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A
Today we are on site at a brand new facility in Newport beach called Giga Kick. And we are sitting down with the founder of Giga Kick, Giga Chikatse. And he is known as one of the world's foremost expert strikers, a UFC legend, a multi world champion kickboxer and karate specialist. This guy is an absolute ninja and one of the most humble people you will ever meet. Please welcome the one, the only, welcome to another episode of Coffees. Thanks for having me, Giga. It's a pleasure. It's, it's, it's an honor to hang out with you. You're such a special human being. A very, very humble guy. I'm very impressed with, with your new dojo. It's, it's beautiful. And you're attracting some of the world's best talent. Now I like to open up every single episode the same way. I ask everybody. What's your morning routine?
B
Morning routine is waking up, jumping in a shower obviously, then making the coffee, preparing the little breakfast, which most of the time is very limited, and preparing my bag and heading towards the gym. That's pretty, that's when I'm in a camp. It also depends on timing. Sometime I'm mixing up with my kid to drop one of them at school. Depends. Time and yeah, always heading towards the gym.
A
Yeah. You don't need a crazy morning routine when your whole life is training. Yeah, yeah.
B
I skipped the supplements as well because when I'm doing the supplements, like it's not just one or two. It's pretty much like the couple of glass, full glass of different type of the vitamins.
A
Yeah.
B
Different pills.
A
I mean, I'm sure your supplement stack is pretty intense.
B
Oh, yeah. You gotta be on time and do multiple times per day. Most of the time when I'm in a camp, I really follow that plan. If I'm not in a camp, because I live in a camp, you know, that's something that I've been doing since I was little kid, 4 or 5 years old, and always had the tournaments and competition and I was preparing for some tournaments or fights.
A
Since you were four years old?
B
Since I was four or five years old, I stepped in on a karate dojo and that's how I started. Yeah.
A
Yeah. I mean, like I was just talking to your doctor here, he was like, yeah. Did you see what Georgian kids look like as kids? They're all ripped. Every single kid. I'm like, yeah, you know, that's what RFK is trying to do to America now. You know, trying to bring America back to how we looked in the 60s, you know, in the JFK era. It's like you guys are already there in the Georgian era now. It's like all the kids are competitive, they're athletes. And, and we see it now in ufc. There's multiple fighters coming out of Georgia.
B
Yeah, Georgia is doing so good in ufc. And it, it was just a matter of time. And I'm glad I had, I had to do my part to help that little flow to come up. Here we are, we got two champions right now at the moment. One, but yeah, we're only like 3 million people. And it's insane how much of the mixed martial arts is loved inside the country and how all the new generation are involved in martial arts.
A
It's amazing. And I think you, you've been a big contributor to that, you know, so put them on the map as the first official.
B
I think I did a little part.
A
Yeah. God bless you for that. Let's jump into it now. You've been in martial arts now for 30 years. That's. That's crazy. I mean, over 30 years.
B
Yeah.
A
Now you know, who were you before the ufc? Like what, what was life like before the spotlight, before the center stage, before, you know, the notoriety and the fame and all the following, et cetera.
B
So I signed inside, I signed with UFC 2019, 2018. I had the Contender Series chance to get to UFC. So I already had some relationship with them. And till then that was like 2018, 19. And I came here first time in 2014 just to check it out. In 2015 I moved here. So I spent like three years working really, really hard, really tough to get to the ufc. And while I was in these years, I was fighting the kickboxing, the biggest stage called show called Glory. I was headlining the shows in Madison Square Garden, Steppel center, in multiple different areas, different states, in the biggest kickboxing show. Then I was invested all the money into my grappling wrestling to get. Get smaller steps to make it to the ufc because we all. That is, was very necessary to get to ufc. You know, ufc, even you are the. I was like ranked number one featherweight kickboxer when I left that show called Glory. And UFC won't sign you straight if you don't have some experience of mma. Even kickboxing and mix MMA so close to each other is like whole different sport and you have to be ready for that. You have to have a couple of fights on the record. And it's funny that I was fighting one day on that show, like the biggest show in kickboxing. And three, four days after I would come and do some local show.
A
You're a nobody in mma, in mma.
B
And yeah, in MMA they all knew me, all the fighters. But public wise, you know, the people, they didn't know. So I had to prove it that I was ready for ufc. And it was then same time I had to do like competition in Jiu Jitsu and start with white belt, blue belt, purple belt and travel around the tournament.
A
Are you a black belt Jiu jitsu too or just.
B
No, I stopped when I got to purple. I never trained with GUI after. Which was seven years ago or six. Yeah, seven. Seven years ago.
A
The requirement now in UFC is Jiu Jitsu, right. You have to have some Jiu Jitsu experience.
B
You gotta know Jiu Jitsu and you gotta know the kickboxing as well and wrestling. It's not the one thing. Only you can't do just one thing.
A
Yeah. I had the CEO of LFA on my show a couple weeks ago, about a week ago, and he said that hoist Gracie came in and proved that Jiu Jitsu is the superior martial art. And that was. And he was one little tiny guy. Your weight, right? 150 pounds, going up against 300 pound fighters. And since he proved that, now look at UFC, they're requiring every fighter to know Jiu Jitsu to compete. So it's become such a difficult sport now because everybody knows Jiu Jitsu.
B
Yeah.
A
So to be a champion like you really got to put in an extreme amount of effort in every martial art.
B
Yeah, that's how the sport evolved. You know this, this is only like what, 35 years, 30 years old sport. And there's only gonna grow more and more and more. And we just started, I'm super excited to see in the future, like back in the days there was like karate versus wrestling, kickboxing versus boxing, or Jiu jitsu with sambo. So there was all different type of martial arts going against each other. But nowadays you can go into one gym and you can bring your kid inside and have wrestling and grappling and kickboxing and karate and all that together they're gonna grow someone like, well, those
A
kind of gyms don't exist. And then we talked about this when we met the concept of Gigakick. What was the inspiration for starting Gigak?
B
When I train and when I have a camp, when I really want to train with one of the best striking gym, one of the best wrestling. So if some big fights coming up, I want to get all the Experience till my fight. And it's like almost impossible, it was impossible before to get to someone who's one of the best grappler, one of the best striker, one of the best wrestler all together in the same gym. Because all that, they all have little egos that, oh, I'm a best wrestler. I want to be separated with everyone. I want my thing to have. Then you have grappling that I'm the best grappler and I do traditional this way. And that's the only way I'm gonna do it. In my case, I was driving around in one gym in LA for boxing, almost two hours, just one way, and come back doing 45 minutes to Anaheim and come back, so 45 minutes back and then to different areas in Irvine and in other areas. And then after all that, me driving and spending the six hours of driving per day just to get to the gym, I was like, you know what? I think it's the right time to do something for community, put nice tojo here, bring my all the experience, help the fighters to become the better strikers, better fighters. And to the community to build up the traditional martial arts, karate, jiu jitsu, and bring mixed martial arts more easier for community and kind of like to build something special because you come in this place and you have everything, the best, best karate, best kickboxing, best grappling, best wrestling. Finally you meet somebody, the young kid who is a knowledge of the full mixed martial arts in one place. I think it's a good concept what we're doing.
A
I love the concept because, you know, finding a boxing gym, you gotta go to a boxing gym, you gotta go to a jiu jitsu gym. And you know, we discuss. I got kids, you know, and I want them to learn to strike, but then it's like I gotta take them to a striking gym and we belong to a jiu jitsu gym. And you know, like having daughters, they gotta learn to strike before they gotta learn jiu jitsu. And Jiu jitsu is a long process, you know, striking. Like if they come to a couple striking classes, we know that they could defend themselves. You know, just a couple classes, they don't gotta train years, they don't gotta train arm bars, you know. So for me, just finding something where as a, even as a parent, that I could rest assured that my kids can properly defend themselves quickly is awesome. But then to learn all of the arts in an intense environment like this, where you have some of the best fighters in the world training here, we just witnessed it and the viewers Will see it on camera here. It's like you're already attracting the most illustration elite talent here already. The gym just opened, right? And, and the best fighters are already coming here. How in the world did you attract the best fighters on the planet that quick?
B
You know the gym's name is Gig. There is a reason why they call it giga. So when I was a young kid started training with karate and then I developed this skill that I could transition my direction of the kick from the different areas while I was aiming high kick to switch the body kick or body kick to high kick. And that was really successful. Then I moved to kickboxing and I moved in Netherlands, traveling around the world, fought in Thailand and multiple, multiple different countries. And I use my kick. Once I got really a lot of success in kickboxing, people started to call this kick Gigas kick. So time to time then they, some people just skipped s and it became a giga kick. So after that there's not only one kick. I do, I do multiple different kicks. And some people think that that's a giga kick, some people think the other one is a giga. So in mixed martial arts today, people know me as one of the best kicker in the game. And I have something that not many people have it maybe only a couple of. And all that experience, what I have in the kicking and striking game and transitioning karate to kickboxing, kickboxing to mixed martial arts, finding the right stances, right kicks, right techniques for the striking. I think that's something that attracts one of the best fighters to come and train with me and take something from here, you know. Because what I find for mixed martial arts, it's not came just like that. For all you just mentioned the over 30 years of experience I was concentrating and practicing the all different striking sports. I've been practicing there a lot of high level boxing trainings as well. Kickboxing, Dutch style kickboxing in Thailand, Muay Thai karate in different style. There is a Kyokushin, there is Gojurus, there is Shito rider, there is Shotokan, all that different type of karate. So that kind of gave me the ability to help other fighters find real or find for them the real and right techniques, plan their strategy for the fights. And not only in MMA obviously in kickboxing and Muay Thai fights as well. I think that's a smart thing to come here and hang out with us and train. I think that's, that's why they figured it out by themselves know because we just opened it's been only like 15 days.
A
15 days. And there was like five UFC fighters here, champions here. 15 days. And they're coming. I heard them talking and they're, they're driving like an hour, two hours.
B
Many of them, yeah.
A
And how many hours was the training session?
B
Like it was two hours.
A
They come for two hours and they train and they're going to train again because these people are training in the middle of the day. So they're all professional fighters.
B
Do some, yeah, a lot of. Most of them they have a fight coming up. Like. Yeah, one kid has in two weeks, the title fight coming up. Another. Yeah, 15 days, three weeks, UFC fight, four weeks, UFC fights. All packed.
A
Yeah, it's amazing. I mean I, I just come here and I see all these shredded dudes just like fighting in the middle of the day. It's like they're all fighting coming up. It's just, I've never seen that. I've never seen, saw professional fighters in their element training in their training camps here. And they're just, you know, and I'm like, it's 12 o'.
B
Clock.
A
You know, these guys are all pros. It's not like it's a, it's people either work out in the morning, they're not here for a workout.
B
They had their workout, they're going to go now, take a little nap and in one more hour they're going to do the same thing in different place for conditioning or something, anything like that.
A
Unbelievable. It's so cool. At 15 days now you're attracting. I mean, what is it going to be like here? Cuz you're in a prime location. This is the first time I've ever seen like a, this is like a fight camp area. And it's in the most famous part of Newport beach, right on Newport Boulevard. So you're getting a million views a day. Probably more than a million views a day. Yeah, you're going to get, you know, every probably 10 seconds there's some UFC fighter being turned on to this place. I foresee this place as being like a hub for the world elite athletes coming because there is nothing like this. And we're in the most prime real estate on the planet.
B
It's gonna be fun that where professional high level fighters and serious kids can get together in the same mat, get the same energy, get experience. For kids from professional stars that are around on tv. And for all that professional fighters, it will be more like unique place because in the backyard we're building the Ice Pass sauna, some private area for the gym as well. So. So say there is a. Someone has a special camp and we don't want nobody to see the training that will be in that room.
A
So you can have like the world famous like number one champion in the back. Nobody knows he's here.
B
We're probably gonna direct him here as well because all the kids are gonna have fun to share that little energy. You know, it's always good, good to see someone who's role model but yeah, yeah, will be something really special there in the behind.
A
I love the idea that you've made it like with a focus on the children, you know, like because you got the pros coming in the afternoons, training in the middle of the day, the, the world elites and then you got kids in the evenings.
B
You know my challenge, what's my challenge in reality? You know how lately last 25 years around Karvate has a bad reputation around that. You see the very young age kids with the black belt and most of them, they don't know how to use it. And let's say some incident happens and they cannot defend themselves. You watch karate tournament and it's all about belt or not all of them, but most of them, you know. So I'm trying to bring real traditional karate back again. So my, my challenge is to get that Japanese traditional martial arts back to popularity and teach them the real karate in general. This is what I want to bring because you see there's so many Jiu jitsu gyms around here and so popular become. Right. And imagine that we bring the karate back again in the same, same popularity with the right instructors, right sensei's, then this kid's gonna be.
A
I was talking with a dad actually who's at our Jiu jitsu gym that you know, Jiu jitsu now is the karate of like the 90s.
B
Yeah.
A
You know where there was a karate gym on every corner?
B
Yeah, yeah. And in my country back then it was no, it was even illegal to train karate. My parents and their brothers and cousins, they would train karate into the separate, like the closed area and garages and stuff.
A
The giga kick, it's an up down kick, right?
B
Yeah, it could be.
A
Can we get, can we get a, like a demo of what it looks like?
B
Sure. It's like you're going into the body and then you do the high kick or high to the body.
A
Was there a moment in your career where you had to rebuild mentally, not just physically to keep going? You really had to just get through that barrier mentally because this is a very taxing sport?
B
Yeah, multiple times. You know, like the first thing I got married when I was 18. I was a world champion in karate. And I'm like, hell, what I'm going to do, you know, I don't want to be just a. Back then I wanted to be a fighter. And karate would not pay any salary back. So I had to figure out what to do. So I moved in Holland. I moved in Netherlands to join the kickboxing team and learn kickboxing and. Because back then there was a league called K1 and K1 would pay some money. So that fight that was always like. I mean it was mentally tough, but because I had a new wife, she was pregnant very soon as well and we had the baby on the way. We moved in city called Breda first and then later in Amsterdam. All that things like fights were like only €200 they would pay. So I had to fight Friday. I would for fight Saturday and Sunday to survive every other weekend, you know, so wow. We would. I would fight in Belgium, in Germany and in Holland and travel around in close by countries. So after time to time I made my name there.
C
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B
And everything changed. And. Yeah, there was many ups and downs with it. Besides that my mom had health issues while I was in Holland and was really hard to be there and support my mom somehow. Right. And then she passed away from cancer. That's another. The big change was in my life. I was very young, I was 24. And then that was a time that kind of destroyed a lot in my life. Then was another big change. We moved from Georgia. So from Holland we moved to Georgia and from Georgia we moved back in US My wife was like, again, we're gonna do this again. We settled in Holland. Finally we're good, everything is great. And now we're going in the US but actually she. She actually loved that idea as well. Because moving to the U.S. yeah, first I traveled here, I came down. I was invited from one of Philadelphia's boxing gym to start boxing career. But I checked out Philadelphia, traveled in New York and D.C. and last stop was LA and when I came in Cali, I was like, that's the right place to come. The weather is a big game changer, you know.
A
So what's the weather like in Georgia?
B
Oh, in Georgia, we got the great four season. We have a very nice summer, hot. We got beautiful autumn and spring when the nature is changing, not cold or something like that. And we have winter when sometime has some snow in the city, but nothing crazy. It's not like Russia, like freezing and stuff. Not like that. We have a mountain in, you know, Caucasus Mountain that you can go and have skiing. And it's beautiful snowboarding. It's amazing. Like, whoever lives close by, all the regions, they know that that's the skiing resorts are in Georgia. So while we have a Black Sea, we also have a mountain as well.
A
Yeah, I mean, it sits right on the ocean, on the Black Sea.
B
It's very nice. Yeah.
A
So what was that transition? You know, moving from a beautiful place like that, then you're coming over to these random states in the US finally landing in the most beautiful part of America in Newport Beach. But then before that, you know, the transition, like, did it feel like a downgrade? Like, did America feel like the place that you wanted to be?
B
Yeah, that was really different because we loved Europe, we loved Amsterdam. When we moved first, we slowly worked, we worked on the seven years to settle well there. And we were very happy in the end. And somehow something didn't click. You know, I was already one of the biggest name in kickboxing in my weight division category. But price wise, that was not what I dreamed of. You know, I wanted something much bigger and I felt like some talent I was wasting into something different because financially, to even till today, kickboxing, it's not same what it used to be 20 years ago in Japan. Yeah.
A
Now you're known as one of the most technical fighters in the ufc. What does, what does elite level striking demand that fans don't fully understand? Because what I witnessed right now from your striking was like, that was crazy. I don't think fans really understand what it takes to be an elite level striker.
B
You gotta know so much. You have to train a lot and get a lot of experience of, you know, the boxing. The one thing kicking is another thing mixing up these two things. Let's say you are a good kicker, but you're not a good boxer, or you're a good boxer, you're not good kicker. You can use the your hands to distract your your opponent and then get benefit from kicks and then mixing up again and it's all like, all that mixing the combination, mixing hand to hand, knees and whole leg. It's very. Something that people don't understand how much it takes to get like a habit, you know? Yeah. People train like 10,000 kick and they do well, this or good boxing forever. But just put the boxer into the MMA or kickboxing and you'll see how quick they gonna fail it. Or someone who's, let's say, Taekwondo fighter, you bring in kickboxing and even a karate fighter who goes straight to kickboxing without experience, they fail it very quick. So mixing up all the techniques is something that takes time. And people don't understand. Today how much it takes. It's all about experience.
A
So, yeah, I mean, people are now not valuing striking as much, you know, as they as ground and pound type of stuff. You know, they want the. There. It's all the. I think there's a resurgence now in striking. And really that's, you know, if fans witness the ufc. I mean, I think striking is obviously the. The most entertaining, most exciting.
B
Definitely most entertaining.
A
And we were just having that discussion, like, for kids, it's obviously the most like, exciting for them to do it versus, like, you know, the technicalities behind jiu jitsu. And a lot of the fans don't, don't understand how technical jiu jitsu is and how much brain power goes into it versus, like striking. It's like the same. We see punching, we see kicking. It's more fun. We're not looking at the mental chest.
B
Yeah.
A
Even though I know as a striker, it's definitely still mental chest.
B
Yeah. They can still have fun even if they don't have much experience. It's much easier to start baby steps.
A
Now walk us through a real fight camp. Okay. A really high level fight camp. We see these fighters in here right now. What's happening behind the scenes that the public never sees? Because the people are like, fight camp. Like, I don't even know what the heck a fight camp is. Like, what is a fight camp? What's a high level fight camp? What's happening? Like, how do you guys become the ultimate fighters in these camps?
B
Yeah, there are so much that has not really seen on TV or publicly. Like, a lot of times people say that, oh, I don't watch my opponents fight. I don't care. Whoever he is, I'll fight anyone and I'll do this and that. We all watch our opponents fights. We try to learn their skills, what type of shape they are, who they are training. That's Something that kind of helps you to understand that who you will be fighting. Right. A lot of fighters, they have habits that, oh, after they punch, they drop the hand, or after they do left hooks, they do shoot, take down something. So we really study our opponent very well, at least. Like we try high level fighters. That's what we, we got. You know what's one of the most hardest in a camp to stay healthy? Because you come here, you saw it here, and all the MMA gyms, when there are high level fighters, camp going, going on, a lot of times people get injured. So to stay injury free for the whole camp, that's the most challenge.
A
I mean, these weight cuts are gnarly. Like you're probably rolling around 170. You fight at 145 right now I'm 185, so. 185. So you drop £40 for a fight?
B
Yeah, last time I started camp, I was for 191. So 45 pounds over.
A
You're gonna drop 45 pounds for your next fight?
B
Next. Yeah. So far, 40 probably. Yeah. Yeah. You guys gonna not recognize me when I, when I'm, when I make the weight, but next day,
A
what does dropping 40 pounds and you're, you're fit already. Like, what are you gonna do to drop 40 pounds? Because you already train every day, right?
B
Nutrients follow my daily routine, how I told you about my limited breakfast and the right supplements. Train multiple times per day walk, because walking is great for burning the fat. Sometimes you run, you train, nothing happens. You cannot break your weight on the scale. You know, it just doesn't come. It's interesting that just a slower, like, little higher pace walking for 45 minutes to hour could be so much helpful to burn that little fat inside the park. All that makes much easier weight cuts. So we all do that. We try to nap between trainings, otherwise you feel really tired and none of the training will be helpful. So that part, you know, the recoveries are multiple different facilities that we go and use. Do red light therapy. We do hyperbaric chamber CVAC therapy, obviously mechanically. Like some injuries we have, we go see massage therapist and acupuncture and all that stuff. Oh, I forgot in my daily routine when I wake up, I start with ice baths as well. When I'm in a.
A
Start with an ice bath.
B
Yeah.
A
Every morning you put your whole body in ice.
B
Like five days a week, I jump into 40, 40 at least three minutes.
A
You have an ice bath at the house?
B
Yeah.
A
So every morning you start that's. You do do the cold plunge.
B
I do every morning when I'm in a camp.
A
In a camp? Okay. Not normally.
B
Normally I try to kind of relax a little bit, which doesn't last for long.
A
Okay. So walk me through a morning routine during camp.
B
My bedroom, when I sleep, when I'm in a camp, it's sealed and I have an altitude chamber where I sleep every single night. So you come in my bedroom and it's like, like a big tent and you plug it in. There is a big machine generates the altitude. So it's high altitude, over 8,000ft.
A
In your room?
B
Yeah.
A
And do you do your room here? Like, are you leaving somewhere or you're doing it here at your normal house?
B
In the house? In my bedroom, yeah.
A
Wow.
B
They flew. They did all that here. What does it do is like helps me to have benefit of my conditioning. It's like amazing. You say, and I do that every Sometime I sneak out from my tent, but I try to stay there every night.
A
Wow.
B
It's not easy. The first two, three days and then starts your nose kind of sometime bleed. Bleeding depends how we feel. It's like a higher mountain when you go.
A
Yeah. I remember taking my kids just to Colorado on high altitude. They all had bloody noses.
B
There are the fights in Colorado. There are fights in Mexico City when people go there and if they don't used to it, they get tired in one round. And whoever lives there, if they just come from there and fight in Vegas or somewhere else, then those guys get extra cardio boost.
A
It's fascinating. Okay, so you're opening up giga kick now. What kind of culture are you intentionally building inside this dojo? Because we see a culture I love when we chatted the first time, you know, you're the first person to bring like an icon of St. George from Georgia in martial arts theme. I've been driving by this and you know, for a long time and you know, it's the first time I've seen something like this where you're really intentionally building a very unique culture so that
B
this place, as you guys can see, it looks very traditional, very old school Japanese culture influenced same time. I want to bring something from my country, more from my culture, which is based on respect. And we have in our Christianity the St. George, which is like a role model for a lot of people around that. It's what it translates. It's like St. George battling with evil. It's pretty much similar as yin yang in Asian culture. Right. It's like your inner good and inner bad. So you pick Your path, which way you're gonna go. So one of the artists, Jiang Ganlang, he did posters for ufc. He worked for Nike Reebok and is very famous. He flew from New York and stayed here for two weeks. And when he came up with that painting mural, made my. I don't know, like one of the dream come true as well, that I wanted to do something here.
A
I want that painting in my house.
B
Yeah.
A
I want you to fabric, you know, publicize that painting and release it.
B
Yeah, those two things also he came up with. Yeah. And this was later done, so that was a little earlier. And yeah, so that's something that I want to show the kids and teach the kids that everything you guys decide into your head, you want to pick the good or you want to pick the bad. So. And we're going to help the kids to choose why they should pick the good ones, you know, so that's what I'm trying to build. The way this gym is gonna run, it's not gonna be just a gym. It's. We call it dojo, where when they come, they do bow, and when they leave from here, they do the same thing. It will be about respect everything here and respect the higher balls and alders and trying to share the knowledge. I think we're gonna do something really great.
A
I believe it. I think it's gonna be something really special. Now I have a couple last questions for you. What's a personal goal that you have for yourself this year? What's a family goal that you have for your family? And what's a business goal that you have for Giga kick?
B
Personal goal. Your personal goal, besides the business wise and this gym to make successful is to get my sports career get going back again. I have to come back with a nice, nice W. That's something that I'm looking for. About you say the family dream.
A
Family goal. Business goal.
B
Family goal.
A
Personal goal. Family goal.
B
Family goal. I mean, family goals. It's very simple, right? It's torture. Who's studying high school and make her see success at school. At the moment, my son plays football, trains here. So we want to see some competition. We want him to make it. Actually, I want to see him happier, you know, happy. He's already very happy and even happier in the future. So it's something that I'm not really pushing to him. He picked the side that he wanted to train here. So I'm happy to see his. What he stands for and what he wants to do and for my wife. Together we have, you know, I Think we made the one of the dream come true, that we started the business here together. He is the main author of this dojo that looks like this Japanese style, very minimalistic. And she's very involved in pretty much everything, marketing to sales to all the stuff. And in general, I kind of see that family dream is like more business dream at this moment, for this year to get the gym going, get multiple members in the gym, right. Community and going from there. We'll see what happens.
A
And how about a personal goal for yourself?
B
Personal goal back to 140. Yeah, 145. Yeah, definitely. You know, I'm very God believer person, so I believe every single morning when I wake up and sunshine, something good's gonna happen. So I'm just trusting in God's plan and following it. I don't plan. I mean, I always like to plan it.
A
Just living in positivity.
B
And after this, I'm gonna do my hundred percent, whatever I can do every day. And I know that tomorrow and the day after tomorrow, something good's always gonna come up.
A
Now, last question for you. When you're in front of the pearly gates, what do you think God's going to tell you?
B
I hope not. Too many bad things I'm going to hear about me and I hope I'll hear something, one thing that make me happy, that, oh, I did the right thing. We are all sinners here and we all are working on that to make the way up there with him. So I don't know. I don't know. Probably inside me, I know what I'm doing, good or bad. And hopefully when I go there, I'll be ready to face him. I don't know.
A
That's what we all pray for, man.
B
What about you?
A
You know, when I go and I was just thinking about this, and I think about this every time I ask the question, it's like, is he gonna tell me, well done, good and faithful servant, Is he gonna tell me, like, you could have done better, Like, I give it my best. And I fall every single day, every day fall on my face and I just get back up and I fight again every single day. So when I go, for me, God knows my heart and he knows I exist for one thing and one thing only, to do his work. Yet I fall into the same temptations and the same issues. But I'm here as a servant. That's it. So he's going to tell me and this answer probably changes every time I think about it. And he's gonna tell me, you should have done better. But I'm gonna let you in.
B
I'm gonna let you in.
A
Like, barely. Barely made it.
B
You got your visa.
A
Giga Tikate. If people want to find you or find out more about your charity or get in touch with you, how do they find you?
B
Our website for the gym is called gigakeek.com and besides that that, I run my social media, my personal. And for charity, they can contact me on knockout cancer on Instagram. And we just opened a new account for gym in all social media. Giga Kick as well for the gym. So, yeah, that's it. Very simple.
A
Thank you, guys.
B
Twitter, like the X, it's Gig Chikatsa. And Facebook. Gigachik.
A
Thank you so much, Giga Chikats. Make sure to follow him. Check it out. And check out this gym. It's going to revolutionize martial arts. Let's go.
B
Let's go.
D
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E
And Doug, there's nowhere I wouldn't go to help someone customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual. Even if it means sitting front row at a comedy show.
A
Hey, everyone. Check out this guy and his bird. What is this, your first date?
E
Oh, no. We help people customize and save on car insurance with Liberty Mutual together. We're married. Me to a human, him to a bird.
A
Yeah, the bird looks out of your league anyways.
E
Only pay for what you need@libertymutual.com com Liberty.
A
Liberty. Liberty. Liberty.
Recorded: April 10, 2026
Location: Giga Kick Dojo, Newport Beach
In this episode, Joseph Shalaby sits down with UFC star, world champion kickboxer, and karate specialist Giga Chikadze at the newly opened Giga Kick dojo. Their candid conversation spans Giga’s martial arts journey, the relentless discipline needed at the elite level, his motivation for opening an all-in-one world-class gym, and his philosophy on resilience in and out of the cage. Listeners gain an inside look at the reality behind fight camps, the evolution of martial arts, and the importance of instilling tradition and respect in the next generation.
[00:59–02:38]
[02:40–04:10]
[04:18–07:13]
[08:52–12:34]
[12:34–16:09]
[17:51–19:08]
[19:23–21:14]
[21:30–25:28]
[27:31–30:07]
[30:47–36:06]
[37:09–40:17]
[40:34–42:56]
[43:43–45:42]
On the birth of Giga Kick as a brand:
“Once I got really a lot of success in kickboxing, people started to call this kick Giga's kick… after that there's not only one kick. I do, I do multiple different kicks.” – Giga [13:07]
On blending martial arts disciplines:
“Nowadays you can bring your kid inside and have wrestling and grappling and kickboxing and karate and all that together—they're gonna grow someone like, well, those.” – Giga [08:37]
On Gym Culture:
“This place… looks very traditional, very old school Japanese culture influenced. Same time, I want to bring something from my country, more from my culture, which is based on respect.” – Giga [37:37]
On sacrifice and hardship:
“All that things like fights were like only €200 they would pay. So I had to fight Friday, I would for fight Saturday and Sunday to survive every other weekend…” – Giga [22:07]
On fighting mindset:
“Just living in positivity… I'm gonna do my hundred percent, whatever I can do every day. And I know tomorrow… something good's always gonna come up.” – Giga [43:30]
| Time | Segment | |-------------|-----------------------------------------------------| | 00:59-02:38 | Giga’s morning routine, supplements, early life | | 03:17-04:10 | MMA culture and rise of Georgian fighters | | 04:35-07:13 | His path to UFC, cross-training, proving himself | | 08:52-12:34 | Dream and logic behind Giga Kick gym | | 12:34-16:09 | Rapid success, elite draw, meaning of “Giga Kick” | | 17:51-19:08 | Facility features, focus on youth and pros | | 19:23-21:14 | Reviving authentic karate, martial philosophy | | 21:30-25:28 | Overcoming adversity, effects of personal hardship | | 27:31-30:07 | Striking complexity and misunderstood skillset | | 30:47-36:06 | Inside a fight camp, prep, weight cutting, recovery | | 37:09-40:17 | Dojo culture, respect, St. George mural | | 40:34-42:56 | Giga’s personal, family, and business goals | | 43:43-45:42 | Reflections on faith, legacy, and humility |
This episode offers a rich portrait of a modern martial artist—relentlessly disciplined, yet humble; obsessed with improvement, yet devoted to tradition and community. Giga Chikadze’s journey from Georgia to UFC contender, and now to visionary coach and gym owner, is filled with lessons on perseverance, adaptability, and the power of bringing people together through martial arts.
Find Giga and Giga Kick:
Host: Joseph Shalaby
Guest: Giga Chikadze
End of Episode Summary