Cat Zingano went 8-0 in MMA, capped by crushing current UFC women’s bantamweight champion Miesha Tate. Then she lost her husband tragically, to suicide, leaving her a single mother. There was a gap without fights for 18 months during which she had surgical treatment on both knees, but she finally came back strong, and beat Amanda Nunes, earning a title shot.
Then she lost to then champion Ronda Rousey in just 14 seconds.
It has been a long, strange, hard hard hard trip.
Only July 9 at the biggest MMA event in the sport’s history, Zingano will fight The Ultimate Fighter 20 champ Julianna Pena, at 136 pounds.
Adding to that difficulty, Zingano’s weight ballooned to 175 pounds. But she is not ashamed.
Now she is 145, and on July 8, she will be 136, you can bet on it. That 39 pound drop represents an astonishing 29% of her fighting weight.
“I was 175 in January and 145 today,” she wrote. “Reality vs expectation. There is a much bigger fight than what you see go on in that cage. And If I can do it, anyone of y’all can.”
That is an inspiration.
To see how she did it, check out this conditioning routine highlight, courtesy of Muscle Madness.
UFC 200
•Main Card
Daniel Cormier (c) vs. Jon Jones (ic)
Brock Lesnar vs. Mark Hunt
Miesha Tate (c) vs. Amanda Nunes
José Aldo vs. Frankie Edgar for Interim championship
Cain Velasquez vs. Travis Browne
•Prelim Card (Fox Sports 1)
Cat Zingano vs. Julianna Peña
Johny Hendricks vs. Kelvin Gastelum
T.J. Dillashaw vs. Raphael Assunção
Sage Northcutt vs. Enrique Marín
•Prelim Card (UFC Fight Pass)
Diego Sanchez vs. Joe Lauzon
Gegard Mousasi vs. Thiago Santos
Jim Miller vs. Takanori Gomi
