Issue 084

January 2012

Exclusive: inside Tito Oritz’s Huntington Beach man cave

UFC president Dana White said in a recent post-fight interview that in little more than five years the promotion has made at least 20 fighters “multi-millionaires” – and although he didn’t mention any names, former UFC light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz most likely would have to be included in that group. 

Ortiz, 36, who defended the light heavyweight crown longer than any other champion, maximized his earning by unleashing his former persona, ‘The Huntington Beach Bad Boy,’ a brash trash-talker who backed it up with punishing ground ‘n’ pound. Ortiz was the first UFC fighter who developed an image – from his bleach-blond hair, to his flame-bordered board shorts, to his half-Mexican, half-American flag. And, let’s not forget, the gravedigger routine and the crazy post-fight T-shirts. 

Ortiz then parlayed that image into a successful clothing line, Punishment Athletics. Growing up poor and homeless to heroin-addicted parents, Ortiz, now known as ‘The People’s Champ,’ said he wants to provide his three children “everything I never had as a kid,” while also “kind of spoil myself a little bit.” 

INTERIOR 

Inside Ortiz’s Huntington Beach home, with its rich cherrywood finish, which Tito admits is “like a castle,” there are several flat-screen televisions. There is a 60-inch in the living room, a 55-inch in the master bedroom, and three 42-inch TVs in the guest rooms. Each is equipped with a Blu-ray player, and a DirecTV hook up.

For entertainment, he competes via Xbox Live, using the best Titan headset money can buy. “Modern Warfare, that’s all I play,” he admits. “You can interact with people across the whole world… It’s pretty realistic for a war game.”

As for his favorite movies, perhaps not surprisingly, Ortiz digs a couple of classic gangster flicks, “Goodfellas and Casino are both great movies,” he says, along with the seminal Jean-Claude Van Damme work Bloodsport, and the acclaimed American success story, Forrest Gump.

When it comes to music, Tito has two genres in particular which satisfy his musical tastes: rock and rap. For rock, he likes the band Korn, who he has become friends with over the years. “I know the band really well; they’re great live.” He even made a cameo in Korn’s video for Got the Life. And as for rap, he likes The Black-Eyed Peas, again, as a perk of his stature and gregarious personality, he knows two members of the group personally, will.i.am and apl de ap. “They make unreal music… I saw them at the iHeartRadio Show in Vegas, they were awesome,” he adds.

VEHICLES

If you were able to afford a fleet of vehicles, you’d probably want a luxury vehicle, a high-end SUV and maybe a sports car. Ortiz has all that in his fleet, with most of the vehicles customized in one way or another. The first car he mentions is a Rolls Royce Phantom, white with tan interior, equipped with 26-inch Giovanni rims. 

One of Ortiz’s two SUVs is a cream Cadillac Escalade EXT, with a totally re-done interior by A&G Custom Sound and Auto Accessories in Los Angeles. “The guys at A&G installed TV monitors in the dash, behind each headrest and one that pops down from the ceiling for passengers. Rounding out the Escalade are 26-inch Lexani rims.” Ortiz’s second SUV is a white Range Rover, with white interior and 24-inch Lexani rims. Nice.

Filling the sports car role is a Maserati Quattroporte, gun-metal gray on the outside, with a gray interior. “It’s a fast, fast car,” Ortiz admits. “I get back and forth to Vegas really quick.”

WATERCRAFT

When your backyard doesn’t have a pool, because he’s got the Pacific Ocean behind him, which he accesses by a 55-foot dock in his backyard. Calling himself an outdoorsman, Ortiz reveals: “That’s where I like to spend my spare time, when I have any,” he said. His favorite thing to do outdoors? “Fishing for yellowfin tuna and white seabass around Catalina Island aboard his 38-foot Fountain powerboat,” he reveals, “it’s equipped with three 275-horse power engines.”

ATTIRE

“There’s two things that I have a lot of – Armani suits and Punishment clothing,” Tito says. He also admits to wearing True Religion jeans, then says: “Next thing I’ll probably make is some denim, for Punishment Athletics.”

CELL PHONE

With dozens of smart phones now on the market, Ortiz’s cell of choice is a HTC Sprint, on which he watches movies and shows, and listens to music. As far as apps, he uses Pandora, and a new app called Sleep as Android, which monitors his sleep patterns.

As far as what the future holds, Tito readily admits that he will fight two more times in the UFC before retiring. Most days, he can be found at his Punishment Training Center, which he opened earlier this year, where he teaches classes. He firmly believes in being hands-on as an owner, not just attaching his name to the marquee and never showing up, but interacting with his clients on a weekly basis: “It makes all the difference,” he says.

He’s also keen to delve into acting a little further. He played a minor role in controversial Turkish film, Valley of the Wolves: Iraq, which is about a Turkish commando team sent to Iraq to track down the US military commander responsible for the interrogation of a group of Turkish soldiers. The movie features a host of – you guessed it – Turkish actors, along with Gary Busey and Billy Zane. “My character, he didn’t believe in what they (US troops) were doing and he actually got killed for fighting back,” Ortiz reveals. “I got paid a pretty penny for it, [but] I never got a chance to see it myself.”

Ortiz said he also has a role in an episode of CSI: NY, where he plays a fighter suspected of killing another guy. And although he’s had a few bit roles over the years, he plans to take acting lessons so he can land some bigger parts once the gloves are finally hung up. “Acting, that’s my next step, I believe,” he said. And with Tito’s track record who would bet against him succeeding on the silver screen as prolifically as he once did inside the Octagon.