Martial Arts News

Cristiane Justino is staying active in her combat sports career.

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For the second time this month, Justino will compete in a professional boxing match in Columbia. This time, “Cyborg” will lock horns with 23-year-old Josefina Travecedo (3-3, 2KOs) in a four-round bout at 154 pounds. “Cyborg” announced the bout in a release on Wednesday.

The pairing comes on the heels of the Brazilian’s second-round knockout victory over Karen Fernandes in Medellin, Columbia, on March 3. According to the release, “Cyborg” remained in the country “to receive post fight therapy at BioXcellerator, the leading stem cell treatment and research facilities in the world.”

With a win over Travecedo, Justino is targeting a boxing match against WBC champion Cecilia Braekhus this winter.

The Chute Boxe standout’s lone MMA bout of 2024 occurred at PFL Super Fights "Battle of the Giants: Brace for Impact,” where she took a five-round verdict over former PFL two-divisi…

Mauricio Ruffy had some special inspiration for the highlight-reel kick that dispatched Bobby Green at UFC 313.

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In an interview with Sherdog.com, The Fighting Nerds representative confirmed that Brazilian soccer idol Neymar Junior motivated him to unleash that maneuver.

“Neymar always does a sequence of dribbling that confuses his oponents. I just thought how it could be applied in MMA, and that’s the movement I did with Green, a sequence of hand feints that confounded him and permitted the kick to enter,” Ruffy said. “I´ve been practicing that movement alone for a long time. I have to avoid using it in sparring because there is no way to control the speed, which may hurt my training partners.”

To make the move even more impressive, Ruffy revealed that he had to undergo an urgent meniscus surgery in January that prevented him from kicking until two weeks before UFC 313.

“It was at the limit,” he said. “I was just allowed to kick in the last …

Paul Hughes has a dance partner for his upcoming Professional Fighters League appearance.

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The promotion announced on Wednesday that Hughes will lock horns with Bruno Miranda in the PFL Europe Belfast headliner on May 10 at the SSE Arena. The card will also include PFL Europe tournament pairings, where fighters must win three bouts to earn a $100,000 cash prize. Participants in the tournament will be announced at a later date.

A former Cage Warriors champion, Hughes was a prized free agent before signing with the PFL in 2024. He made his presence felt at PFL “Brace for Impact” last October, when he defeated ex-Bellator MMA featherweight champ A.J. McKee via split decision. “Big News” then challenged Usman Nurmagomedov for the lightweight belt at PFL Road to Dubai, losing a narrow majority decision in one of the best fights of 2025 thus far.

Miranda is coming off a split-decision triumph over former Bellator stalwart Patricky Freire at a PF…

Arman Tsarukyan believes it’ll be unfair for Justin Gaethje to get the next lightweight title shot.

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Gaethje earned a unanimous decision win in a rematch against Rafael Fiziev at UFC 313 last weekend, going 2-0 against the Kazakh. “The Highlight” is now asking for a title shot after rebounding from a knockout loss against Max Holloway to make it 3-1 in his last four.

However, Tsarukyan believes Gaethje must pass one more test to deserve a title shot. According to “Ahalkalakets,” Gaethje has to fight either him or Charles Oliveira before he can challenge Islam Makhachev.

“I wanna fight someone from Top 5, Gaethje or Oliveira,” Tsarukyan told The Schmo. “Gaethje wants to fight for the title, it makes sense to fight with me. Because nobody gonna give him title fight. It’s not gonna be fair that he’s gonna get title fight. So he gotta beat me or Oliveira to get the title fight… So I think they’re gonna give me Oliveira, or Gaethje or title fight.”…

Chidi Njokuani doesn’t mind the absence of a crowd once he enters the Octagon.

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Seven fights into his promotional tenure, Njokuani has mostly fought at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas and has never been on a pay-per-view card. Njokuani is now scheduled to co-headline UFC Fight Night 254 against Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos on Saturday at the Apex.

Njokuani won’t miss the crowd. A major part of Njokuani’s preference of fighting in Vegas is because he lives there, which makes everything easier. And “Chidi Bang Bang” doesn’t really care who’s watching once he starts trading leather. While he doesn’t mind traveling, the rather reserved Njokuani just likes the ease of things while fighting at home.

“I don’t think that really matter to me,” Njokuani told MMAjunkie.com. “I like fighting at home because I get to cut weight here, I don’t have to travel, I get to sleep more a bit. I don’t see how people don’t like doing that. But I get it. The crowds don’t real…

Rafael Fiziev (12-4) is eyeing a move to featherweight.

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Fiziev suffered a unanimous decision loss against Justin Gaethje at UFC 313 last weekend. “Ataman” is now looking to move down to featherweight despite having competed at lightweight for the most part of his career.

Fiziev’s plan to move to 145 pounds is influenced by his weight cut for UFC 313, which he claims was really easy. Fiziev says his nutritionist was focused on making him gain weight during the cut, as he was shedding pounds too fast.

“I’m start to thinking right now about change weight divisions,” Fiziev told Ariel Helwani. “Because I really cut weight really easy this time, and this is short notice. Very easy bro. All this week, my nutritionist, Jason, he tried to gain my weight because my weight go low so fast. Yeah, right now I have to think about it.”

Fiziev also said that he weighed 170 pounds on fight night, while he thinks Gaethje was much heavier. When asked if t…

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The first-round matchups are in place for Professional Fighters League’s new tournament format.

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The promotion on Tuesday officially unveiled the pairings for the eight-fighter brackets at heavyweight, light heavyweight, middleweight, welterweight, lightweight, featherweight, bantamweight and women’s flyweight. Each first-round event includes a four-fight main card and prelims featuring additional tournament and alternate fights. The four events will all be held at Universal Studios Florida, Stage 19.

The tournament will kick off with welterweights and featherweights on April 3 with a card headlined by a 170-pound clash between former Bellator champions Jason Jackson and Andrey Koreshkov. In the co-main event, 2023 PFL featherweight champ Gabriel Braga will lock horns with former Bellator title challenger Adam Borics.

The next event takes place on April 11, with women’s flyweights and men’s bantamweights getting the tournamen…

The Professional Fighters League tournament semifinals now have locations and venues.

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The promotion will head outside of Florida for the next part of its bracket, with events at the Nashville Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tennessee, on June 12; the INTRUST Bank Arena in Wichita, Kansas, on June 20 and the Winstrust Arena in Chicago on June 27.

Matchups for these events will be determined by the winners of the four first-round events in April and May.

Meanwhile, the PFL tournament finals will be spread out over three dates: Aug. 1, Aug. 15 and Aug. 21. Locations and venues for those cards were not announced.

The 2025 PFL World Tournament will begin with events on April 3, April 11, April 18 and May 1 at the backlot of Universal Studios Florida in Orlando. The winner of each bracket will receive a $500,000 bonus, and the tournament as a whole will provide payouts of more than $20 million. Events will be broadcast on the family of …

After arriving in Curitiba, Brazil, to begin training for his Global Fight League debut, Fabricio Werdum learned that proposed opponent Frank Mir had recently undergone emergency spinal surgery.

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Mir is unlikely to be able to recover in time for their fight in April, when his team (Los Angeles) is set to face Werdum's Team São Paulo in the inaugural GFL event.

“I heard about this news from you. Now I'm waiting for the event to confirm who my opponent will be, [Alexei] Oleynik or [Andrei] Arlovski,” Werdum told Sherdog.com. “Both would be rematches, but since they have opposing styles, it would be important to know right at the start of the camp. I've stopped all my projects, podcasts and lectures to focus entirely on the camp for this fight. This will be a wonderful opportunity to return to my roots, when I used to come by bus from Porto Alegre and stay in Curitiba at the Chute Boxe dormitory. Master Rafael Cordeiro is on the plane from LA to lead …

Alexander Volkanovski believes he can beat Diego Lopes in all aspects of their upcoming fight.

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Lopes and Volkanovski will fight for the vacant featherweight title in the main event at UFC 314 on April 12 at the Kaseya Center in Miami. While Volkanovski acknowledges Lopes’ skill set, he believes he can hold his own against the Brazilian.

Although Lopes is known for his dangerous submission game, Volkanovski won’t hesitate to engage on the ground. According to Volkanovski, Lopes will be very uncomfortable realizing that he can’t put his opponent away even if things are going his way.

“I think I can beat Diego everywhere,” Volkanovski said in an interview with interview with fight gear brand Engage. “He is dangerous. He’s gonna be dangerous everywhere, so I need to sharpen everything. Even if I wanted to go the wrestling route, or grappling route, I think I would dominate there anyway. Everyone knows him for his jiu-jitsu, but trust me I ain’t w…

Magomed Ankalaev and Jiri Prochazka have been going at each other.

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It all started when Ankalaev dethroned Alex Pereira via unanimous decision in the main event at UFC 313 last Saturday. While Prochazka congratulated Ankalaev, he said most fans don’t like the Dagestani as a champ. Ankalaev responded by calling Prochazka a fraud.

Addressing Ankalaev’s comments, Prochazka claimed the only fraud between them is the champ. According to “BJP,” Ankalaev was cordial with him when they previously ran into each other at the UFC Performance Institute. Prochazka believes it’s the high of the title win that is making Ankalaev act “gangster” now. However, the former champ also claims that Ankalaev’s win came against the worst-ever version of “Poatan.”

“[Ankalaev] can think what he wants, but I know the only person who is a fraud is him,” Prochazka told Ariel Helwani. “Because when I met him in the UFC Performance Institute in Las Vegas, he was there, he wa…

Frank Mir’s proposed Global Fight League debut is likely in jeopardy after he recently underwent emergency spinal surgery.

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The Ultimate Fighting Championship and Bellator MMA veteran revealed details of the procedure in a recent Instagram post.

“I wanted to take a moment to update you on my health and share a bit about my recent journey. As many of you know, I’ve been dedicated to martial arts since I was just four years old. My love for hard training has driven me to push my limits as a professional athlete. However, this passion comes with its challenges,” Mir wrote. “Recently, I faced a significant hurdle: I underwent an emergency spinal fusion and laminectomy of my entire thoracic spine. Although it was a tough decision, I’m happy to report that the surgery was a complete success!

“Now, I’m diving into rehabilitation and focusing on my recovery. This is just another challenge that I intend to overcome, and I’m committed to coming back st…