Ultimate Fighter Season 10 Q&A with Justin Wren

By Dave Carpinello

The Ultimate Fighter Season 10's Justin Wren (Team Evans) will be doing a Weekly Q&A for the Readers of PDG. Justin will give his answers to your questions weekly beginning on Oct. 8th. Thanks Again to Justin for taking the time. Make sure you catch this week’s episode on SpikeTV Wednesday Night!

Here is some background information on Justin Wren:


Record (10-1) 6’3”, 22 years old. Born and raised in Fort Worth, Texas where he trained with Travis Lutter. Justin was a two-time national wrestling champ in high school and he turned down a full scholarship at IowaStateUniversity to pursue MMA. His first two MMA fights were as a fill-in for a sick friend. Raised in a conservative family, Wren hid his UFC tapes from his parents as he got into the sport. Has fought and trained full-time for the last three years.

Questions regarding Episode 5:

1. Up 5-0 at this point what was the Team chemistry like?

Justin Wren – “The team chemistry was great, we couldn’t have had a better team at this point in the show for sure. Matt “The Rat” Mitrione was the only real bad apple we had so far but we didn’t let his attitude affect the team. Besides that weak link we were very excited at that point up five to nothing. We had great coaches that every fighter loved working with including Roy Nelson who turned his attitude around and was training very hard.”

2. Congrats on the victory. What did you think of the fight?

Justin Wren – “I really appreciate it. I don’t think I would have changed anything other than my striking because I don’t technically think I landed one punch. I am used to ground and pounding my opponents but I really can’t critique my performance because I felt like I did a great job. I was very fortunate to be able to end the fight that quick and easy and move on in the competition injury free. It was awesome and I couldn’t have been happier at that time.”

3. As a female fan of fighting, I wanted to know why did you choose the bright purple panties for your weigh-in?

Justin Wren – “Hopefully you appreciated it. I used to wear stuff like that back in my high school wrestling days when I was a 2-time national champion. It was hard to find tough competition in Texas at the state tournament so I wore funny underwear to the weigh-ins to spice it up a little. I wore a pink thong my junior year and a leopard one my senior season. I toned it down a little for national TV and bought a pair of manties before I went on the show. I take my fights seriously but until I flip that switch anything goes.”

4. Why was Matt Mitrione not interested in fighting?

Justin Wren – “I think that Matt “The Rat” had some arterial motives and that he was playing some sort of game in the house. Apparently it was working for him because he has gotten tons of air time so far; whether it is good or bad, everybody knows who he is. That was probably his main motivation but he also wanted the fights that the coaches had picked to be changed up. Matt is just looking for attention and as Rashad put it he is just a “Drama King”.”

5. It sure looked like Rampage and his coaches gave little support to their fighters after they lost. What was your impression?

Justin Wren – “I absolutely have to agree with you. I heard Rampage saying it was the editing but even though his fighters liked him; look at the last TUF he was on and his record was 1-7. From the day I got there I knew I didn’t want to be on his team and I don’t think it has anything to do with the editing. He really did just ditch his fighters and to be honest he is no coach. I was really fortunate to be on Rashad’s Team.”

6. You had previously fought on the same card as Wes Sims about 2 years ago; did you think about that at all?

Justin Wren – “Yes I did and I have seen Wes Sims fight quite a few times; I have been a hardcore MMA fan since I was 13 years old. I didn’t want to be a Dallas Cowboy when I was growing up; I wanted to be a UFC Fighter. So I was familiar with how Wes likes to use antics in his fights and that fight in particular he put hands up like he was going to tap gloves and Wes ended up punching him when guy went to tap. I knew he was a nutcase so I wanted to finish our fight before he had a chance to distract me.”

7. You had also beaten a guy who beat Sims. Were you thinking about those game plans when getting ready for this fight? You must have been very confident going into this fight.

Justin Wren – “Yes, I knew I had fought a common opponent before so when they asked me to fight Wes I was very confident because I beat the guy who beat him rather quickly as well. I asked for either Marcus Jones or Wes because they were the biggest guys on Team Rampage and if I went in there and beat one of them as a 22 year old kid, I would make a big statement on national TV. So yes the fact that I beat a guy who beat Wes twice gave me a lot of confidence going to the fight”

You can submit your questions for Justin Wren HERE and he will answer them each Thursday following the next show on Spike TV!