Oregon native Ed "Short Fuse" Herman, now fighting out of Fort Collins CO, will take on former Strikeforce Champ Jake Shields this Saturday, August 11th, in an 185 lb matchup on the main card of UFC 150 in Denver CO. Herman enters this high-profile bout with Shields on a three fight win streak in the Octagon after coming back from a devestating knee injury that kept him sidelined for two years. Herman spoke with NW Fightscene a day before weigh-ins about the bout with Shields and his training for the fight with some familiar names to NW fans. He also talks about his gym Trials Martial Arts and Fitness that he co-owns with Ryan Schultz, his life in Fort Collins, and he sets the record staight about the recent UFC 150 Countdown show that misportrayed his time growing up...

NW Fightscene: How's the weight?
Ed Herman: Everything's going good man. We're just rocking and rolling. My weight cut's going real good. I'm 8 pounds over right now so it shouldn't be a problem. Feel great. Ready to kick some ass.

NWFS: You're fighting a big name oppoenent in Jake Shields. I just watched the UFC Countdown show about the both of you which is pretty cool. After your last three fights against lesser known opponents, how does it feel to be back in the limelight?
Herman: It feels good. It gives you a little feeling of accomplishment. You feel just like you're appreciated or people give a crap, you know what I mean. To finally get a little exposure on one of the UFC Countdowns shows and be on the upper part of the main card.

NWFS: Jake Shields makes no secret he'd like to see it go to the ground.

How do you see it playing out?
Herman: I'm pretty confident whereever it goes. I'm going to look to do some sprawling & brawling and knock this guy out. If we end up on the ground, letting my elbows & hands go, doing some ground & pound and maybe a little submitting of my own. So we'll see.

NWFS: Something Shields mentioned when he came into Denver was that he had a little trouble with the altitude bothering him. With you living out there in Fort Collins at 5000 feet high, you're obviously used to the altitude. Talk about that aspect of the fight.
Herman: Well, it can definately play a factor. I don't know if he's playing possum a little bit with that but even if he is, the altitude is no joke out here. It takes more than a week to get adjusted. Plus if he's only been out here a week, that means this is the end of training camp. The end of any training camp is the easy part. He needs to be out here training HARD and getting those HARD pushes to really start to get used to it. It'll affect him more than he thinks.

NWFS: There's a picture on your twitter of a recent training session with you, Ryan Schultz, Dave Jansen, Robert Follis, Yushin Okami who is also on the UFC 150 card, and a whole group of guys. Talk about the training camp and the last few weeks with all these guys out there.
Herman: It's been great. I had Chris Leben out here. I had Tyson Jefferies out here too for a while. So its good to see some familiar faces and have my old buddies to train with. And then Coach Follis to kind of keep me in line and lead me with the gameplan. He's kind of the mastermind behind a lot of stuff. It's been great. I'm preparing right in my hometown. I cross-train down in Denver with The Grudge and Easton Jiu-jitsu as well. But not as much for this camp as I had a bunch of guys out. In my previous camp, I was driving down 4 days a week. Driving two and a half, three hours a day. Kind of rough, so its nice to not have to do that as much this time.

NWFS: Your partner there at Trials MMA is Ryan Schultz who was the IFL Lightweight Champion. We haven't heard too much of him of late.

What's up with his fighting career?
Herman: We've been having a helluva a time finding him fights. Nobody out here in Colorado will fight him. Cameron Dollar's ducking him, he's got all the titles out here in the smaller shows. I ended up getting him a fight up in Wyoming which is crazy and like the wild, wild west up there. We got one fight for him here in Denver against not that great of an opponent. So he's won two fights in the last six months. But again its like six months between fights, so its been hard to keep him consistent just because we cannot find him a fight. Nobody wants to fight him. It's just hard because these promoters out here aren't offering much money. But he's training hard and he's ready to go, and the UFC knows it. He's training hard and ready on short notice. We've talked to them many times and they keep telling us that he just needs a few more wins before they bring him back. So we're just keeping our fingers crossed and maybe if they need a fill-in spot, they'll give us a call for him.

NWFS: Talk about the gym.
Herman: The gym is rockin and rollin. It's really great. It's called Trial's Martial Arts and Fitness. We're in Fort Collins, Colorado. About a 5000 square foot facility. We've got tons of mat space, two rooms, a matted area with cage walls, surrounding a big bag rack, a little weightlifting area. It's great man. We've got a kids program. We've got fitness stuff for the ladies and for you regular guys who just want to have stength and conditioning classes. We've got Jiu-jitsu and Kickboxing, a little bit of everything. Our MMA competition team is starting to really build. We're getting a good core group of guys. Things are coming together.

NWFS: Any of your fighters turned pro yet?
Herman: We just turned our first guy pro. His name is Josh Cole. He was in the main event of a show in Denver two weeks ago. It was awesome. We went in as a big underdog. We fought this kid who was 5-1 and who was like the hometown hero, the local favorite. The promoters down here, since we're the new kids on the block, always try to set us up to lose. We went in there and spoiled the show. We shut the whole crowd up. It was awesome... A huge huge debut fight for Josh Cole. A big upset victory. It was just great to see one of our athletes go in there and get a big win and start his professional career off in a positive manner.

NWFS: Fort Collins sounds like a nice place to live, been named best place to live in the US numerous times. And with your family and kids there, how has that been going.. that family stability factor and its affect on you as a fighter?
Herman: It's a lot to juggle. Working at the gym full time. Managing a gym, coaching. Working my fight career and my camp. And then finding time to spend with my family as well. Have to sacrifice a little bit with that away from my family. But its for the better, for the future of my family. The gym is kind of a long-term thing, so we have some security down the road. We're not making any real money yet. The gym is paying its bills and stuff like that. Bring a real small check home but definately not anything to live off of. But its good to have something set up like that so down the road I have a little bit of security and then something I can go to. It's been great though. Colorado has been a good move for us. Fort Collins is a good solid place to live, a good place to raise a family. I miss Oregon though. I definately miss Oregon, Washington. That's where I grew up. Definately miss home.

NWFS: You're 10 years into your fighting career. Looking back, what has been the hardest thing to learn and get your head around in the game?
Herman: After being injured and having to possibly think about retirement with multiple knee surgeries. In almost two years, I had three knee surgeries. That was a scary feeling. Feeling like it could all be over at some point. I think that just revitalized my career and my mental attitude going in. I credit a lot of my success just to my mental game coming in. Just the way I've approached it. Getting a second chance in life in a way. Just go out there and prove that I can still do this and make a run.

NWFS: Now you're only 31 which is still young. Randy Couture was one of your early mentors coming into the sport. Do you see yourself fighting into your forties like he did, going up to 47 years old and still fighting?
Herman: No, definately not! No way. (laughs) I always thought 35 would be a good number but I wouldn't mind getting 15 years in the sport. So 36 which would give me another 4 or 5 years to accomplish what I want to accomplish. We'll see how things go. If I stay healthy and still compete at a high level, I want to keep doing it as long as I can.

NWFS: Anything else you'd like to add and anyone to thank?
Herman: Yeah, I just want to set something straight. The UFC Countdown showed a little bit of a false image of the way I grew up. They showed some negative things about my parents and stuff. I just want to let people know that I had a good childhood and my parents are good people. We went through some tough times but we're all stronger for that. They showed some pictures of a trailer park, I don't know where they got those from. I've never been in a trailer park. It was kind of a bummer in a way. The producers, I don't think it was the UFC producers, but more like FUEL TV who want to portray you to sell the show. I just want to let my friends and family in the Northwest know that I feel bad about that. Love my family.

Besides that, I'd like to thank my family, my friends, my teammates. Everybody that helped me prepare for this fight. My longtime sponsor, Dethrone. Stuck by me from day 1 almost. RevGear is one of my sponsors and at the gym as well. They sponosr all my amateur fighters. Love working with them. And NW Fightscene, you guys have been a long time kicking. I appreciate you guys giving me a little press.

Many thanks to Ed for the shoutout and for taking time out to speak with us. He'll be fighting Jake Shields at 185 lbs this Sat August 11th at Denver's Pepsi Center on the main card of UFC 150: Henderson vs Edgar II. The main card starts at 7 PM PT and is available Live on Pay-per-View. More info at UFC.com.

Follow Ed on Twitter at twitter.com/EdHermanufc. Check out his fan page on facebook at facebook.com/EdShortFuseHerman.

Ed and Ryan Schultz's gym, Trials Martial Arts and Fitness, is located at 2649 East Mulberry St. (Suite #A12 & 13) in Fort Collins CO and online at TrialsMMA.com.