Abdul Razak Alhassan had to battle through some adversity before and during his fight with Joaquin Buckley.
Alhassan (11-5 MMA, 5-5 UFC) lost a split decision to Buckley in the main card opener of this past Saturday’s UFC Fight Night 201 event, marking his fourth loss in his past five outings.
But Alhassan revealed that an array of unfortunate circumstances and injuries made his training camp difficult, almost forcing him to pull out of the fight. Not only that, but Alhassan says he broke his rib in Round 2 of his fight against Buckley.
“This fight business sucks!! Not to make any excuses or take it away from my opponent this fight camp sucked!!!! Got cut right above my eye right before camp! Had 8 stitches, and the eye got infected so even took way long to heal. Middle of the camp I injured my back and couldn’t even get out of bed through the whole camp! 4 weeks before fight I got COVID which took me outta commission for almost 2 weeks. Week before the fight I injured my right hand before the fight. Light the universe is telling me not to take this fight. But as you know there’s no back down in this guy, so I went for it. And don’t regret it. Also broke a rib in the second round with the take down. But I really wish I could have just done a lil more. Love my coaches and my team!!!! I feel so blessed to have people them like around me. We will come back strong and stack up those victories! Trust me! I swear I will be like kakai to them. They will hear my name and hide!”
Despite breaking his rib in Round 2, Alhassan was able to impressively win Round 3 on all three judges’ scorecards. But unfortunately for the 36-year-old, it wasn’t enough to win him the fight.
