Over recent months, nearly 400,000 people were affected by the floods in the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul.
UFC bantamweight Vinicius Oliveira felt he had to do something about it.
Oliveira was already in camp for his UFC 303 bout with Ricky Simon when tragedy struck, but he used his free time to distribute food to those living in shelters in his hometown of Porto Alegre. Oliveira’s home was not directly affected by the floods, but his mother’s house stayed underwater for weeks.
“The water only went down two or three days before I came to Vegas,” Oliveira told MMA Fighting. “I left there a few days earlier so I can stay focused on this war ahead of me, to keep my mind 100 percent here, but I haven’t abandoned them. I have people that were working with me taking care of everybody.”
Oliveira said his training camp wasn’t affected by the extra hours dedicated to helping the victims because as much as he would have liked to aided every single person, “I knew I had a war coming up and I have to help myself first before I can help others.”
“I can’t help people if I’m not OK,” Oliveira said. “If I’m not 100 percent, I can’t support others. I was able to train correctly and help people with the time I had available, taking food to the church and and shelters. I was doing what I could.”
The 28-year-old Brazilian won his UFC debut with a third-round knockout of Benardo Sopaj in March, and pocketed two bonuses for best fight and performance of the night. That extra $100,000 was a life-changing prize.
But hundreds of thousands of people have “lost everything” in Oliveira’s state, and he hopes the government provides them an avenue to build their properties again.
“People lost everything and they will need money to buy things. How are they going to do it?” said Oliveira, who doesn’t put much weight on a win at UFC 303 bringing joy to the citizens of Rio Grande do Sul. “People need joy, but what they really need is money, man. Money. It’s not about heads and hearts, it’s about providing to their families and getting their houses back up. The joy they might feel won’t pay the bills, you know? It won’t build their houses back but, sure, it’s something good in the midst of all the chaos.”
Oliveira wants to cash another $50,000 bonus Saturday in Las Vegas, but doesn’t expect Simon to pressure him enough to make it a Fight of the Night worthy bout.
“I’ll dominate him the entire time,” Oliveira said. “He will try to take me down and won’t be able to. He only does one thing good, and I’ve trained really hard to make sure it doesn’t work.
“That last fight [against Sopaj] didn’t show who I am. I’m way better than that and I’ll prove it on the 29th.”
