“I Lost £20 Million” Eddie Hall on Boxing & MMA Fights

Why MMA now? Like, you only just kind of got into boxing and now it's mma.

I, I guess obviously the boxing journey was like we spoke last time was a tough journey and I feel like boxing is, although a great sport, is a very restrictive sport for a big muscle bound man like myself. So after the fight with Thor is, it's like, come back, look, I had a good two years of just one year and a half of just letting go, like I hadn't had a break. And geez, I'm gonna say like 15 years, like just had no breaks, like very, very few holidays. And I just let go. I don't know if you notice, I put a lot of weight on during that period, but I was also working with a hormone doctor and I managed to get my sperm count back up and I managed to have two, two more children during that period as well. So it was like a nice big reset, you know, finish the boxing, just stop everything. Did a little bit of weights, but just like just a reset. Two more kids. It was like something that I really needed in my life just to reset myself. And then the, the challenge, it came along actually to fight Brian Shaw, Mitchell Hooper and Martin Ford in a four, four way MMA fight.

Just like a free for all.

I think it was two fight, right? So I think I was going to fight Mitchell Hooper and then the winner of that one would fight the winner of Martin Ford, Brian Shaw.

Yeah.

And then so it'd be like a four man eliminator. Sorry.

Yeah.

So I signed this deal, like life changing money, stupid money. And I went on this quest to become an MMA fighter. And during that six month period, I just really enjoyed myself, you know, lost a lot of weight, learning something new every single day. And then that fight got canceled. The Ministry of Sport got arrested for fraud in Qatar and that big paycheck fell through.

Oh, no.

Six months of my life down the drain.

How much was it they were paying?

My contract was for 20 million. Yeah.

And you never got it.

And I never got a penny. Six months training. Yeah. Six months of my life, committed, fully committed, Nothing but mma. Turning down hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of work, obviously neglecting my other work, neglecting my, you know, sort of soul career, which is lifting weights and YouTube. Everything was neglected.

Yeah.

So it was like a massive frustration of like all that prep for all, and I've got to do something with it, so how can I challenge myself? And the challenge was to fight somebody who had done big waves in MMA world and someone that was gonna create some big attention and then Marius Podnoski came to mind and I hooked up with this MMA coach, G. Oaks and his son Jake Oaks, and we went on this journey and we did pretty much from the, from the day of visualization, like, all right, I want to fight Mary Spanowski. Pretty much a year later I was in the ring with Marius. So it was, it was all, I, I guess accidental, but then worked out pretty well. It's something that I enjoy and I'm still actively, you know, looking for more fights now. And yeah, it was something that I feel it was very needed in my life because I think it's very easy for people like myself to win the world's Strongest man like I did and then retire and you just turn into a massive fat slob. So. So, which I. So it was nice to give myself a challenge and stop myself from turning into that.

Yeah. And who's your next fight then?

So I'm in talks at the minute with a few federations about fighting Dylan Danis, who is the, like a world renowned probably only I think he won some big titles in jiu jitsu.

Yeah.

Quite a badass. You know, he's got a lot of fights and obviously you've seen him fight on Misfits.

Yeah.

And stuff like that. A bit of a love him hating character.

Yeah.

So, yeah, Dylan Danis has all been. Well, we, we get the, get some contracts signed and hopefully off we go.

And he is a lot smaller than you, so I guess you're gonna have to cut.

I mean, from. Right. So from face value, it looks very unfair because he's, he weighs 80 kilo a new way. 165. Hear me out though. Okay? So face value, it seems very unfair. Yeah. But from what I gather, he walks around close to 100 kilo.

Okay.

And as part of the stipulation, I've got to come down to under 300 pounds, which is 130 kilo or 135 kilo. So come the fight there will only be around 35 kilo difference.

I mean, that's still a lot.

It's still a lot, but it's nowhere near as, you know. It's not 80 kilos.

No. And he's a pretty much a professional fighter.

He is a professional fighter. Yeah. He's been doing it full time for his whole life. Yeah, I've been doing it a year and a half. So it's so face value, it sounds like, oh, you're going to mince him. But by the time, by the time you factored in the weight loss his weight gain, the round times, obviously everything's going to be in his favor. It's going to be the five minute rounds.

Oh, so you'll just sign that off, will you?

Well, I'll have to. I have to sort of give him every advantage because I've got the biggest advantage, which is size and strength.

So he's going to go for really long rounds and try and gas you out.

Yeah, so. So, yeah, but that's what makes it tough, that's what makes it fun, that's what makes it a challenge. You know, getting down to 135, I haven't weighed 300 pounds since I was 21.

How are you going to lose that much weight?

I honestly don't know yet. I mean, if we to get the deal done for February, it gives me just over three months. It's going to be a hard process because there isn't 30 how many, how much I've got. I've got to lose 30 kilo, pretty much that. I also don't think this, if I were to be like 0% body fat, I could probably lose kilo and be 0% body fat. That's just unrealistic. It's not going to happen. So I'm going to have to lose muscle. You know, there's going to be, you have to pull some muscle back as well as the fat to get down to that weight. So it's going to be a super strict diet, be carnivore only. That would just be meat, eggs and dairy.

Yeah.

And yeah, it'd be a little bit of calories restriction, I would imagine, to get down to that weight pretty fast. I mean, 30 kilo in less than 30 weeks, that is a lot kilo a week.

And surely it's against your religion to lose muscle. I was just, it must be. The ego's gonna hurt, isn't it?

I mean, it hurts every day of my life, you know, not being as big as I used to be. So yeah, it's gonna hurt a lot. Getting down to 135 kilo. It was going to be really tough.

Yeah, of course, yeah. Does it not scare you getting in the ring with professional dangerous fighters? Because obviously you're a big guy, but you know, they've been training their whole life fighting.

I mean. Yeah, of course it does. I'd be lying if I wasn't scared going in the ring with Thor, I'd be lying.

I mean, he's big at that time.

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't scared getting in the ring for that 2v1 fight. You know, I wasn't scared getting with the Mario circle. I was. Yeah, because these are all opportunities that you're going to get knocked out.

Yeah.

Broken nose, broken jaw or even worse, unalived. You know, these are very, very serious things.

Yeah.

So yeah, the Marius fight was, I was bricking, I was shitting bricks.

I mean, but you great performance, wasn't it?

You did the business. A lot of things led up to that, that, that really backed me into a corner. I think that that made the Marius fight so interesting. So, so I, we agreed some, some sort of details, like a year out, like right, we're going to fight next April. We're going to do two minute rounds. We're going to be these rules that rules. Right, fine. Right. So I, I off I went training a whole, pretty much 10, 11 months, 2 minute rounds, signed the contract and then I think it was something like four or five weeks before the fight. Marius says, unless we're doing five minute rounds, I'm not fighting. And I was like, you fucking bastard. Yeah, like I've trained all this time. And he must have known what he was going to do. And then he pulled this ace out at the last second. Like he's got five minute rounds. And of course for someone my size like being almost 160 kilo, that's a big ask. Five minute rounds is a huge ask. So we argued and argued and argued and in the end he was like, right, okay, I'm not fighting. And it, and it looked as though I was the one pulling out because I wouldn't agree to his terms. So all the media and all the press was like, Eddie Hall's thinking of backing out this fight because they weren't, they won't come to his demands of the fight, you know, the two minute rounds.

Yeah.

And I'm like, you, he proper put me in a corner here because like we agreed two minute rounds and then he ups it to five and it made me look, the twat made me look like I was pulling out. So in the end me and my coach just sat down and we're like, you know what him, give him exactly what he wants and just smash him in the first minute. And that was literally our tactic. So give him two hour rounds, it doesn't matter, just go out there and bulldoze him. So I think it was actually his own doing as to why that fight went the way it did. If it would have done two minute rounds, I would have paced myself. Yeah, I would have, you know, Bit more of a fight. But the fact he put so much pressure on me and taking my advantage away, it was just, it put me, it made me go the opposite. It's like, right, one minute, you've got one minute to finish it. Give it your all.

Yeah. So it was in like 30 seconds.

Or something, 28 seconds. Yeah. So his own tactic worked against him, in my opinion. He himself over by.

Yeah.

Asking for the five minute round.

Yeah. And I saw that, that the two person fight you had, I mean, you were throwing them around like they were kittens. Yeah, yeah, you were.

I mean, it was.

How was that?

It's good fun. Yeah, it was good fun. I mean, that was just something that just came about very weirdly. There was a couple of Polish kids on, on Tick Tock.

Fair play to those nutters.

Fair play to him. Yeah. They were giving me so much online and I just sent him a message like, luke, guys, keep, keep my name out your mouth or I'll sort you out. And the next minute I've got a contract under my nose to fight these two guys in Blackburn, in England. And I was like, looked at the amount, I was like, okay, this is an easy match. It wasn't that much, but enough for me to be like, yeah, you know, Friday payday, a Friday night out. It'll do for in the uk.

It must be a lot of money then.

So, yeah, that was good fun. I mean, they both weighed 165 pounds, which is like 65 kilo, something like that. And they were like what, 5, 10, 5, 9, something like that. But yeah, it was, it was good fun. It was good fun.

Yeah.

But again, risky.

Yeah.

Like people think, oh, you, it was such an easy fight. You get in the ring with two guys and tell me how easy.

No, you, you made it look easy.

I made it look easy. But yeah, dangerous territory because there's only one's got a grip around the neck and then you're done like the other one's smacking you in the face. Yeah, it was a risky, risky fight to take. Yeah.

Is there anyone you wouldn't fight? You know, because they're just too good or.

I, I think, I mean, look, money talks. I think everyone's got a price on absolutely anything in life. Yeah. So I would fight. There's no one on this planet that I wouldn't fight for the right amount of money, if that makes sense. That does make sense. But you know, if we're talking, do I want to fight Francis and Ganu?

Well, isn't there some quote you said about that fight.

There is. Yeah, but this is the thing. So in the circumstances, I just fought Marius and then obviously my contract was to fight again with KSW and they were like right, your next, we're going to get your next fight as Francis and Ganu and I'm like, there's like, I would rather get in the ass by the devil than fright Francis and Ganu for a few hundred grand. Like that. Like that's it was just, it was just. No, no, no, no. As I say that like the, the risk reward was so off.

Yeah.

It was like you want to fight Francis and Ganu, it's got to be the multi millions.

What would you fight him for?

Oh, it out.

You do it for 10 million, probably do it for five, right?

Yeah. And that's like. And I would still train my dick off.

Yeah.

And try and beat him for five. Like I, I wouldn't go in two, take a beating. No, like I would take five million and I would literally try and decimate him.

Same, same strategy.

Same strategy. Just go in and just bulldoze. What else could you do with someone like, someone like Francis? There's no point standing there and exchanging with someone like Francis is so experienced, got so much IQ that it would just outlast you in a few minutes. He'd wear you down. Yeah. So someone like him. Yeah. It would just have to be a, have to be a bulldoze job and just hope you get the job done.

Yeah. And would you fight Jake Paul?

Yeah, of course. Jesus.

A good payday, wouldn't it?

Good payday, yeah, yeah.

Would you fight my boxing?

Yeah, yeah, I'd fight him. A boxing. Yeah, I think, I think that'd be a tough, tough little battle actually.

Yeah.

People playing down and people like love to hate on Jake Paul, but I actually quite like the kid and some of the, some of the fights have he's taken, people say he only fights old man and whatever else. I mean the mic minus the Mike Tyson fight, but all the others like legitimately good fighters, good scrappers and he went in and held his own. Even, even Tommy Fury, you know, Tommy Fury is a decent level boxer and he lost to Tommy but not by much. Yeah. Do you know what I mean? It wasn't like a, it wasn't like a beat down. No, you know, it was, it was a good scrap. So bit fair preps to Jake Paul. I think if, you know, he's probably, and no doubt improved a lot since then as well. Yeah.

And he disrupted the whole industry. Didn't he, he did the whole thing.

He did. And what people don't quite realize is he's making more money than any of the pro boxes probably put together.

That is mad. Do you think that's warranted?

I think he deserves it because of how much, like, balls he's putting on the line. You know, for a man that's literally laid his bollocks out for the whole world to see and win, draw, lose, he's gone in there.

Yeah.

And I think you should get paid for that. And he's, he's created that, that environment for himself. He set those fights up. He's. He's set up those platforms. He's got it on Netflix. He's done that. These other pro boxes haven't got fights got on Netflix and everything else. So, yeah, you've got to give him his props. He more than, well, deserv. Sam.