Former
Ultimate Fighting Championship heavyweight titleholder Fabricio
Werdum is ready to move to the next stage of his career.
In September 2023, Werdum returned from a lengthy layoff to test
himself in bare-knuckle MMA. He faced former opponent Junior dos
Santos at Gamebred FC 5, and he suffered a split decision loss
to “Cigano.” Following the match, Canal Combate produced a
documentary about the ex-champ titled “Werdum, Acima da Dor,”
chronicling the late stage of his career. This arrangement led to a
partnership with the heavyweight, and he has joined influencer
Kefera Buchmann to host an MMA-themed talk show on the network
called “Papo Cruzado.” Werdum spoke to Sherdog about his new show
that will debut at the second half of 2024.
“These are topics that go beyond the usual routine of talking about
when the next fight is, who you want to fight against, how your
training is going,” Werdum explained. “I thought it was cool that
we covered topics like ‘a woman’s place is on the mat,’
‘celebrities vs. fighters,’ ‘brutes love too,’ ‘harassment,’ [and
the] ‘importance of jiu-jitsu in spreading Brazil’s image around
the world’…different themes, but still within this fighting
universe.”
“Vai Cavalo” revealed that this first season will have 20 episodes,
and guests include a number of prominent MMA fighters as well as
coaches and some celebrities not involved in combat sports.
“Charles
Oliveira, Wanderlei
Silva, ‘Minotauro’ [Antonio
Rodrigo Nogueira], Demian Maia,
Juliana
Velasquez, Amanda
Ribas, Wallid
Ismail, Pedro Rizzo,
Murilo
Bustamante, ‘Dede’ [Andre
Pederneiras], and some celebrities from outside the fighting
world such as MC Guime, Sergio Malandro and Marcos Mion,” the
heavyweight listed. “It was a very pleasurable marathon, two weeks
recording all day away from my family here in Sao Paulo, but the
result was really cool and will definitely reach audiences outside
our niche as well.”
Werdum, who now lives in Florianopolis, Brazil, travels to Sao
Paulo almost every week to record his other show of “Dos Nosso
Podcast.” The two cities are well over 400 miles apart, or roughly
an hour by plane. This amount of traveling takes away from his time
to train. Despite being happy with the new phase in his career, the
former UFC and ADCC champion does not rule out a return to the ring
or cage, if there is a good proposal. He noted that he had
previously negotiated with Karate Combat for an appearance, but
that failed to come together.
“Fighting is no longer my priority,” the 46-year-old concluded,
“but if an interesting proposal arises with an opponent I have some
history like it was with ‘Cigano,’ without a doubt we can return.”
