Michael Bisping does not hold back when discussing Vitor Belfort’s career, which the UFC middleweight world champion feels was influenced heavily by performance enhancing drugs.
Vitor Belfort succumbed to a first-round knockout loss to Kelvin Gastelum last weekend and looked every day of his 39 years of age. With a record of 1-4 in his last five fights, “The Phenom” has confirmed that he will likely turn away from the sport following one more fight in the UFC.
Belfort first fought under the UFC banner in 1997, and is one of the most famous fighters in the promotion’s history. The Brazilian, who is a former UFC light-heavyweight champion, has been strongly criticized by many in the past for what is perceived as taking performance enhancing drugs in order to gain an advantage over opponents.
In 2006, Vitor Belfort tested positive for elevated testosterone following his fight with Dan Henderson. In 2014, Belfort fought former middleweight champion Chris Weidman, who had commented: “I’m 10 years younger than him, he’s got a way higher testosterone level.” The American had registered testosterone levels of 370 nanograms per deciliter on two separate occasions, in comparison to Belfort’s recordings of 1200 and 500.
Belfort and Bisping, however, also have history. In 2013, “The Phenom” beat “The Count” in the second-round via TKO, and later tested positive for (you guessed it) heightened levels of testosterone. Suffice to say, Manchester’s Bisping had something to say when the topic of Belfort was brought up:
“Vitor, you know, you’ve got to give the guy credit. He was the heavyweight champion back in the day… juiced out of his mind. He was the light-heavyweight champion back in the day… juiced out of his mind, of course. And he went on an absolute tear in the middleweight division and you know, you got to give him credit for that. But was he juiced out of his mind? Absof**king-lutely!”
As for an opponent for Vitor’s last hurrah in the UFC? Bisping feels that the former multi-weight title contender should look outside of the octagon:
“You know what I would like? I would like Vitor to have to go out there and face some young kid who’s roided out of his mind. Just to let him know what it’s like. You know what I mean? Stick him in there with somebody down in Brazil who’s still in the system who’s roided out of his mind and has just got super-powers because of his steroids.”
