John Danaher

But let's all just stay together until ADCC 2022 as a unified team.

Go out, prepare yourselves as best you can.

And then after that, we can make a decision as to whether we break up or not.

But that was rejected and the team split.

And they moved to Austin.

We'd made prior arrangements to go to a local gym and they took that gym.

And we were left with no gym and more or less homeless in Austin.

A year out from ADCC.

Yes, this is one year out.

So roughly three quarters of the competitive athletes left in one week.

So at that point, that was probably the lowest point, because at that point, not only did we not have a place to train, we had very few training partners for the few that had remained.

The main athlete in the team, Gordon Ryan, was going through a particularly bad spell with his unresolved stomach issues.

And there was doubt as to whether or not he could compete at all and was actively thinking about retiring from the sport.

Yeah.

So that was a time when it was like, man, the whole program seems to be dead in the water at this point.

Most of the competitive athletes were gone.

There were very few training partners for the few that remained.

And the main athlete around whom the group had initially bonded was seemingly out of action, possibly permanently.

Where was your mind?

Where were you mentally?