JitsCast #14 features former Bellator fighter and current professional grappler Ian Butler. Although Butler made his name as an MMA fighter, he has since retired from the sport and embarked upon a career as a Jiu-Jitsu competitor instead. He began his martial arts career with wrestling and made his professional MMA debut in 2014, continuing up until 2020 when he decided to stop fighting. As a lifelong grappler and long-time Jiu-Jitsu competitor, Butler started to compete for some of the biggest grappling shows in the world. He has since made his debuts for both Polaris and Who’s Number One, and has even more matches booked in the future.
We asked Butler about the very beginning of his career as an MMA fighter and he spoke about some of the incredible experiences he had training at Victory MMA and living with Dean Lister. He also shared some insight into the last year or two of his time as an MMA fighter too, explaining why he left the sport while he was still at a relatively young age. Butler has since moved into coaching and has founded the Silverback Wrestling Club, which now has 5 locations. He was eager to talk about the mission that he has for the affiliation and the exciting things he has planned for the future.
Butler doesn’t just have a future as a coach either, he also has a match against Victor Silverio at Who’s Number One 26 coming up very soon. He shared how he’s been preparing for the match and his general approach to competition preparation, along with what his hopes for the match are. We also spent a little time looking back on the various events that Butler has competed on in order to find out where he had the best experience, and that led to him looking at future matches too. There was four competitors in particular that Butler named as his preferred opponents, and all of them look like they would be exciting matches.
JitsCast #14 with Ian Butler is now available to watch on the official JitsMagazine YouTube channel, click here to subscribe for more or check out the interview below:
