B-Team 柔術：克雷格·瓊斯、尼基·羅德與尼基·瑞安

Lex Fridman Podcast #363 – B-Team Jiu Jitsu: Craig Jones, Nicky Rod, and Nicky Ryan Machine transcription by Qwen3-ASR 0.6B (MLX, local, Apache-2.0). May contain recognition errors. The following is a conversation with Craig Jones, Nikki Rod, and Nikki Ryan, who together with Ethan Krellenston and others make up the B Team, a legendary jiu-jitsu team here in Austin, Texas. It was formed after the so-called Donahard Death Squad, the team headed by John Donahard split up into new wave jiu-jitsu and B Team jiu-jitsu, both located here in Austin, Texas. There has been a lot of trash talk back and forth, including accusations of greasing and steroid use. And I, as a practitioner and fan of grappling jiu-jitsu and martial arts in general, am here for it. To see the best grapplers in history go at it both on the mat and on Instagram. I like the people on both teams and train with both, and am really happy to see the exciting rapid evolution of the sport that these athletes and coaches are catalyzing. And now a quick second mention of each sponsor. Check them out in the description. It's the best way to support this podcast. We got BetterHelp for mental health, 8 Sleep for naps, and Athletic Greens for daily multivitamins. Choose wisely, my friends. And if you want to work with our amazing team, we're always hiring. Go to lexfreeman dot com slash hiring. And now on to the full ad reads. As always, no ads in the middle. I try to make this interesting, but if you most skip them, please still check out our sponsors. I enjoy their stuff, maybe you will too. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp spelled H E L P Help. There is that quote from Jack Kerouac. The book on the road that I recently finished reading, re reading, re reading for like I don't know the tenth at least time in my life. 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A lot of things in my life making me happy. This is one of the consistent ones. They'll give you one month supply of fish oil, one of the only supplements I take when you sign up at athleticgreens dot com slash lex. This is the Lex Friedman podcast to support it. Please check out our sponsors in the description. And now, dear friends, here is Craig Jones, Nikki Rod, and Nikki Ryan. Craig, can you introduce everyone? Yep, so we got Nikki Rod here, brown belt, two time ADCC silver medalist. Nikki Ryan here. That's it. Who are you? And I am Craig Jones, also two time ADCC silver medalist. Silver medalist, so the number one loser. Number one loser. And maybe a little bit more. Your bio says widely known as the black belt slayer Hales from New Jersey, the land of pizza and biceps. Yes, that's pretty accurate. Okay, you also do carry gun on you a lot. Yeah, I keep I keep it keep it loaded, you know, keep it on me. Uh huh, you have one today in the car. That was a mistake. That was your first mistake. Yeah, I think you are too close. Very uncomfortable. And you are Nikki Ryan. What else is there? What else do we know? Gordon Ryan's brother. Gordon Ryan's brother. Without one. All right, so and you are all together a part of the leadership of the the B Team here in Austin. Let's just get out some introductory questions. What in general accomplishment of the things you mentioned you most proud of? I mean, I am proud just to not have to work a full time job just to get by on the bullshit I've done so far. Yeah, honestly, just making money of a thing you love. Exactly, yeah. When was the first time you made money on a thing you love? Probably a jiu-jitsu tournament. I think maybe in Abu Dhabi where I won a thousand dollars. Thought I was rich. Yeah, yeah. Would you spend the thousand dollars on? Probably something bad. Probably drugs or something at the time. I'd be blew it at the after party. That's a good introduction to Craig. So what about you? When's the first time you made money with on jiu-jitsu or what? What's actually stepping back? Like what's the thing you are most proud of? Is it a similar kind of thing? I think I think I am most proud of is I mean for sure two ADCC silver medals which hurts because you are so close to getting that gold but you know it takes time. I am understanding that you know sport of jiu-jitsu takes quite a while to be at the tip top to be the absolute best. So and I am just being consistent in my training and my craft and I'll get that number one spot one day. What failure or loss is the most painful to you? I don't know. I could probably have a pretty short term memory. So my losses, I just like I'll just forget about them. Yeah, I mean for sure, my loss at at this past ADCC in the finals. You know that one sunk a bit because I definitely thought I I was going to win. I mean like it takes a while to produce the skills or the reactions more so that you need to to have to be you know to be that number one pound for pound guy. And you know pre ADCC I was coming off a injury so it took me a little bit to find the right mentality and physicality that I needed in order to you know get the wins that required gold so yeah it's just process. Interesting, you keep saying process like it takes a while to build up. You are not like thinking of a loss like ADCC is like a specific failures. You are not you haven't gone long enough in a particular process to being a champ. Well, I mean for me, I am coming I am closing in on five years of specifically jiu-jitsu training. I am about about four and a half right now, and yeah, it's just the you kind you constantly have these ups and downs in training where like as long as you stay consistent you'll have a gradual raise but you know it's still you'll have these peaks and lows and you know just just trying to get better every day. I am definitely not where I will be in in a few in a few years from now but striving to get there. Are you actually a brown belt? Was that a joke? Brown belt. Yeah, you are a brown belt. Like how many stripes? No stripes. No stripes. Stripeless. Okay, is that part of the process that you are working through? Definitely part of the process. I mean, I think a black belt is just based upon how much knowledge you have. Obviously, like you know if you are talking competitive wise like from when I started I was able to beat most black belts that's just kind of how I was gifted from my my wrestling experience and you know the time will come when it's right but I am not in a rush at all. I am continuing I just kind of take every day for what it is and and try to improve upon that. I mean I want to give him the black belt. Nikki Ryan says he's not ready. What is? Are you guys like us? No geek folks, do you take that seriously like the black belt or like how much does it come into play into? Yeah, I mean it's like Nikki Rod said you know it's based off of knowledge, not just you know what you do out on the competition mats because you know like he said he had years of wrestling experience and obviously he's very physically gifted so we grade based off of the amount of knowledge that you have. Like how do you measure knowledge? I think teaching is a good measurement of it, like how well you are able to show the moves and you know really make sure that you have an understanding of what you are doing. Yeah, it's an interesting rank. It's like it's something that takes many years to accomplish and for a lot of people it's truly meaningful. It's like it represents a particular step in a journey. But for you guys it's almost like different because you've been so focused on competition that I guess if you take it seriously it is a big step for you too like as martial artist that that's bigger than just being like top of the world competitors right. So I thought it was a joke. You guys are actually taking it seriously. Like that he's a brown belt. He's a brown belt and he's and you are taking seriously the the rank of black belt and like it's part of it's part of your journey. Think by time I get a black belt, I'll I'll be number one pound for pound. I think it'd be pretty nice to accomplish that as a brown belt and then maybe toss a black belt on top. Maybe get promoted on on the podium. What do you guys do? You love winning or hate losing more. I definitely don't hate losing. If it pays the bills, I don't mind. Oh really? Yeah, but honestly, if I win, I feel more relief than anything rather than like excitement and stuff. I am like oh fuck, thank God that's over. You know I I hate losing for sure, but I understand that it's necessary to get you know to get to where you want to be. And then winning is like I mean what I think winning is probably the closest you can think you can get to like heroin or something because I mean we're on a like if you do have extreme success in a tournament that you've been you know adamant about training for and competing in for a while and you end up winning it on me I feel like you are on that high for days at a time afterwards heroin's going to be better you think so I am a mistake with no but I am not going to suck dick to win you suck that for heroin okay I guess that's a good boy yeah. But you know, like because you you come from a little bit of a wrestling culture. One of the things I really love is at the end of the match when they lose, they just there is no they just run off. They're like almost pissed off. It's like some mixture of anger and frustration at themselves. I think I think sometimes the people like freak out on the mat and I think that's just to show everybody like they're acting like they care it a lot and really maybe they didn't work enough to to you know get to where they want to where they expected to be and they lost and then they had this big boost of emotion like after their after their loss but yeah I mean I think you just cry in the mirror not to everybody else you know. Um, what have you ever cried watching a movie? I don't think I've ever cried. Period. Okay, have you cried watching a movie? Not yet, not yet. The notebook. I try to avoid those movies. Actually, I lie. Actually, Titanic. The last part of a difficult weight cut for me is I try to find a sad movie and at least cry about a pound out that really gets me over the line low energy cutting the tears. Um, there is other following liquids I could talk to you about, but let's just let's just continue on low energy. What, um, what about you, Nikki? Love of winning versus hate of losing. I am a very competitive person, so I for sure hate losing more than I like winning. I I do think it's something that's kind of held me back over the the past few years because it it makes it so that I am not as active as I should be because it's like I really hate that feeling of you know after a match that you just lost so it kind of prevents me from competing so it's definitely something I need to work past. So like when you think about a competition, the possibility of losing which is always there in competition is a thing that like weighs heavy on you in in the months and weeks leading up to. Yeah, my whole life you know my financial stability everything depends on you know my ability to go out there and compete and my ability to teach so you know it's it's a huge hit to the brand if you lose so you know leading up to matches that's that's definitely something that's in my mind. I know so you guys are like world class athletes but for me more like a hobbyist competitor I compete a lot. The thing I was because I really wanted to win. The thing I was probably most afraid of is not just losing but like embarrassing myself. Yeah, even even actually winning by stalling. That was the thing I hated the most about myself. In terms of crying in the mirror, is like being too afraid to take risks after I am up on two points or something. I think you got in competition sometimes it's good to take the emotion out of it. It's too easy sometimes to like think about all my girls and in the crowd my family's watching like I want to win because they're there, but the highest level if you are emotional at all no that's affecting you. Yeah, that's tough though. That's tough, especially like leading up to when you are on the map maybe but leading up to it. I think it's okay to be emotional prior like you know if we know ADCC or it's coming up and we have a big match like definitely I'll go out in in practice and I'll I'll visualize I'll put myself in that competition that way when it's game time it's like I've been there a thousand times already. So not the actual competition but even leading up to it like stepping on the mat like all the walk walk towards it all that all that stuff like I'll do the same exact warm up for weeks on end and until my competition day comes that way that way you know when I compete I am just like oh it's it's another Tuesday at practice. What about you, Craig? Like how do you prepare mentally for tournament like ADCC? I push it completely out of my mind. Don't even think about it. Try to avoid any visualization, any rituals, warm ups, anything like that. Block it out until the last second. Yeah, try not to think about it. I just go to training to have fun, learn a bit. So I try to approach competition the exact same way. I don't warm up at training. Do very little warm up for competition. Uh huh, and you just step on the mat, step on the mats. My philosophy is there is no warm ups on the street. We're so vastly different. All right, so like legit don't warm up. No, I probably should now. I am thirty one, but I'll just like in the gym, take it easy the first round. You know, like if I look around the room and Nikki Ryan's there, I go, "All right, we'll have an easier first round today." So even for like the most high stakes matches, you try to push it out. Yeah, I didn't think about it. What about like all the social like Instagram posts you have to do about that match? You just make a joke out of it and kind of. Yeah, I mean it's all kind of pretty silly, you know. We're just wrestling each other, you know. Yeah, we put the meaning into it, but to someone that doesn't follow the sport, it looks stupid. Well, all of human existence is pretty silly. Like what are we doing? None of us really know what's going on. We kind of have sex to reproduce. We get hungry, we eat, and then we're all chasing money and cars and whatever the hell in a capitalist society or we worship a dictator in a authoritarian regime. Yeah, and then we get off on we let power abuse us and then we just murder others because we get off on it. Yeah, and then eventually all of us will die because the sun will run out of energy. Because colonizing other planets is very difficult, so nothing matters. It's a good good philosophy. It's pretty pretty good. That's exactly how does the sun run out of energy. You call me there. It's burnt out. It's like a it's a nuclear fusion engine that eventually burns out. Like when you get tired of training. Yeah, it's never happened. I try to get tired. I was like, dude, it's not working. All right, cool. So you legit don't care about losing. It doesn't weigh heavy on you. I try not to list like if I win, I try to block out all the compliments, all the niceties and stuff. So I try to do the same with losing. It's happened, move on to the next one. You know, don't dwell on it too much and sometimes make a joke out of it. Yeah, exactly winning or losing with the right joke we can make money off of the event that just transpired. That's what's most important. Excellent, thank you. I have a bunch of your merch. Oh nice. This one's the Jordan Burrell's rip off. All I see is silver. The way pronounce Burrell's is is very is very very sexy. Okay, I throw lions at people and I try to gauge your reaction. Like sometimes I'll say something, Nikki, and I'll be like, "All right, that's probably crossing the line." You know, mean we'll tone it down to the public. So yeah, yeah, so it's not just right. You have to think is it's crossing the line. Yeah, yeah, I get as close to it as possible. Yeah, I feel like you can't really cross it. Just just a little bit. Just a little bit. Yeah, okay. Speaking of which, you said that I am Switzerland in World War Two since I am friends with both you and Gordon and John. Very rich country. Are you a Hitler or Stalin by the way? In this analogy, would you like to be Hitler or Stalin? And should you make a T-shirt out of it or. I mean, an off-see t-shirt. I don't know how well that sells. I think it would, you know, I think. Let's brainstorm on this one offline. I think since Hitler lost, so he got second place in World War Two. That's true. That's true. That makes you Hitler, anyway. In to the degree that you can, can you tell the story of how the time you've had with the Donaher death squad and why you split up. I competed against Gordon for ADCC and EBI in 2017, and I remember I competed against him at ADCC and then we had the EBI event and then I had a Kasai. I competed. I used to compete all the time every week. I wouldn't even do the preparation or anything. I just be like trying to do seminars, make money, and then jump in and compete. I remember I shot up to Kasai after I faced him twice, and there were like four locker rooms and they put me with all the DDS guys. It was just me and all of DDS and I think we competed the week weekend before. So I thought it was going to be super awkward, but it was actually it was actually pretty chill and the Kasai was in New York and they suggested to come train that week. So I came trained, hung out with them a bit. Ultimately, the goal was to move to America and join a bigger team just because. That flight to Australia is death. Australia is so far away from everywhere. It's kind of like not realistic to base yourself in Australia when all the tournaments are in America. And then I went and trained with the guys and they just had a massive, massively deep talent pool in that room. Like show up to like a meant to be seven a.m. Actual eight a.m. Class on Brazilian time. It would be like a hundred people in there, maybe I don't know how many black belts, but a ton of elite guys. And I was coming from Australia. Training with Locklin Giles, but really that room was pretty shallow and like most people had serious jobs and stuff. So it was like basically me just training with Locklin, maybe a couple of other guys, and then to go to New York and have access to a a wide array of training partners and guys that are training twice each day. I feel like that's what you really need. You need people that can train as much as you are. You get humbled. Humbled in that room at first. For sure, because my style at the time was basically a rip off version of what they were doing. Leg locks came in. I remember just watching Eddie Cummings nonstop and just seeing this guy rip people's legs off and I was like, you know what, that's probably a good move. You know that looks like an easier path to victory than trying to beat these guys at what they what they're good at already. You know. My philosophy at the time was if it's bothering old Brazilians, it's bothering them for a reason. It's probably effective, and that's the path I took to sort of try to rip off their moves and then obviously to go into that room try to do them to them. It's going to be a bit more difficult. All right, so that's how it started. How did you end up here? How do we end up here? We're in Austin, Texas. I mean, I like to think of Puerto Rico as Apocalypse Now. John Donaher as Colonel Kurtz. Things got very weird in the jungle, and the teams went in two different directions. But honestly, I mean it's still really my story to tell. I had some issues with some of those people at the time of the split. I got along very well with John. I feel like me and him connected very well. I don't know why that was maybe it was just because the he missed home he missed a familiar accent Australian New Zealand accent. But I mean I basically followed Nicky left with Nicky sort of that core group of guys left with Nicky and I mean I just back there was personal problems I just back Nicky basically. Got it, just sticking on you for a bit. Is there part of you that you know finds it heartbreaking that DDS split up? This part of you miss working with John and everybody. Like, can you steal me on the case for that? I mean, I miss certain aspects of it, but I also do prefer the freedom of being apart from it. It's obviously a very strict regime under John Donaher. You know, obviously it's part of it. I miss the part the the public doesn't see of John. The behind the scenes banter. I feel like he's very conscious of the imagery portrayed to the world, but basically it closed doors. He's always making jokes, always finding I guess more in line with the Australian Kiwi sort of culture. But you don't really see that in the public class. So that perspective, I do miss that relationship with John. In terms of setting aside personal differences, Gordon was a good training partner, definitely a good training partner to train with. But obviously the negative things we can't really talk about outweighed all of those things. And we obviously had to make a decision. To leave, but was that happening in the jungle? The things happen in the jungle. Shall never be spoken of. But I personally can not speak of. Yeah, but obviously I do miss certain aspects. Like I mean, nothing's all bad, nothing's all good, you know. Yeah, this goes back to your like everything we're doing is silly. Yeah, exactly. That's why I don't get people take it so serious martial arts so serious. It's just it's just pretty stupid really, especially in the G. It looks just it looks bad and then I mean it's pretty silly with with and without the G. Just a bunch of apes. What's silly about no G and what's silly about the G and just mixed and match bottoms that you know what I mean. Wait, which one? Sambo. I see what you are doing, brother. You come to my house and defend my people. All right, this is we're going to go to every dark place apparently. Nick, how did you get with DDS? Like, what was that journey like? Is there try to see if there is things that you remember fondly that you've gotten from the experience. All right, so the way I started training with DDS. Initially, I was training for like well, initially I was I was a bouncer right. I would I dropped out of college to pursue this fitness modeling career. I ended up signing with a Williamina Models up in New York and I was like trying to get in better shape. And while I was bouncing, kind of the talk of like you know who tougher came up between the wrestlers and a few of the bouncers that trained jiu jitsu. And you know they convinced me go to a practice and and I went to my first practice over there. And for the most part, I just controlled everybody, got on top of them, was able to avoid like kind of like you know shitty submissions because I had I had an awareness of the sport and you know I'm a fan of fighting and whatnot. So you know I kind of understood it pretty well. And then soon after that, I joined a school and my second week of jiu jitsu, I started competing, had pretty good success. You know I was like subbing a few black belts and beating everybody like you know pretty decisively with points and stuff. And about three months into training locally, I got connected with Gordon, Gordon Ryan and John Donaher up in New York and I started. I committed to you know make the drive up there as many days as I could at the at the time I lived in South Jersey and it was about two and a half hour three hour drive without traffic to New York to where in South Jersey. Gloucester County, Clayton New Jersey specifically, but Gloucester County. Yeah, so it was about it was about about 130 miles and without traffic, you know about and two two and a half hours or so, but on the way back, man, it'd be three plus sometimes, you know, catching that rush hour. Wait, year was this? Do you remember? This was in 2018. I forget how young you are. I was there before before all that. All right, cool. Anyway, you are doing the long drive and then and then and then what? Yeah, doing the long drive and then you know once I won ADCC trials, I was able to make a couple bucks and then you know I got my silver medal at ADCC and I was able to afford to live up there in New York in in New Jersey area. So I lived up there, trained there full time every day and you know just kind of stuck with the team throughout throughout the turbulent times and found ourselves in Austin. In the jungle. In the jungle, the things we shall not speak of. What what are there things that you remember that you learned from John Donaher from your time you spent with him? Yeah, I mean I definitely learned a ton from from John and the team as a whole. Like you know, it's you have to be the guy that asks questions in in the type of environment right because there is not it's not you are not going to get singled out to be that specific like star or the best guy in the room when you have all these other you know stud athletes. So I really had to seek out and and figure out the kind of questions that I needed to ask. And once I became a bit more verbal with my training and you know I'm showing I'm expressing all my curiosities about grappling to these guys. Definitely help boost my boost my technique and my career as a whole. Yeah, did you understand what kind of stuff like technically you want to get good at? What fits your body? What like what would be good for you? What are your weaknesses and all that. So initially, and when I started grappling, I had an innate ability to just get to opponents back. So I was like, all right, I'm good at getting to the back. Let me get let me perfect controlling the back and then submitting opponent via rear naked choke. And then besides that, I really focus on leg lock defense and then eventually came the variety lock pass where you know I'm I'm really good at body lock passing my opponents now and and yeah just takes a quite a long time because you have to find different sequences and then there is always these an abundance of opportunities that your opponent gets from these specific sequences so takes a while. Is there part of you that finds the fact that DDS split up heartbreaking? I definitely you know having one person to go to that runs practice every day that's you know consistent. It was definitely it was definitely definitely a gift. But now I am also gifted with many many other partners. I have Nicky Ryan, you know Craig Jones. Ethan Craig Jones. Yeah, yeah, we have Ethan, Craig, seeing Damian Anderson. So a full team of knowledgeable athletes that I can continue to go to with multiple questions. But yeah, definitely definitely it took me some time to adjust to to training or to learning from you know specifically my team and not just one person. We should mention for people just listening because you can't visually see that Nicky Ryan is currently terrified and Craig Jones is currently enjoying the fact that. Anyway, can you talk about your Nicky? Can you talk about your time with DDS? I started training when I was like around 13. You know my brother Gordon had started prior to me and I really just went into training just as like a means to exercise and lose weight at the beginning because I was pretty fat as a kid. So I went to the first class, loved it, and then just started training every day at a Gary Gym Brunswick. And then during the summer, when I get off from school, they would take me up to New York to to train under John. And you know I just absolutely loved it. I knew what I wanted to do with my life at a young age. So I ended up dropping out of school actually after my my freshman year in high school. So yeah, 15 I ended up dropping out and just pursuing jiu jitsu full time. You know training every day up in the the blue basement. Like what aspect of jiu jitsu was made you know that this is the thing for you. It's just something I just enjoyed being you know like on the mats every day. I love that there is you know a problem solving aspect to it. So it's you know it's mentally challenging, it's physically challenging, helps me get in shape. So I just yeah right off the bat I knew I loved it. Okay, so then we go to the jungle. What happened in the jungle? And in general, like I like this, I like this this is like this like shroud of mystery that shall never be penetrated. That shall never be like we've got a book deal. It's coming one book deal. Obviously left high school, he's not riding it. Okay, I'll do the Russian translation. Okay, so what are what are things that you enjoy that you remember from working with John Donaher? Yeah, I mean you know obviously he's considered one of the best coaches in the world. You know very charismatic guy when you see him in person. You know I pretty much was you know kind of raised in the DDS. You know that's where I spent the the majority of my time every day. So I obviously had very deep connections you know with John, my brother Gary, you know even Eddie Cummings and stuff back then. So obviously I miss interacting with those guys every day and you know it's like they said it's it's good to have somebody to kind of crack the whip at you every day. And John John was very good at that. When you are like younger in your teenage years, you can kind of like have to get humbled, right? There is like a process to that. Yeah, for sure, and that's a pretty good room to get humbled in, I guess. Yeah, exactly. I mean, I was I started training with them just when like everybody started to break out. Gary was like the biggest name at the time just because he had one ADCC trials already and he had a crazy match with Cron at Cron Gracie at ADCC. But Eddie was just starting to break out. Gordon just started winning EBI. So I I started training under John. You know right when when everything was exploding. What are the good things about life about jiu jitsu you learn from your brother? Both me and my brother never really wanted to you know work a full time job doing something that we hate. And he was always you know a very confident person. So he just went you know full fully started pursuing jiu jitsu. So I'm very happy that you know he did that and I ended up following in his footsteps because you can ask these guys I'm a lazy sack of shit out of out outside of the the mat. So that's that's definitely one thing that I'm very grateful for. That he paved the way like you can you can make money doing stuff you love. Yeah, exactly, and he was he was a big reason you know why my parents eventually let me drop out of school because you know when when they were coming out there was there was no money in the sport it was very hard to make a full living. Like if you wanted to actually make a living, you'd eventually have to transfer to MMA. And I feel like Gordon and Gary and those guys were you know some of the first people to make a very good living off of just jiu jitsu. This part of you find it heartbreaking that you split up from DDS, but also from your brother in terms of spending time in the mat every day. Yeah, for sure. You know, I mean, growing up, you know, obviously he's he's my big brother. I looked up to him a lot. So I definitely like I said, I miss interacting with those guys. I was pretty much raised you know in that blue basement. You know that John was like you know a father figure to me. So I definitely you know miss miss seeing those guys every day. Do you have animosity towards Gordon and does he have animosity towards you and what is the source of that and do you think you'll ever be able to forgive each other? Definitely initially during the the initial split, we we definitely hated each other at the beginning. But it's definitely started to to calm down. Actually, just prior to you know all this social media drama that's going on currently. He had reached out to me and that was literally like the first time that we have actually talked since since the split happened. So we didn't talk to each other for was it now like almost two years. And that was the first time that you know we we interacted again. And overall, you know he wasn't you know aggressive towards me. I wasn't aggressive towards him. You were cracking some jokes. So hopefully the the animosity is going down. There's this Godfather quote that wrote down. I recently rewatched it from from the Don from Don Corleone Vito Corleone. The strength of a family like the strength of an army lies in its loyalty to each other. Is there some aspect of family that you miss of the blood that kind of connects you? That you can count on. Yeah, my parents, you know they they both raised us. That you know like family is everything. You never you know betray your family or anything like that. So I definitely you know miss him from time to time. Okay, imagine you are like 40 years from now sitting on a porch with a shotgun drinking whiskey, looking over like all the land you've conquered. Looking back to this moment, is the reason you split up a bullshit reason or is it a good reason from the perspective of the king who has now conquered the lands have proven themselves have done everything. I think it was definitely like a justifiable reason for the team splitting. Like