Arnold Allen put on 20lbs between weighing in and stepping in the cage for his fight at UFC London last weekend.
Allen, who hit the 145lb mark for his featherweight fight with Dan Hooker at the event, secured the first knockout win of his UFC career by dispatching the New Zealander in the first round. The win meant 'Almighty' is now unbeaten in his last nine UFC appearances.
The Ipswich-based fighter has moved up to No.6 in the featherweight rankings and is likely just one more win away from a title shot. He called for a fight with Calvin Kattar next, who is one place above him and last fought in January against Giga Chikadze.
Allen revealed that after the weight cut for his fight with Sodiq Yusuff last year went wrong, he was glad to not make the same mistake for his fight with Hooker and successfully rehydrated by putting on 20lbs following the weigh-ins.
"What I did last time when I fought Sodiq Yusuff because they weigh you on fight day, I weighed 153lbs which is over 10lbs lighter than what I should fight at, just because I messed up the weight cut and messed up the rehydration," he said on The MMA Hour.
"It was a stupid mistake really, but this time I was like 165lb when they weighed me. So I was just full of energy and I felt strong.
Hooker was returning to featherweight for the first time in five years after a string of losses at 155lb. Allen thinks that his opponent, who is now on a two-fight losing skid, was slightly heavier than him in the cage.
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And Allen said of Hooker: "I think he should [go back to lightweight]. Obviously there's still good fights for him at featherweight, but I don't know much of a toll it takes on him to get down [to the weight]."
UFC middleweight champion Israel Adesanya was critical of the stoppage in his teammate's fight with Allen. The Brit struggles to see how Adesanya thinks the fight was stopped early as Hooker would have continued to absorb punishment had the referee not stepped in.
“I think it was the right call,” he said. I can’t really see how Izzy can think that was early. The man himself didn’t complain, so that’s the biggest tell for me. All that’s gonna happen in that position, where he’s sort of curled up, is more shots landed, so I don’t know what’s Izzy’s thinking.”
