Caio Borralho is the next man up on The Fighting Nerds’ “comeback season” in the UFC, and vows to be a better athlete after a “nightmarish” experience in 2025.
Borralho was on a roll in the UFC when the organization came with an offer: already scheduled to headline UFC Paris against Narrourdine Imavov in September 2025, he could also serve as the back-up fighter for the middleweight title bout between Dricus Du Plessis and Khamzat Chimaev three weeks before. Borralho said ‘yes’ without even asking his coaches, but was dealing with unfavorable circumstances.
Back to the cage this weekend to take on Reinier de Ridder at UFC 326, which goes down March 7 in Las Vegas, Borralho opened up on the trials and tribulations faced ahead of his most recent fight.
“First, I was in a huge existential void,” Borralho told MMA Fighting. “That was something that was really bothering me. I had lost some interest in MMA. I wasn’t studying fights, I wasn’t watching fights. I like to sit and watch, pick up patterns and all that, and I only watched [Imavov’s fights] Friday after the weigh-in. That was also something that really hurt me in the fight because I had no timing, no adaptation, without my ability to read the fight. And I’m not making excuses. Imavov had his merits in that fight, he was really damn good and shut me down. He did his homework and fought very well.”
To make matters worse, his health was compromised.
“I spent almost two months with pneumonia during that camp,” Borralho said. “I went to Chicago [for UFC 319], I cut weight twice in three weeks. I finished my antibiotics in Chicago. I would train for three days and then be out for a week, wrecked. I’d go back to training for three or four days, then another week out. That went on for about six or seven weeks. That really hurt me and made me more and more unmotivated too. But in this camp now, I’m healthy, doing everything right.”
Despite all that, which led to a decision loss to Imavov in France and snapped a perfect 7-0 record in the organization, Borralho doesn’t regret the decision to be a replacement for Du Plessis vs. Chimaev and cutting weight twice in 21 days.
“I think it was an experience I had to live to become the person I am today, you know?” Borralho said. “Maybe I’d be better if I hadn’t lived that experience, maybe I would’ve won the fight, but maybe the connection with my coaches wouldn’t have come back. Sometimes you need to hit rock bottom and take a few steps back so you can see how much you can improve. I don’t regret it one bit. It was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up. I wouldn’t forgive myself if I had said no to being the backup and then Chimaev didn’t fight and they put someone else in. Like, ‘I worked my whole life for the title and when the opportunity came I said no.’ I wouldn’t forgive myself. I don’t regret it at all.”
“If you ask me whether I think it was a wise choice, of course it wasn’t,” he added. “It wasn’t a wise choice. It wasn’t a decision I made together with my team. It was something my manager brought to me and I accepted right away, said yes, and only informed the team afterward.”
Fighting at UFC 326 will be special for Borralho, whose six previous bouts in Las Vegas took place inside the APEX. Being the co-main event of a numbered show at the T-Mobile Arena motivates Borralho to get back on the horse after his teammates Carlos Prates, Jean Silva and Mauricio Ruffy have all done the same.
“I was the first to enter the UFC, and I’ll be the last to close the Fighting Nerds’ comeback season with a flourish,” Borralho said. “It was a moment we needed to go through because it shaped the team into what it is today. And now we’re getting the results we worked so hard for. Prates with two awesome knockouts, Jean with an incredible performance against Arnold Allen, who is a very tough guy to fight. Ruffy with a crazy knockout over [Rafael] Fiziev. Now it’s my turn.”
“Pressure is a privilege,” he continued, “but I know I don’t have to prove anything to anyone. I know this pressure is only something I’ll put on myself if I want to, and only I can take it off. Today I live in a state of great fulfillment, really at peace with myself both spiritually, physically, and mentally. I’m doing everything within my power to have a great victory. The result will be a consequence, but it’s something I don’t control. I have no expectations or pressure on my shoulders. I’m at peace. I don’t live in the future. I live in the present.”
De Ridder is also under in the hot seat in the UFC after quitting on the stool in his fight with Brendan Allen. The former two-division champion in ONE Championship was 4-0 in the promotion prior to that setback, competing five times in under 12 months, and Borralho aims to put him out at UFC 326.
“After a huge knockout like I’m predicting, knocking out De Ridder to win this fight, I definitely see my name back in the title conversation,” Borralho said. “I’m in the mix. Especially with this whole situation of Chimaev not knowing whether he’ll defend or move up. I see that a dominant win definitely puts me back in that conversation.”
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