WARNING:  This page has adult language and may not be suitable for young viewers.

These are just my rants and raves about training, competition, anything, and nothing. First and foremost I’m not a writer, so don’t e-mail me about my grammar, use of punctuation or spelling if anything it’s the computer’s fault, I fucking use spell check.

Why

By Rudy Hernandez

Why am I writing this? Because I want to. I figure it’s my web site so I can do whatever I damn well please. If what I say offends you go watch High School Musical or something. Like Adam Sandler said in The Wedding Singer, “I have the microphone, so you will listen to every damn word I have to say!”

For those of you who don’t know me, I live a healthy lifestyle. Not because it’s cool, but because for me it’s a way of life. Period. I’m an MMA Fighter and former bodybuilder blah blah blah. But What I pride myself most on is that when I dedicate myself to a goal I see it through no matter what the cost. You can ask anyone of my coaches and teammates. I eat every 3 hours and in my “little red cooler” you can usually find 2-3 tupperware with chicken and rice in them. I eat the same thing every day. Why? Because it’s what has to be done. I get in the steel cage and battle. Let me tell you, that shit aint easy. There are some tough mother fuckers out there. I eat 6-7 times a day and train 2-3 times a day 5-6 days a week. Now yeah I have my cheat meals where I eat anything and everything on the menu, but after that it’s right back to eating like a Saint. I train as hard as I do because I don’t want to lay my head down at night knowing I could have trained harder. It’s like I tell my training partners, “earn your sleep!”

Where I work my co-workers are always trying the latest diets and doing the latest yoga booby ballet dvds’, but at the end of the day they are still over weight and not happy with themselves. Then they see me with my red cooler full of food eating the same thing over and over. Then they ask me, “Rudy, how do you do it? I can’t see myself eating like that.” You know for a while there I used to try and explain the reasons why and the benefits, but after a while I just got tired of repeating myself. Now I just say, “yeah…” and leave it at that. Because they will never understand that there are no fancy diets, no gimmicks; just good old fashioned strict dieting and hard work in the gym. Period. But they won’t accept it. Because it’s not in them. It’s something I call DDI Dedication, Drive and Intensity. And they don’t have it. They eat once a day all week and wonder why they haven’t lost any weight. They ask me to put together a diet for them because they are “serious” about getting in shape. So I write it down on a napkin that’s handy. When they read it that ask, “where’s the rest?” Then I respond, “that’s it. Get through one week and I’ll put together the rest.” By the second day they’ve given up.

They’ll never understand the sacrifices that we as competitors make. I’m not just talking about fighters, I’m talking about anyone who does anything physical on a competitive level. From Mountain Climbing to Tennis to Football to Running, it takes time to develop your craft. You have to sacrifice time, effort, and money. You have to put off hanging out with your friends and family to go lift weights, or get your head banged in sparring. At family gatherings you have to eat chicken breast and salad when everyone else is having fucking Bar-b-q. Shit I can’t plan anything during my week with my girl, much less anyone else. Monday-Friday I usually train morning, noon, and night. Our times to hang out are Saturday night and Sunday during the morning and afternoon because Sunday evening I’m cooking all my food for the week. What a fucking production that is. I got it down to a science though. Hell half the time I can’t plan any trips or vacations because I always got a fight coming up and they usually land right in the middle of my training camp. If I do get the energy to go the club with my girl, I can’t fucking drink alcohol because it will affect my performance. I can count on one hand the times I actually took off training to hang with my people in the last 3 years. Then why do you do it you ask? Because there’s nothing like getting on stage and hitting your first pose and the crowd goes wild. Or when you choke your opponent out in the cage and your hand is raised in victory knowing that all the weeks of training and dieting have paid off. That’s something some people will never understand much less know what it feels like.

We are the The Warriors; The Spartans. The few who are willing to sacrifice for glory (oh I just had to put that in there). While others stop when they break a sweat, we are pushing through pain, screaming all the while, and the floor we train on is drenched with sweat. We are the brothers and sisters of steel.

So if you ever ask someone why they they train as hard as they do, you’re probably standing on the wrong side of the sword. Peace.