PFL Hopeful Carson Frei: Separating Life as a Para-Educator and a Fighter

The upcoming PFL Challenger Series 5 card will feature Carson Frei taking on Bruno Miranda in the headliner. While pursuing his dream of signing with the Professional Fighters League, Frei (9-4) works as a para-educator in an elementary school. Frei has won three of his last four fights, and confessed that he had to bear some of the resulting bruises at school sometimes. He discussed concealing the nature of those marks from his students, most of whom don’t know that he’s an MMA fighter.

“There has been a couple of times when I went to school with black eyes, or I had a cut and stitches. Most of the time, I do a pretty good job like, ‘Oh, I was in a bike accident,’ that sort of thing. I really try to keep it separate. Most of the staff know that I’m an MMA professional fighter though. Maybe some [families] would be bothered. It’s hard to tell, I don’t know. Possibly, some might find it kind of intriguing. Basically, I just don’t want anything to take away from their learning or from their school. Maybe having a teacher or someone that helps them out being an MMA fighter, that would be kind of a distraction, you know? I just kind of keep it to myself.”

Frei also talked about how he went from training into a garage to opening his own gym, discussed his plans for the fight, and more.

Timestamps:

(00:00) Intro
(00:25) Working as a para-educator
(01:27) Whether his students know that he’s an MMA fighter
(02:52) Opening up his new gym
(03:50) Training in a garage before opening his gym
(05:00) His main training partners
(06:30) His corner for the fight
(07:00) His path in MMA
(08:10) Studying his next opponent
(09:03) His motivation for the PFL Challenger Series
(10:27) What he expects from that experience
(11:27) His message for Miranda
(11:33) His walkout song
(11:50) Outro

Tudor Leonte started writing about mixed martial arts in 2013 for Italian media outlets. His journey with Sherdog began in 2018 and he now covers One Championship and countless European shows. You can follow him on Twitter @MrTudorLeonte.