Rose Namajunas beat Joanna Jedrzejczyk by first-round knockout at November’s UFC 217 at New York’s Madison Square Garden to win the UFC women’s strawweight belt. Joanna Jedrzejczyk, 30, was undefeated going into the bout and held the title since March 2015.
Jedrzejczyk requested for an immediate rematch with ‘Thug’ Rose despite the quick and vicious nature of her loss. However, she got her request fulfilled, signing on for the rematch at UFC 223 in April from Brooklyn, New York.
After her bitter loss, Jedrzejczyk left her nutritionists Perfecting Athletes team of Paulina Indara and Michelle Ingels “as humans,” said she cannot work with them anymore. she fired her nutrition team following a disagreement about how her weight management was handled prior to the UFC 217 fight.
Joanna Jedrzejczyk, a former strawweight champion was recently speaking at The MMA Hour, opens up how she has to cut 15 pounds in 14 hours.
“Man, I felt so bad, I had to cut 15 pounds in 14 hours; I did it in 14 hours.
“I think Perfecting Athletes couldn’t believe that I did that. I start my weight cut at 5 pm on Thursday and I was on weight five minutes before 11 am on Friday, so it was a miracle. I was praying to God for this miracle. And it happened. I took this mentally. I was crying, I was so weak but I believed it. I said to one of the Perfecting Athletes team, ‘Hey, it’s a shame for a champion to not make her weight’, and then I made it — a thing I couldn’t believe.”
She further goes into details, reported feeling numbness in her legs on the day of the fight.
“After the weigh-ins, I had only fluids and I went to bed because I took just two 15-minute naps during the weight cut.
“The thing is, my legs got numb after I woke up. I said to my doctor, ‘Hey, my legs are numb’, and she said, ‘nothing to worry about, we’re going to hydrate you more’ and ‘you’re going to be fine’.
“But the next day, I felt the same and thought the most crazy things. I took the fight mentally. I wanted to go into the fight and push away all of the worries.”
Joanna Jedrzejczyk insisted that she cannot work with perfecting athletes anymore, as I had trusted them so much, but they made a mistake – a mistake which she paid the ‘ultimate price.’
“They were like family, you know. I trusted them so much and I paid the ultimate cost for someone’s mistake,” she said. “They agreed with me. We sat and talked on Monday after the fight and they agreed with me that they made a mistake, but I paid the ultimate price.”
“I was light in this camp,” Jedrzejczyk continued when asked what mistake had been made by Perfecting Athletes.
“I was like 127 on the Friday and Saturday a week before the fight. We were planning to get me to 125 by Tuesday, but my weight went up on Sunday to 130 and I couldn’t drop the weight for three or four days. I did everything that I could, and it’s their mistake. I started my weight cut with the limit at 130, so it was almost impossible to make that weight.”
Are you guys excited to see the Namajunas and Jedrzejczyk rematch at UFC 223?
