Coach details Gastelum collapse

Kelvin Gastelum’s coach Chance Farrar from Yuma MMA spoke with Marc Raimondi for MMA Fighting following the fighter’s failure to make weight, by nine pounds, before his fight with Tyron Woodley at UFC 183.

Friday morning Gastelum was 174, with just three pounds to go, but then they returned to the hotel and things fell apart. Gastelum had been ill earlier in the week, and in his depleted state, it returned. The fighter had to be taken to the ER where he was rehydrated and diagnosed with flu-like symptoms.

“He wasn’t vomiting food,” said Farrar. “It was more like mucus. He was in a bad state where he couldn’t get himself off the floor. I had to pick him up.”

“I was scared. I’ve never had an athlete do that before. That’s the long and short of it.

“I was thinking the fight was off. There’s no way this guy is fighting, it’s done. … That was kind of the attitude. Maybe it was a little bit quick to the make the decision, but that’s how I felt at the time.”

“I’m not saying it was an easy weight cut, it never is. But it was going as well as it could until that happened. People can say what they want, but that’s the only difference in my book for this weight cut.”

“I always leave these decisions up to Kelvin. I’m a coach. Of course, I’m a support system. Do I think that he’s 100 percent? I do not, no. Do I think that he’ll do great and that he’s capable of winning the fight? Absolutely. He’ll come to fight.”

“Kelvin wasn’t feeling well in the front end of the week. That’s one of the reasons he was a little heavy at the front end of the week. But ultimately we felt like the weight cut was going fine. Everything was going good. We used different stimuli. He was consistently losing weight.”

The coach feels the fighter may have felt pressure to fight despite not being at 100%, but Gastelum is cleared to fight by the Nevada Athletic Commission, and the fight is on. Next time the cut should be drama free, as UFC president Dana White says this is Gastelum’s last fight at welterweight.