(Photos
by Lee Whitehead –
MMAWeekly.com)
UFC 80
WEIGH-IN PHOTO GALLERY
UFC 80
PRE-FIGHT PRESS CONFERENCE PHOTOS
NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE,
England – The fighters for Saturday night’s UFC 80 card weighed in on
Friday at the Metro Radio Arena, the same venue where the fights will take
place.
The main
event features a battle between Joe Stevenson and B.J. Penn for the Ultimate
Fighting Championship’s lightweight title, which was made vacant when Sean
Sherk was stripped of the belt after testing positive for performance enhancing
substances in California.
Although
Stevenson and Penn have been very cordial to each other leading up to now,
there was no handshake between the two at weigh-ins as they’ve both gone into
“all business” mode.
That’s not
surprising though, both fighters acknowledged such during a pre-fight media
call last week.
“Joe, I
love you and you're a great guy, but don't take it personal if I don't talk to
you in England,” Penn said.
“I know, I
know bro, me too,” replied Stevenson, who also said, “I've known B.J. for a
while and definitely would consider him a friend, but it just goes to show the
professional level of this … we're going to be able to be friends.”
Alessio
Sakara and James Lee each weighed-in one pound over for their 205-pound bout,
which is allowable though since it is a non-title affair.
In an
interesting side note, French-born, British-based fighter Jess Liaudin came
into the weigh-ins wearing a Newcastle football (soccer for those of us in the
U.S.) scarf in a wise move to secure fan support from the local crowd.
Main Card
Bouts:
-Joe
Stevenson (154 lbs.) vs. BJ Penn (154 lbs.)
-Gabriel
Gonzaga (255 lbs.) vs. Fabricio Werdum (247 lbs.)
-Marcus
Davis (169 lbs.) vs. Jess Liaudin (170 lbs.)
-Jason Lambert
(204 lbs.) vs. Wilson Gouveia (205 lbs.)
-Kendall
Grove (186 lbs.) vs. Jorge Rivera (185 lbs.)
Preliminary
Bouts:
-Colin
Robinson (238 lbs.) vs. Antoni Hardonk (244 lbs.)
-Paul Kelly
(170 lbs.) vs. Paul Taylor (170 lbs.)
-Alessio
Sakara (206 lbs.) vs. James Lee (206 lbs.)
-Sam Stout
(155 lbs.) vs. Per Eklund (155 lbs.)
