It's been a tough few weeks for Ronda Rousey since her devastating knockout loss to Holly Holm at UFC 193. Not only did Holm walk out of the octagon with the bantamweight belt, but for the first time in Rousey's professional mixed martial arts career, she was defeated.
The former champion covers ESPN The Magazine's "Ideas of the Year" issue. In it, she opens up for the first time about the fight, injuries she sustained and her desire to come back.
"It might be three to six months before I can eat an apple, let alone take an impact," she tells writer Ramona Shelburne. "I'm just really fucking sad. I need to come back. I need to beat this chick. Who knows if I'm going to pop my teeth out or break my jaw or rip my lip open. I have to fucking do it."
Rousey's ground game has never been in question. In 1992 she became the first woman to medal in the Olympics when she took home the bronze in judo. She had used her skills as a judoka to walk through her opponents on the way to a 12-0 record.
She's worked hard on her stand up game in an effort to become a more well rounded fighter. She's not yet at an elite level with her hands and that proved to be her downfall against Holm, a former professional boxer and kickboxer.
"I got hit in that first round. ... I cut my lip open and knocked a couple of my teeth loose. I was out on my feet from the very beginning," she says now. "I wasn't thinking clearly. I had that huge cut in my mouth and I just spit [the blood] out at my feet. Then they brought the bucket over and I'm like, 'Why didn't I spit it in the bucket?' I never spit on the ground. It was like a dumbed-down dreamy version of yourself making decisions. ... I was just trying to shake myself out of it. I kept saying to myself, 'You're OK, keep fighting. You're OK, keep fighting.' I just feel so embarrassed. How I fought after that is such an embarrassing representation of myself. I wasn't even fucking there."
Rousey was hit with a six-month medical suspension following the fight. She’ll have to spend 60 days without fighting and 45 days with no contact at all.
“Maybe I can’t do it all before my prime, before my body is done. But fuck it, maybe I can.”
ESPN The Magazine's "Ideas of the Year" issue hits newsstands on Friday.
Source: ESPN
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