Faber: Ludwig doesn't support women's MMA, made racist jokes in the gym
The Urijah Faber-Duane Ludwig feud has reached a fever pitch.
Since Ludwig left his post as the head coach of Faber's famed "Team Alpha Male" to start his own gym in Colorado, the two men have been sniping each other through the media, each painting a picture of deceit and dysfunction.
On a recent episode of MMAFighting.com's "The MMA Hour," Faber lobbed a few more bombs in Ludwig's direction, portraying "Bang" as a sexist, racist bully who was obsessed with systematically bleeding every cent he could out of the team.
I had a girl from Alaska who said that Duane keeps on saying these comments. And first off, Duane refused to work with any females. He said, 'I just want to tell you, I'm not supportive of women's MMA. I won't be working with anybody, I won't be working with Paige (VanZant), I'm not going to be working with Nicky, I'm not going to work with Veronica. I don't believe in it.' Okay. That was an issue.
The second thing was, he was saying racial things. And that's what I'm saying when I say, things aren't jokes just because you laughed at them, especially if they're hurtful. So I had two of the African-American guys on our team who approached me and said, ‘this is getting real uncomfortable. It's funny one time, I guess, when he says stuff like, all the black guys at the end of the line. But he's saying it every single day.' Then one guy says, ‘every single time I'm in the gym and I'm talking to a girl, Duane yells across the gym, hey, so-and-so, all black guys 25 feet away from the females.' He says, 'I get it, he thinks it's funny, whatever. But he keeps doing it and it's really getting on my nerves.'
Ludwig, of course, was quick to deny any allegations that he made fighters feel uncomfortable with racist jokes.
"I don't know what the hell he's talking about," Ludwig told MMAFighting.com's Marc Raimondi. "There's jokes floating around the gym all the time. For him to point me out, like what the hell dude?"
As for refusing to train female fighters, Ludwig didn't completely dismiss the notion.
"I wouldn't say I'm against women's MMA," Ludwig said. "I do feel uneasy seeing a woman get punched in the face. That, I don't like. Women's grappling and wrestling, that's cool. But seeing a woman punched in the face, I don't really necessarily like that. There's awesome women's fights, but it still makes me feel a bit weird. But yeah, I don't like to train women."