From the ages of 17 to 20, Georges St-Pierre worked three jobs, attended school like all young people his age, and trained in mixed martial arts. Five hours of sleep a night was enough for him.
He thus took courses in natural sciences at CEGEP, held a position in a youth center for juvenile delinquents, worked in a store specializing in floor coverings and acted as a bouncer at the legendary nightclub Le Fuzzy in Brossard, in the suburbs of Montreal.
To this day, he is still proud of having obtained his flooring specialist certificate.
Hard work eventually led him to the UFC, where St-Pierre won two titles and set numerous standards of excellence in the octagon. And on Thursday, the 42-year-old fighter was inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame.
St-Pierre announced his retirement from sport in February 2019, after being crowned champion in two different categories and compiling a record of 26-2-0, notably boosted by a 13-game winning streak. His successes inside the cage, brought about by hours of meticulous training, helped mixed martial arts gain popularity in Canada, allowing the UFC to begin its expansion across the globe. .
He doesn’t regret anything.
“In terms of my career in mixed martial arts, I’m happy and I’m satisfied,” he said in an interview Thursday. I wanted to be champion. I wanted to change something in this sport, particularly in terms of sports doping. I succeeded because people see this sport differently today. I wanted to change people’s perception of fighters.
“And I also wanted to leave at the top and enjoy a healthy retirement, which I did,” added the friendly Quebecer.
St-Pierre remains the record holder for most defenses of his UFC welterweight title (nine), and for the total length of his reign in this category (2,064 days).
He bounced back from each of his losses, first defeating welterweight champion Matt Hughes, then defeating Matt “The Terror” Serra in a championship bout. Then, in 2017, after a nearly four-year break from his sport, he returned to the arena in a higher weight class and dethroned middleweight champion Michael Bisping. He then had to give up his belt a month later, citing health problems (ulcerative colitis), and never set foot in the octagon again.
“He is the most famous athlete to come from Canada, and one of the greatest mixed martial arts fighters of all time,” UFC President Dana White previously said.
But “GSP’s” career isn’t just limited to the octagon.
He plays a role in the film The Cage which will be released later this year on Netflix. The story revolves around a young mixed martial arts fighter who finds advice from the character played by St-Pierre, whom the Quebecer himself compares to Apollo Creed in the Rocky film series.
“It will be a bit like (the series) Entourage, in mixed martial arts,” St-Pierre explained.
He also owns the Pur Sang vodka brand, a BaseBlocks home workout program, a line of nutritional supplements called Warrior and is an ambassador for Bet99, a sports betting site, among other things.
And as if that were not enough, St-Pierre is also involved in various philanthropic works. The objective of the Georges St-Pierre Foundation is very simple: to put an end to bullying among young people and to promote physical activity in schools. These themes are dear to the eyes of the man from Saint-Isidore, himself a victim of bullying when he was young.
St-Pierre was inducted into Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame along with 10 others, including skaters Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir, captain Randy Ferbey’s curling team, wheelchair basketball player Danielle Peers, the late softball coach Phyllis Bomberry, judo coach Hiroshi Nakamura and lacrosse pioneer Oren Lyons, among others.