By the time I was 4 or 5, I was doing 250 push-ups and sit-ups a day. When I was 6, we bumped it up to about 500 push-ups and sit-ups a day. Some days it could even be 750 or 1,000.
Sage Northcutt
Getting to fight at my natural weight, that was huge for me.
Typically, when someone gets a choke on me, I have a pretty strong neck. It's usually hard to choke me.
Houston is super cool, and Katy is super cool, and so is Sacramento.
I believe the UFC knows what they're watching and looking for, so I always try and put on a great show for everybody watching and try to go out there and finish my opponent and do something exciting. I believe a lot of people come out to watch me and see me perform.
For me, it was just a huge honor to fight in the UFC.
I'm in the UFC; this is a sport about fighting. If someone wants to fight me, or someone wants to fight someone else... you're here to fight each other, so I get it.
I'm always learning and getting better with my technique.
People see a lot of my standup, and that's what I'm known for since I was trained in karate and kickboxing, but I also have ground game.
A lot of the times, anything that somebody tries to say negative is actually kind of funny.
I wanted to study to be a petroleum engineer and get my engineering degree and fight in the UFC at the same time. But unfortunately, to be the best I can be at the UFC, I needed all focus to be there, and more focus, also.
Personally, I think I might end up fighting heavyweight in the future. I can just see myself keep growing. I'll be 24, 25, growing 2, 3, 4 more inches, and putting on a lot of muscle. I can absolutely see it.
Whatever Dana White and Joe Silva have planned for me, I'm ready.
I've trained my whole life, and I've always had the UFC be a goal of mine.
I'm a bubbly, happy guy.
It's an incredible feeling, just to know that you have MMA fans that are behind you and want to know when your next fight will be.
You only get one chance to fight in the UFC, and while you have the chance, you might as well take it.
Mr. Faber is a huge role model. He's a UFC Hall of Famer. He's such a driven person and a champion.
I'm getting to put all my time and effort into studying my martial arts and to be the best fighter I can be.
I'm still trying to figure out being calm.
I'm training to be the champion. I become the champion of whatever I put my mind to, so I believe I will be the champion. I think the UFC will be able to realize that, and we'll see what they say.
I consider my MMA training starting the day I set foot in Urijah Faber's gym.
What I love the most about being a pro fighter is meeting the people. You get to meet all the fans and new friends that you get to meet up with all the time.
I feel like I have goals that I set, and I try to accomplish those goals, so no matter what room I step into, I know the direction that I'm wanting to head.
I've always thought about welterweight.
I just want someone who's got a great personality, beautiful, fun to be around.
People say I don't have the experience. I might not have 20 MMA fights, but I've been fighting my whole life.
I'm young, and I learn not only from every fight but from every practice. When you're young, you soak it all in. You have a lot to learn, and you can get better and better as each day goes by.
People can say what they want. But you can silence a lot of people when you go out there and win.
I really don't listen to any of the negative stuff. Anything that's positive, that's kind of the stuff I'm listening to, and that's kind of what, like, brings you up.
I'm taking it one fight at a time. But I always see myself being victorious.
I believe coming in early to the UFC gives me an advantage. More time to learn, more time to be in the UFC and get better as a fighter.
Jon Jones is awesome and won his first world title at 23 and 8 months. I believe I can do it before then.
I always stay positive if I can. I always stay upbeat and always have a ton of energy.
There's always going to be people saying negative and positive things. If you let all that into you, and you're always contemplating that and thinking about that, I'm sure that can get to you. I try not to do that.
I have my coach, Urijah Faber. He's watching me do everything pretty much all the time. I'm training or grappling or sparring live. He's over there making adjustments. He's really hands on, so that makes a big difference.
Going into the UFC debut, you have to wonder what's going on, what's the workout going to be like. It's just an honor to be at an open workout.
Knowing what God has in store for me - it gives me hope. I kind of feel like God's warrior, pretty much. God's weapon.
Everybody who is fighting at UFC 200 is awesome! It's going to be awesome to get to meet everybody. I'm excited.
Every day at Team Alpha Male, I'm improving. The biggest thing with that camp is everyone is so positive and has the work ethic to go out there and push the pace and keep going and going and going.
CM Punk was a great wrestler, and he has so many fans and made a lot of people happy with what he did over the years.
The UFC offered me a fight against one of the Top-10 fighters named Demian Maia. I believe he was, like, No. 2 at the time. They obviously believed in me to think that I could face one of the best guys in the division.
It can be kind of difficult because of the workload I have at Texas A&M, so I have to find time to study as I pursue my major, but also to travel and compete and train hard for my fights to come in the UFC.
I'm always looking to go out there and finish my opponents as soon as possible so I can stay safe and protected.
I would like to be the youngest UFC world champion. I believe I can accomplish that.
Georges St-Pierre - he's so awesome. It was very great getting to roll around with him and getting to train with him. He's so nice and so friendly, and he's very humble, too.
I might take a little time off from school to train. I'd be a totally different animal if I trained full time.
When I was nine years old, I was on the cover of 'Sport Karate' magazine.
I was at my house, and me, and my brother, and my sister were kind of just playing around. And I was like, 'I wonder if I can twist this apple and rip it apart?' So I was playing around, and I did it, and I was like, 'Wow, that kind of takes a firm grip.'
I started working out and doing martial arts when I was about 4 years old, and I was competing by the time I was five or six. So my mom and dad had me doing push-ups and sit-ups from a very young age.
