Bruna Brasil finished her UFC Vegas 113 camp in Las Vegas as The Fighting Nerds coaching staff flew to the city for Jean Silva’s UFC 324 bout in January, and hanging out at the UFC Performance Institute for weeks led to a dream meeting with Amanda Nunes.
“The Special One”, a 32-year-old who carries her country’s name as surname, was “starstruck” meeting Brazil’s greatest female MMA fighter. “The Lioness” had her UFC 324 title bout with Kayla Harrison cancelled as the champion had to undergo neck surgery, but decided to fly to Nevada and continue training as if the fight was still on.
“I was getting dressed in the bathroom and started hearing her voice outside. I said, ‘Damn, Amanda is right there!’” Brasil told MMA Fighting. “I hadn’t seen her yet. I got ready super fast and ran out all excited. It was really cool. She’s very, very, very friendly, really nice. We talked for a bit. You get kind of starstruck when you meet someone you admire so much in person. I was really happy.”
Brasil, who faces Ketlen Souza at the Meta APEX on Feb. 7, ended up meeting “The Lioness” many times over the past couple of weeks at the UFC P.I., watching her train with her wife Nina Nunes and help teammate Priscila Cachoeira, who also competes at UFC Vegas 113.
“She surprised me positively as a person, with her friendliness,” Brasil said. “The way she speaks, her posture. She really carries herself like a champion. You can see she has that strength — even as a coach, talking about ‘Pedrita’s’ camp and her goals, and how she wants to grow as a coach as well. You can tell she’s different, she has a different kind of star. She’s obsessed with winning. I think she’s going to be very successful in this coaching career too.”
The UFC plans on re-booking Harrison vs. Nunes at a later date when the two-time Olympic gold medalist in judo is cleared to return to the gym, and Brasil sees “The Lioness” regaining the 135-pound championship whenever that superfight comes to fruition.
“I’m 100 percent Amanda,” Brasil said. “Kayla is very good, I admire her a lot as an athlete too, but Amanda’s experience is much greater. She’s more complete, more skilled, with a much more champion-like mindset. She’s going to fight for the victory, not for money. I think that’s a huge difference.”
Happy to be back in Las Vegas after traveling all the way to Shanghai to beat Chinese prospect Ming Shi in the main event of a Road to UFC card, Brasil said she’s open to flying oversees again in the future after past UFC bouts in Sydney, Manchester, London and Kansas City.
“It was better than I imagined,” Brasil said. “I headlined [a Road to UFC] card but it felt like I was doing king of a regular UFC event. The arena was packed, sold out. I went to watch the UFC the next day and it was the same. The fight got a lot of attention over there because it was against a Chinese fighter, so there were posters of my fight all over China. It had much more impact than if I had fought on a regular UFC card, which would probably have been a prelim fight and wouldn’t have gotten as much spotlight.”
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