Amanda Nunes says injuries played a key role in her stunning UFC 269 submission loss to Julianna Peña to lose her bantamweight belt.
Nunes was a massive favorite against Peña and in the first round was dominating. However, in the second, she began to slow down and Peña was picking her apart and eventually got her down and got the submission win in the second round.
According to Amanda Nunes, she says her training camp was a mess as she dealt with a ton of injuries and that showed in the fight.
“My whole camp for this fight was a mess,” Nunes told ESPN. “I always want to put in my head I was OK, I can do this because we are like that. We want to go through whatever to step in the cage, and my first fight against her fell through. I got COVID, so all those things and in my second fight with her, the camp I went through a couple of issues, as well, that I knew I wasn’t going to be able to really show up to the gym every day at 100 percent. But I didn’t want to let that fight go again. I don’t think it would have looked good for me.
“I paid for it. I paid for my mistakes. I was supposed to listen to the doctors, I was supposed to listen to my body and show up how I always do, 100 percent in the gym, full camp, and it was obvious in the fight (that I wasn’t 100 percent). I really showed how my camp was, and I feel like I paid for it.”
According to Amanda Nunes, her knees were very bad and she wasn’t able to recover properly.
Although she lost her belt, Nunes and Peña are set to coach TUF and will rematch with Nunes looking to reclaim her belt which she’s confident she will now that she’s healthy.
“Both knees were pretty bad, and I wasn’t able to recover, and I went through,” Nunes said. “Every time I was training back home and the next day I couldn’t even walk, but I don’t want to make excuses. I did that. I paid for my mistakes, but I want to do a full camp, and I didn’t. … I needed time off. I couldn’t turn, do all the things that I have to do, like do jiu-jitsu that much, wrestling. I was pretty much only doing hands like striking or whatever I did for conditioning. I only used my arms, so that cost me my belt.”
