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Our father has always been very passionate about taekwondo. In all honesty, we were forced into it without a choice. He would train us every other night at home, so we would always be perfecting our technique.

Training in taekwondo for eight years and then being able to do it in a film was pretty amazing.

I've been training super hard at the Lopez Taekwondo Academy in Houston, which belongs to my brother Jean. For me, I think confidence is the biggest thing; it's all mental. I train with the best of the best, including my brother Steven, a five-time world champion who won Olympic gold medals.

I got into Taekwondo when I was nine, and I started training Muay Thai and Brazilian Jujitsu later in life.

I started taekwondo at 5 or 6 years old and did a bunch of kick-boxing later, too. Eventually I became a black belt and coached as well. I did some basketball and softball growing up, but most of my activity was martial arts.

After the Olympics and being on such a high and then losing in the World Championships, I was distraught. But now, looking back on it, I think it was the biggest blessing. I was going into every fight thinking I have to win because I am Olympic champion and putting too much pressure on myself. I lost my hunger and stopped enjoying my taekwondo.

It wasn't until I went to Korea out of high school and got exposed to the martial arts for the first time and was just completely enamored with the physical ability of the martial arts and making my black belt.

With taekwondo, anything can happen, really. You get bad days; you get good days of training, so you've just got to hope that you're on it on your day.

The Olympics was always my be-all and end-all, so when I won, it was the best feeling in the world. But I didn't realise how much it would affect me mentally. All that pressure. I was only 19; I still didn't know everything about taekwondo, I wasn't experienced. I just did amazing on that day and won.

My father was one of the first Tae Kwon Do Masters to come to the states in the '60s. He had one of the first all-African-American fighting teams, and I was basically raised in a karate studio since I was 3. It's part of my blood, competing, and all that stuff was responsible for a lot of me just growing up.