Fans of Georges St-Pierre, the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) welterweight champion, will have to wait another year before they get to see their favorite fighter defend his title.
UFC president Dana White announced via his verified Twitter account on Wednesday afternoon that St. Pierre, 30, has torn his ACL (anterior cruciate ligament), an injury that would sideline the star fighter at least 10 months.
White added that in St-Pierre’s absence, Nick Diaz, Georges’ scheduled opponent in UFC 143 on February 4th in Las Vegas, will now fight Carlos Condit for the interim welterweight title.
St. Pierre was supposed to defend his belt against Condit at UFC 137, but had to pull out after injuring his left knee and right hamstring during a training session.
The 30-year-old champion said on a conference call Wednesday he believes the latest injury happened because he returned too soon to training and was overcompensating for the previous injury.
His doctor, Dr. Sebastien Simard, revealed to Bloody Elbow that surgery for St. Pierre is “mandatory.”
“There’s no way he can compete with the problem on the right knee. We’re looking at doing an ACL reconstruction with meniscal repair,” Simard said.
On the positive side, the doctor added that, barring no complications, St. Pierre should make a full recovery within six to nine months.
“His recovery rate is completely off the chart.,” Simard said. “He has amazing genetics.
Georges St. Pierre is one of the most popular fighters in the UFC, and has been dominating the promotion’s welterweight division for four years.
Despite the flood of bad news, GSP remained optimistic and vowed his mixed martial arts career is far from over.
“Mark my words, I’m going to tell you right now … in a few months I’m going to be back stronger than ever and I will be champion again,” St. Pierre said. “This I promise my fans.”
Check out the following clip which shows a few of Georges’ fighting highlights over the years:
via Toronto Sun Image: UFC.com
