Rener Gracie Talks Training CM Punk, Punk Joining MMA

Rener Gracie, the husband of former WWE Diva Eve Torres and member of the legendary Gracie family, recently spoke to MMAFighting.com. One of the topics that came up during the interview was CM Punk, a close friend of Gracie. Through the years, Gracie has trained Punk in jiu-jitsu, continually tracking his progress.

Gracie talked about training with Punk in California from time to time:

“He’s showing up for two weeks at a time, training exclusively with me, 100 percent, then he’s out. Then he comes back six months later. So, there’s not been enough consistency to concern ourselves with belts. But man, he’s remarkable. He’s in the top tier of students that I’ve ever worked with as far as his retention ability goes — his athleticism and his ability to train for long periods of time, because he’s very resilient and very athletic.”

“I don’t know what he wants to do with it, where he wants to take it. I just enjoy the process and having students as dedicated as him.”

Additionally, he hit on Punk potentially getting more involved with MMA or jiu-jitsu:

“CM Punk is a very unique individual in that he obsesses with things very easily and when he commits and he obsesses with something he goes for it 100 percent. Like we’ve seen over the years with his success in the WWE, when he applies himself he finds a way to make it work.”

“In MMA? I don’t know — I’ve only been working jiu-jitsu with him, and he’s still very new to jiu-jitsu.”

“Because when he was with the WWE it’s hard to get with him more than every couple of months. But man, he hasn’t mentioned anything to me. It’s just a matter of whether he applies himself or not. He can be very good. In jiu-jitsu, he’s known to be very fast.”

Continuing, Gracie said Punk for sure has the dedication to make it in MMA, if he so chose:

“Absolutely, without a doubt, if he wanted to apply himself to any skill, he would have to apply himself like he does to jiu-jitsu to the other arts as well to make sure he’s well-rounded. But this is something completely speculative that I know nothing about. For now it’s just jiu-jitsu 100 percent.”

Punk has been linked to UFC due to Dana White making it known that he is open to talking to Punk. In fact, on Dec. 6, Punk and White will reportedly chat at “UFC 181.”

Check out the entire interview, here.