Wendy Corr:
Well, hey there folks, welcome to The Roundup. We are a Cowboy State Daily podcast, and we focus on really interesting people in the Cowboy State. And as we kick off this new year, we're in January, we all have these ideas that we're going to do, just a little bit better this year.
Bryan Pedersen is one of those guys that has made it his life's mission to just do a little bit better, but for his community, for his family, for the interests that he's passionate about. And so we are really tickled today to have Bryan Pedersen on as our guest on The Roundup.
And Bryan, Hello, Happy New Year!
Bryan Pedersen:
Yeah, happy new year. Thanks for having me on. I'm excited to be here with you today, Bryan,
Wendy Corr:
This is going to be great. We get ideas from people from either within our staff or or from people outside who say, Hey, you really should talk to this guy. And our staff meeting, and both our editor, Jimmy Orr and our advertising admin, Abby Roich, said, have you talked to Bryan Pedersen? I said, he's not come across my list yet.
Well, this is a great way, a great way, to introduce everybody to Bryan. You live in Cheyenne. You've lived in Cheyenne your whole life. You've taken a few excursions here and there, but you have come back to Cheyenne and you give back to your community. Bryan, tell us about growing up Wyoming. Tell us about Cheyenne of your youth.
Bryan Pedersen:
Well, I'll tell you, born and raised in Cheyenne. I did, the only time I left, of course, I went to the University of Wyoming in Laramie, and then my first two years in finance, I worked in Minneapolis before I had the opportunity to come back here.
And I love being in this community. I love being here. I was, you know, my parents were always so involved in the community. And one thing that you have to understand is we don't know what our lives are like until we are about 19, and then you go to college or go get a job, and you talk to other people and you say, oh, that's the way your house works.
Well, that's the way my house works. And really being involved in the community was something that my parents did when I was little. They've dragged me to fundraisers and board meetings and things. And I just thought that's what everyone does, because you're only living your own life, and you don't realize that when you come out of it.
Maybe not everybody is serving on every board and doing the piece, but it's what drew me into doing. It was the model in which I was raised. I just assumed that we moved forward into it.
Wendy Corr:
Well, you have certainly taken over that role from your parents, no doubt, because you are involved on so many boards and have been involved in everything from chamber choirs to to mix martial arts and combat sports, and that's something we're going to get into here in a little bit. But, but one of the things that struck me when we were just visiting earlier today about what we'd talk about, is you have this phrase that you should date your community, and it's such a unique phrase, and tell me, Bryan, where you got that phrase, and how you live that phrase.
Bryan Pedersen:
You know, I was, my wife and I were co chairs of the United Way with Trent and Tanya Keller and their people in our community. And we were working on fundraising, working on visas, and it's actually one of Tanya's philosophies, is to date your community, as she said one time, several years ago, and it struck me.
And I and I've kind of made it a theme, because when you want a relationship to be better, you date, you do more things, you become more engaged, and you get more out of it. Your community finds ways to help you after you help it a little bit, because they show that you care and they want to be part of helping you, help to help the community.
And I just love the phrase, date your community, and be engaged with it, and find out new ways to help it grow, and it'll help you grow.
Wendy Corr:
I completely agree. I think that's fantastic philosophy. You know, I did say at the beginning that we were going to better ourselves this year. I think that that's a fantastic example. Bryan, tell us about one of your other passions, and one of the things that that was, the first thing that stood out to the people who were telling me about you, is your work with combat sports.
And that is something I know we've not touched on in all of the episodes of The Roundup that we've had so far, is combat sports. How did you get involved in and engaged in boxing and mixed martial arts?
Bryan Pedersen:
Well, I've always liked sports my whole life. And as I got out of college and got out of other ways, you try and figure out, what are ways that I can stay physically fit, you know, and how do you get involved with those things?
And I was looking around and I was looking at ways that I could be working out in a lot of different ways. And it actually started me originally on a path of Muay Thai, which is Kickboxing. It's a traditional Thai kickboxing. I went to Thailand. I fought twice in Thailand. We had a great time.
I transitioned and did some MMA training, and I trained pretty hard for about 12 years or so, and really had a great time and a lot of fun doing it. But in that process, I met a lot of people who were involved in the sport.
And in the middle of all this, I was a state legislator, and I had folks coming to me, and they were saying, you know, the problem with Wyoming is it's an unregulated state. And this is kind of an interesting story, if I can tell you.
Right now, and this is going to be right now, you've got a legislature that's coming in that they want to perhaps slow the growth of government, or not spend money in areas that perhaps aren't prudent or or shrinking government. A lot of different ways that they're going to come at it.
Well, there was a representative from Campbell County. His name was Wallace. He was chairman of the Appropriations Committee. I actually got to serve with his daughter, Sue Wallace on the Appropriations Committee many years later, but in the 1990s he had pledged that he was going to shrink government.
He came down here, went through every agency, every division, and finally got to the point that he just collapsed the boxing commission so he could keep his promise to his constituents. And what happens then is, it doesn't make boxing or MMA or anything illegal, it just makes it unregulated.
And what that means is that you can have your event, but it doesn't count towards your record. So all of the work that you put in to do that, everything that you, all the money, the training, the broken noses, all of it counts towards nothing. As a matter of fact, if you fight in an unregulated state, you can lose your license in a regulated state.
And so at the time, so around 2012, if you kind of look back at the growth of MMA, places like the UFC and many other promoters were running to regulation. They were looking for places to promote fights, because it wasn't all across 50 states. As a matter of fact, just recently, New York only recently became a place that regulates fights. It was one of the last places out there.
So in 2012 we set forward in the state legislature, to create a path for regulation. And it's interesting, because it's one of the only times that an industry has come forward and said, Please regulate us. And so I had a lot of connections in MMA through participating and training and doing things, and I and I came across people who said, let's, let's get this done. And we did.
And what's interesting is, at the time, we became the only, the only MMA, only Commission - we still didn't regulate boxing, because at the time, boxing had no interest in being regulated. Because, remember, there's costs with regulation, because you've got to pay referees and you've got to pay the judges, and you got to pay for the safety and the fighter checks and the blood checks and all the things that come with it.
So they said, We're just not willing to spend the money to do it. So we didn't. We said, well, then we'll just mark you out, and you're not regulated. We're just going to regulate MMA - only that came with them with kickboxing and Muay Thai as well, wanted in that group, and we went along with that.
And we got to, actually to a point where we were growing and we had a lot of events in Wyoming, and then we went forward and had someone contact us to regulate Bare Knuckle boxing. And that's wild, because we had probably 30 to 35 Bare Knuckle boxing matches in Wyoming before it was regulated, because, remember, just because it's not regulated doesn't make it illegal.
So some states banned it because they said, Okay, we're gonna regulate boxing, but only gloved boxing, right? And so you can't have that. Well, we said we're not touching boxing. So we had probably had 35 events unregulated here in Wyoming that we weren't part of.
Well, finally, we had another promoter come in and say, Hey, we want to be regulated. We want to be recognized. Same thing that happened with MMA. And so we reached out to a whole bunch of promoters, and we said, Send us your rules, and we created a uniform set of rules, and we became the first state in the history of the world to regulate and sanction Bare Knuckle boxing.
Wendy Corr:
This is, this is fantastic. I've never heard this story.
Bryan Pedersen:
No, it is. It's really, it's exciting. And what it's become is global now, so we have these bare knuckle matches in London, Dubai and Canada, and we actually send our staff to go and regulate it, because we're the only place that does.
And so a commission can go regulate - now that may have caught maybe a fiscal conservative who's listening, hey, how? Who's paying for this? It's important that, you know, there are no state dollars. When I set up this commission, it was with zero state dollars to fund any of this.
It's all paid for by promoters. It's all paid for by fighter licenses, promoter licenses. And there's actually a segment in the very base of the bill that that says, if it ever runs out of money, it auto collapses. So we have a small savings account to go against. If someone says that they dispute the outcome, we have a small - we have, I think it's about $10,000 that we could pay the state to help defend the outcome of that event. But really no, no money is paid for by the state. Not a penny.
Wendy Corr:
But it is an official Wyoming commission.
Bryan Pedersen:
Yep, we just fund it only through promotion of promoters, fighters, and they have to pay the cost. And they, if we have travel fees, they have to pay the travel fee. They have to absorb that.
But because they're making money in a sport, you know, they'll gladly fly two of our guys, you know, to London, you know, and then have - we just did one in Ireland, and they flew us over there, and then we regulated it, and we use some local trained people in, but really it's our executive team that goes and really sets up.
And it's exciting because we have a global presence from in Wyoming, because of the of the way that we set up the commission,
Wendy Corr:
That is absolutely fantastic. And I am not a combat fighter here, but I just have to appreciate the ingenuity and the passion and the drive that it took to create this, and the fact that this is a global presence with a basis right here in Wyoming. That's something really to be proud of.
Bryan Pedersen:
Yeah, we've worked our way up. We're on the rules making for the American Boxing Association, so association of boxing commissioners. Rather, Wyoming's on the rule making authority, because we have done so much to push global growth, we have a say on a lot of stuff.
And so you're a place like California, Nevada, and then Wyoming is on the list and made it kind of a big presence for just our proud cowboy state, who generally maybe won't have that in some other ways.
Wendy Corr:
That is so great. Bryan, you were in the legislature for what six years total? Was that correct?
Bryan Pedersen:
Yeah, I was elected originally in 2004. And remember I kind of told you earlier that you don't know what you're doing when you do something, because you thought everybody did when I was younger, my mother ran a series of campaigns for Dick Cheney, Max Maxfield, and so I have been licking envelopes since I was four, sending them out to various places or going or inside, like the the GOP headquarters in Laramie.
My mom would run that and bring me down there. Well, she worked for LSO in the state legislature, and so she my first day that I was, like, six weeks old. And so I just thought that everybody ran for an office sooner or later. Because, remember, everybody that came through my home was running for an office at some point.
So when I was 29, in 2004 I ran, and I was elected. And what's interesting about that is it kind of shifted an age, because I was the first person under 30 elected in 30 years. The prior person was Cynthia Lummis.
And now there's a lot more young people because, you know, like, Dan Zwonitzer got elected. Throw that there's a lot of people who are elected. I think we've got at least somebody now, I think they're 24 but it gave them a span of ages of people that are in there and make it more of a representative democracy.
But at the time, it wasn't that way. And I served then in house district nine and and, and then we moved 800 yards, and I was out for two years because I crossed the District line. But we had a small house. We knew they were going to have a big family, so we needed more space.
So we moved, and then I was able to serve in house district seven for two more terms, and all of which was on Appropriations. And I really enjoyed that time. But it was then, in 2012 that we created the boxing commission, and then years later, I became appointed to the commission, and we've had a great run.
Wendy Corr:
I just think that's great. I want to shift to - that’s a great segue - to your family. Folks, you might have noticed the really cool kind of castle architecture that's behind Bryan there. It's Legos. Just, I mean, I'm geeking out here because that is so cool. This is something you do with your kids. Tell us about this.
Bryan Pedersen:
Those are wonderful. My time investment with my kids is what it is. And I joke about investing in Legos because I don't know if I'm going to get the return, but we have a whole Lego room in our house. It's huge. This is what can't fit inside there.
But what I've done with Legos from when I was a kid, or from when I, sorry, when my children were young. I also had them when I was a kid and built some castles and things. But once I had children, you want to have conversations with your kids, and I have teenagers, and so you would say to them, what'd you do at school today? And they go, nothing.
So you left for school at 6:30 this morning because you had weights, and then you went all the way through football practice, you’re home at 6:30 at night, and nothing happened? You know what I mean? But when we go through and we build Legos together - so if you and I are sitting across from each other, and we each have legos, and let's say we're sitting here for two hours. Maybe you might not tell me something for 20 minutes, but after about 20 minutes, you're gonna go, you know what the cool thing I did today was? And I'm gonna go, No, tell me, Wendy, what was the cool thing you did today? And we'll go on.
So we built a Lego collection that is really an investment in communication with my children, and I've trapped them into our dining room table over, you know, Christmas and various other times where we sit and assemble Legos. A lot of families did it through puzzles. If you go to a lot of people's houses, they have a giant puzzle, and everybody will sit, and I'll work on my corner, and you work on your corner.
It's not different than that, where you're doing something together at a table, and you're thinking about it and putting pieces together. And it's a, it's an investment in a relationship with my children. And then I brought the ones that don't fit in the house down in my office. And it's a fun talking point when clients come down.
Wendy Corr:
It absolutely is. It was a fun talking point when you and I - now, you said that the places that are represented in your Legos are places that you've been, and that means that you have traveled to the Coliseum and you have traveled to see Big Ben.
In fact, you spent some time in London doing something completely different from anything that we've talked about so far. Tell us about that.
Bryan Pedersen:
Well, I have a little fun with it - when I got out of college, you know, my parents were just amazed that I actually had a degree. Wow. How did this happen? I was a bouncer, you know, in West Laramie, and it took me five years to get out of school, and I had actually paid for most of my college through scholarships.
And everybody should know that - when you're looking for college savings, go have your kid or yourself, or if you're going in, apply for all the small stuff. No one applies for anything that's $50, $250, $300, I just applied for all of those. And then I'd have to send out a lot of mail at the time. I know that it's all done, you know, obviously, through the internet now, but I got $1000s of dollars in small scale.
Everybody wants the $5000 to $10,000, and I just ate up all the $250 ones, you know. And so I had money left over, you know, after college, and my mom said, you know, they gave it to me to use. And I think she thought I'd use it towards a new truck, a down payment on a truck or something, but I had a truck named Thor, and we weren't going to break up over this.
And so I took the money and I went to London, and I studied classic French cuisine at Le Cordon Bleu. I had a job in finance in November, but I had nothing to do from May to November, and so I just went as an avocation. You know, I was just doing it for passion.
My wife is way more attractive than me, and I had to figure out a way to keep her, so I just make really good food, and then she sticks around over time. But it's been fun.
Wendy Corr:
I bet it has. What's your favorite thing to make?
Bryan Pedersen:
Well, you know, well, I go through cycles of things, you know, that we do, and I was classically trained French. My wife loves Italian. I will tell you that over Christmas we had chicken piccata for one of our main Christmas meals.
And a lot of times when we're cooking, I'm going to try and make my own version of something. So I'm going to see it on TV, I'm going to see it on Instagram, and then I'm going to make my own version of it. Two of my children are adopted from China, and I have two birth boys, and then two children adopted from China.
And so I've actually gotten pretty good at Chinese cuisine, and we do that probably once a week. And it's a little different. Obviously, it's not classic French, but you learn the basics, and then you try and fold stuff in. So it goes off in a lot of different directions, and I go through a lot of cycles, but we're now in a pretty strong Italian time again, because it's my wife's favorite cuisine.
Wendy Corr:
That is so much fun. Oh my gosh, are your kids learning to cook?
Bryan Pedersen:
They do. They like to cook. They've all taken their culinary classes at school, you know, because you can take it in your high school courses, and they actually love the process of fine dining with us.
That was another - this is a kind of a good story about - we've all been lied to about what we feed our children. And I love to share the story, because when you go through the grocery store, there's a lot of kid items. So when you sit down at a menu at a restaurant, you actually get a kid's menu, and it's got things like chicken fingers, and it's got things like mac and cheese.
And so what Western society, modern Western society, has told us that, this is what kids eat. They don't eat the other things. And it leaves the fact that, you know, a thousand years ago, we might have a night where we ate bark because we got stuff in our stomach, and the kids didn't say, Well, can you just cut up a hot dog instead of this deer that we took down, because that wasn't an option.
And so what I learned when we adopted Aya, it's kind of a good story, but I was a short order cook, essentially, at my house. I'd make my wife and I something, and then I'd make that separate dish for the kids, you know, because you have to make kid food, whatever it's fish sticks or things.
And so we go to adopt Aya, and she cried for, you know, four and a half hours when we first adopted her on the first day. And then we because we're something new and different, you know, and she's two. And so then we went down to breakfast the next day, and I got her a big glazed donut, and I said, Guess who's going to be the best dad that you've ever seen?
And she just stared at it. She had no idea what to do with it. And so the manager of the hotel came over and said, let me help you with this baby. And he got me a bowl of Kongi, which is really runny oatmeal, almost, with chicken stock in it.
And then he also got me what's called a thousand year old egg. And this is an egg that's buried in alkaline lime until it turns into a bluish-brown, gelatinous substance that smells like feet, and I then realized - she ate three of them, by the way - I then realized that you're going to eat whatever you're used to eating, right? Because that's what was served at a foster mother and orphanage.
And so I then came home, and then I started lying to my children and telling them, Well, you had it before and you liked it last time. And then that kind of moved them in. And so now they like all kinds of cuisine, and they're very interested in it and they try a lot of different foods.
And we're very blessed, because then we have an opportunity, maybe to do a little, to do some food and dine internationally, and they'll try some different things. But I had to defeat the commercial lie that has been told to us by Monsanto that says there's kids food, and it turns out there's not. And that you just eat what your parents eat, and it works out real well.
Wendy Corr:
I think that is so perfect, and that goes along with very much a philosophy of mine, that's so perfect.
So I need to switch gears here, because you and I talked earlier today about some real principles and some real ethics and kind of a code of conduct for people, for relationships, for contact sports. Tell me about the four principles of bare knuckle boxing, that's what you had mentioned. And just that was fascinating to me, because it's applied to life. So tell me about this.
Bryan Pedersen:
When I kind of went through and I was deconstructing how, like, what have I learned from combat sports? One is, you have to know the rules. And one of the things about knowing the rules is the way that you might - here's a good example. When my wife and I would argue when we were younger, she would use the rules that she had used with her mom when they argued, and I was using the rules I use with my dad when they argue.
But it turns out it's a different deal. You have to know the rules, the way each other fights, you know, the way you fight with each other, or the way you argue with each other, or conflict resolution with each other, and we had to adapt our rules. So knowing the rules is, the first is the first rule to know, and then the second one is understanding your opponent.
And that's an important piece, because maybe your opponent is the news story that you're going to cover. Maybe the opponent is the goals that my client may have when they come to me. But instead of just maybe moving forward and pushing your way into things, to better understand, to know your opponent and know what, what, where you're beginning with, knowing the actual need that's being addressed is huge.
And then you gotta know that there's no such thing as a first round knockout. When you see highlight films and everybody gets a knockout and they go, Oh, that was amazing. You never notice how it's called a highlight film, because it doesn't work that way. Most fights are long, and you gotta train hard for them, and you have to work your way through some very difficult things to get through it.
And there's no quick path to wealth, that you can get rich slow. When people come to me and ask, what's the get rich quick scheme? I guess if I knew, I'd own an island in Dubai. But here's a way that we can move forward and consistently get what - maybe do the baseball, hit a lot of singles, you know, and then just an occasional home run. But we're not getting a home run every time, because there's no such thing as the first round knockout.
Then the final one is, know that you can't do it alone. And so if you're in a relationship, you can get an outside counselor to help you. I have a personal business coach that I visit quarterly that holds me accountable to what I'm bringing forward inside of my business, and new ways to look at that.
And you'd have a traditional coach, of course, in sports, if you have a trainer, I have a trainer for the gym, because I'm always going to give about 70% of my best, because I go, Well, I'm sweating right now and I'm tired, so I must be done. And he's going to demand those three more reps on everything, and it's going to push you a little bit further.
So when you know the rules and you know your opponent, you know there's no such thing as a first round knockout. You know that you can't do it alone. You can take on almost any battle with that and then, and maybe that's, you know how we're going to raise our kids and make sure that college goes first.
Maybe that's going to - there's a thousand different ways that you can apply those pieces to and when you put that frame into it, you can lead you to success in any fight that you're having.
And a fight isn't necessarily a fight. A fight is a path or a struggle to get somewhere. And so it doesn't have to be conflict, but it's representative of the journey of life.
Wendy Corr:
What a great analogy it really is, because not all of us are going to take the idea of bare knuckle boxing and principles of bare knuckle boxing, and say, Oh, but I can use the same thing here and here. And you've done that is - you mentioned another phrase to me earlier today, the commoditization of relationships, and it sounds complex, but, you're using the same principles here.
Bryan Pedersen:
Well, you're using a lot of really - and so we can talk about tokens, and let's make them tokens, so we can make them chips. But what happens is, you don't - a lot of us are investing our chips in other people, and other people are maybe investing their chips in us, and we don't recognize it, and some people aren't making change for each other.
And I look at it like this - a lot of times, when people, humans in a relationship, we take that economic chip, that economic token, and we say, that's important. So if I take you to dinner, then you have to take me to dinner, because we exchange dollars, because in Western society and most of the world, we've made dollars a very important thing that pays for all the stuff, and we got to do all the things.
But people pay in different ways. And I think about it, when people pay economically, socially, politically and emotionally, and a lot of times, you don't realize that maybe you know the person that you took to dinner, well, they're helping you grow your social group, you know. And that's a wonderful way.
Or politically is another way, where people exchange political chips. And I think of it sometimes I'll narrow it to politics itself, because I was a legislator and I've been an elected official. But there's office politics and there's family politics in ways that people can help and make change for one another.
And then there's the emotional chip. I know that there's a lady in town who, when I have extra tickets to things, I always send it to her - and you know what she does? She makes six cupcakes on my daughter's birthday, because she was helped out with something that Aya was involved with when she was very young, and brings us six cupcakes.
And it probably maybe the value of the tickets that I send her have more dollar value. But she had to go to the store. She had to mix all that stuff up. She took time out of her day, and then drove to my home. And I never remind her, she just shows up. And the value of that emotional chip is enormous.
And once we acknowledge that people are paying each other in different ways, we can better value it. And you know, you think about the weight of a chip - like, a small chip for Elon Musk, economically, would change all of our lives. But you have to also understand that there's someone out there who, maybe they've given $5 to something, but that's a huge chip for them. So then it's also seeing where those chips are valued based on the individual people.
And really, one of the things that helped me is recognizing people who weren't making change. You know, because I'm giving you $1, you're going to give me back 25 cents. Are you making change? Are you? Are you helping build my family as I try to help build your family?
But measuring everybody in those ways, helps you better see who's helping you. And there's a lot of people who you may not realize how much they're helping you, because maybe you're waiting in the traditional we haven't gone to dinner in a long time, but maybe they're helping you in other ways, around the office, socially, emotionally or politically, in a lot of ways.
And I really felt like that was a huge lift for me to see the value that each person is bringing to my life that may be different than something that we might traditionally see.
Wendy Corr:
That is such an incredibly well rounded and unique way to look at relationships, and I think that, just talking about this with you helps me in the ways that - I think of my relationship, maybe with my church, or maybe my relationship with work or things like that, or with my children, that's really a fantastic way of looking at things.
This has been so educational and really eye opening, and I'm so glad that we did this. Bryan, what are some of the things that are ahead for you and your family in 2025? What are the things that you're looking forward to in your community, in your life, in your work? It's the start of a new year, and that's always something where we kind of take this and say, This is what I want to accomplish this year.
Bryan Pedersen:
You know, we do a lot of stuff with our kids in sports, and we kick off our calendar and their training opportunities. But one thing that my family's focused on is, as you know, we had a few children that we said we adopted from China. We're kind of refocusing our efforts this year back to the Wyoming Children's Society, which is the adoption agency in the state of Wyoming, and we have left some of our other boards and refocused our efforts to that, because that's one that touches our heart.
Now each person listening to this has something that impacts them, and that's perhaps their focus. As we move forward it is just - January comes forward, we have all that time in a year, and maybe we use the four principles of bare knuckle fighting, or maybe we learn to better commoditize things, to help people and build people up as we build our community and date our communities.
Wendy Corr:
I just think that that's a fantastic way of looking at and just kind of sorting things out and identifying what's important and identifying moving forward, how to to better those relationships. Bryan, this has been a fascinating conversation. Thank you so much for agreeing to The Roundup today.
Bryan Pedersen:
Anytime. I love it. This is great, great program. I love your podcast. Thank you so much.
Wendy Corr:
Thank you - and folks, thank you for tuning in to this episode of The Roundup. We've got so many more wonderful people that are on my very long list to talk to in 2025 for the next season of The Roundup. We're just getting started, so have a wonderful new year, folks, and we'll see you next week.
