Q1: What’s it like competing in your second Junior World Championships?
Rousey: I’m a lot more nervous this time.  Last time I was so excited, but I also went in there with kind of reckless abandon.  I’d just done the Olympics and the U.S. Open and Rendez-Vous were right before it so I just kind of went out there without expectations.  Now there’s nowhere to go but down, but I usually perform well under pressure. 

Q2: You qualified for the 2002 team, but didn’t take the slot.  Why not?
Rousey: Yeah, I qualified that year at 57kg, but I was what?  Fifteen?  Sixteen?  I don’t believe in going to a tournament if you’re not going there to win it.  It’s why I didn’t go to Paris [for the World Team Championships in September].  I don’t think you should go if you’re not at your best and you’re not going to represent your country well and at that time I wasn’t ready.

Q3: Who do you view as your toughest competition? 
Rousey: Alice Schlesinger from Israel is the girl I lost to at [Senior] Worlds last year.  But I fought her in February in Belgium and really beat her.  There’s a Russian who just won European Juniors who’ll be hard, too, and I tend to have trouble with right-handed Russians.  You’ve always gotta be cautious about the Koreans and the Japanese, too.  And China.  Really you have watch everyone. 

Q4: You’re ranked No. 4 in the world as a senior going into this event. How do you think your experience with older athletes has helped you?
Rousey: I’m more used to a mature style of judo.  Lots of times with juniors they fight kind of randomly without a whole lot of reason why they’re doing what they’re doing.  But none of them have really had a chance to fight me or see me fight.  It’s one thing for your coach to tell you about somebody and how they fight, but it’s another thing to actually get your hands on someone even at a training camp so I think that really helps me.  Also, I’ve never really fought much in junior events.  The biggest thing I’ve fought in besides Junior Worlds was Junior Pan Ams and a lot of these girls just fight mainly junior events.  It’ll be a new group because when I won it I was 17 and everyone else was 19, so all of those girls are gone now.

Q5: You’re training in Montreal now.  How’s that going?  Who are you training with? 
Rousey: I’m training in Montreal at the Shidokan.  It’s great.  Everyone’s been really welcoming and no one’s treated me like an outsider.  They’re always like, ‘How’s your roommate?  Do you need anything?’ They offered to coach me at the Rendez-Vous.  It’s just been great.

Q6: Are you in college there?
Rousey: I’m trying to get into school next semester.  You had to apply in February to get in for this fall, so I missed it, but the European Tour’s broken into two next year so I’ll have time to actually go to class. It’s a long process to get in as a foreign student, but I’m living in the dorms there now and hope to be going there next semester.

Q7: How did you get involved in judo?
Rousey: Well I did swimming before judo, but I just got bored with it.  I wasn’t motivated anymore.  My dad died and that had been one of the things we did together, so I just trudged through it for two more years after that and then I quit.  I was always a hyperactive kid and that’s why I was swimming to get all of the energy out of me.  Then we moved to L.A. and my mom would go to the judo clubs to see all of her friends who she used to train with and I’d come along and try it a little bit.  She really didn’t want me to get into judo because she didn’t want everybody to have really high expectations of me, but her friends were like ‘Awww…  C’mon…’ So she let me do it.

Q8: Is there more pressure on you since your mom [Dr. Ann Marie DeMars] was a World Champion in 1984?
Rousey: No, it’s never been so much like I have to win because my mother did…  It’s so easy to be an American and say, ‘Oh we’re never going to win it’ and just go in with that attitude, but when you have someone who won a World Championship in your house it’s not an unreal thought and you think you actually can do it…  It bugged me more when I was younger, but it’s never been like I have to live up to anyone’s expectations.  My mother also really understands.  She’s knows what it’s like to train and want to win and she’d never say to me: ‘Oh it’s just sports.  Whatever.’ 

Q9: Do you have any pre-match rituals or superstitions?
Rousey: No, not really.  I finished second at my second U.S. Open and I had all of my good luck stuff and everything had gone exactly perfectly all day, but I still lost in the final.  Then the next week was the Rendez-Vous and everything went wrong.  It was like I woke up late and then kicked the black cat under the ladder and I won it.  Anytime I’ve had trouble making weight and have to get up early and run before I weigh I’ve always won later.  If anything, my only superstition is that something has to go wrong because if everything goes too perfect then I worry that something bad’s going to happen later. 

Q10: What do you listen to before a match?
Rousey: I don’t really listen to anything right before a match.  I’m not Bobby Lee [No. 1 Junior at 73kg] who practically bows in with his headphones on (laughs).  I have music, but it’s not usually a “pump-up list” because I don’t like to be totally psyched up right before I fight.  I like to be more relaxed so I usually listen to fun stuff like “It’s Tricky” by Run DMC, but if I listen to anything it will be lighter, not like Rage Against the Machine or anything.

Q11: Favorite foreign country to train in?
Rousey: My favorite place to train is Castelldefels in Spain.  It’s this judo club that’s in a big tent thing with a window that looks out to the ocean.  It’s just beautiful and sometimes I got thrown because I’d just be looking out the window going, ‘Look it’s the ocean…’  But it’s beautiful there.  I just love beach towns and there’s no pressure.  You’ve got some of the best people in the world there, but it’s really laid back and you all train hard, but then go out together at night.  They only have the camp once a year because it’s not a year-round training center or anything, so I was really mad I missed it this summer.

Q12: What are your long-term goals?
Rousey: Win the Olympics.  Graduate college.  I’d like to become a physio – work in physical therapy.  I think that would be fun.  Then have kids who will all do left-handed judo and they’ll have some wicked armbars. 

Q13: Speaking of armbars, that’s become kind of your trademark.  Is that how you prefer to win? 
Rousey: I don’t have a preferred way to win, I just like to win however I can.  I mean I always like throwing people for ippon because it’s a big, pretty way to win, but really I’ll win however I can whether it’s a throw or an armbar or a shido [penalty] as long as I win in the end.

Q14: If we made a movie called “The Ronda Rousey Story” tomorrow, who would play you?
Rousey: Definitely Julia Stiles because everyone says I look like her.  It would be pretty cool if Natalie Portman or Drew Barrymore played me, but just for looks I’d say Julia Stiles.  I don’t know how tough she is, but we’d have her hit the weight room to buff her up.

Q15: What’s the wallpaper on your computer?
Rousey: It used to be my little sister Julia getting kissed by a dolphin in Hawaii, but my boyfriend lives in Portugal and he just came to visit, so it’s a picture of us kissing on the subway. 

Q16: A new boyfriend, huh?  Is he a judo player too?
Rousey: Yeah, he’s actually ranked 8th in the world at 66kg.  Pedro Diaz from Portugal.  I’m actually going out to Portugal to train after Junior Worlds and then I’m going to Sweden for a tournament and then a training camp right after that and then I’ll go back to Portugal so that’ll be fun.  It’ll probably be two-a-day trainings, but still it’ll be fun and they’re going to design a workout program for me.

Q17: Junior Worlds is the 12th through the 15th.  What day do you actually compete?
Rousey: Friday.  The 13th.  Oh my God I’m competing on Friday the 13th!  There we go.  That’s my unlucky thing.  Knock on wood.  That is something I do do a lot that’s superstitious.  Knocking on wood.  And when I can’t find wood I knock on my head!  (Laughs)

Q18: Advice for up-and-coming juniors?
Rousey: Just not to get frustrated.  I never won the Triple Crown [three consecutive junior national events held each summer] because I never really thought it was that big of a deal.  If you love the sport, just keep doing it.  Don’t get down on yourself if you lose junior nationals or something.  Just keep training and fighting your best and as long as you’re still having fun, keep doing it.