After Dan Henderson's tremendous performance at the King of Kings, he ran into a freight train by the name of Vanderlei Silva. That was one of the most exciting fights that I have seen. For Pride 13, Henderson came back and tried his hand against the most active Gracie in NHB, Renzo Gracie. Henderson won by knocking Renzo out as he shot in. It wasn't apparent from the video that I saw whether Henderson's sprawl or his punches knocked out Renzo. I caught up with Dan to ask him about that fight, his previous fight with Vanderlei and who is he training with. You will be surprised!

FCF: There was high expectations for your fight with Renzo Gracie at Pride 13. How did you feel going into the fight?
Dan Henderson: I felt real comfortable and real confident in my abilities to beat him. I was real interested in how our standup skills matched up with each other. I felt that his strengths were submissions on the ground, where mine are in the clinch and the takedown. I felt that I was a lot better striker than him. That is kind of how we matched up.

FCF: What was your strategy?
DH: Pretty much exactly how the fight went. Not often when you actually get out there in competition do things happen exactly how you plan them. This time it did. It almost went to a tee on how we practiced. We thought that he would kick me once, maybe twice, and hit me a little bit. Then come after me and go to put me in his guard. I would control him, let him up and hit him on the way in. That's exactly what happened.

FCF: Were you surprised at the way it ended?
DH: A little bit. I felt that if I were to knock him out, it would be standing up and not when he was shooting in. I tried to hit him once or twice on his rear end while he was coming in the times before that when he shot. I was a little surprised that after I hit him he went limp. It kind of surprised me a little bit, but I was able to follow up with another shot.

FCF: Was it the sprawl that knocked Renzo out and your punches finished him or was it the punches?
DH: I hit him with a right hand, a right hook. My hand is still sore a little bit from that. I hit him pretty square. I felt my hand sink in a little bit.

FCF: You had a tough, but exciting fight with Vanderlei Silva previously. Can you tell us about that fight because both of you had the upper hand at one point or another?
DH: Yeah, and I guess looking back that hindsight is 20-20. I kind of made a mistake and kind of fell down to the ground when I should have just pushed him away and kept striking and the fight could have been finished right then and there. But I fell down to the ground and allowed him to cover up and the ref stopped it and that helped him recover a little bit. I definitely have to hand it to him recovering after that. He came back well and showed a lot of heart.

FCF: Were you surprised by Silva in that fight?
DH: No. I wasn't surprised. I heard that he hits hard and now I KNOW that he hits hard. I just wasn't in the condition that I should have been for that fight. I didn't give myself the proper time to prepare and went ahead and fought anyway. I guess that's part of the game.

FCF: You seemed to be comfortable enough fighting on your back to roll to the guard numerous times during that fight. Was it because you trained a little too much on your back or was it a strategy to avoid Silva's knees?
DH: No, that wasn't part of the game plan at all. I didn't train specifically to do that. It's good for me to train on my back as well as to train up on top. I don't limit myself to just training on top because I think that I will be on top every fight. It wasn't the case in that fight. I just ran out of gas and couldn't take him down because I was too tired. He had decent defenses.

FCF: At first, when I saw the fight, I thought that maybe you just trained a little too much on your back. But when I watched the fight later, it occurred to me that you may be doing that to avoid taking some knees when you are trying to get back to your feet?
DH: When I couldn't take him down, I kind of did that just to avoid getting hit. I wasn't about to sit there on my hands and my knees and get hit. I would have rather have been on top, let's put it that way. That's where I should have been. My game plan was to get into the clinch and just take him down. And I kind of didn't do either one.

FCF: I read a post fight interview in which you said that you were only going to fight a few more times. Last time we talked you mentioned this. How many more fights are you planning on taking? Did you set a limit?
DH: Well, I will probably fight for another year or two years. And that's probably somewhere between 4-6 fights. I would at least give myself four fights. That would put me at about 15 total fights in my career. And after that I am ready to do other things with my life. The money is definitely helping. Obviously if the money got better, I might stay in it a lot longer. It's got to be a little bit more worth it for me to put everything else on hold.

FCF: What were you planning on doing after retiring?
DH: I am working on getting my contractor's license and start building houses and stuff. Things of that nature.

FCF: What happened to the gym? Is it still open? Someone told me that it closed and another person told me that it moved.
DH: Well, a little bit of both. I moved out of Oregon away from Randy [Couture], but I still go up there to help him prepare for his fights. We closed down the health club part of the gym and moved the wrestling and fighting portion of it to different location.

FCF: So you're no longer in Oregon?
DH: No, I'm no longer in Oregon. I am actually going to be building a house in the summer in California.

FCF: Do you guys still train regularly with each other [with Randy Couture] or do you guys just help each other right before the fight is coming up?
DH: We train right before the fights. I'm going up for about 10 days to help him train for this fight. And he came down for about five or six days for my fight.

FCF: How is Randy looking for this fight?
DH: Well, the last time he came down to train with me, he was in real good shape. And he's been training harder, so I think he is going to look real good. We're going to watch some video, that is what we usually do, and we both come up with a game plan of what we both think is the best plan for each other's fights and go from there. But conditioning is the first thing and a game plan would be the second, I guess.

FCF: Who is up next for you? Has any opponents been named?
DH: No, no idea. I am supposed to be given a few names this week for the next Pride. Depending on who it is and who I want to fight, I may want a little more time to prepare. The next Pride is on May 27th and like I said I'm building a house in the summer, so I may not fight again until November. If I fight again soon, it will probably be in the next Pride, if not then it will have to be in November.

FCF: Is there anybody on Dan Henderson's hit list that you would like to test yourself against?
DH: I wouldn't mind fighting Rickson Gracie, but I don't think that would ever be pulled off. I wouldn't mind fighting Sakuraba as well. He is still tough, even though he just lost. Vanderlei is a tough opponent as well.

FCF: How do you feel about the new rules in Pride? It really turned everything upside down in this past Pride with Sakuraba losing.
DH: I didn't think that Sakuraba was an upset. I thought that would have happened. With or without the new rules.

FCF: Do you feel that the new rules favor your style?
DH: Yes, I think so. It depends on who I'm fighting and how our styles match up, but for the more part, the more and more my standup skills improve, the more and more that rule favors me. That will probably mean that more guys will be shooting in on me to try and take me down and be in that position.

FCF: So you are looking for your opponents to be on all fours and deliver some knees?
DH: Yeah. I was really surprised that they put that rule in effect right before Sakuraba fought Vanderlei.

FCF: Yeah, it seems to work perfectly into Vanderlei's game.
DH: Absolutely, especially against Sakuraba, who is comfortable in that position, on all fours. He really didn't have a place to really hang out. I don't think that he appreciated that.

FCF: Anything else that you would like to add? Like who you are training with or any up and comers?
DH: I have mainly been training with Fabiano Iha and Tito Ortiz before my last fight and now for a few days. I have been friends with Tito for years and I lived in Huntington for a while before moving up to Oregon. I have trained with him before and when I moved back I went in to train with him again. Tito improved a lot as a wrestler. We've known each other's points of view as far strategies. I think it was really good for both of us, especially for me because I got the royal treatment this time and I am going to return the favor and help him out in his next fight.

FCF: Good to talk to you Dan and keep in touch. Tell Randy that I said good luck. I look forward to seeing you fight again soon.
DH: Yeah, I look forward to fight again soon too. [laughs] If you need anything else, give me a call.