of the greatest fighters of all time, who retired from the UFC undefeated with a perfect twenty-nine and O record. It was a huge honor for me to meet him, t...
[01:00 - 00:01:59] Minute 2
The translation and dubbing are a collaborative effort of translators, real human beings, including myself and AI. Thanks to the incredible team at ElevenLabs for their help. And now, please allow me to take this moment ...
[02:00 - 00:02:59] Minute 3
water. And yet, this humble little gym managed to raise more than twenty world champions, including several UFC champions. Can you try to explain or maybe reflect on what factors in that gym, those training sessions, tha...
[03:00 - 00:03:59] Minute 4
And if we go even further back, before two thousand, before we moved to Makhachkala, we lived in a village. In the village, we had a gym right inside our house. My father, he built a gym at home, and he was training all ...
[04:00 - 00:04:59] Minute 5
- Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You hear the hitting, the throwing over and over. And my father's voice, how he's shouting, giving instructions, pushing someone, coaching, teaching. I lived with those sounds. But that was in the vil...
[05:00 - 00:05:59] Minute 6
And in all these situations, there are very interesting stories. But one of the things I heard you say is that the best results are born out of the worst conditions. What can you say about that? Philosophically, is it co...
[06:00 - 00:06:59] Minute 7
But when you live too well, let's say, you know, you're never in need. For example, you were born into a wealthy family and you already have everything. Would that same wealthy father, would he force you to do such a bru...
[07:00 - 00:07:59] Minute 8
countries. Why has Brazil produced so many great football players? Why does Argentina have so many football players? Of course, you have Germany, France, and all that. - European, yeah. - The whole European side. But tho...
[08:00 - 00:08:59] Minute 9
people in Dagestan love football. Yes, we have wrestlers, fighters. There are many of us. But for football players, there is no ecosystem like that. Not so well organized where a kid can, for example, play at school, the...
[09:00 - 00:09:59] Minute 10
combat sports, and all are full. If you win in Dagestan, you move on to the North Caucasus level, then to the Russian nationals. If you're champion of Russia, you go to the Worlds. In amateurs, they notice you and you ma...
[10:00 - 00:10:59] Minute 11
and then I became a champion, and the other guys became champions too. And my father's philosophy, it really resonated, and he became known for it. But there are coaches in Dagestan that not many people know about. They ...
[11:00 - 00:11:59] Minute 12
retired, they all became great coaches themselves. And these coaches, they raised a very large number of guys who are really good at wrestling. And then some of those coaches, they kind of switched over to fighting, let'...
[12:00 - 00:12:59] Minute 13
Every parent wants their children to wrestle, to be physically strong. Our approach to kids is that a child must be strong. They must be able to stand up for themselves, for their family. It's something that has traditio...
[13:00 - 00:13:59] Minute 14
there was the Khazar Khaganate, the Arabic Caliphate, then the Iranian Empire, or the Persian Empire, I should say. Then the Russian Empire, Timur passed through there, the Mongols. And if we look at the geographical loc...
[14:00 - 00:14:59] Minute 15
we have so many languages, more than thirty different languages, and people just don't understand each other. Take Islam and me. We have different languages, come from different backgrounds. Islam is Lak, and I'm Avar. W...
[15:00 - 00:15:59] Minute 16
last fifteen hundred years of history have left a huge mark. If you're into history and you start reading about Dagestan, I think you'll get completely immersed and be amazed by what a unique place it is. So all of this ...
[16:00 - 00:16:59] Minute 17
Gate of the gates, Babul Abwab. Historians wrote about it, say, a thousand or fifteen hundred years ago, great historians from various countries. People have written so much about Dagestan. It went by different names bac...
[17:00 - 00:17:59] Minute 18
grew up, the conditions, and who you had around you. And after all, genetics are also a part of who you are. So when you add all this up, yeah, I just feel like all of this has come together inside me. - It's interesting...
[18:00 - 00:18:59] Minute 19
regular fighter, let's say, a soldier for ten years, and then when he became the leader, he went on for another twenty-five years. So, 35 years of his conscious life he spent fighting not just some random empire, but wha...
[19:00 - 00:19:59] Minute 20
that conditions in the mountains are incredibly harsh. That's part of it too. Just surviving up there is a real struggle. - See, back then, people in the mountains worked all through the summer just to survive the winter...
[20:00 - 00:20:59] Minute 21
easily get to you there, so they'd build a village in rugged terrain- ... somewhere tough to invade. For instance, our village is Sildi. It's from the word si, which is like a castle or a fortress or a tower. They built ...
[21:00 - 00:21:59] Minute 22
- So you just built a sports complex there. Pretty legendary, you know. Could you talk about that? - Yes, that was my father's whole plan. He really wanted it way up in the mountains. First, it's great for the fighters. ...
[22:00 - 00:22:59] Minute 23
this base was sort of my father's dream. He started building it back in 2016, 2017. Money was tight back then. It was really hard, but we built it little by little. In 2020, my father passed away, but I kept the project ...
[23:00 - 00:23:59] Minute 24
somehow gives you that, you know, like Americans love to say, positive energy. Not everything has to be done for money. And you know, you shouldn't just look for profit in everything, let's say financially. There are cer...
[24:00 - 00:24:59] Minute 25
- I think we could film a really good story out there. I'm not sure about a podcast, but I'm sure we could shoot a really nice vlog there. - So can you tell me a bit about the journey from Makhachkala all the way to Sild...
[25:00 - 00:25:59] Minute 26
champions. They win so much. Things are going so well. How much harder is it to stay a champion when the money and the fame start coming in, when all that stuff starts showing up? - Well, those are all distracting things...
[26:00 - 00:26:59] Minute 27
many distracting factors: money, flights, you know, meetings, contracts, video shoots. There are just so many distracting factors. And so if a person doesn't know how to handle all of this, then that person comes down fr...
[27:00 - 00:27:59] Minute 28
staying a champion, that's totally different. It's incredibly tough. - You're saying that even on a local level, once you become a champion, that's already the tough moment because a lot of people who start winning, like...
[28:00 - 00:28:59] Minute 29
paths. First, you build an amateur career just to get into the pros and go even further from there. Second, after you've made it into the pros, you become a champion. And third, after you become a champion, you have to s...
[29:00 - 00:29:59] Minute 30
and a person who can accept guidance from a coach who when they are being guided, discard the cons and take only the pros. But there are people who take criticism very hard and very negatively, and are very sensitive, le...
[30:00 - 00:30:59] Minute 31
he doesn't really know how he's going to act in this new role, doesn't know how he'll behave once he becomes big, famous, and a champion. Nobody knows. Some people say and wish, "Oh, if only I'd made it like that, I woul...
[31:00 - 00:31:59] Minute 32
when you sat alone thinking about your life, "Who am I really, and what do I do to keep being a champion or to become one?" - Well, first of all, from the very beginning, if you realize that what you're chasing isn't the...
[32:00 - 00:32:59] Minute 33
To some people this will probably seem a bit crude, but we all go to the restroom, excuse my language. If we can't control even this, so what can we actually control in this life? Look how many people we know, how many g...
[33:00 - 00:33:59] Minute 34
and my goal was always to become... To prove to my father that out of everyone, even though he trains many other people, he trains everyone, I mean, I'm also here. I can show him. He doesn't have to look very far. I'm ri...
[34:00 - 00:34:59] Minute 35
thought of being crowned king after I became a champion. I was never going to walk around like, "Look how cool I am." That was never in my head, and I'm really glad that the Almighty protected me from all of that because...
[35:00 - 00:35:59] Minute 36
But in the end, your opponent is the person who wants to stop your dream. So here the boundaries expand just a little bit. Right here, you're already not playing humble. Right here, you just step out and you want to clea...
[36:00 - 00:36:59] Minute 37
When they would give me a fight, I always tell this to my guys, whenever they would give me a fight on a professional level, 100 days before it I was... How do you say it? Addiction. I was fixated like when people have t...
[37:00 - 00:37:59] Minute 38
training sessions. And I simply could not miss that evening training session because I had to train during the day from four to five hours, two in the morning and two to two and a half in the evening. And I needed to I w...
[38:00 - 00:38:59] Minute 39
That's the fuel. - The fuel. - Four to five hours every single day. - Every day. - There is a story that I heard. Sadulaev, the legendary wrestler, told a story that he went to a hotel, I think it was in Moscow, to train...
[39:00 - 00:39:59] Minute 40
- I think he doesn't skip his training either. He never missed one back then. I believe that we both ended up there because we both, you know, hate to lose, and we both really want to win. And, you know, recently I came ...
[40:00 - 00:40:59] Minute 41
resistance bands, you work on the pull-up bar, you do push-ups, dips, jumps, you know the bands then work with a partner, drilling and so on. That's about two hours of work. You drop two, two and a half kilos there. Not ...
[41:00 - 00:41:59] Minute 42
up going out for a third training session as well. Sometimes Father would say, "Rest. In the morning, we're gonna have a heavy workload." But sometimes I wouldn't tell Father. I'd just go out at night, head out, and trai...
[42:00 - 00:42:59] Minute 43
That was just my approach. Everyone does it differently. I don't know. I just think it has to be in your head. You've got to want it incredibly badly. - So you believe that to be a champion, you have to train like that, ...
[43:00 - 00:43:59] Minute 44
to take a fanatical approach to it. - Well, look, I'm training with John Danaher. And they train like that too. They train three times a day. And it actually feels right this way. I mean, of course, this is how you have ...
[44:00 - 00:44:59] Minute 45
- He creates champions, not just one or two, but all of them. He finds a champion in everyone, across every category. - Look, the people who come to him, he has a system, let's say, right? Under this roof, under his roof...
[45:00 - 00:45:59] Minute 46
Long, long time. And after some time, they achieve success. They become the best. They prove to themselves that once they enter the system, they could stay there for a long time, endure, and become the best. They prove t...
[46:00 - 00:46:59] Minute 47
The mental strength and capacity mean a lot there. And when I talk about his system, look, I mean those schools that became the best, let's say, in football or in freestyle wrestling or, let's say, in MMA, in grappling, ...
[47:00 - 00:47:59] Minute 48
And when you were young, was there ever a moment like that? 'Cause the guys from Dagestan on the team, really great guys, by the way, all say they've never seen you broken in training, not even losing really. But when yo...
[48:00 - 00:48:59] Minute 49
I wrestled with them, grappled, was in this uncomfortable environment for myself, where we always had the rule that the youngest has to do everything, and he is always wrong, and I had to deal with that. Especially in th...
[49:00 - 00:49:59] Minute 50
was always making me read and write, read and write. I would copy out entire books by hand. There was always this control. It wasn't like he'd say, "Khabib, go do this", and you could just walk away and not do it. When h...
[50:00 - 00:50:59] Minute 51
And it helped me a lot to become mentally strong. - Tell me more about your father. You've read a lot. You didn't just fight. You were well-rounded and you told several stories about this. There was a book, what is it ca...
[51:00 - 00:51:59] Minute 52
the right approach. I now understand how farsighted my father's approach was. First, he tried not to give me anything for free. Only sometimes I could get something for free. For example, before a holiday, like Eid al-Fi...
[52:00 - 00:52:59] Minute 53
him as a gift. My father read through it, and he realized that it was perfect for me, for a child who was 10, 11, maybe 12 at the time. That book was part of my life for about two or three years, something like that. - I...
[53:00 - 00:53:59] Minute 54
He would look through it. The countries were arranged alphabetically. A for Andorra, Angola, and so on. B for Belgium, Brazil, and so on. Everything went in alphabetical order. I started from A and read them all straight...
[54:00 - 00:54:59] Minute 55
It wasn't just about reading. I also had to rewrite it. I had to write it down. I always wrote down what I read. And actually, this is very good advice for parents, you know. They can use this with their children too. Th...
[55:00 - 00:55:59] Minute 56
This really helps develop a child's mind. - I actually saw advice from the great writers who said that they remembered doing the same thing when they were young. When they first started writing, they just simply copied o...
[56:00 - 00:56:59] Minute 57
father did the right thing. He provided me with the right kind of information, and I learned a lot just from being around him. I learned so much just from his presence. He was there at home, and then we also went to comp...
[57:00 - 00:57:59] Minute 58
That you just need to work. You need to stay busy all the time. - These were training camps from two thousand and five to two thousand and seven. In the summer, we went to the mountains. There was a children's camp there...
[58:00 - 00:58:59] Minute 59
But during the day, so we wouldn't be busy with unnecessary things, my father sometimes gave us work. And we'd ask, "Why are we digging this pit?" He'd say, "Well, people used to use it like a refrigerator. When you dig ...
[59:00 - 00:59:59] Minute 60
And by this time, you should already, I believe, have decided what you want to become. You should already be investing in what you want to turn into. - By the way, you had several very good conversations with Nurlan, wit...
[01:00:00 - 01:00:59] Minute 61
- You didn't start? - I didn't. Well— - Tried to finish. - Well, maybe there were some moments, but mostly no. Mostly I didn't start. Abubakar, sure, he was like that. In my circle, I had some guys who were a little bit ...
[01:01:00 - 01:01:59] Minute 62
you to get involved because I think it's wrong, right?" Well, as kids, we just didn't ask. We just went right in. When we moved to Makhachkala in 1999, let's say the end of 1999, so there were—we were many brothers, more...
[01:02:00 - 01:02:59] Minute 63
let's say misunderstandings, we didn't go easy on those guys. And even those who lived around there near that house, in that district, in the settlement, everyone knew that there were lots of brothers living there. So th...
[01:03:00 - 01:03:59] Minute 64
turn into a whole different sport, and that's how we were growing up. We spent six, seven years there, almost ten years. We were living together, growing, training. A lot has happened over that time, but I was never... W...
[01:04:00 - 01:04:59] Minute 65
one guy could beat the other very easily. But the street is completely different. There are no rules, no referees, no points. You just fight there, and it's totally different. I can say I actually had a major turning poi...
[01:05:00 - 01:05:59] Minute 66
It was called the School of Higher Sports Mastery. The local guys from the city know this place. He came to practice and got into it with a guy in our gym who was heavier, maybe one class heavier. This guy was the best i...
[01:06:00 - 01:06:59] Minute 67
I remember he shot in, lifted and took him down. Abdurakhman, my brother, threw up a triangle and he choked him out. When we went out, I was thinking Abdurakhman will lose to this guy. I even visualized it happening, the...
[01:07:00 - 01:07:59] Minute 68
You impress me." I came home and immediately told my father. I said... That was in 2002 or '03, if I'm not mistaken. I am 14 years old. I said, "I'm switching to combat Sambo." I said, "What Abdurrahman did, the one he c...
[01:08:00 - 01:08:59] Minute 69
I started going to my father's trainings, despite that he didn't let me. He didn't want me to do fighting. I think most people don't know this. My father wanted me to do freestyle wrestling or judo, but in my head, I alr...
[01:09:00 - 01:09:59] Minute 70
all kinds of sports. Everything that involves wrestling and fighting. I competed everywhere. I competed in freestyle, in judo, in grappling, in combat Sambo. I competed in sport Sambo, in hand-to-hand combat, in pankrati...
[01:10:00 - 01:10:59] Minute 71
let this weight, this competitive energy pass through you, and psychologically you get better, better, better each time. You become more relaxed about it. And this moment really affected me, although then I didn't agree ...
[01:11:00 - 01:11:59] Minute 72
The preparation was already happening then when I was 15 years old. For example, when I went into the biggest fight in combat sports history, when I fought in 2018 here in Las Vegas. At that point, I was already at my pe...
[01:12:00 - 01:12:59] Minute 73
- I didn't want to lose. I just didn't. It never occurred to me that I could get hurt, that someone could hurt me, that I might break a finger somewhere. I never had that in my head, that I could get hit, that I'd get a ...
[01:13:00 - 01:13:59] Minute 74
- Were you afraid to lose? - Yeah, in my youth, I wasn't always so sure. I just wasn't. Because I never stood out. Yes, I had a coach for a father, and how many, how many trainers have kids who compete but aren't success...
[01:14:00 - 01:14:59] Minute 75
I have fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes is enough to make a person tired." I'm like, "Okay, if you wanna stop me, come here. I'll give you that chance. Let's get in the octagon." I had this impatience during fight week. ...
[01:15:00 - 01:15:59] Minute 76
I was, let's say, like squeezing this energy out of them, and I was getting better and better minute by minute. - Can you break down the technical details of your top pressure? That pressure you put on in wrestling, on t...
[01:16:00 - 01:16:59] Minute 77
where they have to escape wasting their energy. Like when we were sparring yesterday. That's exactly what I wanted. I wanted you to feel that energy, that heavy top pressure. We could have just played around. I could hav...
[01:17:00 - 01:17:59] Minute 78
to his work. I always approach my craft very professionally, you know, respectfully. I believe that if you're gonna be in this game, in this sport, you have to completely dedicate yourself to it. - But I think you had a ...
[01:18:00 - 01:18:59] Minute 79
right? His strengths are his striking, his timing and his speed, his boxing. Why would I stand and strike with him? What am I supposed to do? I have to put pressure on his weak spot. So, That's what separates the fighter...
[01:19:00 - 01:19:59] Minute 80
I mean, our sport is still very young, say thirty-five years old, starting from the '90s. Put it this way. Take, for example, the sport most similar to MMA, which is, well, let's say boxing. How old is boxing? A hundred ...
[01:20:00 - 01:20:59] Minute 81
Yes, there was public interest, but there wasn't the energy that there was with Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. - Yeah, if I can just pause for a second, I'll check on Perplexity. List the biggest boxing fights of all time...
[01:21:00 - 01:21:59] Minute 82
- Yeah, he came back and won. - Yeah. Well, if you look at it out of everything that stands out, I think, You can mention Frazier and Muhammad Ali. And there was also Joe Louis against German Max Schmeling. Hitler stood ...
[01:22:00 - 01:22:59] Minute 83
This was politics. Those were nations. - This was politics. This was nations. - Everything. - It all came together. - And it's the same thing with Ali too. Muhammad Ali with the Vietnam War, all that stuff. - Yes, yes. -...
[01:23:00 - 01:23:59] Minute 84
- Yeah. It's everything combined. The way he talked, what he stirred up, the lines he crossed, touching on family, religion. And then somehow on one side you had Conor, this really interesting champion who knew how to hy...
[01:24:00 - 01:24:59] Minute 85
Nothing has changed. When you let your emotions take over, when they're off the charts and you completely lose control, that's a very bad place to be. So you'll tire out faster. You'll fall. You'll fall for any kind of b...
[01:25:00 - 01:25:59] Minute 86
I had to step right in and prove it, and punish him, and show them I'm better, that I'm better than him, and put a final end to this whole bitter rivalry. When all of that was over- - Your emotions came out? - ... that's...
[01:26:00 - 01:26:59] Minute 87
very lucky. My father called me at that time I was here two months before the fight. His advice helped me out so much because for me it was not just that it mattered, it was actually the most important thing for me back ...
[01:27:00 - 01:27:59] Minute 88
You have to be like, sort of like a soldier in front of a general, right? If you can even make that comparison. If a soldier stands at attention like that, then with us it's even, even stricter. Like even, just to give a...
[01:28:00 - 01:28:59] Minute 89
and just be there by my side. But for me, since he didn't have a visa, I just had to know exactly what he thought. I didn't care what anyone else thought. I didn't care about the opinions of, like, millions, tens of mill...
[01:29:00 - 01:29:59] Minute 90
He even told me something once. Do you know how diamonds are, like, actually made? Under great pressure. He says, "You're under great pressure, and you have a choice. You can break down and give up, or you can get throug...
Broadcaster Questions (1)
[02:15] Can you try to explain or maybe reflect on what factors in that gym, those training sessions, that led to your success?
Context: Khabib Nurmagomedov's training in Dagestan and the factors that contributed to his success.
Full video: Watch on YouTube