Former Bellator and ONE champion Ben Askren’s story is one of the craziest of 2025. In early June, “Funky” was admitted to the hospital with pneumonia so severe it put him on death’s door. He spent 45 days in a medically induced coma, basically died four times, and got a double lung transplant to save his life.
Six months after that nightmare scenario, Askren is back up and going. Video footage from November captured him getting some light wrestling training in, and he was on hand for the Real American
Freestyle 4 show on December 20th in Indiana. The Schmo got to ask him a few questions about his turbulent 2025, and Ben’s answers will inspire you.
“The ‘how you doing’ question is always funny because I’m doing great compared to what I was doing a month ago, and great compared to a month before that,” Askren said. “But I still got a long ways to go to, like, feel what would be called normal compared to, prior to being sick.”
“I wish I could do rigorous activities,” he said of his impressive progress. “My strength is starting to come back. I got my grip coming back and whatnot. My cardio, though? Bro, I get so tired so fast. I run up a flight of stairs, it’s no good. I mean, I almost died, so I suppose I got an excuse. But I gotta get the cardio back.”
While Askren’s recovery has been incredible, there’s no doubt the entire experience has been extremely tough. But “Funky” is trying to keep things in perspective and use his story to motivate others.
“If I had to say there’s a good part of almost die almost dying, that would be it: my ability to bounce back from the bottom,” he said. “I mean, I was on the bottom, right? I was on my deathbed, and people were able to see that the words I speak are the words I live by … I’m on bottom no matter where I’m at. I’m gonna wake up every day, I’m gonna work hard.”
Askren had a message for those following his story.
“Talent doesn’t exist,” he insisted. “If you really, really put your mind to something and you’re dedicated, you put in time over a course of a period of years, you can accomplish anything. And so I think people are impressed by my comeback, but I wake up every day and I put my mind to it. I do the very best I can every single day, and I think if everyone else tries to live by that, they can do amazing things.”
