The Ulysses Gomez Experiment: Willing to Change

“Willing to Change”

This week’s blog is all about change, I’m a HUGE Anthony Robbins fan so I like to quote him from time to time. Don’t worry I’ll save the “YES” cartwheels for Diego Sanchez.

Anyways he has a quote that goes, “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.” I heard that quote and thought about it and how it impacted my MMA career.

I realized that after my last fight that “what I’ve always done” just won’t cut it anymore. I mean, I have two losses in my career and both of the losses are to guys that are in the top 10 at 125 pounds.

Some people think that’s pretty good but NOT ME, the way I look at it is that’s two losses TOO MANY!

So it was time to make some changes. I don’t like losing because frankly, second place hurts… and in this sport I’m talking literally, not figuratively.

A few months ago I realized that I needed to REALLY work on my wrestling so the first change I made was to switch camps.

Wrestling is one of the keys in MMA; if you suck on the feet you can take the person down. If you suck on the ground you can keep it on the feet where you have the advantage.

If you look at the top guys in this sport a good majority of them have great wrestling. Cain, GSP, Cruz, Edgar, Maynard, and that’s just in the UFC. That doesn’t count all the top guys in other shows like Strikeforce or Dream.

So I live in Las Vegas, and which gym has the best wrestlers training there? Well that’s a no brainer, Xtreme Couture.

Besides my wrestling, another thing that I had to change up was my eating habits. In my many years of cutting weight I finally realized that losing weight is a marathon not a sprint. The only problem was I always tried to be Usain Bolt.

I would diet just enough to get close to my weight class. I knew that if I was 14 pounds 5 days out from weigh-ins that I would make weight. The only downside was how it would affect my performance.

It was like a crap shoot, a gamble, but I live in Vegas and I don’t even gamble here so why was I gambling on my fight career?

A good friend of mine said that every time I have a fight scheduled that I have two fights scheduled. My first fight is with the scale, I always fight the weight. I push off dieting till the very last minute.

I mean I really HATE to diet, just look at the first three letters in the word DIET….DIE! That’s what it feels like sometimes.

Anyways, he said that I fight to make weight and then I have to go out there the next day and do the actual fight. My last fight, I woke up and had to cut 9.4 pounds the day of the weigh-ins. Now that’s not that bad if you weigh over 200 pounds, but for a guy weighing less than 135 I felt miserable the whole time.

But the only person to blame was myself. Was the pizza, Taco Bell, cheesecake worth it? Ha-ha not even close!

So I needed help cutting weight, but the right way, eating the right types of food in the proper amounts and at the right times, no more waiting till the last minute to get my weight off.

My manager suggested that I work with his good friend Eric Triliegi. I hit Eric up and we started to work with each other for this fight.

So far I’m happy with the results, I got good energy and the food he has me eating tastes pretty good. Before Eric, the only time I ate buffalo was Buffalo Wild Wings, but this guy has me eating buffalo and grass fed beef and chicken now. Not only that but my mouth hurts from eating all the fruits and vegetables. Ha-ha.

Anyways, sorry for the FRAT. I will be adding a short video Eric shot so you guys can see what type of nutrition program I’m on. Check back Monday evening for that. See you guys next week (this Friday).

-Uly

P.S. – You can follow me on Twitter @uselessgomez.

P.S.S. – Here’s some of my trainers that you should follow for more updates and training advice:

• @EricTriliegi for nutrition info
• @Mastermitter for striking
• @SimGo for grappling

“The Ulysses Gomez Experiment” is a weekly ProMMAnow.com blog series written by world top 10 ranked flyweight Ulysses Gomez as he prepares for his Aug. 5 fight at Tachi Palace Fights 10. “The Ulysses Gomez Experiment” is published each Friday and is part of our ongoing series of exclusive content written by individuals involved in the mixed martial arts industry.