Champ Zhang Weili secures visa to travel to United States for UFC 248

MMA News

Champ Zhang Weili secures visa to travel to United States for UFC 248

UFC strawweight champion Zhang Weili – the UFC’s first champion from China– has secured her visa to travel to the United States for her upcoming fight against Joanna Jedrzejczyk on March 7 in Las Vegas.

According to a report from MMAFighting.com, Zhang was granted her visa with plans to travel to the United States later this week to wrap up her training camp ahead of UFC 248.

There had been some concern about Zhang’s status for the fight after the deadly coronavirus outbreak hit China, which then resulted in travel restrictions being placed on anyone coming into the United States.

Rather than wait until the last minute, Zhang and her team moved their camp to Thailand before the UFC eventually intervened and sent her to Abu Dhabi instead. Zhang continued her training there while working to secure her visa to travel to the United States.

The coronavirus death toll has now reached over 2,000 people with more than 74,000 people infected by the disease in China.


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Zhang and her team initially continued training in China with their camp far away from the Wuhan region of the country where the outbreak first started. Sadly as the disease began to spread, the UFC strawweight champion had no other choice but to leave her country.

Now that Zhang has received her visa, the fight with Jedrzejczyk can move forward as scheduled.

The strawweights will serve as the co-main event at UFC 248 with middleweight champion Israel Adesanya defending his belt against Yoel Romero in the headliner from Las Vegas.

Champ Zhang Weili secures visa to travel to United States for UFC 248