Over the next six years, Markos shared the Octagon with a litany of top talents, earning wins over Carla Esparza and Angela Hill, battling current contender Marina Rodriguez to a draw in the Brazilian’s promotional debut, and serving as a litmus test and perennial tough out against a host of emerging names, including Karolina Kowalkiewicz, Alexa Grasso, Amanda Ribas, Mackenzie Dern, and Kanako Murata prior to filling that same role opposite Pinheiro in May.
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It was during the week of her fight with Dern that she met one of the coaches from the Travis Lutter team she now works with, and after a couple more challenging camps filled with long car rides between gyms, cross-border travel complicated by COVID-19 restrictions, and mounting loses, Markos pulled the trigger on shipping off to Texas to get a different look and put herself in a better position to succeed.
“Being here, being with a team that is established, that have been through this already with other fighters, it’s a like a big weight has been lifted off my shoulders,” said Markos, who had been the lone elite fighter in her last gym, and therefore was looked upon to set the tone and dictate what needed to be done. “It’s a big difference and I didn’t realize how big it was until I came out here.
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“It was an hour-and-a-half to get to the gym, an hour-and-a-half back, every day,” she added, touching on a tag team of under-discussed challenges that many fighters deal with — traffic and the rigors of commuting to and from different gyms. “It might not seem like a lot, but that could be time relaxing. Going to a few different gyms instead of staying at one gym too — I have my boxing, my wrestling, my jiu jitsu, my conditioning, all at one gym here, so that’s been great.
“I just show up and they’ll have whatever I need to do that day ready for me. It’s just focused on me getting better.”
