Borralho: "I fought with a totally broken rib" against De Ridder, then needed emergency surgery

The Brazilian middleweight, who faces Yousri Belgaroui at UFC 334 next Saturday, says the UFC did not know how severe the injury was and he kept it from his own parents.

Caio Borralho says he beat Reinier de Ridder at UFC 326 in March with a rib he had broken two weeks before the fight, and that an MRI 10 weeks later showed the break had separated further and sent him into emergency surgery the next day.

"I broke my rib two weeks before my fight with De Ridder. I fought with a totally broken rib," Borralho said in an interview quoted by Bloody Elbow. "It was the craziest two weeks of my life. It was a mental war."

He said his doctor told him after the fight to wait for the rib to heal. "I was waiting for 10 weeks and still had pain, so I went back to the doctor and we had an MRI," he said. "The results showed that it was separated even more after 10 weeks, and we had to have emergency surgery the next day."

Borralho said the UFC did not know how severe the injury was before the fight. "Even my family didn't know. My four coaches and my wider team knew, and my wife. But I didn't tell my mother or father," he said. "Fighting is already a lot of worry for them, so I didn't want them to worry more than needed, and I fought, and won!"

The recovery forced him out of a fight with Joe Pyfer at UFC 330 in August. Borralho, who is 18-2, is No. 5 in the UFC's official middleweight rankings, one place above Pyfer.

He faces Belgaroui, an 11-3 former Glory kickboxing title challenger who is unbeaten in three UFC fights, on the UFC 334 main card at Madison Square Garden in New York on Saturday 14 November. Ciryl Gane defends the heavyweight title against Josh Hokit in the main event.

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