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Brock Lesnar leaves the arena after defeating Frank Mir in their heavyweight title fight at UFC 100 at Mandalay Bay Saturday night. Lesnar won with stoppage in the second round.
Monday, Oct. 26, 2009 | 11:20 p.m.
Lesnar: Weighing in on Heavyweights
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UFC Heavyweight Champion Brock Lesnar talks about his rise in the UFC and his next opponent, Shane Carwin.
Monday’s news of Brock Lesnar’s decision to pull out of his UFC heavyweight title defense against Shane Carwin on Nov. 21 seemed to have shocked everyone.
Including the champion’s own training camp.
According to Lesnar’s training partner Chris Tuchscherer, Lesnar said he was feeling better from a three-week flu as recently as Sunday before announcing to his team in Minnesota that he was going to pull out of the fight.
“He actually practiced (Sunday) and thought he might be feeling alright. He said, ‘Wow, I think I’m doing OK today,’” Tuchscherer said. “(Monday) he got here and it was the same old stuff — fatiguing right away, not being all there.
“After practice we were all sitting around, we were actually going to come back later at night to work out again, and he basically told us, ‘Hey guys, I’m going to pull out of this thing.’”
Tuchscherer said Lesnar began feeling flu-like symptoms about 25 days ago and didn't practice last week in the hope that rest would end the illness.
Although there's no confirmation that Lesnar has the H1N1 flu, commonly referred to as swine flu, Tuchscherer said he thought it seemed likely.
“There’s a lot of cases of that around here,” Tuchscherer said. “There are a lot of confirmed cases of it. I don’t want to say it’s that for sure, but it wouldn’t surprise me.”
Yahoo Sports broke the news that the bout had been canceled after receiving confirmation from UFC president Dana White on Monday.
“He said he’s never been this sick in his life,” White told Yahoo. “He said it’s been going on for a long time and he just hasn’t been able to shake it.”
Carwin said he was "very disappointed" with the news via his Twitter account.
He also said it looked like the fight would be rescheduled for UFC 108 on Jan. 2 and that he was sympathetic to hear of Lesnar’s condition, as he has suffered from H1N1 before.
The post read: “Looks like it is postponed till Jan. 2. I had h1n1 myself and I understand how devastating it can be.”
The fight had been highly anticipated as Lesnar (4-1) and Carwin (11-0) are two of the biggest and most electric fighters in the heavyweight division. Lesnar is a former NCAA Division-I national champion wrestler, while Carwin is a former Division-II national champion.
The UFC has announced that the rematch between Tito Ortiz and Forrest Griffin will now headline the Nov. 21 event.
Tuchscherer said Lesnar seemed disappointed when he announced the news and that he had been looking forward to defending his title again.
“He was very excited for this fight. He was always in good spirits,” Tuchscherer said. “I could tell he was kind of let down today and he told us he felt really bad.”
Brett Okamoto can be reached at 948-7817 or brett.okamoto@lasvegassun.com.
No way he would have pulled out if he was feeling good. It will be a good match when it happens.
Man up Lesnar. Lesnar needs to keep his mouth shut period. Dana White should have kicked him out after his last fight when he was so vulgar in the Octagon. The gestures he made and the comment he made about his wife were uncalled for. Maybe it's Karma?
lesnar is THE draw in the ufc. who cares what he did after his last fight, he was pumped up. anyone that's ever won a fight knows how mega-pumped you get right after. the beatdown he laid on mir was AWESOME. i can't wait to see him fight again.