Coach: Silva a ‘Terrible Fight’ for Griffin

Sherdog.com: You work with three of the best middleweight fighters in the world -- Paulo Filho, Ronaldo Souza and Anderson Silva. When will Filho return to the ring?
Distak: He’s going to fight in Dream’s light heavyweight division. He’s just waiting to find out his next opponent. He already requested a fight in the 205-pound division, where I believe he operates much better. Jacare has been a very important person in helping Filho. Some days, we train hear at the X-Gym in the morning, then have lunch and drive almost 100 kilometers to train with Filho in Niteroi, Brazil, where he likes to train. To drive 200 kilometers [round trip] to help a friend definitely shows Jacare has a great attitude.

Sherdog.com: Can you break down Jacare’s middleweight title fight against Jason "Mayhem" Miller at Dream 9 on May 26?
Distak: I can say Jacare is 100 percent prepared. He’s been training hard with us for the last six months; we actually have to slow him down. He helped a lot with Anderson’s ground training for the fight with Thales. Many people though that if Thales took Anderson down, he’d submit him. During the fight, Anderson recaptured the guard and tried a triangle when he got taken down. That resulted from months of training with Jacare, [Andre] Galvao, Feijao and Master Sylvio Behring. If you ask me to make a prediction, I’d say Jacare will win by knockout.

Sherdog.com: What’s special about your four main fighters?
Distak: With Anderson Silva, the whole world can see his skills, but what impresses me more about him is how much he cares about his family. When he’s not training, he’s always thinking about his family. Paulo Filho is a dog man; he needs dogs in his life. I’ve never seen a guy who loved dogs so much. Today, he has 24 dogs at his house; he used to have 70. Feijao is the best 205-pound fighter in the world. He just needs a chance to prove that. He’s complete. I don’t see anyone beating him at his weight -- in the UFC, Strikeforce, Dream or any other promotion. Jacare has proven he’s among the best jiu-jitsu and submission fighters in the world. In training with us, he has shown many other qualities, like amazing explosion, an impressive striking evolution and a great will to fight for his dreams.

Sherdog.com: Forrest Griffin said Jacare was one of his best sparring partners when he was at Xtreme Couture. Randy Couture sees Jacare as a man who could possibly defeat Anderson. What’s the secret to getting top guys like Jacare and Anderson to train every day without getting injured?
Distak: To start with, I have them train at full speed, like real MMA, but as the fight gets closer, I avoid real vale tudo contact between guys like Jacare, Feijao and Anderson. We use other means of sparring, so we can extend their training into different areas. If we put a camera inside the academy to see our training at the beginning, fans would get the chance to see amazing MMA fights. Actually, it might be a good idea to make it a pay-per-view.

Sherdog.com: As you approach the end of Jacare’s training camp, when will you start to prepare Anderson for UFC 101?
Distak: We’re going to Japan on May 20. Right after the Jacare fight on May 26, we’ll go to America, where Anderson and Feijao will have already started training for Forrest Griffin. Paulo Filho is also coming with us. Jorge Guimaraes and Ed Soares, who manages Anderson, opened an MMA training center in Los Angeles. Feijao and Anderson will be training there.

Sherdog.com: What’s your main goal as a trainer?
Distak: Our goal is to have two champions [in America] and two [in Japan]. In Dream, we have Paulo Filho at 205 and Ronaldo Jacare at 185. In the U.S., we have Anderson Silva at 185 in the UFC, and we want to conquer the 205-pound class in Strikeforce with Rafael Feijao. We’re working really hard for that.