After an rocket-quick rise through the his former employer, the UFC, Roger Huerta spent much of the last year on the sidelines while his fighting career took a backseat to his acting work. He’s currently 1-4 in his last 5 fights, but with close losses in two recent Bellator contests, he’s ready to start fresh. According to MMA Mania, he’ll start over November 26th against War Machine (f/k/a Jon Koppenhaver) at the Events Centre in Pharr, Texas.
“I lost to Kenny Florian who is fighting Jose Aldo for the title and has fought for a title how many times? And I lost to him by decision. I lost to Gray Maynard by a split decision which could have gone either way and this guy is fighting for the title too, I lost to Pat Curran by split decision and this guy is two time Bellator tournament champion. I lost to Eddie Alvarez who is considered one of the top pound for pound guys in the world he’s the champion, apart from the last one these were all close losses.”
After fighting much of his career at 155 lbs., Huerta will experiment at a new weight of 170 lbs. for the Koppenhaver bout. He feels that having to cut too much weight for his previous fights had an adverse affect on his energy and results.
“What I started to realize is that I don’t have a lot of fat to lose so I was losing strength and muscle and I started to fight weak and I don’t know if I wasn’t doing the weight cutting properly. I’ve fought at 170 before and at catchweights like 160, 165 and then I started dieting to fight at 155 and did very well but it started tapering of so I wanted to try this out, its like a trial run to see how I feel competing at this weight. When I train I am grappling with heavier guys and I’m as strong or stronger as the guys who fight at 170 lbs and I thought to myself, ‘I can still have the same strength at 170 lbs but I will have more speed’.”
