Muhammad drops Usman pursuit and reveals vertigo struck him before Garry defeat

Belal Muhammad has drawn a line under his long-running pursuit of Kamaru Usman, declaring the former UFC welterweight champion has been avoiding him long enough, and revealing for the first time that he entered his November defeat to Ian Machado Garry suffering from vertigo.

Muhammad had spent the better part of a year publicly targeting a fight with Usman, with whom he had traded barbs across interviews, social media, and a shared podcast appearance. After losing his welterweight title in May and then falling to Garry, Muhammad was hopeful the UFC would finally book the matchup while Usman was sidelined following his win over Joaquin Buckley. Instead, the promotion paired Muhammad with rising prospect Gabriel Bonfim for the UFC Vegas 118 main event on Saturday.

“The guy’s been avoiding me forever,” Muhammad told MMA Fighting. “So I’m not going to keep chasing somebody. My mindset is Bonfim and then looking at the next guy. He got away. It’s whatever. For me, I can’t think about him anymore.”

Muhammad was equally blunt about the prospect of calling Usman out again in the future. “There’s no need for it anymore, for myself,” he said. “Then it looks like you’re a bully, and I don’t like picking on guys.”

Beyond the Usman chapter closing, Muhammad offered a significant new detail about his loss to Garry in Qatar last November — a defeat that handed him consecutive losses for the first time in his career. He says vertigo struck him immediately after his weigh-in, leaving him disoriented throughout fight week and into the bout itself, compounding the damage done by eye pokes during the contest.

“I went into that fight with vertigo,” Muhammad revealed. “I had vertigo after my weigh-in, and it was the first time I ever felt it. I was literally head shaking the whole time.”

Muhammad said he still does not know what caused the episode, and that medical staff in Qatar provided little clarity on the diagnosis or its origins.

With both grievances now aired, Muhammad says his focus is entirely on Bonfim and rebuilding his standing in the welterweight division. “Now it’s about getting my hand raised, getting back in the win column, and reminding people who I am,” he said.