ONE Championship 159: Reinier De Ridder training with former foe

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By Jake Skudder

Published Jul 6, 2022

Here is what Reiner De Ridder revealed about his training ahead of his ONE Championship 159 bout against Vitaly Bigdash for the ONE Middleweight title.

ONE Championship 159 will be taking place on Friday, July 22nd from the Singapore Indoor Stadium and ‘The Dutch Knight’ Reiner De Ridder will be defending his ONE Middleweight World Title against Vitaly Bigdash in the main event.

ONE 159 is shaping up to be a massive event for the MMA promotion, with a number of other major contests scheduled to take place on the night.

Prior to the massive bout, De Ridder revealed that he has been training with an old foe to get himself ready for the threat of Bigdash.

Here is what Reiner De Ridder revealed about his training ahead of his ONE Championship 159 bout against Vitaly Bigdash for the ONE FC Middleweight title.

Reiner De Ridder on Training

Image Courtesy: ONE FC

Speaking to the official ONE FC site, De Ridder revealed that he has been training with Aung La N Sang ahead of the contest on Friday, July 22nd.

De Ridder and “The Burmese Python” have fought on two occasions, and interestingly, La N Sang has also faced Bigdash three times.

“I talked to Henri a couple of times when I was there in Singapore. He’s Dutch as I am, so it was easy talking to him. We had some meals together up there and he told me, ‘Why don’t you come over?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I might,’ and I brought my family and made it a trip” De Ridder revealed.

“They were very warm, very friendly, and very welcoming. So it was a true pleasure. Very nice people. Aung met my wife, met my kids. It was very nice.”

De Ridder also revealed some of what his former foe revealed about his upcoming opponent whilst they were training.

“Yeah, we talked about it a little bit,” De Ridder revealed. “[Aung La N Sang] told me that [Bigdash] was pretty massive and that he missed weight twice. But hey, there’s not a lot there that I didn’t see already in the videos before. And he told me what I already know – that I’m going to dominate this guy.

“What else did Aung tell me about him? Well, that he’s strong, muscular, but we can all see that stuff. And that he got pretty tired at the end [of their fight], and that was pretty visual as well.”