Barao: I stopped eating crap
Renan Barao: “After this defeat, I improved my diet, and I saw that I have to train more. I stopped eating crap, now I’m only eating athlete food.”
On August 29, the UFC suffered the craziest fight cancellation since Kevin Randleman slipped on pipes backstage and knocked himself out of the UFC 24 title defense with Pedro Rizzo. Renan Barao was cutting weight in a tub, stood up, fainted, hit his head on the wall on the way down, and did not wake up.
“He stayed out for a long time,” said his trainer, the famed Andre Pederneiras. “That made us really scared.”
His camp called the UFC doctor and the UFC called an ambulance. Paramedics decided to take him to the hospital, and administered an IV, making a weight cut impossible. The UFC immediately pulled Barao out of the rematch with champion T.J. Dillashaw.
Joe Soto stepped up valiantly from obscurity, and gave Dillashaw a good fight, before getting kayoed in the final round.
Now in an interview with Brazil’s AG Fight, Barao acknowledged that his poor diet was to blame, via Google translate.
“After this defeat, I improved my diet and I saw that I have to train more,” said Barao. “I stopped eating crap, now I’m only eating athlete food. I ate a lot of pizza, pasta. It took a while (laughs), now I am more disciplined, with a nutritionist.”
“It’s never easy to make weight, but I’m very well thank God, with a much more well-balanced meals before the fight. Everything will be fine, it will be much easier.”
Barao next fights Mitch Gagnon at UFC Fight Night 58 on December 20 in Sao Paulo, Brazil.