Kelvin Gastelum looks to get back in the win column in a division that has gotten even more interesting over the past month.
Gastelum returns to action this Saturday against Dustin Stoltzfus at Noche UFC in San Antonio. Since his most recent bout at UFC 316 against Joe Pyfer, Dricus du Plessis dropped the middleweight title to Khamzat Chimaev at UFC 319 in August.
After Nassourdine Imavov‘s dominant win at UFC Paris this past Saturday, the hunt for Chimaev’s next opponent is down to three names — Imavov, and the UFC Vancover headliners Reinier de Ridder and Anthony Hernandez. When asked who could give Chimaev his toughest fight, Gastelum weighed in.
“Man, I really think RDR is someone to look at as a serious threat,” Gastelum told MMA Fighting. “I think he’s the man that could be the one.
“His size, his style is something to deal with, man. I mean, look, when I saw him fight against [Robert] Whitaker, I was blown away, like the size difference. I fought Whittaker and I know how big he is. He made him look like a lightweight.”
Gastelum hopes to get back on track following his loss to Pyfer, and is happy that chapter of his career is behind him after spending nearly seven months preparing for the Contender Series standout. Pyfer withdrew from the original booking at UFC Mexico the day of the fight, which forced it to get pushed back to UFC 316.
The middleweight division certainly has a new look with Chimaev as champion. And while it’s been a mixed bag in the MMA community in regards to how people viewed Chimaev’s performance against du Plessis, Gastelum couldn’t have been more impressed.
In fact, Gastelum decided to bring in somebody who helped Chimaev prepare for his first world title fight for the fianl stretch of his training camp.
“Just super impressive how dominant that was, right,” Gastelum said. “I mean, his wrestling, nobody’s been able to do that to DDP, and these are some of the best guys that he’s fought — Izzy, Whittaker, etc. He’s fought the who’s who and nobody’s been able to do what what Khamzat did to DDP and I think the, the difference was the wrestling.
“And, actually one of the guys that he had in his camp was Pat Downey, [who] immediately after helping Khamzat came over to my training camp and helped me finish off camp. So that was cool to do. This guy, Pat Downey has been helping a lot of MMA fighters, helping them elevate their grappling game and I think that’s been a difference maker.”
