UFC middleweight contender Chris Curtis had a pretty unusual incident while training. He accidentally got hit by athletes sparring besides him.
Professional mixed martial artists train year round and organize training camps to prepare for specific opponents 4 to 8 weeks ahead of the scheduled bout. In camp, they train hard. Due to that, it’s not rare to see UFC athletes suffering through serious injury, resulting in their bouts getting canceled.
Chris Curtis recently suffered a pretty gruesome neck injury. But, he got it from a pretty unexpected source. On his social media account, Curtis revealed that he was improving his ground game with someone when another pair of grapplers clashed with them.
Suddenly, he got kicked by another pair who trained pretty near him. Curtis didn’t really feel that the hit was quite hard. He noticed it after someone pointed out that the back of his neck is bloated with a reddish color.
“Sooo this happened today. Got kicked in the neck while grappling by the group behind us in round 1 of sparring. 6 rounds later somebody points it out, I didn’t even notice. I guess even my spine is armored. Just built Different.” Curtis wrote on Twitter with laughing emojis.
Chris Curtis is one of UFC prospects who climbed the ranks pretty quick. ‘The Action Man’ entered the UFC in 2021 and earned two victories against Phil Hawes and Brendan Allen that ended via knockouts. In 2022, he earned a decision win against Rodolfo Vieira. After that, Curtis stepped in on short notice to face ranked opponent Jack Hermansson, replacing Darren Till. He had to suffer his first UFC loss via unanimous decision against Hermansson.
On his latest outing, Curtis bounced back when he faced Joaquin Buckley. He knocked out Buckley in the middle of the second round. Curtis is now sitting at number 14 in the middleweight rankings.
Chris Curtis is set to face UFC veteran Kelvin Gastelum, who is currently sitting at number 14. The pair will exchange blows on April 8 at UFC 287.