Those who remember Jose Aldo’s epic five-year run as the top featherweight on the planet may also remember hearing that cutting weight wasn’t always the smoothest experience for the Brazilian striker.
And those same people might — understandably — have been the most surprised by Aldo’s move down 10 pounds to bantamweight at the end of 2019. Two years and four fights later, he’s still in the mix at the upper levels of the UFC’s 135-pound rankings, consistently making weight with arguably less difficulty than he had at 145.
Cutting out pre-fight pizza and steak will do that.
“There were some times that, before the fight, one week before the fight at featherweight, I would go and eat pizza or go to a steakhouse,” Aldo told The Post over the phone Wednesday through an interpreter. “… Every fight. We were already celebrating beforehand.”
Those days are over, professes Aldo (30-7, 18 finishes) ahead of his “UFC on ESPN” headliner against Rob Font on Saturday night (10 p.m. main card) at UFC Apex in Las Vegas. The move to bantamweight went hand-in-hand with what he called “a mindset change” regarding his diet.
Jose Aldo no longer has issues making bantamweight, having cut out the pre-fight pizza and steak dinners.Icon Sportswire via Getty ImagesAldo, who won the WEC featherweight crown (with direct lineage to the current UFC title) from Mike Brown at age 23, pointed to youth as part of the reason his pre-bout diet included foods many fighters deprive themselves of for months ahead of a fight. But once his coach and manager Andre Pederneiras suggested he return to 135 pounds (following a loss to eventual and current 145-pound titleholder Alexander Volkanovski) for the first time since the early days of his 17-year career, he knew it was time to wise up about what went into his body ahead of fights.
“I was reeducating myself in terms of what I was going to eat and how I was going to train,” said Aldo, 35. “… I compromised that that was the way to go to bantamweight. And since I started doing things different, and my mindset was different, that was when everything changed. It’s not difficult at all [to cut weight].”
So, no steakhouse visits this week. That’s for later.
“Now,” says Aldo, “it’s only after the fights.”
And if the Brazilian, who owns one of the most spectacular résumés in MMA’s young history, finds himself celebrating a victory over Font (19-4, 12 finishes) post-fight at such an establishment, he’ll be one step closer to his ultimate goal of a second chance at the bantamweight belt. The first came last summer — off a narrow split decision loss to Marlon Moraes — when he hung with Petr Yan for much of four rounds before suffering a lopsided beatdown for the bulk of the fifth until action was halted with 96 seconds to go.
Jose Aldo fights at a lighter class than his old featherweight — where he was one of MMA’s top fighters.Zuffa LLC via Getty ImagesYan is now the interim champion while current champ Aljamain Sterling, a Long Island native, recovers from neck surgery. The complex situation — Sterling won the belt from Yan in March via disqualification after absorbing an illegal knee and his return date remains up in the air — leaves unclear whom Aldo could be chasing to become a two-division champion.
Regardless, Aldo maintains he is highly motivated to obtain UFC gold once again. He’s just staying focused on the fight in front of him and allowing the chips to fall where they may around him.
“I’d rather take one step at a time,” he said. “I’m really focused on the belt, and I think that this belt, it is going to make my legacy larger than it is right now. I’m always open to new things, whether it’s going to be superfights or it’s gonna be facing someone new. I really don’t know, but I don’t want to think about this right now. I want to take one step at a time.”
