Robert Whittaker was halfway up a sandhill on Christmas Day when he did the unthinkable.
He stopped.
Which made no sense.
Or not for Whittaker.
That unbreakable UFC fighter who, for five years, has devoted his Sundays to climbing those famed Wanda dunes in Sydney’s Sutherland Shire.
When an NRL team tackles Wanda, a dozen hills have been enough to see players collapse, even hospitalised.
Yet Whittaker, he runs 37.
Has never once quit on a dune, either.
Or not until last December.
“I just stopped,” he says. “Then stood there, asking ‘what the f... am I doing?’.
“It was Christmas Day.
“My family was somewhere else.
“That moment, it’s when everything crashed.”
Speaking now after a morning training session in his sprawling, home gym, Whittaker is walking The Saturday Telegraph through the shock breakdown — or “burn out” as he calls it — which occurred four months ago to the day.
A situation which saw this Sydney striker not only quit on that dune, or then withdraw from an upcoming UFC 248 bout against American Jared Cannonier, but disappear for days, then weeks, as rumours emerged about donating bone marrow for his daughter.
Which for the record, Whittaker says are completely false.
“All my kids were fine,” he says. “They are fine.”
Instead, the 29-year-old reveals his shock disappearance, which came only a dozen weeks after also losing his UFC middleweight title to New Zealand prodigy Israel Adesanya, is the result of a life that simply became too much.
Since late 2014, Whittaker has trained seven days a week.
With four, sometimes five sessions a day.
And sure, there have been breaks.
Like in 2019, when the fighter’s bowel twisted and collapsed so badly before a title fight with Kelvin Gastelum, three emergency surgeries were required.
Or a year before that, when a bout of chickenpox was severe enough to see his skin blister and scab.
But the crazier it got, Whittaker concedes, the harder “I bit down on my mouthguard”.
Always has.
He stopped.
Which made no sense.
Or not for Whittaker.
That unbreakable UFC fighter who, for five years, has devoted his Sundays to climbing those famed Wanda dunes in Sydney’s Sutherland Shire.
When an NRL team tackles Wanda, a dozen hills have been enough to see players collapse, even hospitalised.
Yet Whittaker, he runs 37.
Has never once quit on a dune, either.
Or not until last December.
“I just stopped,” he says. “Then stood there, asking ‘what the f... am I doing?’.
“It was Christmas Day.
“My family was somewhere else.
“That moment, it’s when everything crashed.”
Speaking now after a morning training session in his sprawling, home gym, Whittaker is walking The Saturday Telegraph through the shock breakdown — or “burn out” as he calls it — which occurred four months ago to the day.
A situation which saw this Sydney striker not only quit on that dune, or then withdraw from an upcoming UFC 248 bout against American Jared Cannonier, but disappear for days, then weeks, as rumours emerged about donating bone marrow for his daughter.
Which for the record, Whittaker says are completely false.
“All my kids were fine,” he says. “They are fine.”
Instead, the 29-year-old reveals his shock disappearance, which came only a dozen weeks after also losing his UFC middleweight title to New Zealand prodigy Israel Adesanya, is the result of a life that simply became too much.
Since late 2014, Whittaker has trained seven days a week.
With four, sometimes five sessions a day.
And sure, there have been breaks.
Like in 2019, when the fighter’s bowel twisted and collapsed so badly before a title fight with Kelvin Gastelum, three emergency surgeries were required.
Or a year before that, when a bout of chickenpox was severe enough to see his skin blister and scab.
But the crazier it got, Whittaker concedes, the harder “I bit down on my mouthguard”.
Always has.
