Cris Cyborg close to being done with catchweight fights
Cris Cyborg close to being DONE with fights at 140
Invicta FC featherweight champion spoke recently with Marcos Villegas for Fight Hub TV, ahead of her catchweight fight with Lina Lansberg in the main event of UFC Fight Night 95 on September 24, 2016 at Ginásio Nilson Nelson in Brasília, Brazil.
Footage from the weight cut for her last fight, vs. Leslie Smith at UFC 198, showed Cyborg in tears. It left many fans thinking that 140 shouldn’t happen, and 135 was never going to happen.
Ever.
Cyborg sounded like the catchweight fights will not happen indefinitely. She has already said that 135 is off the table.
As the UFC pays for her to fight in both Invicta and in the UFC, and the UFC has no plans to add a women’s 145 division, it is not clear where the #1 pound for pound best fighter’s prospects are from now until retirement.
“Almost two years I’ve been doing dieting and working with George Lockhart and for me to make 140 it’s a big challenge,” said Cyborg, as transcribed by Jed Meshew for MMA Fighting. “I’m not 18 years old anymore. I’m 30 years old it’s really hard. I started this camp now – for 140 again – I started running and I said, ‘man, after this fight I want a vacation, I want a break,’ because I need it. To make 140, I have to run six miles every day and train every day…
“I’m supposed to defend my belt at 145 and Invicta wanted more time to develop the girls for 145. I would like to defend my belt…I can make 140 but I think I’m very close [to being done] because it’s too much for my body.”
“For me, it would be my dream to make my division, 145. And you don’t see any champion go down for fights. Go up. McGregor went up. A lot of guys go up, they don’t go down in weight… But I know the girls in the 135 top 10 don’t want to want to go fight me. But I hope and have a dream that my division will be in the UFC one day.”
“I never choose my opponents but I think the biggest fight that everybody wants to watch, the fans want to watch is me and Ronda. Why do I make 140? I make 140 for superfights. Not just to be world champion of my division and sit there and wait. If I can make a superfight so when I finish my career I can say, ‘you remember this fight with Ronda, with Holly Holm,’ something nice that I can talk about with my kids or my friends. I’m open to make superfights.”
Cris Cyborg fights Lina Lansberg at UFC Fight Night 95 on September 24.