Props: Sherdog.com
Quoteworthy:
"I was injured the whole camp [for Thiago]. I had a hurt shoulder, [and] I had broke my hand, so I didn’t get to lift at all for that camp. That’s why I wasn’t as big as I am now. I’m lifting again. I’m getting my strength back. I think the UFC is gonna be impressed with the way I come into this fight -- strong ... There will never be another fight for Diego Sanchez at 155. That was a brief hiatus. I told everybody I wanted to win the belt and go back up. Truthfully, I was never 100 percent at 55. I was always 75 percent. I was never strong. I was wiry strong, but I didn’t have my brute strength that you have from lifting weights. I want to make a statement with how I look. I want guys to say, ‘I can’t believe how strong he was in there.’ I don’t ever want to get out-strengthed in my career ever again."
Watch out welterweights, Diego Sanchez is back (and back in the gym), ready to "make a statement" with how he looks after an intense training camp of pumping iron for his UFC on Versus 3 main event against Martin Kampmann. The original "Ultimate Fighter" dabbled in the 155-pound division and looked impressive early, but returned to his previous weight class after being stopped by then-champion BJ Penn in late 2009. Can the bigger, stronger Sanchez be a contender at 170-pounds? Or will he still be "out-strengthed" by muscular monsters like reigning division champion Georges St. Pierre?