Q&A: Julianna Peña Reflects After a Long Journey to Become Champion

Ahead of Saturday's rematch at UFC 277, the bantamweight title-holder shares how life has changed since December's shocking win.

The damn T-shirt didn’t even fit. It was a triple-XL, designed for a man the size of Fedor Emelianenko, not a woman of 120 pounds or so. Julianna Peña had taken the fight—what might pass for a pro debut—knowing she wasn’t getting paid in actual currency. But the ill-fitting shirt the promoter tossed her as compensation for her efforts added insult to whatever minor injury she suffered.

This was in 2009 or so. These were the early days of MMA. And the infancy of women’s MMA. Dana White was still declaring that women were supposed be pretty, not swollen and bloody and puffy. Ronda Rousey had yet to come barreling onto the scene. In Spokane, Washington, Peña was taking off shifts from waitressing to fight in bowling alleys and barns and the backs of clubs. All the while her parents were hoping this phase would pass and she could find a real line of work.

The phase did not pass. But Peña found a career. One that, even after giving birth to a daughter, Issa, in 2018, she discharges better than any other woman her weight on the planet. That was made official in December when Peña submitted Amanda Nunes, the reigning GOAT, to become the UFC’s women’s bantamweight champ. Pena was not only paid well that night—more than $300,000 that night—but a celebrity lane opened up.

In advance of the Saturday's anticipated rematch, Pena, 32, is sitting cageside and ringside and doing the media rounds and making a left turn when she boards planes.

In early May, she sat down with Sports Illustrated. Some outtakes lightly edited for brevity and clarity

Peña says she's prepared for her first title defense since winning the belt against Nunes in Decemeber :: Stephen R. Sylvanie/USA TODAY Sports

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Jon Wertheim: Everything good?

Julianna Peña: Yes, yes, I just got done doing Good Morning America. It was great. I think I probably overthought it. It was 30 seconds and then it was over. And so I was like, “Wow, why was I tripping the whole time?”

JW: That sounds a little like it could describe a fight as well. So does December 11th [the night she beat Nunes] seem like a long time ago or does it seem like yesterday? 

JP: It seems like a long time ago for sure. 

JW: What’s been the biggest change?

JP: Flying first class. 

JW: Really?

JP: Yeah, you get treated like a real person when you sit in first class. It is something that I could definitely get used to. 

JW: What were your thoughts watching that [Katie Taylor-Amanda Serrano] fight? 

JP: Well, I have a few of them. I had heard that Katie Taylor created a law in Ireland allowing women boxing because she had to cut her hair and change her name and fight boys in the amateurs because women weren't allowed to box. I couldn't believe that that kind of stuff is still happening In modern day. You know, it was actually very sad to hear that. So I think that she is an absolute pioneer in women’s boxing. I don't think any other woman had done more for women’s boxing than Katie Taylor. With that being said, I commentate for Combate Global … and Amanda Serrano has fought MMA, so I've called her MMA fights and just to see her, power her skill, her hands. And Amanda Serrano is a freak of nature in such a good way. That I just get so inspired by watching her to see women for the first time, headlining Madison Square Garden. I mean it really was historic and they just kept saying making history, making history. And I would argue that it was making HERstory. 

JW: When did you know you could make a career out of this?

JP: I actually was running away from the sport, trying to find a different means of “what I was going to do with the rest of my life.” It was something that just kept calling back to me. People ask: “How did you find fighting?” but fighting truly found me. It wasn't something that I was gunning after. It was just something that kind of fell into my lap. And as the opportunities presented themselves, I just continued on the rise. But there were many times where I tried to walk away. 

JW: If MMA doesn't exist, what do you suppose you're doing right now? 

JP: If fighting didn't exist, there's a good chance that I'd still be waiting tables. Unfortunately, the fact is that I love serving people. I was a full-time server. I was a full-time college student and I was a full-time MMA fighter. And I had to choose: do you want to be the best server in the world, or do you want to be the best fighter in the world? I quit serving. 

I don't really know anything else besides the hospitality business because I grew up in the hospitality business from 15 years old when I had my first job.

But one thing that I would say is, aside from fighting, I want my career to always involve MMA, to always be involved inside the bubble whether it’s commentating or being the first woman alongside Joe Rogan and calling the fights on pay-per-view.

JW: When your daughter says, "Mom help me understand what is this feeding in you, what is this tapping into?" What are you going to tell her? 

JP: I would say that it's about empowering myself. It's about taking charge of my own life. It's about feeling powerful and feeling like I can do anything that I set my mind to. It's about mindset and breaking the barriers of what I am capable of doing and what I'm not capable of doing.

JW: How are you dealing with the work-life balance. 

JP: You know, they say that it takes a village to raise a child and I just want to take that time to shout out my village. My mom is my village and she has come to Chicago to help me in my training camp. She has been an immense help to me and without her, you know, I don't think any of this would be. She literally helps me take care of my daughter. Takes her down for naps. She feeds her. She does all my laundry. She does my baby’s laundry. She cooks and cleans and mops my floors, and literally, if it wasn't for my mom, I would just be, you know, sucking wind.

JW: What's your favorite part and your least favorite part? 

JP: My least favorite part would definitely be the media obligations, you know, or friends. In this day and age, everybody wants to see what I'm doing, right? They want to see me training. I don't want to let anyone in because I'm like these are secret things. ... My coach reminded me: They see your fight then they see you stop across the ring, grab the girl, wrap your hands around and turn on the ground and beat her up. It's not a secret right? I'm just trying to find that balance of allowing people into that and showing that other aspect of me, but I'm trying to [do] covert operations. 

JW: You’ve been saying you have a mental edge over Amanda. What do you think the source of that is? 

JP: First off, you have to have a strong mentality to do this type of sport. You have to believe in yourself. You have to know that you're gonna go in there and get your hand raised. You gotta be confident. But another one of the things that I feel like I had a mental edge over her on is the fact that she never took a fight with me. I called for the fight for five years at UFC 200, she said she would fight me. And she didn't. And then she kept saying that I wasn't worthy enough to fight her. And then when we finally did have the fight, she didn't show. So then she finally showed up. You know the second time and she was just telling me the whole time you're never going to be a champion. You're never gonna get this belt. And to me all of those things adding up were little wins, where I just felt like I got this girl. She’s already defeated. When you talk like that, it's because you're terrified, you know, and so I just wanted to encourage her and say it's OK, It’s gonna be a little fight. It's not gonna be that big of a deal. So it's gonna be a little fight. And it's gonna be over soon. Don't worry about it, you know? 

JW: If I give you truth serum truth here: You gotta sell a fight, it's one of the rules of being a fighter, but how do you feel about her? Is there really friction?

JP: You know, one of the things that I think is interesting is that she was so graceful in defeat. But as time went on, she just couldn't accept it. Instead of it being like, “Yes, you won fair and square,” it became all these excuses that started pouring out of her and she just refused to accept that she lost. She refused to accept that I've been champion. ... It's almost like a backhanded compliment. Every time I run into her it's like, "Yeah, you won," but there's always an excuse, always a loophole that she's trying to jump through. You know she can't take that win away from me and she's not going to take that away from me again. 

JW: Favorite fighter?

JP: Fedor Emelianenko versus anyone. He was my all-time — he is my all-time — favorite fighter and I feel like, you know, he's all about the real. The real shit. Like I draw my inspiration from Fedor. I want to be a mini-Fedor. I want to fight like that I hope that somebody could say, she's like a female Fedor–no Fs given, she's coming straight down with fists, even winding with looping shots that don't matter. She doesn't care. 

JW: You have a favorite fight? 

JP: You know, every single fight for me is my favorite because of how much work that I've put in. I'm fighting every single fight to get my name out there, to get people to recognize who I am and to get people to understand a little bit more about me and who I am. I pour so much into every single fight that I’ve just been dying for people to say: I want to watch that fight on Saturday night. I have to see what happens with Julianna.