Inspired By Gina

By year’s end, Mexico’s Alexa Grasso will have been competing as a professional fighter for a full decade.

The 28-year-old has had plenty of up and downs, but getting to this point didn’t come without a little bit of inspiration from one of MMA’s most impactful presences. 145-pound featherweight superstar Gina Carano had her last fight three years prior to Grasso taking the plunge. If it wasn’t for the future actress, Grasso may not have found her passion.

Well, an all-time great hailing from Canada also played a part.

“Gina Carano was the first female athlete I saw fighting,” Grasso told MMAMania.com. “I knew then that I wanted to do this. And GSP (Georges St-Pierre) is my top role model ever!

“There’s been so many [learning experiences] and I’m still learning. But the only thing I can say is that hard work pays off. Anything you want in life you have to work as hard as possible until you reach it. Never settle for less. You can always be better.”

Grasso finds herself as a 13-3 125-pound flyweight Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) contender in 2022 and has had many great battles along the way. Those who have followed her career closely going back to her days in Invicta Fighting Championship will remember the war with Mizuki Inoue. More recent performances against Karolina Kowalkiewicz and Maycee Barber will stand out to those still getting familiar with the boxing savvy competitor.

Directly before her venture to the states to compete in Invicta, however, Grasso recalls a wonderful brawl with a future teammate, Karina Rodriguez. MMA, folks. The sport where you get to punch your friends in the face.

“We had one of the most epic female fights in Mexico, at a Grand Prix,” Grasso reflected. “I won the tournament and earned my pass to Invicta. A few years later we coincided when training at Entram Gym [in Tijuana], we noticed that we were actually good training partners. I asked her to come to Lobo [Gym] and that’s how it started. Good results since that fight!”

February 2021 marked Grasso’s last time out when taking on the aforementioned Barber. Meanwhile, Rodriguez has gone on to capture the ever-elusive Invicta title.

It wasn’t for lack of effort from Grasso though, as she had two fights booked following her early 2021 win. The first being a personal dream matchup of hers with Joanne Wood, the second being a striker’s delight vs. Viviane Araujo. Unfortunately for the Guadalajara native, the injury bug prevented her from making it to either.

Luckily, Wood was free to throw down in March at UFC Columbus and that’s just what they’ll do, as the UFC once again gave Grasso the offer.

“It has been tough,” Grasso said of the layoff. “Sometimes things are out of our control but I’m feeling great, I’m a committed athlete and I’ve been sharping my game. I’m pretty excited for this fight because we’re both strikers and these fights are the ones I enjoy the most.”

Aside from getting her body back in competitive shape, Grasso has been honing her mental skills as well.

More and more fighters have gotten into roles outside of the cage as time goes on. It’s proven to be a great way to stay busy, especially in cases of injury, and provides new perspectives.

That’s where the UFC Espanol desk came into play for the bilingual Grasso who can now fancy herself an analyst along with being a fighter.

“What an experience!” Grasso exclaimed. “It is more difficult than it seems, I had to study a lot of fights, a lot of different games and, of course, it helped me. When you deeply analyze other athletes you can have a better vision of how to use certain techniques. I’ve thought about it but never pushed hard on it and I’m super happy that the UFC believed in me and they are giving me these challenges. Out of fight camp, I’ll continue doing it.”

Grasso currently sits at No. 11 in the official UFC flyweight rankings and a win over the No. 7 Wood in March will put her on a three-fight winning streak. The champion in Valentina Shevchenko has continued to knock off contender after contender to the point where maybe three names clearly stand out at present; the Lobo Gym staple being one of them.

“My goals for 2022 are to win all my fights in a blunt way to meet all requirements to be in line for a title shot,” Grasso said. “I’m not the matchmaker but I hope to be pretty close to it after this next fight!”