Survivor’s Dee Valladares Shares How She Trained for Survivor 50 with Only 2 Months to Prep (Exclusive)

Former Survivor winner Dee Valladares had two months to prepare before being a castaway again.

Ahead of UFC 326, the season 45 winner, 29, shares with PEOPLE how training looked a little different going into season 50 and what she wishes she’d done more of ahead of the season.

“I had two months of training from the moment I found out I would be on, so I kicked it up running and some CrossFit. I didn’t do much swimming, which I should have trained for. I definitely kicked it up a notch a little bit there,” Valladares shares with PEOPLE.

Because she was returning as a winner, Valladares says she had a different mindset going into season 50.

“At the end of the day, we’re all castaways, but we’re also people, right? A lot of times, you come back a little bit worried about, ‘I won my first season. Can I top that?’ “

She shares that part of her preparation is “mental reframing” to understand the first time she competed on Survivor, “I went in there with something to prove.”

“The only way that I could get there was to win. Then the second time around, I told myself, okay, I don’t have anything to prove, one, have fun, but two, give it your all. Go crazy because I, with three winners on the cast, I’m not even supposed to be there, right? I allowed myself to be open and go all out,” the Survivor winner shares.

She also reveals that the one thing that host Jeff Probst told them is that “everyone that he chooses, he wants them to give it their all.”

“I think that’s exactly what I did,” Valladares says.

Related Stories

26 Surprising Rules ‘Survivor’ Contestants Have to Follow

‘Survivor 50’ Cast Reveals Their Favorite and Least Favorite Parts of the Game (Hint: Aqua Dumps Aren’t So Bad!) (Exclusive)

To get through the hard parts of the challenges, Valladares kept telling herself: “It’s gonna come, it’s gonna pass.”

“The discomfort’s coming, it’s gonna pass. Just stay longer or give it your all,” she adds. “There are very few moments in life where you’re on Survivor doing these challenges. It’s a blessing to be there. It really is. You can’t take any moment for granted, even the moments that suck, and there’s a lot of it on Survivor.”

For the rest of the season, Valladares says fans can “expect more arguments.”

“Everyone really brought their all, and even though I am a castaway when I watch the show, I watch as a fan. I’m rooting for all the mess. I want everyone to fight. I want everyone to laugh. I want people to cry. When you’re watching a fight, you can tell when the fighters want it, and at 50, you can tell that the players really want not just the money, but the title of Soul Survivor on their biggest season yet,” Valladares says.

She adds that everyone was “extremely vulnerable in the best ways and the worst ways possible.”

PEOPLE caught up with her ahead of UFC 326. She was in Las Vegas alongside fellow Survivor 50 star Jonathan Young, to participate in a private training session led by UFC athletes and trainers on March 7.

“I think my favorite part was just meeting Sean [O’Malley] because I hear he’s a huge Survivor fan,” she says of the MMA star. “And you would think that him being such a well-known fighter that he’s intense, but he’s actually so calm and collected. That, to me, was so impressive and really cool to witness.”

Although she is a CrossFit athlete, she says her training is “nowhere near” what UFC fighters do.

“I was wrestling [O’Malley] for a minute and I’m still so tired,” she says. “I respect it so much because I grew up doing judo and watching UFC with my dad. There’s so much endurance, timing, and even patience. It’s you against your opponent. It’s very inspiring to have seen them there and kind of like in their element, and they’re just inviting us into their home.”