My father was a bricklayer, and my mother was a housewife. It was complicated, obviously, because of our humble origin, but thank God we were all focused.
I was a fan of jujitsu, so that pretty much got me started in fighting. I won a lot of local competitions when I was young and eventually won a ticket to go compete in Rio de Janeiro. In Rio, I struggled a lot in the beginning, living in the gym and not having much to eat, but eventually I joined the Nova Uniao Team and really improved my skills.
The training is intense here at Nova Uniao.
Interim belt is made for media and fans, not for me.
Cub Swanson was the first to talk a lot on fight week in the WEC, and I got there and ran through him.
I was really close to my father since I was young. He always told me that I had to work in order to become a man, so I had to stay with him when my mother left. He always took me to work to help him as a bricklayer. I was just a kid, so I did what I could do to help him.
