Juliana Velasquez Talks Dealing with Pressure Ahead of Title Defense at Bellator 278

At Bellator 278, Bellator MMA women’s flyweight titleholder Juliana Velasquez will attempt to notch her second defense. Velasquez (12-0, 7-0 Bellator) is set to face former Ultimate Fighting Championship title challenger Liz Carmouche in the night’s headliner. Velasquez captured the divisional championship after upending former champion Ilima-Lei Macfarlane at Bellator 254. In her next appearance, the Brazilian took home a narrow split decision from Denise Kielholtz. In a recent interview with Sherdog, Velasquez revealed that she wasn’t quite herself that night due to the amount of pressure she was dealing with, even though she attempted to conceal it during fight week.

“I was saying all week that I wasn’t nervous at all about that, that I felt no pressure, but I did feel a lot of pressure coming to [me] more than I expected. Right after the fight, I looked for professional help. I got a psychologist to work [on] it and control it and overcome this kind of feelings that I was having before the fight. Right now, I’m feeling much better than I did [before]. Now, I’m really feeling almost with no pressure at all. I think that’s something important going forward.”

Velasquez then explained that she generally didn’t feel much pressure going into her battles before Bellator 262. However, something changed in her mind on that occasion, and she put way too much pressure on herself. That condition prevented her from competing as usual.

“It was the first time [it happened]. It wasn’t only the external pressure. It was more like an internal pressure. There was more pressure [than usual] from everyone around this fight but also the pressure that I put on myself going into it. That’s the main aspect I’ve been training on since that fight, not to put too much pressure on myself.”

Velasquez also discussed her training camp, said that she would love to see Bellator holding an event in Brazil, and more.

Timestamps:

(00:00) Intro
(00:51) Her training camp
(01:40) Her expectations for the Carmouche fight
(02:44) Her sparring partners
(03:31) Her cornermen
(03:50) Commenting on the split decision over Kielholtz at Bellator 262
(06:15) Her takeaways from that fight
(08:08) Dealing with pressure going into fights
(09:18) Hoping that Bellator holds an event in Brazil
(10:38) Walking out to “In The End” by Linkin Park
(11:07) Outro

Tudor Leonte started writing about mixed martial arts in 2013 for Italian media outlets. His journey with Sherdog began in 2018 and he now covers One Championship and countless European shows. You can follow him on Twitter @MrTudorLeonte.