Chris Weidman, the former middleweight champion who returned to UFC after a two-year break due to a snapped leg, has suffered a fracture in his left leg during his fight with Brad Tavares at UFC 292 but avoided any serious knee damage and is expected to recover within four weeks.
Chris Weidman, a renowned fighter, had a lucky escape from any serious knee damages in his fight against Brad Tavares at UFC 292. Even so, he didn’t leave the fight totally unharmed. The former middleweight champion had recently rejoined the fighting arena in August after a hiatus of two years that ensued post a nasty leg injury he sustained during a 2021 fight with Uriah Hall. Unfortunately, this return saw him lose a unanimous decision, with Tavares ruthlessly attacking both his legs with a series of fierce kicks over the course of three rounds.
UFC president Dana White cast some light on the possibility of Weidman having fallen victim to another major injury during the fight. He implored Weidman to “please, please retire.” However, retirement doesn’t seem to be on cards for Weidman, who despite the injury combat is still resolute about his career in the game. Nonetheless, he’ll need some time off to recover from a new fracture in his left leg, an injury sequeling the right leg break he endured two years ago.
Elaborating on his physical condition, Weidman revealed on his Sirius XM show, “There was no ligament tears at all. So ACL, LCL, MCL, PCL, all those ‘Ls’ that you do not want to tear because that’s like six months to a year of recovery. The ligaments are good. What did happen to me though, I have a fracture in my left leg. So he broke my leg with one of those leg kicks. I ended up switching to southpaw and figuring it out. But I’m pretty sure that’s when my leg broke, fractured it. It’s on the tibula head, right below my knee is where it broke. Upper tibia bone is what’s fractured. Recovery wise, it’s not bad at all. Four weeks. Four-week recovery, that’s it.”
While a recovery period of four weeks is necessitated for the fracture in his left leg, Weidman certainly will have to withhold from training till October. There’s no official announcement yet regarding when he might be back in the ring again. Despite his fractured leg and innumerable surgeries – including the four on his right leg – the 39-year-old stalwart already has his sights set on another comeback once his recent wounds have healed.