Gallery Derrick Lewis def. Alexander Volkov at UFC 229: Best photos view 10 images

If you’ve been around the MMA game for a while, you’ll know Derrick Lewis has affinities for many things.

One of them happens to be the chicken from Popeyes Louisiana Kitchen. And in that, he’s not alone. UFC dual heavyweight and light heavyweight champion Daniel Cormier has been outspoken of his love for Popeyes in the past, too.

Saturday, Cormier (21-1 MMA, 10-1 UFC) puts his heavyweight title on the line against Lewis (21-5 MMA, 12-3 UFC) in the UFC 230 main event at Madison Square Garden in New York. The main card airs on pay-per-view following prelims on FS1 and UFC Fight Pass.

The fight was made on just about a month’s notice, so there hasn’t been a lot of time to build up much beef between the two (pun fully intended). But in July, after UFC 226, when Cormier and Lewis were seated next to each other at the post-fight press conference, Lewis said he took issue with how Cormier once “disrespected Popeyes chicken” in a commercial.

The mock commercial in question was one Cormier did for the World MMA Awards, and he could be seen dancing with a Popeyes drumstick and, well, putting the kinds of moves on it that probably should have needed the drumstick’s consent. (In fairness, he did that with a cake, too, in the same video.)

Ahead of Saturday’s title fight, though, Lewis wants the world to know just how seriously he’s taking his training to beat Cormier to become the heavyweight champion. And almost without question with Cormier’s past supposed indiscretions with Popeyes in mind, Lewis has made Popeyes an integral part of his training.

Check out the video above to see Lewis get put through the paces with Popeyes – as well as the appropriate breaks in between to get some more memes up on Instagram.

The training video was done for Represent.com, which has a special Lewis T-shirt available in the wake of his epic post-UFC 229 interview – in which he dropped his fight shorts while talking to Joe Rogan because his “balls was hot.”

And for the latest on UFC 230, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.

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