Weili Zhang grew to become the primary fighter to defeat Tatiana Suarez and in doing so Zhang defended her UFC strawweight title a 3rd consecutive time.
The reigning 115-pound champion earned a one-sided unanimous determination victory over Suarez within the co-main occasion of UFC 312 early Sunday in Sydney, Australia.
The champion entered the match as a slight underdog however by the top of the 5 rounds it was abundantly clear that by no means ought to’ve been the case.
Suarez took the motion to the bottom inside the first minute of Spherical 1 when the pair locked up in the course of the cage, touchdown in facet management and instantly pressuring from the highest.
Zhang defended with veteran poise and regained her guard briefly and ultimately managed to get again to her toes. Suarez was hasty on a guillotine choke try, Zhang escaped and Suarez completed the spherical on the underside after racking up greater than three minutes of prime floor management.
The 35-year-old combating out of Beijing was the sooner fighter and much more snug on the toes, touchdown cleanly with each fingers usually, and after permitting that early takedown didn’t quit one other. Zhang cracked Suarez with a proper hand early in Spherical 3 that had Suarez stumbling backwards. Suarez persevered but it surely was a masterclass from the ultimate minute of the opening spherical onward.
Zhang linked on a whopping 233 of her 283 whole strike makes an attempt, whereas Suarez solely landed one important head strike within the 25-minute bout and completed one for 16 on takedown makes an attempt.
Zhang is a two-time champion who now has 4 whole title defences — three throughout her present run and one throughout her first time as champion. Her first defence was her basic bout with Joanna Jedrzejczyk who nonetheless holds the division’s all-time file with 5 title defences that collected throughout her time atop the division from 2015 to 2017.
She was coming off a unanimous determination over Yan Xiaonan at UFC 300 final April. Her present profitable streak is at 5.
Zhang’s solely missteps in her MMA profession have been a call loss in her skilled debut method again in 2013 and her back-to-back losses to Rose Namajunas in 2021.
Her first loss to “Thug Rose” was a surprising 78-second head kick knockout loss at UFC 261; the instant rematch at UFC 268 resulted in a cut up determination throughout which Namajunas used wrestling and management time to win the ultimate two rounds and eke out a slender victory.
In opposition to Suarez, Zhang’s wrestling seemed higher than ever.
Suarez’s UFC’s appearances have been few and much between since she made her UFC debut in 2016 after profitable a season of The Final Fighter. In actual fact, she has solely fought seven instances since then, together with her loss to Zhang, and it had been 18 months since Suarez final competed.
The 34-year-old from California entered UFC 312 with a 10-0 professional file together with wins over former UFC champions Carla Esparza, Alexa Grasso and a submission win over Jéssica Andrade in August of 2023 that obtained her to the highest contender spot.
Suarez is not any stranger to setbacks each out and in of competitors. She had her beginner wrestling profession successfully ended on account of a neck harm in 2012 whereas coaching for a spot on the US Olympic wrestling workforce. Then, her life was derailed when scans she underwent on the time revealed she had thyroid most cancers.
Since her profitable most cancers therapy her profession has been riddled with accidents. Suarez withdrew from two scheduled matchups in 2024 and misplaced when she lastly did return.
Now Suarez should regroup understanding what it’s like going 5 rounds with the highest strawweight within the sport.
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