Former UFC middleweight champion Robert Whittaker has spoken for the first time of the personal battle that forced him to take a step away from the octagon.
In January, former UFC middleweight champion Whittaker (20-5 MMA, 11-3 UFC), withdrew from his UFC 248 fight against Jared Cannonier, and rumors quickly circulated suggesting that it was because he donated bone marrow to his daughter. However, Whittaker said those rumors were completely false.
“I have no idea where that came from,” Whittaker told “The Daily Telegraph.”
“During the break, I got off all social media to spend time with family, so it was my old man who actually contacted me, explaining there was this crazy rumor going around, and from there, it just got a life of its own. But my kids were all fine. They are fine. It was me who had the issue.”
Whittaker explained that he was doing his typical climb up the Wanda dunes on Christmas Day when he suddenly stopped mid-climb, and experienced a moment of realization.
“I just stopped,” Whittaker said. “Then (I) stood there, asking, ‘What the (expletive) am I doing?’ It was Christmas Day. My family was somewhere else. That moment, it’s when everything crashed.”
It’s been a tough past few years for Whittaker, who had to undergo double hernia surgery, battle chickenpox, and go through two wars with Yoel Romero. He adopted a regimen that saw him train seven days a week, causing him to miss valuable time with his friends and family. Eventually, his full-on schedule proved too draining, both physically and mentally.
“I sacrificed everything,” Whittaker said. “My team suggested several plans which I took to and, because it worked, I just kept at it. But you can’t keep doing that forever, you just can’t. Worse than the physical grind, too, was the mental drain. I just wasn’t home.”
He eventually lost his title to Israel Adesanya at UFC 243 last October in a fight where he said he just didn’t feel right.
“I just wasn’t myself,” Whittaker said. “That’s the game though, you rock up and fight, but I know I can perform much better, and have performed much better.”
Since then, Whittaker has changed both his team and his training program as he prepares for a potential bout with Darren Till in August. Another key change to his preparation: He is no longer climbing those dunes on a Sunday.
“Not having those sessions, it means I can do things Saturday night too,” Whittaker said. “Same as I’m now playing with the kids late into Sunday afternoon rather than being completely spent. The changes I’ve made, it really will change my life. Not training to exhaustion every day, I guess you can say I’m living.”
Robert Whittaker breaks silence on recent absence: 'I was completely burnt out'
