“There is no bigger fight in our life than life,” she said, and after clearing up matters outside the Octagon, the “real” Joanna Jedrzejczyk was back against Waterson. And her best friend got to see it. And though Karolina passed away last November, her friend retained the lessons she learned.
Now she wants her belt back. Some wonder if the 32-year-old can climb the mountain again. She doesn’t have such doubts, and she welcomes those who have them because she’s heard it all before.
“There are tons of great athletes and great fighters; the UFC is the best organization in the world,” Jedrzejczyk said. “But the thing is that sometimes you’re not the best competitor, maybe you’re not the most talented, maybe you’re not the most hard-working person in the gym, but you can still become the champ because it’s all about what’s inside you. It’s all about this desire and how hard you believe in yourself. That’s the point. There are people who when I started training, said, ‘No, she’s not gonna make it.’ But I believed in myself so much and I did it. And I left these people behind me.”
That doesn’t mean the doubts never crept in as the Poland native made her way through the world of Muay Thai and then MMA. Was this a viable career? Would she be able to achieve everything she wanted to? This is someone who once spoke of making “minus two thousand dollars” for a Muay Thai fight. But after winning her first two UFC fights and getting the opportunity to face Carla Esparza for the strawweight title in March 2015, she knew she found her place.
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“I feel like it was the spot for me to be,” Jedrzejczyk said. “Since I got the chance to represent UFC, I got the chance to fight for the belt for the first time five years ago in Dallas, and after I won, I felt like I belonged to this world, that I was born to do that. It was a sign from God that you have to do this. I was about to quit so many times. I was coming back and looking for even more motivation, but I found this after winning the belt and being the champ for such a long time. That’s why I stood up and I’m still fighting.”
When a fighter and their championship become intertwined, it’s hard to let go when that belt isn’t there anymore. And few lived the champion’s life better than Jedrzejczyk, who successfully defended her title five times while handling everything else without skipping a beat.
“It’s all about staying focused because when you become the champ, you have more and more stuff to do, more obligations, and some people, they don’t know how to deal with it,” she said. “They just follow the group of people. But I feel like I was the champ for a reason, and I will do this for a second time.”
