At 40 years of age, a
Ultimate Fighting Championship great is deciding to hang up his
gloves.
During the
UFC 311 early weigh-in show on
Friday, Chris
Weidman (16-8) announced his retirement from the sport. “The
All-American” last competed in December, coming up short to
Eryk
Anders in the second round when the former football player
punched him out. While he struggled towards the end of his career,
Weidman started strong by amassing a 13-0 record while beating many
of the best names ever to compete at 185 pounds in the Octagon.
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“I’ve been holding it in for a while,” Weidman said with mixed
emotions on his face. “I got a big fight set up,” he teased to
fellow former champ Daniel
Cormier. “Listen, since I decided to get into this sport since
2009, the goal was to be a UFC fighter. Then, immediately the goal
was to become a UFC world champion. Fourteen years later, I’m here,
and I’m here to tell you guys that I’m hanging up the gloves in the
UFC, and [will] no longer be fighting for the organization that
changed my life in so many ways.”
It only took Weidman four fights to get on the radar of the
promotion, rattling off four victories in Lou Neglia’s Ring of
Combat promotion with three stoppages on the way, most notably
dispatching future UFC fighter Uriah Hall in
about three minutes. Weidman introduced himself to the organization
in 2011 with a one-sided decision over Alessio
Sakara, and he pushed himself quickly to contendership by
submitting Jesse
Bongfeldt and Tom Lawlor in
the same year.
Weidman continued, “I’m super appreciative of everybody who got me
here…I just want to thank the UFC for all the opportunities they’ve
given me. It’s really become a family. From the Fertitta brothers
to Dana White to Hunter
Campbell, Joe Silva who was the matchmaker who brought me into
the UFC originally, Mick Maynard and all the staff in the UFC.
They’re all just like family, just amazing people. But, it’s time
to move on.”
Victories over Demian Maia
and Mark
Munoz—the latter Weidman’s first main event—put the still
relatively green New Yorker into a title opportunity against
Anderson
Silva. The Brazilian was riding a UFC-record 16-fight win
streak into the championship bout, and the wrestler was considered
a talented test but
expected to come up short. Weidman never received that script,
and instead he walked Silva down and knocked him clean out in the
second round at UFC 162 in 2013.
The inevitable rematch came a little over seven months later, where
the match played out similar to the first until Silva hurled a leg
kick at the American. At the perfect moment, Weidman checked the
kick, and Silva’s leg snapped in half. It may not have been the way
he wanted to win, but with two victories over the legendary
“Spider,” Weidman had established himself as anything but a fluke.
Two thrilling victories over Lyoto
Machida and Vitor
Belfort gave Weidman two more defenses to hang his hat on.
“I want to thank my family for supporting me throughout all these
years, through the ups and the downs,” Weidman expressed. “My
coaches, Ray Longo, Matt Serra,
Jeff Jimmo when I moved down to the Carolinas. All my training
partners, shoutout to Gian
Villante who is my main training partner…but [there are] so
many of them that helped me get to where I’m at. My life has
changed in so many ways that I never would have expected if it
wasn’t for the UFC, so I’m just super grateful. I want to thank the
fans for their support over the years.”
After that triumph, a quick drubbing of “The Phenom” at UFC 187 in
2015, the halcyon days of Weidman’s career came to a painful end.
When defending his throne against Luke
Rockhold six-plus months after topping Belfort, a failed
spinning kick resulted in the end of his night and the conclusion
of his title reign. Following the Rockhold loss, the knockout
defeats began to mount for “The All-American,” as a number of
fighters were able to stop him with strikes. While he did pick up a
few wins to keep himself on the roster, a broken leg against
Hall—eerily hearkening back to his second triumph over Silva—put
Weidman on the shelf for two years. While he tried to bounce back,
and even got his hand raised against Bruno Silva,
two losses in his last three were enough for the New Yorker to hang
it up.
“It’s been a ride, from being an undefeated world champion and
being able to beat one of the greatest of all time in Anderson
Silva, and being able to defend my belt three times against
some of the greatest legends of the sport. And then, even from the
amount I’ve learned about myself and dealing with adversity and
injuries—I’ve had 30 surgeries—I put my body through a lot. To be
able to over come a lot of that was always tough, and I’m just
proud that the UFC gave me an outlet to be able to compete against
some of the best guys in the world. I’m proud of the resume, the
type of guys I was able to fight, I respect them all so much. I’m
very grateful, and it’s a weird one, I’ve been a UFC fighter,
calling myself a UFC fighter since 2011, and today, I think for the
first time, I can’t say that. And it’s weird, it’s kind of part of
your identity, and you gotta move on and I’m opening up a new
chapter of my life and I’m excited about the future, and I’m
leaving the door open for other opportunities and big opportunities
out here, but we’re moving on to see my life develop in different
ways,” Weidman concluded.