Elie: How you doin’ Chris?
Chris: Good.

Elie: You fight Elvis next, what are your thoughts on the fight?
Chris: I’m sure Elvis has come a long way since I fought him last time. And you know, I’m not that worried. I think I will be much too physical for Elvis. But mind you I’m still looking forward to the match.

Elie: So what are your predictions on the fight?
Chris: KO… in the first round, it will be nice.

Elie: This is a re-match to your first fight, how did your first fight go?
Chris: To Elvis’ credit there, he’s probably new in the game and I probably had a bit more experience than Elvis. The fight was the fight, you can look back at it, I was never in trouble at all. But if you ask Elvis, I don’t know what fight he was watching. I put my chin in his eye, but I put my chin in a guy’s eye in the fight before too, you know it was all within the rules.

Elie: So what do you think this would do for Australia with the UFC coming down here?
Chris: Oh, here we go. I always knew it would get here and I just think we’re the nation. We really are the fight nation and I think it would really change the way in which we look at the fight sport. Boxing has had its chance and I think, nothing against (Danny) green, but I think that show compared to what the UFC is going to do, it will just show the difference in caliber between the two sports. Boxing has had its own time, its had plenty of time to do what it wants to do and now I think the UFC is going to come through and show what real fight entertainment is about.

Elie: Who are some of the people helping you train for the fight?
Chris: Dan Higgins. What’s interesting is that Dan was a full time student of mine when I was fighting pretty much full time and he come through a program and now here we are, Dan Higgins is now my coach and putting me through the places now on the other side. But I’ve got a lot of faith in Dan. I would class him as probably the best MMA coach in the country. His got a great stable of fighters, he’s had Adrian Pang, Kyle Noke and all those boys come out of there, so it really is a good place to be for me. I feel quite comfortable there; when I come through I am ready to fight.

Elie: You’ve fought huge names in the sport, you are probably one of the most experienced fighters coming out of Australia, what does it mean for you to fight on the UFC card?
Chris: It means everything. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t here. I’m 40 years old, for me to actually get the gloves out and do all that sort of stuff is a big call and UFC in Australia is going to be something we all remember. I guess, particularly in my career a lot of the new age fans wouldn’t even know… who’s this guy, but if you’re a hard core MMA fan over the years they know. I think the fight between Elvis and I has been long in the making, it’s been something that I’m looking forward to it. I don’t know what everybody else is, but I’m looking forward to it.

Elie: Most MMA fans would be looking forward to it. For people who don’t know who you are can you give us a little background?
Chris: My dad jiu-jitsu instructor, traditional jiu-jitsu, all my life he’s been a full time instructor and I can actually say, I don’t think there would be another jiu-jitsu instructor or any martial arts instructor in the country that would have a business structure that he’s set up over the last 40 years. He’s brought up the family, his done the whole lot. I grew up doing it and fortunate enough in my early 20s that I met an American promoter and he set up based in Japan. He gave me a call and said, “hey come on over, I’ve got you a fight”, and I started in an organisation in rings in 1994 or 1995… one of those two years. And there it is, I never stopped I had well and truly 47 fights or something like that, for that organisation and I fought in UFC 38 which it first time went to London and fought a number of times in the States and in Holland. I never said no to a fight, I know people might look at my record, but let’s take Evan Tanner, the UFC rang me with 11 days before the fight and said “do you want to take Evan Tanner on”, yeah I did.

Elie: Most people wouldn’t take it.
Chris: I never said no to a fight ever. It’s like here I go. So obviously there’s a difference, I’ve never chased a record, I’ve chased a fight. And at the end of the day you can pretty it up, don’t come up to me now and say it’s not pretty. You know I’ve fought anyone, it didn’t matter.

Elie: Any last comments?
Chris: At the end of the day, it’s just a great honour to be here and that the UFC would pick me up... you know I can’t thank them enough. It’s something real special for me be apart of and I wish them all the luck.