WHEN CATHAL PENDRED announced his retirement from mixed martial arts in November, he was adamant that there were no regrets.
The 28-year-old Dubliner didn’t take up the sport until he finished school, yet he managed to compete at the highest level in MMA, winning four times in the UFC in the space of 11 months.
Given the ability to turn back time, Pendred insisted there was nothing that he’d change. But that’s not quite correct.
“It was very annoying. I was very pissed about that,” Pendred says, referring to a consequence of a Twitter argument last August with former WWE star Phil ‘CM Punk’ Brooks, who’s due to make his UFC debut this year.
During the exchange, Pendred referred to Brooks as ‘a prick’ and ‘a moron’. Not a big deal, one would think, but a leading car manufacturer felt otherwise. Having just agreed to bring Pendred on board as an ambassador, the company had a change of heart and it cost the Straight Blast Gym fighter a free vehicle.
“What annoyed me the most was that I consciously never curse on social media. But I got into the heat of it, got a bit excited when this back-and-forth started happening, and it just came out while I was poking fun at him,” Pendred explains.
Then I got word back from their headquarters that it wasn’t acceptable as an ambassador. The only thing that was getting me past that was thinking that the spat with him might lead to a fight, and that I’d make more than enough money to buy two cars.”
The story didn’t get the chance to develop to that extent, however, because Pendred’s fighting career has been consigned to the past. He’s now embarking on a new venture as a franchisee for popular salad restaurant Chopped, with a new outlet set to open in Dublin later this year.
But more importantly, the former DCU student is savouring the many aspects of life that the demands of professional MMA forced him to sacrifice. Simple things like meeting friends for a beer or not having to step on the scales first thing each morning, worried that last night’s extra helping of broccoli may have backfired.
Two months on from his decision to call it a day, we sat down with Pendred in Dublin this week to reflect on his journey and the experiences that went with it.
The42: You’ve had a little bit of time to adjust to life after MMA now. What has it been like so far?
Cathal Pendred: “The biggest difference is definitely not having to worry about your weight, which I had to do for years. That just makes day-to-day life in general much more enjoyable. Focusing on the business has taken up a lot of my time — even more than I thought it would at the start — so I wouldn’t have been able to do that properly without stepping away from the sport. My friends, if I want to meet up with them for a drink, I can now. I couldn’t do that for the whole of my 20s. I turned into a bit of a recluse. In MMA, you’re worried about your weight every day. Even when you’re eating something that’s perfectly healthy, you have to be absolutely certain that the portion isn’t too big.
“I used to dread calling over to my friends’ places if they were just watching a movie, because I knew they’d end up ordering a pizza and the smell of it would drive you mad. I often just had to avoid meeting up with them because of that. It was the same if they were going out for pints at the weekend. You really just had to be around people who were in the same position as you. But I remember hearing before: To lead an extraordinary life, you can’t live an ordinary life. I couldn’t do the ordinary things my mates did if I wanted to do something extraordinary, so that’s how I looked at it. But now that I can do the ordinary things, I’m thoroughly enjoying them.”
The42: During your career, you mentioned many times in interviews that you were aiming for the top of the welterweight division. For example, looking at the Robbie Lawler-Carlos Condit fight a couple of weeks ago, did you have a genuine belief that you could progress to that level?
CP: “Definitely. And that was part of the reason for my success.
I wouldn’t have pushed myself as hard as I did if I thought it wasn’t going to pay off.
“I’ve talked before about my work ethic being the main reason for the success I had, but even more so my belief.”
The42: You said that you retired because the desire was no longer there, and that sense had started to take hold in the lead-up to your last fight against Tom Breese. Stepping into the octagon that night, did you know you were going to lose?
CP: “I wouldn’t say I knew I was going to lose but I definitely didn’t have the confidence and belief that I had going into my other fights. It was more of a ‘Give it a lash, Jack!’ type mentality against Tom Breese, but I certainly didn’t have the same level of belief that I normally had.”
The42: In the changing rooms afterwards, did you know that you had just fought for the last time?
CP: “Not really, so to speak. It was just a feeling of despair and embarrassment. Losing a fight is an embarrassing experience, but especially in front of your home crowd and in the way that I did lose as well. That’s something I wasn’t accustomed to either. I was just devastated, really.”
The42: People often talk about the narrow decision wins you had and they probably exaggerate the extent of them, given that the Sean Spencer fight was the only really controversial one. Do you stand over the legitimacy of those wins and how frustrating was it to constantly have to justify them?
CP: “Those wins frustrated me more than anyone because I hadn’t delivered the performances I was aiming for. I always wanted to finish my opponents within the distance and have no question marks, but that’s not easy to do at the level I was fighting at. I didn’t have the striking that Conor [McGregor] has or the grappling that Gunni [Nelson] has; I didn’t have the finishing touch that some other guys had. All I had was a hard work ethic and a never-say-die attitude. They were probably my two biggest strengths but they’re not things that are going to put guys away.
“But I always felt I out-worked my opponents. I never gave up, even when I was in bad situations. Of course, I’d love to have been putting guys away but it just didn’t happen for me too often. So that was frustrating, but then to have people arguing over the decisions as well… I always felt I had won those decisions. In my head anyway I thought I out-worked my opponents. For every shot they threw, I threw one back or took them down or controlled them. I suppose that did rub salt in the wound when I was already frustrated myself.”
The42: One of the consequences was that you received a lot of abuse on social media. Outwardly you always seemed to brush it off quite easily, but was it having an impact on the inside?
CP: “It generally didn’t bother me. It’s something I learned to accept. Social media is a great tool to promote yourself as an athlete, especially as a fighter because you’re not on TV every week life footballers and rugby players. But it does have its downsides, in that these people you wouldn’t want to be listening to are giving you their opinion. But it’s one of the things that goes with the territory.
I had to tell myself that the only opinions that matter are the ones of the people around you: your coach, your team, your family. That’s how I looked at it.
“I ignored it most of the time anyway. As a professional sportsperson, it’s a good thing when people are talking about you, whether it’s positive or negative. They know who you are.”
The42: Was it a case of telling yourself that anybody who posts abusive messages to someone they don’t know has probably got their own issues?
CP: “100%. Sometimes I’d go into their pages and every tweet would just be abuse to people in the limelight. I genuinely felt sorry for some of them because they’re obviously not happy with themselves if they spend their days abusing people from behind a computer screen. Looking into it on a broader scale, what I was getting wasn’t that bad in comparison to some others. Particularly women in the spotlight, they’re being told they’re too fat or too thin, or too muscly like Ronda Rousey. They’re being slated because of their looks, which is very nasty. I think it’s something that needs to be addressed, even with kids in schools. It’s not good.”
The42: You’ve mentioned that your desire and will to win was probably your greatest strength. Is that something that can be taught or coached?
CP: “I don’t think you can teach that. John [Kavanagh] often told me that I had something that can’t be taught. I don’t know where I got it from. I definitely would have had a lot more losses on my record if it wasn’t for my heart. You can see it, even in the top end of the UFC, some fighters tell themselves they’re done as soon as they’re in a bad position. There’s no coming back from that. It’s over once you tell yourself that. Whenever I was in a bad position, I always felt I could turn it around. The body listens to the mind. That’s what stood to me.”
The42: Because of the fact that you were such a latecomer to MMA, were you subconsciously thinking: These opponents all had a headstart on me, I need to want it more than them in order to level the playing field?
CP: “Yeah, it might have been something along those lines. It wasn’t a chip on my shoulder but I knew I was at a disadvantage going into most fights, but I never accepted it as a reason to be beaten. I fought David Bielkheden when I was just finishing college, and this guy’s list of credentials couldn’t have been longer: UFC veteran, Pride veteran, BJJ black belt and all that. But I refused to accept that as enough. When it comes to a fight, it’s one man against another. What they’ve done in the past doesn’t come into the equation. It’s about who wants it more. That was my mentality. When I felt I didn’t have that anymore, that’s why I made the decision to retire. That’s what got me there in the first place.”
The42: You strove for a long time to earn your place in the UFC, beating several of the top guys in Europe and then going through The Ultimate Fighter in a heavier weight class to what you were used to. Having now tasted life as a UFC fighter, was the experience everything you had hoped for or was it a bit underwhelming?
CP: “Em… It definitely was a little bit different to what I had imagined… [pauses]… It just wasn’t everything that I thought it would be. Even in terms of getting there, there were so many guys in my division, it was hard to just plan out a route to the top. There were over a hundred guys in the welterweight division.
If you’re a flyweight or a heavyweight, there’s only 30 guys. You can actually map your way to the top in those divisions, but it was so hard at welterweight to envisage what way I was going.
“Things that did frustrate me… I went to Mexico and pretty much lost money on that fight because I paid to do my whole camp out there so I could get used to the altitude. And in hindsight I wouldn’t take that back because look at what happened to Cain Velasquez the same night. He was exhausted in the second round because of the altitude. But yeah, the overall thing wasn’t what I thought it would be but it was mostly a good experience.”
The42: Are fighters underpaid in the UFC? It’s becoming a hot topic lately.
CP: “I definitely think they could be paid a little more. I suppose people in every company feel they deserve more money and if you get to Conor’s position I suppose you can demand what you want. The blueprint is there. I think Conor is changing it for the better for fighters. I think it’s the first time a fighter has had more of a say than the UFC themselves. In the UFC, you fight who you’re told to fight, you’re given what they tell you they’re giving you, but he seems to be changing that.”
The42: Because of Conor’s influence, some people believe he should use that to take a stand on behalf of the other fighters. Do you think that’s his responsibility?
CP: “Definitely not. I think he’s doing enough for everyone in the sport anyway. MMA is more popular because of Conor, not just in Ireland but on a global scale. At one stage there were seven Irish fighters in the UFC. I don’t think there would have been that many if it wasn’t for Conor. Then there was The Ultimate Fighter that he coached on as well, and all these European guys got in. Even the fact that there’s more European shows now, I genuinely think Conor is responsible for that with the popularity he has brought to the sport. All the fighters are reaping the benefits. They might not see it because it’s not direct, but you can see the impact when you examine it more closely.”
The42: If you were coaching a fighter to try and beat Conor McGregor, as a former training partner of his, what advice would you give that fighter?
CP: “I don’t know if there is anything you can do to beat him but what I don’t understand is how everyone gets so emotional when they’re fighting him. Guys should pay no attention to it because Conor is just having a bit of fun. But they have meltdowns, like [Jose] Aldo and [Dustin] Poirier did. They get so offended and so wound up by everything he says, and that just plays into Conor’s hands. When he was fighting [Diego] Brandao, there was a big bust-up after the weigh-ins.
Brandao was going crazy, screaming like a lunatic. He picked up a bottle of water, threw it at Conor and it just missed his head. There was nearly a brawl. In the end Conor, was laughing his head off, going ‘Your man Brandao is brilliant, I love that’.
“He didn’t take any of it seriously. It’s all just a game to him. So the first thing people should do is just have a bit of fun with him.”
The42: Are you able to look back at your own career yet and appreciate what you achieved, doing things that only one other Irishman — Conor McGregor — has ever done? Does that mean something to you?
CP: “I’m very proud of what I achieved. That was part of the reason I was able to let go. In the heat of it all happening, I don’t think I ever stood back and looked at where I came from and what I did. When I started thinking about finishing, I did realise that what I did was pretty incredible in getting as far as I did. The pride in what I achieved will probably grow as I go on. It’s a bit disappointing that I went out on a loss but that’s just the way the cookie crumbles.”
The42: The UFC have been releasing a lot of fighters in recent months. Did that factor into your decision to retire? Was it a case that you wanted to go out on your own terms?
CP: “Not so much, no. But I always had in my head that I would leave on my own terms. My dream scenario was to retire as a champion, that’s what I had in my head. But pride can keep you going too long and that’s why a lot of fighters do end up going out with a string of losses. They don’t know when to say enough is enough. I always had it in my head that I would go out earlier than most. I didn’t think it would be this early but I just wanted it to be my decision. So that wasn’t something I was thinking about.”
The42: Is this the end of your life as an athlete? Will you go back to rugby or continue to train in martial arts?
CP: “I’m a competitor, first and foremost. That’s what got me into the sport. I’m quenching the thirst at the moment by continuing to train out at the gym but I know I’ll want to compete in something in some shape or form at some stage. Maybe jiu-jitsu.
“I might go down for a rugby game or two, although I genuinely don’t feel safe playing rugby anymore with the way the sport has gone. At least in MMA I only had to worry about one guy. If you have the ball in rugby there could be five guys trying to smash you. I feel like it’s so dangerous now that it might be better for my body if I leave it off. Looking at my mates who play rugby, they’re all in bits and they haven’t even hit 30 yet.”
The42: How likely, or unlikely, is it that you’ll compete in the cage again?
CP: ”You never say never but I’m 99% sure. I think the only reason I’d come back at this point now would be if there was big money involved or a big opportunity. I’m enjoying myself too much now, having stepped away. I think it would be very hard to get back into it at the competitive level I’d want to be at.”
Best of luck to Cathal. He comes across as very smart and mature, and more importantly, decent person.
It’s a shame he didn’t make it further on ufc due to the above. He would of been a great spokesman for the sport and for his voluntary work with mental health.
link to voluntary work with mental health?
Getting battered around the head, couldn’t be good for ones mental health, could it?
The ufc in this case can be a step in some for something even bigger, who knows!
One thing he doesn’t lack is heart. Best of luck in your new venture Cathal.
Seems like a great guy and a gent. I still have nightmares about the rude and ill informed interview Ray Darcy did with him on his radio show where he kept referring to him as “Conor”.
Couple of q’s… When is the restaurant opening and where is it? Thanks for the memories Cathal
“All I had was hard work ethic, and a never say die attitude” certainly enough to succeed in the UFC… but a recipe for success outside of it. Best of luck Pendred.
Well spoken and really understands this own decisions and there’s parts were he’s inspirational too,
sad to see him go.
some people suit the sport.