Penn on future: 'I don't feel the fire to compete right now'

Those clamoring for BJ Penn to retire will have to settle for the next best thing - at least for the time being.

In a Tuesday appearance on "BJPENN Radio" - a handful of months after Dennis Siver extended his seven-year skid - the former two-division UFC champ stated his desire to enter the Octagon again isn't burning too bright, although he couldn't help fancy the notion of competing into his 40s.

"I don't know, I don't feel the fire to compete right now," Penn said, per MMA Fighting's Shaun Al-Shatti. "I'm just kinda hanging out and, I don't know, I don't want to scare anybody and say, 'Yeah I'm fighting again,' or anything. I mean, if I was knocking out guys in the gym all of the time, then maybe I'd be thinking about it. But I'm gonna go back and start training for fun and, I don't know, just enjoy myself. Just take it easy and enjoy myself.

"I do see, though, that there's awesome people - I don't know if they just took better care of their bodies or whatever, but you see them, there's people in their 40s, one or two years older than me, or even way older than me (who still compete)."

Widespread calls for Penn to call it a career came this past January after he suffered a brutal stoppage at Yair Rodriguez's hands at UFC Fight Night 103 in his return from an 18-month retirement. But even though he's clearly lost a step and hasn't seen his hand raised since he KO'd Matt Hughes at UFC 123 back in November 2010, the 38-year-old wouldn't commit to hanging up his gloves.

"I'm going to be taking it a day at a time and just raising the kids. We'll see. I'll be training, but we'll see. You never know what happens next year. Not saying I'm going to fight or anything, but who knows what's going to happen."