As a full-time mixed-martial artist, T.J. Grant’s buddies sometimes give him the gears for what can come across as a pretty sweet gig.

Although he pours in hours of training for his UFC fights – hitting the gym twice a day, six days a week for conditioning and martial-arts development – the 27-year-old gets a friendly ribbing for the time he spends recharging his battery, a necessity in his gruelling sport.

“I have a lot of downtime, and my friends always laugh and say, ‘What do you do, just play Xbox all day?’” Grant said. “But if I trained twice a day and then tried to do a bunch of stuff, I’d just be so exhausted … Rest is really important at this level and I make sure I get as much of it as I can.”

Since his last fight in December, the Cole Harbour native said he has been more focused on training than ever before. He said he knew he “had to get better” after a loss to Ricardo Almeida in UFC 124 in Montreal.

With a pivotal fight coming up on Sunday versus Charlie Brenneman (2-1) as part of UFC Live 4 in Pittsburgh, Grant is full of confidence.

“I feel like I’ve had the best training camp I’ve ever had and I feel like my timing and conditioning are at an all-time high,” Grant said. “I’ve had a long time to work on certain things and I feel like I’m the best I’ve ever been.”

Brenneman, a Hollidaysburg, Pa., native who will be fighting in front of his home-state fans at Consol Energy Centre, was an NCAA all-American wrestler who recently signed a four-fight contract with UFC.

Grant, who has rotated wins with losses since his debut in UFC 97 in April 2009, expects a tough test but has no plans of falling into the first losing streak of his UFC career.

“I’ll have my hands full, but it’s going to be a good fight and I expect to win,” Grant said.