Miesha Tate’s drop down to the flyweight division last year didn’t go well at all, putting on the worst performance of her career during a unanimous decision loss to Lauren Murphy, and in hindsight the former women’s bantamweight champ admits that it was a bad move for her.
“Making 125 [pounds], I’m proud of myself,” Tate said ahead of her return to bantamweight against Julia Avila at UFC On ESPN 52 on Saturday night. “It just goes to show when I set my mind to something, I can do it, because that was not easy. It took months and months and months of dieting, and I’m already pretty lean at 135, so to get down to 125 meant I just had to strip muscle off of my body. There really wasn’t much room to play with body fat.
“So it ended up not being a good thing for me. Hormonally, I had some complications, and I was just too lean for a female, so I think 135 is where it’s at.
Looking back on it, Tate says the process of cutting down to 125lbs was a punishing experience that she wouldn’t want to go through again.
“I don’t think most people realize how difficult any of this is. Most people can’t even stick to a normal diet. They say ‘Oh, I want to lose some weight,’ and they’re not even willing or able to do that.
“So I think for an athlete to shave muscle off of their body, it’s very difficult, and it feels terrible actually. It’s like this burning feeling in your body. I don’t know how to explain it, but it’s like your muscle just being liquified. It’s not a very nice feeling. Easier said than done.”
Given how badly she performed against Murphy some have suggested that the 37-year-old Tate is now simply past her best, but she sees it differently and believes she can still be a force to be reckoned with now that she’s back at 135lbs.
“Since my return [after a near five-year layoff], I’ve had one very dominant win and finish, and I had a very close decision [loss] in my second fight back for five rounds in a main event against a top five ranked fighter [in Ketlen Vieira] after five years of not doing anything.
I think if that doesn’t speak to volumes of how close I am to still being one of the best in the world, then maybe people are being a bit short-sighted and just looking at a piece of paper. I really think my second to last fight really could have gone either way. I think it was very close. Very close.”
With all that being said, Tate doesn’t rule out the possibility that she could go back into retirement sooner rather than later depending on how things go.
“At some point this chapter’s going to close, and I certainly think that I’m much closer to the end of it than I ever have been before. it didn’t stop with my last fight. I don’t know if it’ll stop after this fight. I really feel like any fight at any point could be my final fight, and I’m okay with that because I built an emperor worthy life. Wins and losses don’t define me anymore.”
