Former UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman retires at 40

Photo Courtesy: UFC

Former UFC middleweight champion Chris Weidman is retiring.

The 40-year-old announced during the UFC weigh-in show on Friday that he was hanging up the gloves after a sixteen-year professional career.

Weidman’s career will always be viewed through his July 2013 upset win against Anderson Silva at UFC 162 in one of the legendary moments of the promotion’s history.

Silva had not lost a fight in over seven years and had been the UFC middleweight champion since October 2006 when Weidman stopped him with strikes in a changing of the guard moment. Months later, Weidman retained the championship in a rematch with Silva where the former champ shattered his leg in a gruesome injury to end the fight.

In a harrowing twist of fate, Weidman would incur a similar injury years later in a fight with Uriah Hall in April 2021.

Weidman was a Division I wrestler at Hofstra University and achieved a black belt in BJJ under Matt Serra and Renzo Gracie.

He began his pro career in 2009 for the New Jersey-based Ring of Combat organization and was signed to the UFC after four fights.

In his first year with the UFC, he secured three victories including a submission of Tom Lawlor before getting a major fight with Demian Maia on Fox in January 2012.

Weidman took the fight on ten days’ notice and has since talked about taking his body to the brink by cutting 32 pounds in ten days and stating that he “almost died cutting the weight.”

Weidman beat Maia by unanimous decision and followed with a win against Mark Munoz before the July 2013 fight with Silva and became the champion at 185 pounds.

After defenses against Lyoto Machida and Vitor Belfort, Weidman was unseated by Luke Rockhold in December 2015 and never was able to regain his championship form as he battled a litany of injuries in a deep weight division.

Since the loss to Rockhold, he only won three fights while losing eight fights.

In 2021, he shattered his leg and went through numerous surgeries to correct the problems before staging a comeback over two years later.

This past year, he earned the final win of his career beating Bruno Silva in a technical decision after it was determined that Weidman poked Silva in the eye and led to the TKO stoppage.

Last month, he was stopped by Eryk Anders in the second round of a 195-pound catchweight fight at UFC 310 and leaves the sport with a record of 16-8.

About John Pollock 6010 Articles
Born on a Friday, John Pollock is a reporter, editor & podcaster at POST Wrestling. He runs and owns POST Wrestling alongside Wai Ting.