All right, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. We've got a special guest, Ivana Petrovic, on the podcast today. She's a mixed martial artist with a 6-0 undefeated professional record.
She just signed a deal with the UFC. She's actually the first Croatian woman in the UFC. So that's super cool. And we've got her on the podcast. Thanks for coming on the podcast today, Ivana.
Thank you for inviting me.
Yeah, of course. Awesome to have you on. Super excited. Before we sort of get into, you know, the UFC stuff, can you give us a little bit about your Croatian background?
Actually, I'm from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Mostar, but I'm Croatian. So I grew up in Mostar, but in 2015, I decided to move to Norway. And since then, I live in Norway.
Mostar is a beautiful city. I love Mostar. My family is from near Ljubuski over there. So I've driven, I don't know how many times, but the Mostar. Super nice, really cool city. But moving to Norway, I imagine that's a big difference, no?
Yeah, it is. Actually, in the start, I wasn't sure if I'm gonna live here because it was really cold and it's opposite of Mostar. You know, we like the social life and all that things that we don't have in Norway. But after a few years, it was okay. I'm fine now. Now I'm more used to this and I'm more mature. So I like more Norway now.
Really? Is there anything that you miss about Mostar? Maybe the coffee? I don't know.
Yeah, drinking the coffee. I miss my family and my friends. But other than that, I'm really happy to live in Norway too.
And did you move for training purposes?
I moved because of my husband or my fiancee in that time. He was living here and he was studying. He tried to live in Mostar, but since he lived in Norway all his life, he couldn't be used to Mostar and all the things there. So I decided to move with him.
And to train here, of course. It's much easier to train here, especially if you want to be a professional athlete. It's much easier to train here.
Talking about being a professional athlete, which you are, did you grow up wanting to always be a fighter? How did you get involved in mixed martial arts?
Actually, yes, I really wanted to be a professional athlete, but I was training handball. My father introduced me to handball and he wanted me to train handball.
I always wanted to train some martial arts, but you know Balkan people don't like to see women in that sport. And after I turned 17, I decided to move to kickboxing and I said to my parents, now I'm going to train kickboxing.
I wasn't so happy about it, but I started and it was good. After some time I moved to MMA and my journey starts there.
Well, you know, there are a lot of great Croatian fighters both in history and right now there's a lot of current, you know, Blazibat, Herbovich, Vavic, Delija, a lot of Croatian fighters.
But yeah, as far as Croatian, you know, female fighters growing up, was there anyone that you, I mean, either male or female, that you looked up to as sort of either a fighter or just athletes in general who were sort of your role models?
Yeah, Mirko Krokop is my role model. I was in love in his fights and I used to watch his fights with my father. My father really liked him too.
So I knew that he going to wake up in three o'clock and ask me if I can watch with him. And I was watching fights and I was impressed with his skills.
So my role model, I wanted to start MMA because of him too.
Oh, that's awesome. Krokop, yeah, he's a legend. I always watch that stare down when I need just some motivation or something between him and Silva.
The one I saw, you know, Joe Rogan made that sort of famous as of late last couple of years because he brought that up and then everyone started watching that video.
But yeah, that's crazy. And yeah, he's a crazy fighter with the left leg, right leg hospital, left leg cemetery.
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
That's awesome. Have you had a chance to meet him or train with him?
Yes, actually, I met him when I was 18 years old and just in the start of my career. I wasn't training MMA at that time, but he had a seminar that was free just for the lucky ones.
And somehow I was lucky and they called me. So I was on seminar with him for maybe 10 years ago or something.
Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, that's that's awesome opportunity to train with him and learn from him. I wanted to ask a little, you know, what did family and friends sort of think, you know, when you told them you wanted to be a professional fighter, but it sounds like your dad was very supportive.
He was the one that sort of got you inspired to watch him.
He likes martial arts, but he don't want to see me in martial arts because you how is it and it's a brutal sport, too. But after some time when he saw that I'm really interested to be a professional fighter, I got his support and science and he's my bigger biggest fan I have.
And I'm really happy about it.
Has he been able to travel to watch your fights?
No, he never watched my fights. He's working a lot, but hopefully one day he is going to watch me.
Yeah, that would be awesome. Yeah, I want to talk a little bit about the UFC because you just signed a deal, you know, to be in the UFC. Can you talk a little bit about that?
Yeah, I just signed my or for for a month or two I signed my contract while I was in Mostar with my family. I just finished my fight. I won the fight in R.S.
I was fighting Evelina Wozniak and she was the best pound for pound fighter in Europe.
And to be honest, I didn't expect UFC to call me that soon. And I knew that I'm new in this sport and I wanted to train a little bit more.
But on the other side, I know that I'm ready for the bigger things too. I managed to finish the fight.
I submit Evelina and I think you see so something in me and they saw someone who can be a really good fighter. So they give me opportunity.
It felt like a dream in the start, but after some time they gave me the fight and I knew that I need to adjust the train even harder than I trained before. And yeah, that's it.
Yeah, that's incredible. I mean, the UFC, you know, that's the biggest MMA organization in the world. That's awesome to be called by them.
When is your next fight scheduled?
My next fight is in 11 days.
Wow.
I didn't realize it was that soon.
Yeah, it is.
Well, I wanted to ask a little bit about the training camp and what that looks like. So, you know, maybe now can you tell us a little how have you been training for this fight?
I've been training really hard, even harder than I did before. So sometimes I feel a little bit over trained, but I was so motivated that doesn't affect me.
And every time I'm like, I feel a little bit torched and I have that dream to be a winner in UFC and I just get up and I do the training even better than I was imagining it.
So, I don't know, I feel really, really ready. It was hard camp, but I think we did the job and I'm ready to show everyone what I can do there.
Was there something specifically that you were focusing on, like, you know, stand up or ground game or Jiu Jitsu?
Yeah, I know she is a striker. So I was working on my striking skills. My striking is much better than it was in the last fight because in the last fight we was working just with wrestling because I wanted to wrestle her and finish the fight on the ground.
But now I was working on everything. To be honest, all my game, it's striking, wrestling and Jiu Jitsu, everything is so much better. So nothing specific. I was working on everything.
And to be honest, I really think I can win this fight in every aspect of the fight, striking, wrestling, on Jiu Jitsu. I'm ready for whenever it happens.
As far as like hours per day, are you training basically the whole day or, you know, taking rest days or a couple hours a day? How does that work for you?
I train three times a day because I live near the gym in Oslo and I live there. I live in the office of my manager when I'm there.
So sometimes the coach needs to say you need to go home now, you want to rest.
Sometimes I'm there. I don't have friends there. I have just my sparring partners, my teammates. So I'm there all day. If I'm not training, I'm stretching or doing yoga or something.
So at least two times a day, like hard sparring in the morning, MMA training and then in the evening something like weights and more like specifics MMA.
That makes sense. Yeah. As far as like diet and, you know, keeping weight for the weigh-ins, is that something that you've been thinking about this whole time or is that easy for you in just the last couple days you worry about that?
I cut my weight one week before the fight. I'm someone who is really always shredded and someone who was struggling to eat.
So it's okay for me to do it this way and I don't use so much energy on that. So I'm happy about it.
Well, that's not so bad. Only one week before. So, you know, you don't feel too bad about, I don't know, do you have any favorite foods that you have to cut out that you miss eating?
Yeah, actually I love pasta, but pasta is not so good after I'm finished with my weight. So I do something, I eat something like rice and meat and that stuff. But after the fight, then I eat a lot of pasta.
Yeah, I bet. Actually, I wanted to ask, I've got a question about food that I'll save for a little bit later. But I wanted to ask, you have a walkout song, an entrance song planned for the fight.
Yeah, I have one song that I always use, the paint in black from Rolling Stones.
Oh, that's a classic. Wow.
Hold it. So I'm trying to imagine that song because you know some people like sort of the feel calm when they walk into the ring. Some people just want, you know, all the energy. That song is kind of in between, you know, it's not like a metal song, but it's not like a classical.
So what sort of your attitude when you're listening to that and walking into the ring?
I'm actually really, really calm before my fight. Sometimes I want to slap myself to be like more awake, but that song helps me to get that balance, you know, to get that boost and to paint all black and just go straight to the cage and finish the fight.
That's awesome. That's an awesome walkout song. I'm a big, you know, sort of classic rock band. So that's a really cool song. Yeah, the Stones are great.
You know, as far as, have you thought at all long term in the UFC or are you sort of, you know, you have like long term goals of what you want to do in your division or other divisions in the UFC or you, you know, focus on this fight and sort of you'll make plans later with those things.
First of all, I want to come to top 10. I want to show everyone what I'm capable of and I really think I deserve to come there and come there as soon as possible. I'm 28 years old. I don't have some injuries that stopped me to do that.
And I'm just going to fight to come there. And after that, of course, my goal is the same like in R.S. I want that belt.
Is there a timeline that you're hoping for a specific number of fights or you're just going to win every fight that comes your way and whenever that comes?
I never choose the fight. So I just take everything and no, I don't have timeline when it happens. I know it's going to happen. I just need to train and show my best in the cage.
Yeah, that's awesome. I'm looking forward to it. I'm excited for that. Do you have a favorite current UFC fighter? I know you mentioned Crowe Cop, but someone who's fighting now, maybe that you you got in contact with that now that you're in the UFC or someone you're hoping to maybe get in contact with or train with?
I really like John Jones. I like his style. He was always my favorite fighter and also want to show Jango. She's in my weight class. I like her. I like her style. But also, I never know. Maybe I'm going to meet her to in the cage. So I'm not going to say I'm going to be her fan right now. But I like her. I like how she's doing in the cage.
That's fair. Yeah, you can you can respect someone's you know, style and abilities. You mentioned John Jones, though I have to admit I'm a Stipe Miltic fan. So you know, I've got Stipe for this.
I like Stipe, but I'm not sure if he's going to be here for a long time. He has some years now. I don't know. Yeah, I'm guessing.
I would think this would be either his last or you know, maybe one or two more fights. You know, he seems he's ready to settle down with the family and things like that. But yeah, he's always fun to watch. And he's a great fighter as well.
Yeah, he is.
You know, Ivana, you have a YouTube channel that I just saw. What kind of things are you posting on there? And is that new? Is that something that you just sort of are starting out with?
Yeah, it's new or can I say new? That's from my second professional fight. My husband's brother is really good with filming and he wanted to film me behind the scenes to show people what we are doing before the fight and all that stuff.
And now people like that and we are continuing with that and he's going to film in Las Vegas too. So I think it's going to be cool to have all that footage in maybe a couple of years. And it's cool to see where we start and then where we are right now.
Yeah, that's awesome. You're able to track the journey, you know.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Where can people find you, you know, on both the YouTube channel and you have other social medias that people can follow you?
Yeah, of course.
If they can, how we said, subscribe on YouTube.
All into that and follow me on Instagram, Ivana MMA, it would be great.
Awesome. Yeah, and I'll put links, you know, so everyone listening can click on those links and find you as well.
Thank you Ivana. I've got a couple more questions here.
Let's see, I got the entrance song one. I asked you favorite food. It sounds like it was pasta but favorite food when you're either in Mostar or if you're going to Croatia, you know, for the summer or something you're on the coast, favorite food to eat.
Okay, this is not like summer food, but I like cevapi too. Cevapi is of course my favorite, especially if I'm in Bosnia and Sarajevo too. It's really, that's my favorite food.
And I'm like, I like food that my mother made because that's like all that childhood things like sarma and dolma and all that stuff. I don't know how to say that in English.
I don't either. I think most of the people listening are going to know what sarma is for sure.
Traditional food from Croatia or Balkan, yeah.
Yeah, cevapi of course is the best. And there is what, there's two kinds, but it sounds like the sarjevski cevapi.
Yeah, they're really good. If you didn't try, you need to try cevapi from Sarajevo.
I always get confused. Are those the like the small ones that are together or the long ones? I always forget which is which.
Small ones or not, but the small ones are from Banja Luka I think.
Okay.
I'm not, I'm not really sure. I like them all.
I always get them confused. Yeah, they're all delicious. Yeah. And everyone sort of makes them in their own, you know, they own, they have the ratio of meats or some, you know, won't use pork at all and just lamb and beef.
So it always tastes a little bit different wherever you go.
Yeah, yeah, true.
And then last question, Ivana. You know what I want to thank you so much for coming on the podcast, taking the time to do this. But for you, what makes Croatia special?
I had a thousand reasons why Croatia is special. Right now, my husband asked me if I wanted to be in Las Vegas because I never, I would, I never been in Las Vegas and he thought that maybe that can be fun and train there and be there.
But actually, after the fight, we are just landing to Norway to pick our stuff and we are going straight to Croatia.
Croatia is my, of course, I'm Croatian, but I don't know, I don't understand why everyone are going somewhere else because Croatia is the like heaven on earth.
We have beautiful sea, we have beautiful country, beautiful people, foods, like it's a million of things that are why I like Croatia.
I couldn't say that any better than you did right there. Yeah.
I love it for the same reasons, although I have to admit Las Vegas is cool too for a few nights maybe but yeah.
Yeah, that's why.
Yeah, after that it's, it's too much you can you can go crazy over there with everything they have. But yeah, Croatia.
I won't even try to say it any better than you did. Ivana, you know, I want to thank you again so much for coming on the podcast here and wish you the best of luck in your upcoming fight.
I'm super excited for that. I know you are as well. That's a big deal. So good luck in that and you know thank you again so much.
Thank you very much. Appreciate it.