Rampage reveals he has Thyroid condtion
Rampage: “I’ve been keeping it kind of to myself. It kind of bummed me out. If I don’t stay on top of it, I gain weight really fast. That’s what’s been going on.”
Quinton ‘Rampage’ Jackson appeared recently on Ariel Helwani’s The MMA Hour, and reports that he has received a medical diagnosis for an underactive thyroid. The condition makes him gain weight more easily, and, he says, means he may never fight at 205 again.
His last fight was at a catchweight of 225. He beat Satoshi Ishii via unanimous decision at Bellator MMA: Dynamite 2 on June 24.
The fighter, 38, said he was diagnosed approximately a year ago, that he likely has had the condition for years, and that he will likely have to take medication for the rest of his life.
“I’ve been dealing with this for like a year,” said Jackson, as transcribed by Marc Raimondi for MMA Fighting. “I’ve been keeping it kind of to myself. It kind of bummed me out. If I don’t stay on top of it, I gain weight really fast. That’s what’s been going on. I’ve been noticing after my fights I’ve just been gaining more weight fast, I didn’t know what was going on.”
“I think I’ve gotta change my lifestyle, change the way I eat and stuff like that. Then maybe I can make 205.”
“I just wish that other fighters shared the same level of intensity and excitement the fans and I did. I’m not taking anything away from Ishii, even though I don’t respect him or the way he fought. But he fought a smart fight. It was really smart. He stayed away from me. He stayed away from me at the right times. He crowded me and got close to me at the right times.
“He knows how to throw punches and stuff like that. He just wanted that win and sometimes guys who just want that ‘W,’ they don’t care how they get it. Me, I want the ‘W,’ but I want to do it excitingly. I want to like the fans to feel like they got their money work. … You don’t want fans to walk away saying, ‘Man, that main event sucked.'”
“I don’t really want to fight the real big boys, because I noticed that I tried to pick Ishii up at the end of the fight, I was trying to go for a slam and I was like, ‘This dude is too big. He felt like he had put some bricks in his ass or something. I don’t know if it’s his judo background or what. I was like man, maybe I do need to take my ugly ass back down to 205.”
