© Marc Wickert
www.knucklepit.com
Anaconda light-heavyweight representative, Alex Schoenauer, has one of the most diverse backgrounds in mixed martial arts. And the more you talk to Alex, the more you think you're dealing with a modern-day character dreamed up by Samuel Clemens. Here Schoenauer takes time out to tell us a little bit about his colorful and adventurous past.
At the time of this interview, Alex is on his cell phone in Las Vegas, talking from an events center while waiting for the MMA fights to get underway. There's a lot of noise from the crowd around him, as the Argentinean-born athlete explains what prompted him to leave home at 15 years of age and start a new life in Idaho.
"The school system in Argentina wasn't doing much for me; I wanted to read and write in English, so I decided to move to the States to study. I initiated the move and my older brother also immigrated to America. But we went our separate ways when we arrived here. My grandfather lived in Idaho; however, after a short time I relocated to Washington State to attend high school," says Schoenauer.
It was whilst studying at Washington State that Alex pursued his love of sailing, and enrolled at the US Coast Guard Captains School. "In Argentina, my parents used to do a lot of fly fishing, and at a young age, I used to guide for my dad. While in high school, my summer job was to guide fly-fishing in Alaska. But to run a boat up there you required a six-pack license, which is like a basic coast guard license to run a motorboat in salt rivers and lakes.
"So every time I went up there, I progressed to a better certificate qualification until I got my one-hundred-ton master's certificate for unlimited passengers, which was a captain's license. This lead to my taking a job on private yachts."
By now, most people would be sitting back and feeling pretty happy with what they'd achieved in life – particularly at such a young age. But this was just the beginning for Alex: "After I graduated from high school, I moved to Montana to attend college, and I always liked rugby and contact-type sports. But when I finished playing football, I looked for something else to do and found Olympic powerlifting.
"Then a buddy of mine was doing some type of fighting, and he took me along. I watched it and I thought that would be cool, because with a team sport, it's always: 'Blame it on somebody else,' or 'He didn't pass the ball.' But with an individual sport, it's all on you.
"As a kid, I grew up on Bruce Lee and Jackie Chan movies. I always liked martial arts. But going to karate or tae kwon do classes doesn't really teach you what MMA does. So when I started learning MMA – with arm bars, chokes, submissions… I really liked it. And you can learn a lot of stuff in a short period of time doing MMA. That's what kinda got me into it."
Read the full article on Knucklepit.com.
