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Eating Wild
Hosted by three hunting and fishing buddies with a lifetime of culinary experience between them, Outdoor Journal Radio's Eating Wild podcast brings folks from all walks of life to the boat, tree stand, and kitchen to tell the stories and answer the questions around the pursuit and preparation of wild fish and game.
Eating Wild
Episode 51: Best Fisherman In MMA
What happens when you combine an undefeated MMA fighter with an unparalleled passion for fishing? You get Cody Chavanchek, a rising star from Niagara Top Team in St. Catharines, Ontario, who is making waves both inside the cage and on the water. Your hosts, Antonio Smash Malecka and Christopher Showtime Johnson, are thrilled to have Cody on the Eating Wild Podcast. With a flawless 6-0 record and a reputation as the best fisherman in MMA, Cody's unique journey juggling two intense passions makes for an unforgettable episode. Expect high-energy discussions about his dual talents and what truly sets him apart in the MMA community.
Discover the roots of Cody's love for fishing, which started along the St. Clair River in Petrolia during his childhood. Imagine spending whole days by the river while your mother works, rain or shine, solidifying a lifelong connection to the sport. Cody's heartfelt stories of summer fishing marathons and the profound impact they had on his life are sure to captivate both MMA aficionados and fishing enthusiasts alike. Tune in to hear Cody's incredible tales and gain insights into how he balances two demanding worlds with unwavering dedication.
Follow Eating Wild on Instagram! To reach out to the boys, drop us a line at eatingwild@odjradio.com
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Speaker 4:How did a small-town sheet metal mechanic come to build one of Canada's most iconic fishing lodges? I'm your host, steve Nitzwicky, and you'll find out about that and a whole lot more on the Outdoor Journal Radio Network's newest podcast, diaries of a Lodge Owner. But this podcast will be more than that. Every week on Diaries of a Lodge Owner, I'm going to introduce you to a ton of great people, share their stories of our trials, tribulations and inspirations, learn and have plenty of laughs along the way. Meanwhile we're sitting there bobbing along trying to figure out how to catch a bass, and we both decided one day we were going to be on television doing a fishing show. My hands get sore a little bit when I'm reeling in all those bass in the summertime, but that's might be for more fishing than it was. Punching you so confidently, you said hey, pat, have you ever eaten a drum? Find Diaries of a Lodge Owner now on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast welcome back.
Speaker 3:Welcome back to another episode of the eating wild podcast. I'm your host, antonio smash malecka. We are part of the outdoordoor Journal Radio podcast team. I'm joined with my co-host today, christopher Showtime Johnson Siege. We got a huge episode, brother. I don't even know where to start with this because we've been pumped up. Especially. We've been talking about this next guest for probably Jesus weeks, weeks and weeks, and I don't know how you feel, brother, but my blood is boiling right now, Buddy, it's right up our alley MMA, hunting, fishing, everything man.
Speaker 2:This guy, it does it all, man. We're pumped to have him on. Sounds like a country song.
Speaker 3:Let's bring this guy in right now, brother. I'm going to tell you right now. This gentleman is fighting out of the Niagara Top Team in St Catharines, ontario, with a record of 6-0. Ladies and gentlemen, he goes by the best fisherman in MMA. That's a huge statement. By the way, it is Best fisherman in MMA Cody Chavanchek. Thank you so much for joining us today, brother.
Speaker 5:Thank you for having me. I'm really honored to be on here.
Speaker 2:I'm excited to do it Been looking forward to it for having me. I'm really honored to be on here. I'm excited to do it. Been looking forward to it for weeks too, and you joined the podcast and pretty much you're in fight. No, you're not in fight week, are you? Next week would be fight week for you.
Speaker 5:Uh, no, um, this Friday will be fight week for me.
Speaker 2:This Friday. Okay, is it so, so awesome? You joined us last minute. We really appreciate it, brother, of course.
Speaker 3:Happy to be on here. So, cody man, we're going to dive right into this brother. You are tagged as the best fisherman in MMA. We've been looking at your stuff on Instagram for a long time. It's unreal and we got to start with the fishing. You're a stick brother. Everyone that goes on Instagram and checks out Cody. Forget the MMA stuff for now. We're talking fishing, hunting and loving every day. When did you start fishing? When did your career start? Because I mean, it's incredible to see what you're doing out there in the fishing world.
Speaker 5:Just as a little kid, I was always fishing Like I grew up. I'm from Petrolia, so I lived in Crumpet for a bit, it's right on san claire river. I, uh, and I was just fishing every day like I was. I'm hooked, I'm obsessed with it, right and uh, my mom actually had a job like working as a psw worker. She was doing like 10 hour shifts. We lived in this little country house and uh, so if I wanted to go into town, if I wanted to get to the river, I had to go with my mom for work. So I'd go with her, with uh, to work and I'd fish the whole 10 hour shift. I'd be at that amazing rain or shine. I would be there for 10 hours, grinding like multiple summers in a row and uh, just hooked, obsessed with it. Man, I love fishing. It's huge. It's almost just as much as fighting, I'd say.
Speaker 3:We can tell Sijan One of the questions, just watching you closely on social media and stuff and on the fishing side of things, what would you say was when you first started, Were you in the river? Were you in the lakes most of the time? What species of fish got? When you first started, Were you in the river? Were you in the lakes most of the time? What species of fish got you hooked the most?
Speaker 5:Walleye, bass. That's what started out. Then I started getting into the muskie because I was catching them coincidentally fishing for bass, maybe I got bit off by one and then I was always chasing them and started fishingky with like flipping sticks and stuff with leaders and and getting little tiger, musky and stuff right. Uh, yeah, the sanctuary river's unreal fishery and I fished it hard for years and uh, but yeah, musky and bass and walleye is what started it out for me that's amazing, man.
Speaker 3:Yeah, we, I mean, I I've noticed that you, uh, you, on some of the videos that you're uh, you're you, you pop some, some, some rainbows in your day too, do you guys troll a lot for rainbow?
Speaker 5:uh, honestly, we don't troll. Like you catch them. Uh, coincidentally, like, or like you catch them when you're going for salmon right out on lake right but I didn't fish, and it's funny because saint claire actually, like the saint claire river, has a decent trout run too, and I never. I tried to get into it back in the day, like when I was a kid, and uh, I started using the pin.
Speaker 5:My first rod that was a 17 foot center pin I bought off some dude at the river, so you amazing you can imagine that trying to figure that out, though for your first rod, 17 foot center pin right, it was a mess and a lot of the spots I was fishing it's just like watching a float sit still, like just fishing, like marinas and stuff. We weren't actually fishing a drift, so I kind of threw it out the window. I'm like all right, that's not for me. I got away from it and I started.
Speaker 5:I went back to bass, musky, walleye and then when I moved out to niagara, that's when I really started fishing trout and realizing like how sick trout fishing actually is, with the center pins and casting spoons right and catch them when they come in the spawn and in the salmon run and everything. So I've been yeah, I go to these places and fish. Like niagara is such a hot spot, they have so many different, um, different species to fish for. But then the saint claire river I grew up there fishing too, and then my girlfriend she's from belleville so I go there fishing too so I got got like three, three hotspots that I'm always like fishing back and forth with.
Speaker 3:That's frigging amazing and it's I love, I love the whole center pin thing because you, you and I both know I grew up. That's how I started out fishing too. It's funny. He says he had a 17 foot center pin reel. I had a 15 foot center pin reel and the hardest thing that I I had to do I grew up in the mississauga area fishing the rivers for salmon and trout, like yourself and the hardest thing about flow fishing, in my opinion, is getting that cast, getting that perfect drift, and you know for people that I think that can get started with that style of fishing siege. Um, you know it's. It's. It's very hard but it's rewarding when you actually hook into your first salmon or your first trout because you got to work. You work hard for that fish if anyone hasn't done centerpin fishing.
Speaker 5:They're smart fish. You got to use light line and watch water clarity. Match the hatch. There's a lot of stuff that comes into it and it's uh. That's what it's all about, though chasing it right, trying to figure out those patterns.
Speaker 2:So, cody, we do a lot. We do research on our guests before we come and generally we know the answer before we ask it, especially when we look at people's socials and we generally we can kind of tell what species they like the most. With you, brother, no clue, you got. You catch everything that swims man, and I get it why they call you the best MMA fisherman out there. What gets Cody excited? Like what fish are you going to be like? Oh, I'm going for these today.
Speaker 5:It's a big statement to say best fisherman out there, but we're just getting started. Like I got some big things coming and I'm truly when I say that, it's because I'm just hardcore about it. Like my friends that know me, they know like we'll do trips and we'll fish hard, I'll fish 12 hours a day and uh, I'm I'm addicted to it. It's not like I'm one of these guys that are going out and uh just fishing on the weekends or, like once, whenever they get a chance at the cottage. You know hardcore about it. But uh, to get back to your question there, my favorite fish to go after is musky casting.
Speaker 5:Casting for musky, yeah, like yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, if it's super cold or if it's, yeah, like maybe a new body of water and you don't know where those fish are. They're really spread out and you're trying to. You're trying to find some fish. But I love casting for musky. There's nothing like it. It's like so, so exhilarating watching them come in and eat. Half the time they're eating it both side.
Speaker 2:You're really pumping those baits and yeah, yeah, nothing beats it. We, we're the same as you, cody. We uh I think frank from ugly pike always chirps us because we don't troll enough. And uh, we just I don't know if it's add, I don't know what it is we're always chucking the big rubber blades. And uh, the only time we really troll is when we're having lunch or something you know, to get the carbs in us while we're on the water. And you know, it's maybe one day tone like when we get to the age when we can't, uh, throw the big rubbers.
Speaker 3:Maybe we'll turn into trollers, but you know what siege is funny because we've been chirped by every major muskie, even, even, even, uh, talking to simon or to um, you know kyle and kyle moxon, like those guys up there, you know they troll and they they cover water and they chirp us all the time. But you know us in a boat together we can't sit still for five minutes, even gags like Sean DeGagne. When we're fishing with gags up on Nipissing he's like I don't understand why you guys aren't trolling more.
Speaker 2:I get it. You cover more water, but everyone's cut from a different cloth, right Like it's just in you or not in you?
Speaker 5:Like sometimes it's gonna be. I'd say probably majority of the time it's more effective, but it ain't. It ain't the way to get them like. To me, musky fishing is when they smoke that bait. Or you get them on the figure eight, you see them, or they absolutely hammer it or slack line you and you get to just throw that hook, set right oh, there's nothing like it, so you're.
Speaker 2:so why, tone, you're from a small town, cody, I'm in London right, I'm in London. I know where you're located. Why is it that always the toughest guys come out of small towns?
Speaker 5:Because we're always strapping man, we're always strapping. What else is there to do? Strapping your way through?
Speaker 2:And I got to ask you that's what I was going to ask you and I got to ask you. That's what I was going to ask you. Like, I've heard some stories, maybe on the river there might've been a couple, like you know some people that got out of line. Maybe I'm just running out there, cody.
Speaker 5:One instance like that down at the river and the guy attacked me, so I like just defended myself. I took it really easy on the guy, though, like he was an older guy.
Speaker 3:Did this guy know who he was? Who's dancing?
Speaker 5:partner was or what? He was losing his mind. I don't know, the guy's crazy, but uh, I just held him down and just said, hey, like relax here. And then soon as I let him up, but he tried hitting me at the rock oh my goodness, and I took him down again held him down like relax relax yeah yeah and you know what I?
Speaker 3:I gotta ask this question, cody, because again I'm a fellow river fisherman. It's where I started out. I haven't been fishing the river since, I would say, probably five or six years ago. Do you feel, or do you even know, if you're connected still to that river community, that it's getting out of hand with dudes, like not only is it wall-to-wall dudes, but the respect level has gone down on?
Speaker 5:the river. It's crazy, yeah, it's. Uh, it definitely. Covid brought out a lot of fishermen too, right. And then people, if they could just get into the sport, they don't understand like the ethics of it and like giving people space and and like not crossing people's line when you're using the center pins and stuff. But like you can just, I guess, warn them nicely or like tell them like hey, there's a casting order here, we're all bottom bouncing along. The guy the farthest left, they'll go first and then I'll watch him and watch for his line. But when I think people pick up on it pretty quick. But yeah, definitely see a lot more fishermen than a couple of years ago.
Speaker 3:Can you imagine, siege, that we're on the river together and Cody's fishing just across from us and his line gets tangled in my line and I lose my mind Like I don't think people understand that you're dancing with the wrong partner here.
Speaker 2:That's what I like about guys like cody. If you saw a guy, if you see code, if you see him right now, no offense. Cody, you look like you know, clean cut, frat boy. Like I mean I don't want to stereotype you, good looking guy, whatever, you just don't. And then if something goes shady, you're down like I mean those are the guys that, like I mean.
Speaker 5:I'll do that, like I mean, listen, I don't want to fight for free anymore, I get it, I get it yeah.
Speaker 5:In my power to not do anything and I'm super laid back when I'm out fishing. Right, I explain this to my buddies like this, because I used to have buddies that would get all lippy at the bars and stuff back in the day because I was there thinking that I'm right and stuff, and it's like listen, bro, I'm, I fight every day in the gym, I'm training. Yeah, he got out all that, I don't need to be doing it here. This is my time, I'm chilling. All right, we can probably tag lines 10 times. Here's your stuff back, buddy.
Speaker 2:I'd be one of those guys that would be. If you're my buddy, I would be the lippy guy That'd be like oh, cody's here.
Speaker 5:I'm just chirping, but most people know my ears and they're like oh, this guy.
Speaker 2:Oh, I get it. The cauliflower ears. Yeah, I guess that's what I heard. I said anyone that has like a little bit of cauliflower ears is respect them. You know, and I heard too that is it your wife or your girlfriend Do you have? Or she fights as well.
Speaker 5:My girlfriend yeah, she fights as well. She just won an amateur title. Not too long ago she went to Saudi Arabia, competed in pancreation world championships and got third, and all the girls she was going against were uh were pros. So that was really cool.
Speaker 2:So so you got cody and you got his. What's your girlfriend's name? Danielle, danielle, danielle. So you, cody and danielle, go out to port d'aluzzi for the night. Let's say they're going downtown something goes off, someone says the wrong word. Oh my god.
Speaker 3:I didn't know and even know a tone like no one would even the two of them could just clear a bar it scares me, siege, because I'll tell you right now, I'm, I'm, I get lippy and and if I, if I, I'm telling you, if I'm on the river and I and I see cody and I and I and I get lippy with him, I mean I'm face first in the river. Let's be honest, yeah, I mean we're not, we're not on skates anymore, we're getting popped. But you know what you got to think of this, siege? Cody just said it. That's what he does for a living. He fights. The last thing he wants to do is start any beef on the water because he knows that within a second he's going to drop the guy. And at the same time you got to show people like listen, man, it's an accident, whatever it is, it's just fishing. We're here to relax, we're here to enjoy it. Fish on, relax. But I thought I find myself, siege.
Speaker 3:The reason why I stayed away from the river, uh, was because of that. Like I had a guy. It's funny, cody said he only had one guy attack him. I had the same thing. It was on the beaver river.
Speaker 3:Um, you know, in in thornbury years ago I was with jay neglia from King's Inc now and we had a guy local guys right on top of Highway 26, right above the sanctuary. Fucking guy wanted to come down and he did. He came down with his buddies and they wanted to throw a fist. All because Jay hooked into a fish and that fish swam under that barbed line across where the sanctuary was and that fish went into the sanctuary. Was that fish went into the sanctuary? This guy's thinking that we were fishing in the sanctuary? Long story short, these guys came down running to fight and it was just like we you know we're not here to fight anybody we, we snapped the fish off, cut the line and away we went. We just handled our business. But guys just got to relax and enjoy because you never know who's on the other side of that river season. If, if you're getting with Cody, well, hey, let's hope he's in a good mood. You know what I mean.
Speaker 5:You don't ever know what kind of fouls are out there too nowadays right. Oh, yeah, people don't even want to fight fair anymore. Right Noticeful at night? No yeah.
Speaker 2:But you know what I heard is the American trips.
Speaker 5:they're way worse. You go up to like the Lake O'Louis, American tribes, like Salmon River and stuff I can always like scratch there every day just because there's so many guys piled in, and then you got probably just like such a discrepancy in like skill, right, like this guy's got a red and white bobber just as a missile, a heat seeker for your float or something right.
Speaker 2:Right, so now that you're in St Cath, saint catherine, so you do a lot of, uh, walleye fishing and stuff like that uh, honestly, the walleye fishing is a lot better.
Speaker 5:Where I'm from, in saint claire, I was kind of there is, there is some good uh, walleye fishing here too, but you gotta wait, like it's just starting to pick up. But I was spoiled living on that st claire for so long with walleye fishing like it was.
Speaker 2:Uh, we but we were up in, uh, the windsor area not too long ago and we went out um just the tip of lake erie and we've never fished there from there before and man that run that goes through there detroit river and like oh, I've never been there myself, but like the saint claire is similar, but like we don't get the size, the quality of size, they get in detroit, like guys get tanks, they're in.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it's all that same style of fishing. So I, uh, I grew up fishing jigs a lot, a lot of plastics, jerk baits in the summer for walleye, oh yeah. But then when I moved to niagara, everybody's doing it differently. They use like a three-way and a super long gear with a worm harness your worm harness, yeah bombing out as far as they can from shore and just slowly reel it back.
Speaker 5:So that was cool to learn something, a new technique like that. And then I wanted to bring it back and try it and concern you there, but I haven't had the chance yet that's awesome, man.
Speaker 3:And and let me ask you something, did you get out on the ice at all in the winter time?
Speaker 5:this was my worst, uh, first ice year. Yeah, we, I didn't get a lot of time. I was training pretty hard though, um, so I didn't. I didn't get a lot of time to go up. I usually go to quinney pretty hard. My girlfriend's parents live right there, so I have a place to stay. I'll meet up with my buddies from Niagara. We'll link up and do like a big trip there. But last year was my best year ever there, like my first. My first time out, I caught 15 and I landed a 31 inincher monster in my TV. And then my next time out, I caught 23 and then 25, and then it was just on fire. And I think the key to why I was having such a good year is just I was moving a lot. I got to flip up high, I'd hit a bunch of fish, and if it slowed down I'd move again. And then boom, I'd hit a bunch of fish again and just keep moving.
Speaker 2:Do you harvest your fish, Cody they?
Speaker 5:just want to stay in one spot all day long. Yeah, I'm camping here. It's like, well, if the fish aren't there in the morning, they're probably not going to be there all day. Do you harvest your fish, cody? Oh yeah, for sure, for sure, I, I don't harvest, uh, every fish, right, like that's the big exception, I think, with my friends from, uh, like mma, they, they're like, oh, they see me with like posing with a big musky or something like oh, how'd that taste? Oh, yeah, like no, bro, I eat like small good eating. Uh, yeah, right, like walleye trout. Um, some small salmon, which obviously crappy, those are like more than I'm, I'm keeping yeah, I, I feel the same thing every time.
Speaker 3:You know, we post pictures with big mosky and stuff, there's always the one guy hey man, did you eat? That? It's like everything that comes out of the water, because people want to eat all the time.
Speaker 5:I don't get it, or even like salmon, or even a big walleye. It's like people don't understand that. Um, like those big fish, they're just older.
Speaker 3:They've they've had more time to accumulate pollution if there, if there were pollution right right and they're just yeah it's, it's a big thing, siege, and we always run into this all the frigging time and the last episode that we just did. One of the topics was the salmon coming out of Lake Ontario. We've had people say that it's some of the best salmon you can eat and there's some people that say the mercury levels are high. But I think Cody said it perfectly. You know, if you catch a hog, you're getting a 30, 40 pound fish. Put that thing back, let it make babies, let it produce, let it make more fish for us to go catch.
Speaker 3:And even when we were with Simon on the Detroit River Siege, we were catching hogs and Simon was like you guys want this. We're like no, put it back, we had enough. We were keeping them in the slot and it's exactly what Cody said. You keep it where you think. First of all, are you going to consume 300 pounds of fish if you're pulling that out of the lake or just keep what you want? It's a decent size and fish. On. There you go, you got yourself a good meal.
Speaker 2:Cody, you know what I'm talking about. With seeing your Lake St Clair kind of guy, nothing boggles my mind. More is when you're out at those shore casting areas and you see certain people put like a 52-inch muskie in a garbage bag and throw it in their trunk and it's like I'm just like what the heck man.
Speaker 5:After that, when I was growing up like fishing for muskie, I've seen guys like keep them. I remember one time this guy I knew he was from Petrolia too. He's fishing in town and I'm like fishing for musky whatever casting rubbers probably and he comes up. He's like I got a big musky. I'm like, oh, no way you get a picture of it. Like, show me a picture. He's. I'm like what do you mean? Just come look at it. And then he grabbed some plastic, a nice tiger muskie.
Speaker 3:Oh Jesus, Out of all the things, a tiger.
Speaker 4:Very rare.
Speaker 2:And the thing is we're in Ontario waters where we're not like we have. Like Cody says, we got perch walleye. There's abundance of eaters out there. You know what I mean. You don't need to be bringing these. What are you going to make? Musky chowder, like? I don't get it, but I I guess what's this? I think there's even a slot size for musky on lsc. You're allowed to keep one over. Was it 51 or something?
Speaker 5:like that. It's big. I don't know if it's 51, but I'm pretty sure it's high 40s.
Speaker 3:It's got high 40s, okay, yeah now, now are we talking lsc siege. Like, are we talking LSC Siege? Are we talking Lighthouse Cove area, cody, or are you on the other side?
Speaker 5:I like fishing there more in the summer. To be honest, right Early season in the summer you can work baits a lot faster. But to be honest, I have been there in the fall. I just haven't had that good of luck. I've caught probably five or six fish from there. I've caught probably five or six fish from there. I've only been going there in the fall though the last three years, but I haven't had killer days like these guys are having. It sucks when you only have one day to go and then you get there and it's just an off day. Nobody's there oh, we know it. And then the next day or the day before they're like, oh, it was on fire.
Speaker 6:Are we seeing 20 fish from the pier and then the next day or the day before they were like, oh, it was on fire.
Speaker 5:Are we seeing 20 fish caught from the pier and then you go there. You got one day to do it and it's just a grind all day, especially if you're spending most of your time casting right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the winds. There, the winds can be brutal.
Speaker 5:But yeah, fishing there in the summer I've had four fish morning there, three fish mornings like casting, burning blades. That's what my pb came on, just burning blades as fast as I could, yeah, just thumped it like a brick wall and oh, but yeah, that's. That's really fun, just working it fast speaking of pbs, what is your pb?
Speaker 3:what's the biggest musky? You've gotten 48, three quarters.
Speaker 5:That's good fish, good fish, break the 50 club. I think I've lost probably some 50s. I lost, uh, a couple giants over the last couple years that I still think about oh yeah, those are the ones you lose sleep about.
Speaker 2:I've had, I've had a couple of those and one time mr don't one time I had a net man. That was a little hung over and I'm not gonna say his name I wasn't hung over. All right, relax. Yeah, yeah, yeah, so that he redeemed it the next year. Cody, he, he, he netted my uh first 50 on lsc. So one year he had a little hiccup where he had a little bit of cobwebs.
Speaker 3:Listen, can you imagine you're with your buddy cody and he's never caught in a 50? I've got I think I had two 50s before Siege got his first and we're using Shadzilla's. We're around the around the lighthouse cove area and I think it was early fall. Was it Siege? Was it early fall?
Speaker 3:no late fall man, we could see our reels were our reels were freezing up and uh, and CJ hooks into a 50, it's get, we know it's a guaranteed 50. And this fish is coming in and when your buddy looks at you and says please don't fuck this up, please, the pressure's on you. And I'm telling you, the one thing I did was I went straight down on that fish and I popped him off. Cody, and you know it, man, you fish musky, like you said, and it's not easy to get a 50. So in my mind I'm thinking I just took 10 or 15 years of this guy's life. You know if he were ever going to see another 50 and thank god, the following year he hooks into a 50 and I was going to jump in after it at this point I wouldn't not let you miss that one siege when I net.
Speaker 2:When he netted the 50 the year after, I don't know who was more excited, because he had redemption he was more happy than I was. But yeah, it's a crazy. It's a crazy area you grew up for fishing, that is like, and now you're kind of by like lake erie, another great fishery. I'm originally from fort erie area so I'm really familiar with the niagara river and all that stuff. So yeah, man, you went from great to great. You know what I mean.
Speaker 5:And then Danielle, she lives in Belleville, right, or, like her parents live in Belleville, so I go up there yeah, I'll stay there Big clinic and fish hard around there and they got little musky spots up there that I've been getting into and yeah, it's pretty cool to be able to, and just to be able to travel around Ontario like me and my buddies will do trips like wherever the bite's hot. You just know, certain times of year some places are just popping right.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. And let me ask you this, cody. So we're going to just talk about muskie for a second. So when you're fishing muskie in the summertime, opposed to the fall I know you mentioned big blades Do you seem like there's a difference in the fall? Would you change your patterns or would you change your baits Depending on, obviously, lake St Claire? I mean, we all know that one day it could be chocolate milk, the next thing. You know, you see a. You know a mud line going across and clear water. We ambushed fish out of those before siege. But would you say that you your technique changes depending on, you know, time of year, season, or you always stick in the blazes at your go-to thing.
Speaker 5:Oh for sure. Oh no, I switch it up a lot with the baits I'm using and I'm one of those guys that's always cycling through baits, right, oh yeah, a fresh bait just gives you that fresh confidence in cycling through baits. But through the summer I'm just working baits a lot faster according to water temp, right, and then, uh, as soon as in the fall that water drops and the fish become a little more lethargic, slowing stuff down. I think that's probably why I like the summer fishing a little more. The fishers they fight a little harder, they're a little more, a little more aggressive and a little more speedy to get after the baits and stuff. So, um, but a lot of the time I'm using the same baits, just working them a lot slower.
Speaker 2:But like, really, speaking of action, right, you guys know. Speaking of baits, you got one hell of a sponsor there. Oh yeah, 13 Fishing and Rappella.
Speaker 5:Rappella. Buddy Rappella is OG sponsor, fishing sponsor, they really yeah, og, og.
Speaker 2:And I've been a Rappella fan, gee, and I've been a Rapala fan for years and I just saw in the last two years that they're always making hard baits Right. And all of a sudden I see this Crush City stuff, buddy, unreal Fire plastics.
Speaker 5:Yes, they got that TP technology, the super stress stuff when it comes to some of the plastics, and they are just hammers Like. I've been using them probably just under a year and catching everything with them. So I'm really happy with the jerk they got out for walleye it's like their fork-tail minnow style bait and then they got some really nice swim baits the mayor, the heavy hitter Just some really quality soft plastics. So how did you get hooked up with them? My manager actually got in contact with them and then I talked to the guy at Rappella Mark and gave him the proposition and told him I'm like I've been using them for years. I'm a big fan of their company and what they're doing.
Speaker 2:That's so cool.
Speaker 5:And that I'd love to represent them on the network and the and the platform that I am, that I have in MMA as well. Right, that's amazing.
Speaker 2:That's really cool. That's really cool, especially when it's something that you've been using for years. You know and you you believe in right. It's just not someone contacting you, throwing you some stuff, and you know. You just put your name on something and I see it's on your. The 13 fishing is on your fight shorts and everything I've never seen. I've never seen a tackle company on fight shorts before. That is so cool, man. Yeah, you got the whole fishing community. You probably realize this, but I could say, at least in canada, you got the whole fishing community behind you. Man, there's a lot of hook sets behind every time you throw a punch. My man there is I appreciate it.
Speaker 5:I want to represent, I got to represent. Yeah, oh yeah, that's awesome for canada in this fight. Right, I'm fighting that and oh yeah, he's coming up, uh, and we're keeping that belt in the north. You know, I love it, man.
Speaker 2:Before we talk about the fighting, should we get in a little bit into the hunting?
Speaker 3:there, tone. Yeah, well, you know what I was going to ask him this question. I hope I don't forget this question. When he knocks somebody out, the whole, you know, the cast and retrieve, like that's the best, that's the whole best part of when Cody knocks somebody out. But we're going to talk about that after, because before we go to the next segment, we got to talk to you about hunting and you, you know, talking off camera before we started the show. You know, you mentioned it's only been a year that you've been hunting. But growing up, you, you, you know it was always in your background.
Speaker 5:Yeah, it was always in the woods, like you can ask anybody. I've always been. I've spent a lot of time in the woods just messing around with like pelagons and squirrels nothing serious, right and uh, I always wanted to get into it and I wish I would have, because I lived on like pretty good um country acreage. But you know, it just fires me up even more to pursue it now. Right, and now I can do it and do it properly with the right equipment and I got, uh, really good guys, um, that are teaching me the way and how to be uh and doing it properly. I think it's really important to be an ethical hunter, fisherman, just outdoorsman in general. So yeah, I'm hooked for life, though it's just the beginning of that too.
Speaker 3:I'm already planning out like trips to go somewhere and there's a lot of opportunity in the fight world with the hunting too yeah, I absolutely love that and I saw on your instagram, if I correct me, if I'm wrong, but you popped a turkey this year pop the turkey.
Speaker 5:First one with the oh boy first one with the bow, so it was pretty sweet oh, with the bow, the bow with a crossbow though yeah, still, you're gonna have.
Speaker 2:Uh, we have one of our other hosts, co-hosts, marty. He wants to get a turkey with a crossbow so bad. And yeah, he's going to listen to this and yeah, so that's awesome, man, you got a tom this year, that's great. We, recently we're like you, cody, we fish for many, many, since we're kids and then, uh, hunting is a new thing for us and, uh, we used to go up to lake nipissing and there'd be times I don't know if you're familiar with the lake but we'd get blown out, we couldn't fish or like, let's get into uh, waterfowl and stuff like that might as well. We're up here for like a week, so, uh, hunting's fairly new to us. But you're right, man, there's something with just being on the outdoors, man, either, if you have a bow, a gun, a fishing rod, it's just, it's it's like I mean, especially you being a fighter, um, I can see it's probably a great way for you to just unplug it's that primal feeling it's.
Speaker 5:It's like fishing, hunting, fighting. People have been doing that for thousands of years and it just feels like it's in your blood. It feels like my ancestors have been doing this stuff and that's why I'm drawn to it Just being outdoors. If I could just live in the woods I probably would be doing that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 5:There's just something about it. I'm super hooked on that. I'm hooked for life, for sure.
Speaker 5:But, yeah, for people that don't know. It's so exhilarating Like hearing those toms gobble back and interacting with them and setting up, like coming up with a plan Okay, how am I going to get this bird or how am I going to get this deer? It's cool, but you got to. It's like the little details, right. Like I've been listening to a lot of podcasts lately and it just it makes so much sense. I'm like, okay, it is the little details, because fishing, even muskie fishing, is relatable because you only get so many times to capitalize on the opportunities, right. But if you make one little mistake on the hunt, you can blow your whole hunt for the day. But if you make one little mistake on the hunt, you can blow your whole hunt for the day. Now, if I'm out fishing bass fishing and I make a mistake on a hook set, I'm going to get another chance, probably in a couple minutes.
Speaker 2:That's so true, I never thought about it that way. Well, that's a good point, man, that's a really good point.
Speaker 3:Yeah, how did you harvest your turkey? Did you harvest it yourself? Did you clean it and cook it up?
Speaker 5:Oh yeah, I haven't cooked it up yet because I'm waiting till after the fight. I want to do the turkey nuggets and I can eat that and fight camp. My last bird last year actually I did like a avocado. It's like a like pan fried kind of steamed, almost white wine in it and stuff. It's a meat eater recipe and that turned out really good A healthy way to eat one.
Speaker 3:Nice, that's awesome. Well, listen, man, we're getting into the fighting. It's there, I feel it. We're going to take a short break, siege. When we come back, we're going to dive into the MMA career. Oh boy, how we started and what's happening next Friday. Brother, got your tickets ready, because we got ours. We're going to be there ringside. We'll talk about that right after this quick break.
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Speaker 6:As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons of our natural world become harder and harder to hear, but they are still available to those who know where to listen. I'm Jerry Ouellette and I was honoured to serve as Ontario's Minister of Natural Resources. However, my journey into the woods didn't come from politics. Rather, it came from my time in the bush and a mushroom. In 2015, I was introduced to the birch-hungry fungus known as chaga, a tree conch with centuries of medicinal use by Indigenous peoples all over the globe.
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Speaker 3:Welcome back to the Eating Wild podcast. I'm your host, antonio Smash-Malek, alongside Chris Showtime-Johnson, and we are joined by uh you know, I gotta give him that handle again the best fisherman in MMA. Uh, cody, thanks for joining us again. We're gonna dive into your career, your MMA career. It's what you do for a living, representing Canada and and before we get into it, everyone listening. Listen. Next Friday, june 14th, siege, when this show airs on Tuesday. This Friday, coming up, we got the main event here, folks For the belt, we got for the belt, siege me and you are going to be ringside, ringside for this event. I am so pumped up, cody, you know, let's start from the beginning. Man, what got you into fighting and when did your career start?
Speaker 5:Well, well, like we were talking about earlier, I grew up in a small town and my uh, my best friend growing up he was a good, really good boxer and uh. So him and his three brothers were really good boxers and I trained with them a lot like well, I say training, but we pretty much just fired each other every chance we got, yeah and uh. So I got into kickboxing and I'm half Thai, so I've always been drawn to Muay Thai. It's in my blood and I always had the interest to fight, and in the small town you get lots of opportunities to do it, it's so true.
Speaker 5:And I started wrestling in high school and they kind of just went hand in hand. It's a little different, though usually guys will uh do like jiu-jitsu matches or kickboxing matches. First I went right into mma when I was 17, so my first fight was uh an mma fight. They lied about my age, saying I was 18, but I was 17, no way wow, and I had a bunch of amateur fights and then amateur MMA became illegal in Ontario, so that's when I started kickboxing, muay Thai, that sort of thing.
Speaker 3:So you hit the gym pretty early then, like you said, right out of high school you were already in the gym training wrestling and once it basically became legal, you just already in the gym training wrestling and you know, once it basically became legal you just took it to another level.
Speaker 5:Yeah, exactly, exactly, just getting those MMA fights right when you can really put it all together. That's why I think I've been able like my style is an MMA style, like I'm comfortable whether it's striking, wrestling, pure grappling, or in the clinch. Because that's always been my goal, it has been mma. I didn't come to a specialist background where I have to transfer over to learn everything right right, I think that's the way it has to be nowadays, right, cody?
Speaker 2:like I mean, you can't come in like here, I am like a armchair expert by any means. I sell cigars for a living, but you can't come into the MMA being a one-trick pony nowadays, right, like I mean, they call it MMA for a reason. Like you have to Like these guys. It's insane man, and you correct me if I'm wrong you're a bantamweight.
Speaker 5:Bantamweight yeah, 135.
Speaker 2:Okay, what do you generally walk around? Like on before, do you walk around that area that way, I like?
Speaker 5:160. Oh shit, 155,. Yeah, I'll get up. So, how's your cut? I weigh in at 135, and then I'll put 20 pounds back on the next day.
Speaker 3:Holy crap, holy crap. We got to talk about that. What's the diet? What's the diet like for kovancek? Like, like, what do you, what do you? I mean, we talk about what you walk around it, but like what's? If you know you have a fight coming up in a few months. Like what's you? Like, what do you start eating? Are you because I'm a chef, like you know? I I've I've cooked for actors and actresses every day. It's what I do, and usually guys that are into big stunts and I cook for Alan on on Reacher oh, it is Monster, you know no way.
Speaker 5:That's a big show. I love that show.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think we've been. Uh, dan and I have been on Reacher for Jesus. We're going on the season four now and we're out him and you know the guy's a monster and he eats probably two or three whole chickens a day. Um, you know he's, he's heavy, heavy on the proteins and he's always you know he's always got to be jacked. His shirt is off is all the time. But is that something that you have to do? Are you high protein, low carb? Are you high carb because of the way you train?
Speaker 5:so I I follow a meal plan that, uh, aaron jeffrey gave me. He's a pro fighter, he's our team captain and Niagara top team. He fights in Bellator. He also went to school for nutrition and he's a nutritionalist. So he made my meal plan years ago and I've just been following it since in camp. It's 50% carbs, 30% protein, 20% fat. I'm pretty sure is what the layout is. Wow, um, hope I'm not turning that out, but yeah a lot of carbs because you're working out twice a day, sometimes three times a day.
Speaker 5:Right, you need that fuel and uh but yeah, it just comes down to like, for the weight cut, just uh, staying disciplined in camp just watching the calories really clean up the diet, um, cutting back calories a little bit. And then there's like little tricks that you can do towards as you get closer to the fight, to really search right and when you say you know the fat, are we talking good fats?
Speaker 3:or you know you're, so you're eating a lot of avocados, a lot of you know, like, if you're eating bacon, bacon's okay, because that's considered a good fat, right. And when you're training Cody, would you say you're roles where you know the physique, the way they got to look, it's got to, you know it's got to match their character. But you know they don't have time to work out, they don't have time to go to the gym like Cody. They just got to eat healthy. And when they have time, you know, keep the heart moving. And when they have time, keep the heart moving. But you must be burning thousands of calories a day training.
Speaker 5:Especially in the summer too. We're going hard all the time right? So we're always working hard, sweating a lot. I imagine we're burning a ton of calories. I don't know, I don't have a track or anything like that, but yeah.
Speaker 2:So, cody, you said you'll probably weigh in at 135, and then you put on 20.
Speaker 5:How are you putting on 20 so fast? So, through fight week you can do like water manipulation. You drink like 10 liters of water a day and it kind of tricks your body into thinking, okay, what, what's going on like? And you actually end up pissing out more water than you drank. And then, okay, you lose some weight doing that and then you cut out carbs and sodium. Once you cut out carbs and sodium you start losing weight real fast and then I can do like last time I did 11 pounds of water and I can do that in like three hours, four hours, holy shit, sitting in a tub sweating it out. I'm sure you've seen the UFC videos of fighters crying or whatever in the tub. You know it's miserable, but the better you are with your diet and stuff, the easier that the tub is going to be. But to me that's just, it's all a mindset thing. Cut weight in the tub.
Speaker 5:I put on David Gogid goggins and I. I get that 105, 108 uh degrees like hot yeah, and you lay in it for 20 minutes. You get out, your team wraps you in a bunch of towels like a burrito and then you I lose four pounds. Um, doing that right there 40 minutes. I do it again. Sometimes it takes four or five tubs to get it done it's funny.
Speaker 2:You put on david goggins to wake up. I put on david goggins to be able to cut my front grass. He gets me motivated he gets me fired up man musky fishing all day in your five hours I'm one of those grass guys you know, those guys on the neighborhood everyone's like makes fun of and all that. I'm that guy I put on goggins. I'm like gonna have the best yard in london, ontario, my friend. No, that's awesome. So you're right now your record undefeated, right six and oh six and oh yeah as a pro, and then your opponent is six and oh as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and it's for the bantam weight champ, bantam weight tone. That's such a great division that is.
Speaker 2:I think it's one of our favorites, right, because they gotta be you look at any of those guys on there the bantam weights all through the years and then it's. It's so fun. It's not funny, cody, but it's just so crazy that the fact that you like fishing and you're an MMA guy and I think there's a theme here like we've had Jim Miller on before and he's not a crazy fisherman but he's a big-time hunter he is. I fished.
Speaker 3:I fished with Jim Miller and I'll tell you right now Jim is a stick. Hey, like he is, he can fish. He knows his way around fishing. It's just where he lives he's in Jersey where are you gonna go fishing?
Speaker 2:so he's a big time hunter.
Speaker 5:I see the big hunter there's a lot of guys, man, that are doing it and it's awesome to see it's, it's uh, it's killer. Like even just this past weekend, nico price, it was on the nico. He's like, oh, I'm going to buy a fishing rod and then bet it.
Speaker 2:And they're like looking for fishing rods to buy to go catch a fish in the hudson yeah, it's so cool and I I there is a theme because you got like dan henderson, he's a big time.
Speaker 2:Uh, bryce mitchell, like I mean chad mendes runs a guy guida, yeah all these guys and I don't know if you're familiar with, uh, bryce mitchell um, every time he'd win it's when they had the reebok deal with ufc and every time he won joe rogan would end, or um do his fight commentary. At the end he'd be like, oh, how's the fight? He's like yeah, good, good, good, he goes. By the way, reebok, I want my camo shorts. Every time he won, he was saying it each time and eventually reebok gave him the camo shorts with the Reebok logo on there. It's just so crazy and I think there's a theme here, tone, I think there's a lot of MMA guys are, you know, outdoorsmen? You don't hear too many MMA guys that are late golf.
Speaker 3:You know what I mean. It makes sense. I'm going to tell you why. And I'm going to tell you two other professional athletes like Cody. They turned to fishing and hunting. Look at the rock. The rock's a huge fisherman. You'll never know that. You'll never know, but this guy is smashing 10 pound bass wherever he's probably got his little pond in his backyard.
Speaker 5:Yeah, he's. You know the rock.
Speaker 2:He's got it stocked, he's got it stocked and then he goes out there, throws three spinner baits and that thing's loaded with nickels and dimes and everything.
Speaker 3:The rod looks like a toothpick in his hand. It was so awkward watching him reeling a fish, yeah but that's awesome, cody, that's awesome.
Speaker 5:And if there was a tournament, if there was a?
Speaker 3:tournament Siege. If there was an MMA tournament, let's go Listen I follow all these UFC guys.
Speaker 2:I know we talked about Cody's nickname the best fisherman in the MMA. You know what? Even he's on our show. I'm not being one of those guys. I've seen these MMA fish. A lot of them are hunters, a lot of them do fish. But, cody, I'm tipping my hat to you, brother, I think you got it. I think you got the best fisherman in the MMA man. The grind you put from such a young age and to a current all species dude we're not just talking large mouth and all that stuff, but man, we got to get an eating wild logo on his shorts.
Speaker 3:Buddy, you got to tell me how we can do that. I don't care what seed, you're paying for it, by the way.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, no problem man.
Speaker 3:I got this. You're putting the logo on his shorts, okay, and uh, I'm just, I'm just so pumped. So you know, let's talk about next friday um six. And oh, you're fighting the guy six, and oh, he's from the states, am I correct?
Speaker 5:he is from the states. But before we get into that, can I just mention something real quick, yeah, yeah. So the whole mess fisherman mma thing. I'm just getting started. I got some big ideas and they're coming into fruition here soon after this fight. I got some big stuff planned. I want to start doing some videos, kind of start a channel and and combine both my my fishing and my fighting stuff right where I can reach out to my fighting audience and just teach basics along fishing you know the stuff that we were talking about earlier, people not knowing about like oh, what fish to keep? Or the big ones, yeah, keep and and just show them like doing some fishing videos. And then, on the other hand, I can do my fighting stuff and show my fishing friends just like little breakdowns on videos and and techniques and and different stuff in that.
Speaker 2:So I have a crystal ball right here and I'm looking at your future, but you're going to have a heck of an MMA career. I'm looking at the ball. Yup, heck of MMA career. At the same time, man, I see you afterwards Correct me if I'm wrong I see you as an awesome fishing guide eventually. Would you ever think about doing something like that at the? I mean, you beat, or let's say, you pop Sugar Sean Amali for the band weight. He's band weight, right. Yeah, you pop him. You come back to Canada with a belt and next thing you know, we got your own guide service. We'll book you every week, eh, tone.
Speaker 3:Every week and we're not cheap. Eh, Cody's not cheap. It's a thousand bucks A week's. A thousand bucks just to go on the same boat as this guy. Alright, and you know what? You're right, Siege. It's crazy because we've talked into, like Jim Miller, who is again a dear friend of the show. He's a friend of mine we talked about because he's been in, he's been fighting for for a long time. Now jim's at the tail end of his career. Hopefully he can. He could get a few more dances in, but, um, he's back, like like he's turning into listen, he's the.
Speaker 3:He's doing exactly what cody said he was gonna do. He's got his youtube channel going. You can watch him. You know he's tightening guns, he's he's planting vegetables. He's the outdoor guy. He's he popping a bear. He's getting grouse, he's cooking. He's doing he's showing people what you can eat from your harvest. And you know it's his passion. Fighting is a passion, I'm sure, but you know it's unmatched when you grew up fishing and that's your true passion. And I wish we could all get paid thousands and thousands of dollars for fishing because we'd all be killing each other right now in the water just for a paycheck. But I think that's true man, I think what you have coming up, Cody is sick. It's a great plan and we're excited to see it.
Speaker 2:Man, I can't wait to see it. We'll do anything to promote your videos or anything that come out, because you probably hear it as well there's a lot of people that are in the mma, are also into the outdoors. So what you're talking about there, that cross um, the cross um gen thing there, whatever, not jan, what am I talking about? But the cross uh thing you're looking to do with the fishing and the mma.
Speaker 5:I think you're on to something, brother well it's, I'm a fighter, but fighting isn't my identity. You know, like my passions and fishing and hunting I feel like that's part of my identity and I want to be able to do videos and show people the techniques and just be able to create content like that too, right.
Speaker 2:No, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:So we're moving up to uh, to friday night and uh, how it all started siege, we got it, we got to take it back. So you, you called me up one day. Actually we might have been playing call of duty together. I know it's embarrassing, but that's what we do in our 40s you know we're in our 40s now. Man, we work hard, we go home, our kids are running around. They don't like us anymore, let's be honest. And you're either cutting the grass, you're cleaning the pool, or you're playing Call of Duty or fishing.
Speaker 5:Or fishing right, or fishing.
Speaker 3:And you said to me, siege, I'll never forget it. You said have you seen this guy, cody? And I remember I'm going to send you. You sent me a clip of Cody knocking the dude out and casting at him and that video I was like, and that was it. I went on to YouTube. I've watched all your fights. I've. You know we talk about it. And, siege, you called me and you said do you want to go to the fight? I said absolutely, we are going to this fight. So you know, we got ringside seats. We're going to be there with our eating wild logo. We're going to be going nuts, we're going to get tuned 100, we might get kicked out of the place, but we're going to be going crazy cheering you on. And how do you feel like, how do you mentally and physically feel going into this fight for the?
Speaker 5:well, first of all, I really appreciate you guys coming out. I mean, I fight for fans. I'm always trying to put exciting fights on, so having my people there is always huge to me and, yeah, I'm stoked that you guys are coming. But yeah, mentally, physically, I feel the best I've ever felt I'm having and I feel like right now my skills are just increasing at such a fast rate. Right now it feels like every day I'm getting better and better and I know I just can't help but believe this is going to be the best performance of my career yet. Ooh, I love it. I'm super stoked to rise to the occasion. It's a huge opportunity and I'm honored to be the main event on such a stacked card.
Speaker 2:It is a stacked card, simon.
Speaker 5:Marcus is on the card. I mean the guy was a glory. Yeah, stacked card there it is. Simon marcus is on the card. I mean the guy was a glory, yeah, uh, I don't know a glory, welterweight, uh, world champion, you know, and I'm, yeah, and it's, it's insane and it's super, uh humbling and then you are the.
Speaker 2:You are the hometown favorite, obviously. You're uh fighting into toronto and your opponent is uh was a gage gill I think his name is gage gill. He's got a six and oh record coming from the states. And is there any other? Um, there's other niagara top team guys on the card as well my teammate zach powell.
Speaker 5:He's fighting oh pow, pow. He's yeah, pow, pow. He's right on the cusp, too, of getting into the big leagues. So I'm excited to uh, to be in the back room with him and we feed off each other's energy. We got the whole team there. We always get a big team in the back. I just really love this shit.
Speaker 2:Oh buddy.
Speaker 5:It just fires me up thinking about it. I'm so excited to go out there and perform to the fullest.
Speaker 2:And this is going to be on the UFC Fight Pass as well, right 100% UFC Fight Pass.
Speaker 5:They're doing something big. They're doing two shows in one night. So they got the Toronto show and then they got a show at the same time in Edmonton.
Speaker 2:Wow, oh man, that's amazing. And what promo is this, cody? What's the name of the promotion? Unified MMA? Wow, so a lot of up-and-comers come out of there and then the goal is to get noticed from the. Is it because I've seen it? Um, like, how are like, how their head whiskey and all that like dana white's brands in the ring. Is this affiliated with the ufc?
Speaker 5:um, yeah, so like uh, unified.
Speaker 5:Mma, sorry, yes yeah, so they are. They're affiliated under the ufc fight, right, okay, and I'm sure they have like little deals they'll do Like, okay, howard has Dana's company, let's get it sponsored the event or whatever else, but yeah, it's a feeder league into it. All these other like promotions, these high-level but like just under the big show promotions, are all feeder leagues into the UFC, right? So, uh, unified is Canada's premier MMA league. They're the best league in Canada and uh, that's why you see guys going, uh going to the show from there.
Speaker 3:That's amazing. And and just just let me let us let the audience know and us know as well, because I don't even know. See, this is my very first MMA event. I've never been able to get tickets to go to the Toronto when UFC is here. But how does it work? So you are the main event. Does that mean there's a? Is there an undercard than the main card? And then you're like you're midnight or is it 10 o'clock, like how does it work for timing?
Speaker 5:I'm not sure when doors open up, but there'll be a prelim and it won't be streamed on ufc fight pass. There'll be some fights underneath and then the main card streamed on ufc fight pass. It'll probably be five or six fights and then, yeah, I'll be the very last fight. It'll probably be, I'm assuming, anywhere from 10 pm till 12 till 12, and that was the question I had for you.
Speaker 3:When you arrive to the arena, obviously you're ready to go. There's so much shit probably going through your head and your body Watching UFC Siege. Sometimes the main events don't start till midnight. How do you physically prepare for being the main event and fighting so late? What time do you get up in the morning for this? How do you prepare in the morning for this? How do you prepare? Well, you sleep in.
Speaker 5:Right, you have a late morning and you take it real easy. Honestly, fight day very chill until I don't want to get myself all amped up in the back and I'm fighting five, yeah, yeah, so I really chill. I'll maybe take a nap in the back until, okay, we're four fights out now. Okay, I'll start loosening up, maybe crack a few pads. You know, warm up a little bit. Okay, we're two fights out. Okay, let's get the heart rate going a little more. One fight away, get a good sweat going and then go out there and get the job done. So it's uh, just having that timeline and you, you start figuring that out more and more with the more experience. This is my second time main eventing in my pro career, so I got to feel that late night fight last time or a couple of fights ago, but I stay up pretty late anyway, so that's never been an issue for me.
Speaker 2:Are you cranking tunes real loud? Are you like listening to music or are you just like kind of zoned? Oh yeah, I listen to music.
Speaker 5:I, I chill out. I watch a lot of highlight videos. Uh, yeah, yeah, just watch, like mma highlight videos and just just thinking in my head like going over the game plan, you know, staying calm, composed, it's. Uh, I feel like the last fight I really figured out where I perform best mentally like it's a, it's a, it's a balance. Right, you, you want to have that aggression, but you want it to be effective aggression, but you also want to be a technician and you got to have a perfect balance of that. You don't want to be too calm. You don't want to be calm and I'm so technical, but you're too calm, you want to have that aggression.
Speaker 2:I find I operate best when I have that perfect balance of both. So that's really cool, man, that's really cool. So what's your walkout song?
Speaker 5:uh, it's probably. Are you allowed to say no? No, I can't. I, I haven't made a decision yet. Usually fight week, I just blast a bunch of songs and I, yeah, figure it out. Um, fight week, but I'm probably gonna do.
Speaker 3:Here comes the hot stepper I said, I was just gonna say I watched it on youtube. Here comes the hot stuff. Oh man, I fucking heard it. Man I was. I was gonna say that right before cody said you gotta go, hot staffer man.
Speaker 2:I heard man, that's a good one.
Speaker 5:I was getting me going.
Speaker 3:I don't know why I know that song, but as soon as I heard it, I'm like whoa, I know this song from something, probably some movie.
Speaker 5:And it seems like everybody else is under the same boat. It's like, oh, we all know this song from something and it's just a a good beat. You know, that's amazing.
Speaker 2:I was wondering how that worked. Eh, tone Like what song would you pick Tone.
Speaker 3:Ah, that's a good question, man. I, I, I gotta be honest, it's it's, it's it's hard because, like Cody said, it's almost like you have to feel it that day, man. Yeah, and I don't know, I'm thinking I got to go DMX, I got to go DMX Rough.
Speaker 2:Riders Rough.
Speaker 3:Riders. I got to do something. Or if I'm doing something, that's more heavy metal. I got to say something like I don't know, I'm going to go Limp Bizkit, break stuff. Oh, you're going 90s, I like it, man. I'm going nuts. I'm going to go nuts. I'm going to go Olympus, get break stuff. What about you? Siege?
Speaker 2:It's a tough one man. There's so many. I mean you got the ACDCs, you got the Metallica. I think a lot of them have been done. But I like that some of them they throw it off. Right, they throw off the songs. That doesn't suit the fighter at all.
Speaker 5:I feel like everyone does Metallica Siege. Come on, I mix it up too, like last time I've walked. I used to walk out to tupac all the time ambitions as a rider and then last time I I went uh the ghost of tom jodd or joed, by uh rage against machine.
Speaker 3:Oh, there you go. That's a two and a half. Look at that man yeah, that's awesome, well, man guitar solo beginning. We gotta let you know, bro. We have, uh, we have quite the fishing community coming to watch you. Our, uh, our very good friend d Gray, who puts on the musky brawl every year. Siege, you've been in touch with him. Is he coming to the?
Speaker 2:fight. He's there, man, he's there. Are we having a drink with Davey G? Yeah, he's there. All the boys are there.
Speaker 5:He's coming after me too, so you guys better come too.
Speaker 2:He's younger than us though too, man, we're old, we're old, but we'll try.
Speaker 5:We'll try, man it's so true, it's so true.
Speaker 2:I'd be like Will Ferrell in old school when he's just like. He's like what do you got planned tomorrow? He's like I don't know bed, bath and beyond Home Depot, and then he takes a sip of the keg and next thing you know he's streaking down the street. There goes Tone Frank, the Tank Frank the Tank. No, it's such an honor to have you on, cody. It's especially the week building up and it's just like, oh man, we're in your corner. We're literally going to be in your corner.
Speaker 3:We're kind of in your corner I might get kicked out, man, so pumped, you know me, when we go to live events siege, I got a problem and, uh, you know I, I I'm just so excited to actually be there and the fact that we got you on cody the week before your fight, we're honored to have you and, um, you know, the best of luck, the best with your. You know your family and your training and, uh, we're gonna be there. Listen, man, it's a small community, this fishing community, and uh, it's amazing how you probably have touched so many people in our country, not only with your fighting but with your background in fishing. And it's a small community, cj, and it's a big family, isn't it?
Speaker 2:It is, man, it's so true. And yeah, everyone's going to be watching this and yeah, we're all going to be in your corner, that's for sure, man, and your opponent. I hate to hear it, man. He's going to be driving back to the States, you know, with the L, his first L, that kind of sucks, but you know, I'm sure he's a good fighter.
Speaker 2:I'm sure he's a good fighter, but I heard an interview with him today. He said Cody, you're a little bit of a slow starter and he's not impressed by. And I'm like I've seen tape on Cody, I've seen him start pretty fast and I've seen your hands, so I get it. There's trash talk in MMA, but I think he's sleeping on you and I can't wait till you get that. It's 7-0, bud 7-0.
Speaker 5:Let's go with the Bantamweight Championship. I'm going to be out there fishing with the belt out there. Oh man, it is a group, you know it is a. It is a group, you know, it is a family of the fishing community and I'm happy to represent, I'm honored to represent in the mma world and, uh, to be able to cross those worlds over eventually, after the fight. Some big things are on the rise and and, yeah, I'm I'm stoked that you guys are coming on, uh, coming to the fight, really happy to be on on the podcast with you guys.
Speaker 2:I can't wait to see what you have on the rise with fishing. I see you're with Off Topic. You're with Costa. Now I have a story about Costa. I always buy cheap fishing sunglasses just because I'm rough on them, right. So one year I finally bought a pair of nice Costas. I'm so pumped, stoked to have them. Like, I mean, have them LSC first season. I go to net One of, I go to net one of my buddies fish on LSC. There goes the Costas right on LSC. I was so bummed. So now that you're with Costa, I'm looking forward to your promo code. I'm sure you'll have one Cody Kovacek MMA and I'll put it in to save 15%.
Speaker 5:brother, let's go. I hope so, let's go. Yeah, I'm really happy to be working with them too Rappella 13 Fishing and Bowtech to be able to represent those outdoor companies in MMA. World's huge and I'm going to be using this stuff anyway. Right? They make top quality products and I was already using them before we started working together and I only want to represent companies I truly have faith in right. I think that's important working together and I only want to represent companies I truly have faith in right. I think that's important not to just take whatever offer is is throwing at you, to be selective and and proud on who you represent we've.
Speaker 2:We've had the same thing with the podcast as well. Like, I mean, we've. We want to stand behind our stuff, you know and uh, because listen, you have followed. You have fans. We have 10 fans maybe, maybe I don't know, but they want to buy. Obviously, if you're promoting something, you want to make sure it's quality, and that's awesome.
Speaker 3:you're doing that, Awesome brother. So, Siege, can you still get tickets If people are listening when this episode drops on Tuesday? Can people still get tickets to this fight, or is it sold out?
Speaker 5:No, you can still get tickets. You got to go to Ticketmaster. When you select the seats that you want, there'll be a little button up top. It says unlock. You hit that unlock code or that unlock button and you type in Kvonchak, in capitals 10. So Kvonchak, 10, and that'll give you some extra seating, I think. And then they just know who's coming to watch me fight. So yeah, if you want to come out to the fight, come out. He's going to be a banger. You will not be disappointed and it's going to be one of the. It's anticipated to be one of the biggest MMA card professional MMA cards in Ontario.
Speaker 2:Awesome. Where can our listeners find you on socials?
Speaker 5:Kvonchek. Mma is all my fighting stuff with a little bit of fishing stuff, and then all my fishing content is on bestfisherman__in__mma.
Speaker 2:You hear, to hear first boys and girls.
Speaker 3:Well listen, cody, we're not going to keep you much longer. Brother, we're just so happy that you actually took the time to join us today and we're going to be by your side next week. We're pumped up Folks. If you're listening again, go on to Ticketmaster, punch in that code and you know you're going to get some selected seedings. Maybe save some dough and come by and say hi to Showtime and myself. We might even be getting Lou, and if we can get Lou and Hookset away from work.
Speaker 2:Yeah, All right. Well, that was awesome.
Speaker 3:Don. Yeah, we lost him, but he might come back. But yeah, I mean, if you can get out there next Friday and watch the fight with us, come say hi, we'll buy you a drink and uh mention the podcast and uh see, just guys, this guy's uh the real deal and we're just so excited that we got to have cody on. Thank you cody.
Speaker 5:Thank you, cody, thanks boys for having me on. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 2:It was a lot of fun and, uh, looking forward to doing it again all right guys in person at a fight oh yeah, and on the water man, and on the water 100 we gotta do on the water 100% we got to do this right. All right, brother. Good shot brother.
Speaker 4:Hi everybody. I'm Angelo Viola and I'm Pete Bowman. Now you might know us as the hosts of Canada's Favorite Fishing Show, but now we're hosting a podcast. That's right. Every Thursday, ange and I will be right here in your ears bringing you a brand new episode of Outdoor Journal Radio. Hmm, now, what are we going to talk about for two hours every week?
Speaker 5:Well, you know there's going to be a lot of fishing.
Speaker 3:I knew exactly where those fish were going to be and how to catch them, and they were easy to catch.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but it's not just a fishing show. We're going to be talking to people from all facets of the outdoors, from athletes To scientists.
Speaker 3:To chefs and whoever else will pick up the phone environments to line to chefs. If any game isn't cooked properly, marinated, you will taste it.
Speaker 4:And whoever else will pick up the phone Wherever you are. Outdoor Journal Radio seeks to answer the questions and tell the stories of all those who enjoy being outside. Find us on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3:This week's code to win the prize pack for this month on the Eating Wild podcast is BAG, that's B-A-G BAG. Make sure you go onto the Fish in Canada website under contest punch and bag to win this month's beautiful prize pack. Welcome back to the Eating Well Podcast. I am your host, antonio Smash Malecka, joined by co-host Christopher Showtime Johnson for Hooks at Martins and Louis Top Dog Pereira, who can be here with us today. But, siege, we got to do some house cleaning here. We just had, probably for me, one of the most exciting guests on the Eating Wild podcast, just because the guy is an incredible fisherman. That's his passion man. The guy beats the shit out of people for a living, but his passion and we talked about this with Jim Miller before he loves the fish. He's a stick.
Speaker 2:He does man? And it's a special place for us because he fishes a lot of the same waters and I'm sure our listeners have fished a lot of same waters that he does and what he's doing in the octagon and uh, like man in the hunting and the fishing, the harvesting, this guy is, he's ripped and he's eating clean, he's, he's eating wild. We talked a little bit, uh, off air and uh, he was saying with his diet, you know, with the eating wild game and all that stuff, it was it.
Speaker 3:Oh man, this guy does it all oh, big time man and and um, you know it's a small community but a big family. He mentioned that and you and we find that, now that we're on the other side of this business, behind the mics and people are now reaching out to us and we're engaging in conversations but this guy could go on and become a UFC champion at that weight class, and the fact that he took the time to talk with us who's part of this fishing community now just shows a lot about this guy.
Speaker 2:it does man? It does. Unfortunately for our listeners, we had some audio issues with this connection. He was on the way to the gym and it's so unfortunate for us to have him on before his big fight. But yeah, what he was saying was that, uh, you know, the UFC has looked at him for to be on the ultimate fighter. They want to see if he can, you know, get a couple more wins under his belt. He could be any of our listeners that know the ultimate fighter, or let's find a fight, or find a fight thing. He might be on there, man. Well, you know he might be on there and just what he does for living and I heard a quote today that there's no better adrenaline than actually knocking out another man on the campus. I, I, you've done it, you've done it playing hockey. I'm a lover, not a fighter. Everyone knows that siege make. But you know I'm always the guy to be like come on, guys, let's work it out. But I can imagine man it's there.
Speaker 3:I've knocked out one guy in hockey in my hole and I fought a lot siege. Uh, I've been knocked out. I've been on the other side on the other side. Yeah, it sucks, man. And the smelling salt, oh the salts and everything getting zippers on your forehead. Yes, that's happened to me before, um, but you know you don't want to really promote knocking people out. No, and it's how you make a living, right that's?
Speaker 2:his living. That's his living and and I mean that's we're not condoning going knocking people out, obviously, but that's his living, that's his paycheck and it almost sounds like to me tone.
Speaker 3:Uh, he might be into fishing more than mma, like he is his passion he's so passionate and you know just the fact when he started off and I and again, I didn't know nothing about cody's background in fishing until we had him on the show just from watching him on on instagram um, but the fact that he started fishing with a 17-foot center pin rod, that is not hard. That is hard and it's not easy, I should say, because I started off with a 15-foot center pin rod and just the guy growing up from a small town you said it, cj it could have been him getting up with the Dukes and defending himself as a young kid. That probably got him intrigued into, you know, becoming an mma fighter and he's, he's. I mean, you gotta watch this guy.
Speaker 2:He's one of the best out there at that weight class and the fact that his mom, uh, you know, dropped him off. She was working, like what was it? Nine, twelve hour shifts. Dropped him off on the river. That's awesome. So his, uh, his after-school program was, uh, it was popping fish and that that's a great story and we're looking forward, we're really looking forward to going to the fight. Uh, look for us on instagram doing lives from there. We'll be doing some lives. Hopefully. The the connections there is fine, um, but yeah, man, it's uh, I, uh, I envy him, man. I do, because we're mma guys.
Speaker 3:You know we're, we're. I was just gonna say that before you said that me and you and and and lou and dan, we'd be texting each other, sometimes at one in the morning where you know we're waiting for these. Okay, you said it, man, we're in our 40s. It's not easy to stay up at one in the morning to watch, you know, conor mcgregor fight, but you know, half the times we fall asleep. And now to actually go live and we got Cody is, we're in his corner brother.
Speaker 2:We are in his corner and we might not be at the after hour party.
Speaker 3:I don't know if I'm that spring chicken anymore. Siege, If I do make it to the after party, don't make me do the Frank the Tank, Just one. Just give me one.
Speaker 2:Listen, we could make it to the after party don't make me do the Frank the Tank, just one Just give me one. Listen, we could make it to the after party, but will we be hungover for a week solid? Yes, guys, his age, they get right back up, you know? Yeah, eat some greasy food, have a shower and let's go.
Speaker 3:But yeah, it's going to be exciting, man, it's going to be really exciting, exciting you know, what's cool too is is, uh, our fellow teammates on this show bullrod, you know, pete bowman, dean, you know, dean, our, our producer, dean taylor they're huge mma a fans and we went to lake st claire and we had to make sure we brought our box up just to watch. I can't remember which which fight it was, I don't know what it was dean producer dean made him.
Speaker 2:Might have made a little bit of money that night doing little bets. Sorry, Dean, for putting it out there that you're a degenerate gambler. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding.
Speaker 3:Listen, dino, my box wasn't working because the Wi-Fi was so shit. He actually bought the fight. Oh, he did. He's like we can't do this, we can't watch the fight with it buffering and this, and that Bam puts the money down. And it's cool how the MMA community is. There's a lot of fishermen out there, a lot of hunters out there that are in professional fighting, and Cody's a perfect example. And local guys Ontario. This guy's going to be a champ. I feel it. Man, this guy's going to be the next. You know, I'm not going to go out there and say he's the next George St Pierre, but this guy is, he could be man and he's humble. He's humble man, he's just he's humble His opponent.
Speaker 2:I listened to some of the clips from his opponent and he's not as humble as Cody, and it almost seems like the guy that Jeremy gets the dub is the humble guy. So we can't wait. We can't wait and we're all geeked up and we are obviously not an mma podcast, but from the past. Um, when we talk about the mma, a lot of our listeners seem to like it too. Like, I know, we're eating wild, we eat a game and we fish and hunt and all that stuff. But there's a lot of connection there and I I think he touched on it too as well how many MMA guys like to fish, hunt and be in the outdoors? And I get it, man, I get it.
Speaker 3:Well, we're looking forward to this fight, Siege, and before we close out the episode, just cleaning things up here Next week, Siege, you know what next week is. Brother, Do you know what the next time we record a podcast? Do you know what the next time we record a podcast? Do you know what that day is? Do you even have an idea?
Speaker 2:It better not be Father's Day, because my kids will kill me if I'm doing a podcast in the basement. It's better, brother.
Speaker 3:What is it? It's episode 52. Happy birthday, Siege. Happy one year anniversary.
Speaker 2:Oh boy, I haven't brought this out in a while, but say what?
Speaker 3:It's 52, man, it's going to be episode, episode 52. I just want to say thank you, man. I gotta say thank you to you to top dog to hook set. I mean it's not all the time where the four of us can be together on the pod, but you know we do our best to get together. It's like fishing trips for us. You know the four of us are together, magic happens. And, uh, I just want to say to all the listeners we could not reach 52. We couldn't have gotten there without our listeners and engaging with us on social media, emailing us and the giveaways have been awesome and, siege, we're coming up to 52 next week and it's quite amazing for me the accomplishment and thanks to the Outdoor Journal Radio Podcast Network and the boys over there Angelo Viola and Pete Bowman and Dean Taylor and all the people involved for having us get to this milestone one year and I'm just looking forward to doing more with you, bud.
Speaker 2:Oh, I can't wait, buddy, I can't. It's only been a year, somehow at the beginning of our listeners know I wasn't really involved in this podcast, but my three friends kept on Siege Siege. Can you hop on Siege Siege? You know what? I love it and it just gives us more of a reason to talk about fishing, hunting and eating great food Thanks to having a chef in your group. I tell everyone there's nothing better than having your own Gordon Ramsay in your pocket. You know what I mean. And the fact that our listeners, it's the feedback we're getting and everyone wants to support us and it's fantastic, man. I can't wait for our 52 episode. It's going to be great man. It's going to be fantastic.
Speaker 3:It's going to be great. I agree, and I was so happy to have Cody on and we're looking forward to Friday's fight Again. Go check out Ticketmaster Punch in the code KAVAZCHEK10, all in capitals you might get some priority seeding. Obviously, you could possibly save some dough as well on tickets. Come visit the Eating Wild Boys. We'll be there at ringside and before we go away, Siege. We still are running the latest giveaway, which is a Kushkin knife and an amazing knife bag. I think this might be our last week, Am I correct?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I believe it is. And go ahead on. Go on the Fishing Canada website and I believe they have a giveaway section. Click that you can enter every day and if you enter the bonus code, that was on the last three episodes now.
Speaker 3:I believe I think the last one may be dropped somewhere in this episode. Somewhere Somewhere in this episode will be the last code that will get you 100 free entries into this great prize pack.
Speaker 2:Like A Bowman says, if you haven't entered, what are you waiting for?
Speaker 3:BoRod, listen to the boat ride. He knows what he's talking about.
Speaker 2:You get 100 entries.
Speaker 3:Do it for boat ride, do it for boat ride, okay, and you know, I can't wait to announce a winner for this one, because this gift here, siege, this is something that, me, personally, I would absolutely love to have. You get the knife, you get the bag and and, uh, I believe for you to fill that bag up as well.
Speaker 3:I believe it's a 600 value, if I'm not wrong jesus, that bag, I'll tell you that bag siege is uh, yeah, it's up there, it's up there in value and uh, I'm just we're excited to give it away. And I think what we're gonna do before we close off the show is we are gonna have a banger of a prize for our next one, for for our 52, for our one-year anniversary siege. We're going to have a gift that's going to go out there, or a prize I shouldn't say a gift it's going to be a prize that you're going to have a chance to win. I'm not going to drop it now. You have to listen to episode 52. You got to listen to the one-year anniversary episode because we are dropping a huge, huge prize pack in a huge, huge prize pack and it's going to have EW all over it, and you know. I just want to say thank you again for listening and, siege, I'm pumped to see you next week. Brother, it's been a while.
Speaker 2:I'm pumped too. I'm really excited, man, I'm really excited. And stay tuned, for what are we going to do in the next couple of years? Man, we're just starting. We're just starting out.
Speaker 3:Man, we didn't even talk about our sponsor. That just you know. We're in a very prelim stage of having. This is going to be huge for our listeners.
Speaker 2:Let's just say I drove by their new location today and man, I want to say it's so bad.
Speaker 3:I know I want to say it bad, but listen, we got a big meeting tomorrow. We got Showtime Johnson. What he does is he closes the deal. You get him on, he closes the deal. And you know, tomorrow is a big day for us. Next week is a huge week for us. We got the fight, we got our year anniversary, yes, and I'm just happy to have everybody listening along for the ride.
Speaker 2:Yes, and make sure you follow us on Instagram Eating Wild Podcast, and then on Apple. Make sure you leave us a five-star, or you know what? Even if you don't think we're five-star, leave us a review. It all helps. You know what I mean? Yeah.
Speaker 3:Anything helps, siege, and that's how we collect our data, that's how we know who's listening, and it's great for us, it's great for our network. And, siege, I got to ask Coach to do one thing for us. I need him to get that guitar fired up. We are wrapping this episode up, siege, and I'm looking forward to next week. This is Antonio Smash Malecka, and I was joined today by my co-host, beautiful person, one of my best friends in the world, christopher Showtime Johnson. Yeah, get the net, malecka, get the net. And we got Hooksette Martins and Top Dog Pereira. Thanks for listening and fish on, we'll be right back.