When Amanda Nunes obliterated Chris Cyborg in under a minute in December last year, she cemented her spot as one of the all-time great mixed martial artists.
She entered the octagon as the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) women’s bantamweight champion, and the stunning upset knockout win over Cyborg gave Nunes the featherweight belt as well. This made her the first woman in UFC history to hold belts in different weight classes simultaneously.
The manner in which she created history was nothing short of spectacular. Cyborg was considered the Mike Tyson of MMA — a bullying, intimidating brawler. Nunes, the smaller of the two, was the clear underdog.
But Nunes had a winning formula in mind — come out all guns blazing. Seconds into the battle, she unleashed a flurry of punches which left Cyborg on wobbly legs. A couple of powerful overhead strikes then toppled Cyborg, who landed face first on the canvas. In just 51 seconds, Nunes established herself as a bona fide superstar.
Cyborg was the latest big name on Nunes’ list of victims. In July 2016, she claimed the bantamweight title with a rear-naked choke submission on Miesha Tate. A few months later, she defended the crown by demolishing UFC poster-girl Ronda Rousey. The brutal beating led to Rousey hanging up her MMA gloves and signing with World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) instead.
Nunes is now poised to enter uncharted territory. She recently expressed her desire to defend both the bantamweight and featherweight titles. No UFC fighter has managed to do that for an extended period of time, although a couple have tried and failed.
In 2016, Conor McGregor wore the featherweight and lightweight belts, but after a long period of inactivity, he was stripped of the featherweight title. Daniel Cormier faced a similar situation when he won the light heavyweight and heavyweight titles. During his reign as heavyweight champion, Cormier didn’t compete in the lower weight class and was therefore forced to relinquish his light heavyweight belt.
For any athlete, across all fighting styles, moving up and down divisions is an incredibly hard task. Frequent phases of weight gain and weight loss take a heavy toll on the body, leaving the fighter at risk when entering the ring. In this dangerous sport, no fighter can afford to be drained and exhausted (in the case of cutting weight and moving down), or sluggish (in the case of adding weight and moving up).
What could work in Nunes’ favour is the lack of depth in the featherweight division. The weight class includes just one top-level fighter in Cyborg; the cupboard is empty otherwise. Perhaps Nunes can hold on to the crown until new and able contenders emerge. A rematch against Cyborg is another option that the UFC could explore.
Before these grand plans are realised, a more immediate challenge awaits Nunes. The Brazilian is set to take on Holly Holm in a bantamweight title defence in July. Holm is no pushover, having built quite an impressive resume of her own. She famously put Rousey to sleep with a thunderous high kick in 2015, ending Rousey’s undefeated streak and three-year reign as bantamweight champion.
If Holm — a multiple-time professional boxing world champion before her foray into MMA — gets cracking, Nunes could well slip and fall at this first hurdle.
Not that any of this fazes ‘The Champ Champ’. Nunes’ journey to the top has been filled with bigger obstacles. She grew up in a poor family near Salvador in Brazil, hanging on to a dream of becoming a professional fighter. She began her career in small arenas near her hometown, and slowly gained enough experience to move to the United States of America.
She competed in smaller promotions such as Prime MMA Championship and Strikeforce in the USA for five years before earning a big break with the UFC.
Nunes has broken new ground on other fronts as well. When she choked Tate out, she became the first openly gay champion in UFC history. More recently, her technical knockout victory over Raquel Pennington was the first UFC event to be headlined by two openly gay fighters.
If all goes to plan inside the octagon, there could be more history in the making.
