Issue 068
October 2010
Court McGee’s drug-using past took him to the brink of death. But he fought back from the depths of addiction to win Ultimate Fighter - and a place at The Pit alongside coach Chuck Liddell.
Court McGee’s vivid and harrowing tales of life as an addict sound so outrageous, they could be pulled from a screenplay for an anti-drugs infomercial.
His personal nadir, for example. Fresh from an initial spell in rehab, McGee was out with friends in a Las Vegas nightclub. He mistakenly thought he could allow himself ‘just one drink’. Four days later he came to his senses, wandering around an unknown house in Iowa with no pants on, trying to score a hit of methamphetamine – ‘crystal meth’.
“It was actually a Long Island ice tea,” recalls McGee of the drink that undid six months of sobriety. This relapse came six months after he’d overdosed and clinically ‘died’ on a hospital gurney. With a startling clarity, he can describe exactly what was in his bloodstream the day he OD’d. “I’d taken seven or eight milligrams of Xanax, $200 or $300’s worth of cocaine, I drank maybe a case of beer, and I’d shot up [heroin] 20 or 30 times that day – and that was a regular day of use, not, ‘I’m trying to overdose.’”
The staggering cocktail of drugs that took McGee to the brink sounds fanciful, but he can assure you it is no embellishment. “You watch these TV shows and think it’s overkill with guys shooting up all day long. It’s not bullshit man, that’s how I lived every day for a couple of years.”
You might wonder how a man who’d been so close to death could find himself hunting the streets of Iowa for meth only six months after being given a second chance at life, but McGee’s addictions ran deep. He was an intravenous drug user. Booze, cocaine, pain killers – you name it, he would take it. And his addiction cost him dearly. “I fucking lost everything. I lost my family, my friends, my jobs, everything. I couldn’t do shit.”
That was over four years ago. McGee’s position in life couldn’t be more different now. He has a family: a wife named Chelsea and a young son, Isaac. He found God, and he’s dedicated himself to the existence of a professional mixed martial artist. It’s an eventful life for a man who’s still only 25 years old.
McGee’s story started early. A keen athlete in high school, it was a series of injuries as he entered college that sent McGee into his dark period. “I got a few injuries and had to get some surgeries, and I got hooked on the pain killer,” he recalls. “I wasn’t wrestling because they killed all the wrestling programs in Utah. I was just pissed at the world because of that. I started hanging with the wrong crew and one thing led to another. I started drinking and taking pills, I got into a bit of cocaine, got into a bit of meth… I got into the Oxycontin and pain killers even more, and eventually I got into heroin.”
Losing almost three years of his life to drugs, McGee’s new beginning as an MMA fighter started less than a year after he kicked the habit. Far away from the glitz and glamour of the UFC Octagon, McGee toiled on small shows in Utah, quietly gaining experience and racking up wins. This apprenticeship took its toll though, testing McGee’s resolve. “I fought for two years making no money,” he says. “Some weeks I was working 80 hours a week while I was training for a fight. I fought DeMarques Johnson for $50 to show and $100 to win. I didn’t do it for the fortune or the fame – I did it because I love to fight. Now, the payout from being a UFC fighter and being a TUF winner means there is more money, and I can take care of my family better.”
McGee’s emergence as the winner of TUF 11 ranks as one of his greatest achievements. He can recall any number of low experiences during his time as a user, but name several high points since then without hesitation. “Number one, of course, is my son being born. Then getting married, finding God – and this experience right here, winning The Ultimate Fighter. That’s succeeding – that’s coming from nothing to something.”
His journey from unheralded contestant to overall winner came on one of the most competitive seasons of TUF to date, as McGee was only too aware during the filming. “You saw, they didn’t do anything in the house. Nobody drank for two weeks. Nobody had to be told not to drink or not to party. Everybody was there to fight and win.” McGee even considered a handful of his fellow housemates to have been UFC ready as it was. The high standard of the fighters he was up against saw him narrowly win his first fight and actually lose the second (by a controversial majority decision), thereby eliminating him from the competition. An injury allowed him to step back into the Octagon, and he left no room for questionable calls: three straight submissions saw him crowned the overall winner. Even with the winner’s trophy on his shelf and a contract with the UFC, McGee still doesn’t feel like he’s made it. “This is just the start,” he says.
San Luis Obispo, California is a long way from McGee’s home in Orem, Utah. It’s actually only two states over, but figuratively speaking they’re worlds apart. The laid-back Southern Californian city has less than 50,000 residents. It’s only a 20-minute drive to the beach (“We don’t have a beach in Utah!” says McGee) and it’s home to a very well-known member of the MMA community.
Chuck Liddell was McGee’s team coach on TUF 11. When filming wrapped, he extended an invitation to the young middleweight to join him and train at The Pit, the legendary gym run by trainer John Hackleman and home to Chuck throughout his career. “I spent close to a month there for my camp when I fought Kris McCray in the finale,” says McGee, who lived at Liddell’s house during his time in California. “That shows you what kind of guy he is.”
Training at The Pit’s been a welcome break from Utah. While he’s certainly happy with his home gym back in Orem, the experience of being around such high-level training gave him an insight into how the sport operates at the highest level. Case in point: the quality of the coaches McGee worked with. “Howard Davis Jr, the 1976 Olympic gold medalist, was my head boxing coach. He was hired to help Chuck, and I was able to work with him. We also had Sammie Hensen, he’s the assistant wrestling coach at Oklahoma State – one of the best in the country – and a 1996 silver medalist.” And of course, there was the ‘Pitmaster’ himself, John Hackleman. “I got along with the attitude – John Hackleman has a good sense of humor. And where I came from – I was in such a shitty environment – being around enlightened people... Those guys have got a great sense of humor, they’re just nice people. I got pretty close with them.”
All this has been afforded to McGee by The Ultimate Fighter, and he’s very aware of how lucky he is. “I couldn’t afford to travel and train. I couldn’t afford to get the good coaches. All I have is room to improve.” Another notable figure McGee was able to work with as a result of the show was Jake Shields, who Liddell brought in as a grappling coach during filming. “I got to work with Jake Shields on a daily basis when I was on the show,” says McGee. “I grabbed him every day and went live sparring with him for 40 days. I even went up and trained with him for about a week for his fight with Dan Henderson.”
“I’ve put in over 4,000 hours of work in just over three and a half years,” says McGee, who rattles off his competition experience much in the same way he listed the drugs he had taken on the fateful day of his 2005 overdose. “20 MMA fights, two professional boxing matches, 140 competition jiu-jitsu matches, over a hundred wrestling matches.”
This commitment to development – based, he says, on business models he’s read about – demonstrates his focus as a professional. But beneath the single-minded drive to perform is a true passion for the game and a desire to provide. “I love this sport. I’m 25 years old. I have seven or eight years to really focus. I have a wife and a son and another son on the way.”
The worry, of course, is that as much as McGee achieves, there is always the specter of his past hanging over him. Like they say, once an addict, always an addict. Will his dark past haunt his future?
The answer is a firm no.
“I don’t drink, I don’t take drugs and I don’t party. I’ll go to after-parties, but I don’t blow my money on sh*t like that. I’ve made the amends I had to make. I try to be a better person on a daily basis. I don’t worry about tomorrow or the next day.
“I can’t regret the past. I would never take back the past. Some of the things that happened, I would like to take back, but I can’t – and I can’t sit back and worry about it. If my story can be an inspiration to one person, then all of this sh*t will have been worth it.”
Court McGee spoke to Hywel Teague
