Shannon Knapp: Cris 'Cyborg' Justino on pace to make 135
Cris "Cyborg" Justino doesn't yet know who she'll fight in December at Invicta FC 10, but she knows it will be at a new and lighter weight class - 135 pounds, instead of her usual 145 pounds. The former Strikeforce champion has vowed go down to the weight class her team once said she could die trying to make, in order to chase a fight with UFC champion Ronda Rousey.
Justino was reportedly once offered a fight with Rousey and a UFC contract, after the UFC absorbed Strikeforce into itself, but turned it down because she couldn't make the weight in the relatively short period she would have had to. Now, the Brazilian striker is on pace, according to her boss Shannon Knapp.
“Everything seems to be on schedule,” Knapp told Sherdog in a recent interview.
“She is pumped up and ready. She is making her way. She wants that fight with Ronda. She is putting in the hard work, the time and the effort to get that fight. I think she’s very focused on getting to where she needs to be and where she needs to go to have that matchup.”
Invicta FC 10 and Justino's bantamweight debut are set to appear on UFC Fight Pass. Knapp says that Invicta plans to document Justino's weight cut, once she gets to the difficult part of it.
“As she really starts into that hard cut of the weight, we want to document that," she sad.
"We want to take the fans on that journey with her and let them see. She’s a tremendous athlete. A lot of people have negative stuff to say; they kick her around [about] muscle mass and stuff like that."
Knapp seems as eager to have her champion fight Rousey as the two fighters are to fight one another. “Provided that [Justino] does make that weight, if we can get that matchup between her and Ronda, this is going to be a fight that people are not going to forget," she said.
"If you ask me, this is the biggest female fight there is out there and will be out there for years to come.”
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