“The Dutch Knight” Reinier de Ridder makes his UFC debut this weekend, after earning double-champ status in ONE Championship.
To hear de Ridder (17-2) tell it, it feels like more of an escape from ONE, who simply couldn’t keep him active. The 34-year old had briefly retired after a loss to Anatoly Malykhin, then left ONE for UAE Warriors. A single win there, and de Ridder was in the UFC.
“There was no retirement, this is more of a…” de Ridder trailed off during this week’s media day. When a reporter suggested the “retirement” was a ploy to get out of his contract, de Ridder laughed. “I had to leave, I had to go, because there’s no fights, there’s no guys there. It’s running out. I had to go.”
Later, de Ridder would explain that “between fights I got parked for endless time. I was at times begging for fights, and it never happened. So it was time to move on to some more professionalism.”
Despite talking about a move to the UFC for years, however, Reinier de Ridder is not regretting waiting as long as he did. That’s not how he thinks, he explained.
“It is here right now, I’m going to make sure I capitalize on this moment. That’s all that there is to it,” he stated. “I’ve had a lot of good years, a lot of good success. I’ve been fairly inactive the last couple of years, and I’m happy to be able to make up for those lost years now.”
Despite holding belts at middleweight and light heavyweight, it will be 185 where de Ridder competes for the time being.
“This is my normal weight class. In ONE I fought at 205, but it was with the hydration test and stuff remember, so you couldn’t really cut weight- but then a lot of people figured out that you could cut weight,” he stated.
“Now here, it’s fairly doable. It’s fairly manageable to make 185. It’s not an issue, and if I fight at light heavyweight, the guys are going to be a lot heavier than me. Which might be something that’s down the line, but I’ll have a look at middleweight first here.”
Watch the full UFC Vegas 100 media day appearance by Reinier de Ridder above.
