MANCHESTER, England -- Michael Bisping isn't too sure how he will celebrate if he beats Dan Henderson in his first UFC middleweight title defense this weekend.
"I have no idea," Bisping said. "An after-party at 6 a.m.? I think that's gonna be a tricky one. So I'll be having a nice breakfast somewhere, hopefully."
UFC 204, headlined by Bisping's rematch with Henderson at the Manchester Arena, has not been scheduled to match British Summer Time, but instead to better suit U.S. time zones, with the main event unlikely to start until around 5:15 a.m. local time on Sunday.
Bisping had barely been out of bed when he turned up to speak to the media on Thursday.
"It was nice to go back to my hometown, Clitheroe [in Lancashire, England] just down the road, [to] see my mum, see some old faces, see my dad for a bit, remind myself where this all started," he said. "But of course the fight's happening at 5 a.m., so I've had to alter my sleeping patterns.
"I've not been out of bed long. Unfortunately it has been a little weird. I haven't been able to go out and walk around Manchester in the daylight and enjoy the sunshine this week. It has been sleeping in and then sitting up in a hotel room until 5 in the morning watching movies and rubbish TV that they show in the twilight hours."
Adapting his sleeping pattern has been made slightly easier given the fact that Bisping, his wife and three children live in California, eight hours behind BST.
"It hasn't been a struggle but it has been a chore, because you start getting tired," Bisping said. "I'm on California time but when it goes dark, your brain starts telling you it's bed time. So 1 o'clock in the morning I start yawning, but I'm nowhere near tired enough to go to bed. I went to bed at 5:15 a.m. last night. But it's necessary. I'm gonna be stepping in to fight around 5:15, something like that."
Bisping even had to correct himself when describing how it will feel to walk out in the arena "on Saturday night -- on Sunday morning, I mean," in front of a sold-out home crowd.
It will be the same for those in attendance.
"I know that a lot of my friends are gonna go out for dinner, then they're gonna have a few drinks, then they're gonna go to the arena," Bisping said. "I think there's gonna be some sore heads on Sunday morning, that's for sure. But whether it was 10 p.m. or 5 a.m., [it's] no difference. People like to have a good time. Why not? This is a big event. This is a big title fight. There has never been an English champion before. There's a lot of excitement around."
The fight is reminiscent of Manchester-born boxer Ricky Hatton's upset win in the early hours of June 5, 2005, over Kostya Tszyu in front of 22,000 at the then-M.E.N. Arena.
"When I first heard about this it really excited me," Bisping said. "Ricky Hatton is a national treasure. It was incredible -- 'Wow, they're having it in the middle of the night for certain time zones.' I was a bit younger then and an aspiring fighter. And I remember when the UFC came to me with the idea, I was all for it. I was apprehensive of how the ticket sales might go, because I thought it was a big ask. But part of me thought it was really cool and exciting. I thought back to the Ricky Hatton fight. And I thought, 'Wow, does that mean that I'm Ricky Hatton?' And then of course the tickets sold out in six minutes which blew me away, and brought a lot of nerves. It hit me. It was like a slap. Now I've gotta go and perform."
Bisping has had a taste of the Manchester atmosphere before, having beaten Denis Kang at the same arena at UFC 105, in his first bout since his brutal knockout defeat to Henderson at UFC 100.
"It's gonna be incredible, the people of GB have always supported me," Bisping said. "Sold out arena, the energy is gonna be ridiculous. The first time I fought at the MEN, the Manchester Arena now, I was so taken aback by the noise of the crowd, the roar that they made. I sprinted to the ring, like a mad man. I was just so high on adrenaline. With a little bit of luck there will be the same energy. I'm very excited. Manchester is a city close to my heart. I'm from just down the road and I'm proud to be fighting here."
Bisping will cut weight later on Thursday night -- he said he currently weighed 198 pounds, and must get down to 185 before Friday's weigh-in. But he was his usual entertaining self as he stepped up to face off with Henderson in front of the cameras at the news conference.
"Here he is, old man Henderson," Bisping said. "Good luck, God bless him."
He then poked Henderson in the stomach.
"A little soft there, Dan," Bisping said. "Do a few sit-ups, mate, all that. No TRT [testosterone replacement therapy]."
Bisping then pointed to the title on his shoulder, saying, "This stays right here, pal."
Henderson responded: "They'll give me a new one."
"Not bad for an old man," Bisping said, chuckling, as he walked away. But behind the bravado, he is determined not to suffer the same fight as UFC 100.
"I want to keep hold of this," Bisping said, pointing to his championship. "It would crush me to lose it in my first defense. Also, losing to Dan Henderson again is something. ... If that were to happen, I would struggle to live with that. To lose my title, which is very dear to me now, to Dan Henderson, and to know that he's retiring. If I lost to him twice I wouldn't get a third match anyway. Nobody wants to lose their first defense, especially to an old rival."