Johny Hendricks' coach explains how UFC 192 weight-cut went wrong

Johny Hendricks

Johny Hendricks missed out on a chance to claim a shot at the UFC welterweight title that once rested around his waist after weight-cutting issues forced him out of today’s UFC 192 co-main event against Tyron Woodley.

According to one of his coaches, the issues for Hendricks (17-3 MMA, 12-3 UFC), the No. 2 ranked fighter in the NOS Energy Drink MMA welterweight rankings, began before his camp even started.

“I think that he just came in too heavy for this camp, and it was just waiting until the last minute before zoning into his diet,” Hendricks’ strength and conditioning coach, Adrian Ramirez, told MMAjunkie. “I think that was the biggest issue he had with this camp. I think it was just waiting until the last minute to really get this weight off.”

Weight issues are nothing new for Hendricks. He missed weight on his first attempt at UFC 171. While he eventually made the 170-pound limit and went on to win the then-vacant title against Robbie Lawler, he has since entertained a jump in weight to middleweight.

However, a solid camp leading up to Hendricks’ unanimous-decision win over Matt Brown at UFC 185 had the team believing it again had welterweight locked in.

Johny Hendricks and Matt Brown

“Last camp, for the fight with Matt Brown, we had made a pact that he wouldn’t get above 195 – and he did that successfully for that camp,” Ramirez said. “He stayed under 195. Last camp was one of the best weight camps we’ve ever had in the history of Johny’s fighting career. He did everything right, stayed on the diet and was where we wanted him to be.

“This camp he came in around 210 or 205, which is a little too heavy for our liking. I think that’s the biggest factor in this camp – just coming in too heavy and starting his meal prep a little bit too late.”

Hendricks remained heavier than his team members wanted as fight week drew near, which led them to expect a rough weight cut in the days leading up to Friday’s weigh-ins. But no one expected the disaster of a trip to the emergency room and a canceled bout due to intestinal blockage and kidney stones.

Ramirez said he believes a call with a nutritionist could be partly to blame for Hendricks never properly adjusting his diet during camp.

“One of the owners of our management team had called, and he had talked to a nutritionist,” Ramirez said. ” … I had never been familiar with him up until we spoke. But our management arranged a conference call with (him), whom we’d never met, and he’d never met Johny. We got on the conference call, and I had a couple concerns, because if you don’t know Johny and know his lifestyle, I feel like you can’t really comment on how much he needs to be eating.

“He was pretty much telling Johny that he should increase his meals because Johny was telling him that he was feeling run down after his training, which is fine. I’m not blaming (him) or anything like that. But I think after that conference call, Johny took what he said and justified that he should start eating more and increasing his calories. Johny isn’t a certified nutritionist or anything like that. He was just taking this guy’s word for it. I think that might have caused a couple issues in the middle of camp.”

Ultimately, however, Ramirez doesn’t believe there’s anyone who has to take responsibility beyond the fighter.

“Not to blame (the nutritionist) – I don’t want to badmouth anybody,” Ramirez said. “I’m sure he was giving general information. But I think Johny took from that phone call that he needs to eat more, and he was a bit misguided with his diet. We’ve used Mike Dolce in the past. I’ve never had a problem with Mike Dolce. I’ve seen his system work with Johny. We stopped using him, but I didn’t think that bringing in another nutritionist for a conference call was the right move. I think Mike Dolce had the answer: If you do everything that he says to do, the diet is going to come into place.

“Other than that, Johny started too late on his weight cut, and he has to take full responsibility for that.”

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