Cody Garbrandt revealed in a recent episode of Brendan Schaub’s, Food Truck Diaries, that he’s still dealing with sickness and injuries suffered back in October that forced him out of his title fight against Deiveson Figueiredo at UFC 255, last November.
The former bantamweight champion explained a series of bad fortune that has prohibited him from getting back to competition for nearly eight months now.
“I got COVID-19,” Garbrandt said as to why the title fight between him and Figueiredo fell out. “I had the vertigo – vertigo for about two months. And I was training, and I would get like two or three rounds in of sparring or grappling, and then it would onset.”
Garbrandt says despite not feeling well due to vertigo, he had no idea that he had COVID-19 at the time.
“So we went down to (Mike) Tyson’s Ranch to do a photoshoot and some videography, and that’s when we had to get COVID tested, and they were like ‘oh you’re positive.’ I did the quarantine, came back,” Garbrandt said. “Felt great. I did like 21 days just to make sure, but I was just doing my own training on the road. So I stayed in really good shape. Like conditioning shape was unreal.”
“I hit pads for the first day – first time, it felt great, my bicep was a little sore,” Garbrandt said in regards to his first pad session back from his 21-day quarantine. “And then in the middle of the night, after I hit pads, I woke up and my bicep was like three times it’s size. I thought I tore my bicep. I thought I did. I went to the doctor, he ultrasounds it and he’s like, ‘dude you have a distal bicep tear.’ I’m like, ‘What? No way.’ So I got an MRI three days later and he’s like, ‘no tear.’ But they did an urgent ultrasound on my vein. I ripped my vein in half.”
“I had to go straight to the hospital,” Garbrandt said. “Got shots put in my thigh every three days for blood thinners, and I’m still on blood thinners. I have three blood clots in my arm. Yeah, so that’s what took me out of the fight with Figueiredo.”
With Figueiredo expected to rematch Brandon Moreno sometime later this year, after the two fought to a draw at UFC 256, last December, Garbrandt says he won’t be waiting for that fight to take place before getting his next bout booked.
“I already have the (flyweight) title shot,” Garbrandt said. “They said, ‘you can sit, and have a title shot.’ I don’t want to do that. An inactive fighter, that’s how you kill your career.”
“Jose Aldo,” Garbrandt said in response to Schaub’s question about who he wants to fight next. “He’s a legend. He’s a former world champion. (He’s) coming off a win. We’re both former champions,” adding, “The UFC’s for it. So probably April, beginning of May.”
Source: Youtube.com
