Robert Whittaker says the “middleweight Rob Whittaker chapter has closed” as the former UFC middleweight champion prepares to make his light heavyweight debut against Nikita Krylov at UFC 329 this Saturday at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
Whittaker moves up after spending the past 12 years at 185 pounds, with earlier bouts at welterweight, and enters on a two-fight skid following losses to Reinier de Ridder and Khamzat Chimaev. Krylov, 9-7 in the UFC at 205 pounds, is coming off a knockout win over Modestas Bukauskas in January and owns UFC victories over Alexander Gustafsson, Volkan Oezdemir, and Johnny Walker.
“The middleweight Rob Whittaker chapter has closed,” Whittaker said. “I’m very happy as a light heavyweight. It is honestly life-changing. I recommend it to anybody. … I still do have to cut weight, it’s just not as brutal. It’s not as bad.”
Whittaker explained that dissatisfaction with recent training camps pushed him to overhaul his approach. “A big prompt into why I made so many changes is that I didn’t enjoy the last couple of camps and the last couple of fights and things had to change otherwise I wasn’t going to continue,” he said, adding, “So I made the changes. I moved to light heavyweight. I did the backend of my camp at City Kickboxing, just for the bodies and stuff. I brought my entire tribe with me to the fight itself and it really is life-changing for me. I’m enjoying the journey.”
“I don’t need validation,” Whittaker said. “I know this is my weight division. I’m never going back to middleweight.”
