Catherine ‘The Alpha Female’ Costigan. The Road after BAMMA 22.

Catherine ‘The Alpha Female’ Costigan makes her walk to the cage at BAMMA 22. Photo by Andy Cowan

Last month, the Three Arena, Dublin played host to what will go down as one of the most important nights in Irish MMA History. British Mixed Martial Arts promotion BAMMA made their eagerly awaited Irish Debut in front of around six thousand Irish MMA Fans. On the card there were a number of pro Irish MMA fighters either making their debuts or continuing on in their professional careers. The main card featured two Irish fighters, Chris Fields and Catherine Costigan. On fight week I spoke with Limerick fighter Catherine ‘The Alpha Female’ Costigan to discuss her camp, women’s MMA in general and her expectations for the night. Now a couple of weeks after BAMMA 22, I caught up with Catherine again to discuss what was a difficult night for her as she conceded defeat in the first round to her late opponent replacement Celine Haga. 

We started off by discussing how Catherine was feeling about her loss to Celine, “Some days suck, some days you try to put it out, its something no fighter ever wants to feel, but what do I do? do I just sit down? keep giving up? I can’t, I have a job to do, people to teach, a gym to run, bills to pay, you just have to kick yourself forward and go what can we fix? what can we make better?” 

Catherine’s loss came via an armbar in the first round, I asked Catherine had she had a chance to sit down and watch the fight, “No I try to take away from it for a little bit, I will watch it obviously and see, I am working with a new sports psychologist now and he watched and said all the things we worked on for three weeks beforehand, he did a lot of positive stuff that actually came out in the fight that we had been working on and I was happy with that, so its not all bad, not like Ambers fight, I felt like I gave her something, I got caught in a very vicious arm bar that I didn’t even see coming and if I didn’t tap, my physio said to me I would have been out for more than three to four weeks, I have torn a muscle in my elbow that I have to rest for the next four weeks before I can even lift or do anything with it but I will be absolutely back, I have to take care of it and rest”

Catherine was originally supposed to be fighting Simona Soukupova at BAMMA 22, she was forced to pull out a couple of weeks before the fight due to injury. Celine Haga answered the call to fight Catherine on short notice which forced her to miss the agreed catch weight by nearly six pounds. “Why people keep calling it an atomweight fight I don’t know, she didn’t even make the catchweight, I don’t see why Celine didn’t contact BAMMA earlier on in the week to say I have no way in hell to make that weight, will you back Catherine off, I was cutting my calories and I was walking around with a low level of energy, I could have been a lot more up for the fight and it would have made a big difference to me if she had said, right I can’t make 50kg, maybe we can do 52kg, I literally had forty five minutes to an hour to think did I even want to take the fight, and you know me, there was no way I was going to let everybody down, but looking at it now, I would never ever do it again, there is no excuse for not making weight anymore, we weren’t giving out to Celine but if she said 50kg, she should have made 50kg”

BAMMA 22 at the Three Arena, Dublin. 19th September 2015. Photo by Andy Cowan

Looking forward now from BAMMA, Catherine still has a multi fight deal signed with Invicta FC in the US. “I am definitely going to have a chat with Shannon (Shannon Knapp, president of Invicta FC) and see what they want to do with me, when they are ready to have me back I will answer the call and I will go but of course its up to them, they have signed a lot of new atomweight’s so there is a big queue. BAMMA are also interested in having me back, they saw how hard I worked with the media and I enjoyed it, it didn’t take any time out of my training, it was done carefully in time frames when I wasn’t training, I was very happy getting on the Nicky Byrne Show, the day and night documentary, so many positive things, BAMMA loved that and I sold a lot of tickets, yes it wasn’t the Catherine Costigan show but I put a lot of people in seats to see Catherine Costigan”

When I spoke to Catherine the week of the fight, one thing we discussed was how big her opponent Amber Brown appeared at Invicta in July and at BAMMA, there was a size disparity again between Catherine and her opponent Celine, partially down to Celine missing weight, Catherine says that this will be her focus to make herself a bigger atomweight for when she returns to fighting at Invicta FC. “I do want to change my body and make myself a stronger atomweight, thats going to take a little more time, you wouldn’t really do that in a fight camp so its good to be outside the fight camp now so I can work on that, my dream would be to go to America and train, its just going to take a lot of money, and I run a full time gym which I would need to find cover for, but I have always liked Tristar and what they do, I seen a lot of Irish have gone over there such as Joseph Duffy and Paul Redmond, there is a reason they are going and I have watched all of Firas Zahabi’s technical videos, I would love to lock myself away for a month to train and to have girls to train with.”

On when we will see Catherine in the cage again, she isn’t sure just yet but she has her suspicions. “I don’t know if Invicta will call me, I have a suspicion that they may have another show around when Conor McGregor is fighting in December, If I am ready, I will be up for it, if I am not ready yet I wont, I will really look at everything but I am certainly not retiring, I am not going out this way, I need to go out on my terms when I am ready.”

Catherine ‘ The Alpha Female’ Costigan. The road to BAMMA 22.

Catherine ‘The Alpha Female’ Costigan

This Saturday night, one of the most important nights in Irish Mixed Martial Arts History will take place. British Mixed Martial arts promoter BAMMA will be making their Irish debut at the Three Arena in front of over six thousand Irish fans.

Most people will be familiar with the UFC. The UFC is the top tier in MMA Promotion. For fighters to get to the UFC, they first need to prove themselves on the regional promotions, something that Irish fighters have been lacking since Cage Warriors took a very unscheduled sabbatical last year. This is why the visit of BAMMA to Irish shores this Saturday is a very important event. It gives a platform for up and coming fighters to showcase their talents and prove they are among the elite in the sport of Mixed Martial Arts.

One of those up and coming fighters is Ireland’s very own Catherine ‘The Alpha Female’ Costigan. Fighting out of her own gym Pankration Kickboxing Academy in her hometown of Co.Limerick. Catherine will be making her BAMMA Debut in the Atomweight division this Saturday night when she takes on Norway’s Celine Haga. I caught up with Catherine to get an insight into her training camp for her fight with Haga, reflection on her first professional loss of her career against Amber Brown and her experience in Invicta FC. We also discussed the Irish MMA Scene, Cris Cyborg and why it is she fights.

On her fight camp for BAMMA 22 in her own words, “This one was much better, the last one, I won’t say too much about it but it was one of the worst camps we ever had for certain reasons, a lot to do with travelling twice to Vegas, arranging medicals and visas’. Something Catherine said that was nobody’s fault just ‘things you have to do if you want to fight in Las Vegas.” Catherine was originally scheduled to fight Simona Soukupova on Saturday night but Simona was forced to pull out with an injury with only a couple of weeks to go to the fight. Thankfully Celine Haga stepped up and will fight the Limerick native. I asked Catherine did she have to change up her fight camp to prepare for her new opponent. “You always will have to change one or two things that you would think would work better to defeat that opponent but I always generally look at how opponents would try to defeat me and to try block that”. 

As for Celine Haga, Catherine speaks confidently about her new opponent and what she is capable of. “Celine was always on my radar and was a person I asked on many occasions to fight in Cage Warriors.”  Despite her confidence, The Alpha Female does respect her opponents capabilities and is not expecting to walk through her.

Catherine Costigan Vs Celine Haga

Celine trains at the highly respected Jacksons Wink Gym in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The home of former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones, Holly Holm and Donald ‘Cowboy’ Cerrone. “I have six thousand fans coming and at the end of the day, I am not letting them down.” Catherine believes that even though she has a multi fight deal with Invicta FC, she has to earn her shot back with them and that this Saturday night is the perfect way to do it.  “I lost and now I need to do something very positive within my career that makes them want to bring me back”

Catherine is coming into this fight off the first professional loss of her career against Amber Brown at Invicta FC in July this year. Despite losing her Invicta FC debut, Catherine is full of positives about the whole experience.“I met loads of wonderful people, learned about what it is like to train and fight in America, it has fired me up”. Catherine explained to me how she had to go to Vegas twice for medicals, visas and her Nevada State Athletic Commission license and how that did take away from the whole experience,“You could write a book on all the stuff that happened”. But despite it all, Catherine remained positive especially now that she has all the documents she will need to continue to fight in the States and won’t have to go through all that again.

The headliner of the Invicta FC card in July that Catherine fought on was Cristiane ‘Cyborg’ Justino. Cyborg would be the top draw right now in Invicta FC, a lot of people believe she may be the only woman on the planet who would be able to beat UFC Women’s Bantamweight Champion Ronda Rousey. I asked Catherine, having met Cyborg, does she think she can make the 135lb’s limit to fight Ronda Rousey and how will that fight go. “I think she can do it, on the day of the weigh in, she was down in the pool teaching a class, if she was cutting weight so intensively she wouldn’t be down teaching a class, they are just doing it bit by bit bringing her down, the Nevada Commission wants reports on her weight to make sure its being done safely, it will take time, without this Cyborg doesn’t have a true test, I really think it will be an amazing fight, and one that the whole world will want to see.” On who wins Catherine reckons “ she (Cyborg) will give Ronda problems on the feet, but I believe Ronda will win, I have trained with Olympic athletes and their desire is way different than that of a MMA Fighter. I trained with Sophie Cox and she was still going strong after six hours when I was on the floor nearly dead”

I asked Catherine why it is that she does what she does. “I want to have a genuine impact on the kids I teach from four up at Pankration, all I want to do is look back and just be able to be proud of what I achieved, not my win or loss record, My main reason for doing this is showing other women what they can do in life, be it fighting or coming on my mats and training all the time, and just looking at different ways they can carry themselves be it in work or normal life, Martial Arts is a great way of showing your reflection, not many things in life will show you that, I always chased my dreams, I never believed in can’t”

On the future, the natural question, is the UFC’s 115lb’s Strawweight division an end goal? “I have always been weary about moving up to 115lb’s, how will it suit my health, no matter what I suffered my first defeat and it was bloody awful and I don’t want to be setting myself for that, no matter how appealing the UFC and making money is, I really want to win a world title at atom-weight, thats my dream and I was so close in Cage Warriors, or at least get that fight, and to enjoy my experience of fighting and not look back thinking I should have taken this fight or that one.”

Follow Catherine on Twitter @alphafemalewar

Tickets are still available for BAMMA 22 and are available directly from Catherine herself at http://www.catherinecostigan.com/ free postage and a signed photo are included.

Fantastic insight into a day in the life of Catherine

UFC Fight Night Saskatoon. Max Holloway vs Charles Oliveira. Why you should be excited!

The UFC visits Saskatoon, in the Saskatchewan province of Canada this Sunday evening with a headline bout scheduled to take place between Hawaiian Featherweight star Max ‘Blessed’ Holloway (13-3) and Brazilian submission artist Charles ‘Do Bronx” Oliveira (20-4, 1NC).

It has been a very busy couple of months for the UFC and its fans. Following Ronda Rousey mania three weeks ago at UFC 190, the Conor McGregor show at UFC 189 three weeks before that, and all the scandal in between ranging from Jacob ‘Stitch’ Duran, the legendary UFC cutman being fired over alleged comments made to Bloody Elbow about the financial impact caused to him by the Reebok deal, and the train wreck of an appearance by former Middleweight champion and UFC legend Anderson Silva at his Nevada State Athletic Commission hearing over his doping for the Nick Diaz fight in January at UFC 183.

With all the above going on, it is no surprise that this Sundays fight card has for want of a better phrase, flown under the radar. Not helped of course by the lack of high profile fighters on the card which is to be expected following a number of stacked PPV cards. For this reason the excitement and buzz around this weekends card is truly lacking. Hopefully this little article will be able to convince you to tune in, and like me, be looking for an excuse on Monday morning as to why you are so so tired.

Max Holloway

First off lets look at the main event. Max ‘Blessed’ Holloway has been on a tear through the division. His name will be familiar to people this side of the pond as the only man to bring Conor McGregor the distance at UFC Boston in August 2013. Since then, Holloway has won six fights in a row including three TKO’S, two submissions and one unanimous decision. He has also won two performance of the night bonuses and one knockout of the night bonus in that time. His last victory was a one sided beat down of Featherweight No.6 ranked, Cub Swanson, a fight he won performance of the night for. Max is also only twenty three years old, a couple of years before he reaches his physical prime, so a fighter with a resume as impressive as his at his age is a must see. Especially when the best is still yet to come.

Charles Oliveira

His opponent, Charles Oliveira is himself on a four fight win streak since his fight of the night loss to Frankie Edgar at UFC 162 in July 2013. He will be coming into this fight full of confidence following a performance of the night win against Nik Lentz at UFC Fight night Goiania in May this year. A fight which also won fight of the night. Performance bonuses are something which Oliveira has become accustomed to as he has won nine such awards in his twelve fights with the UFC. Of his twelve fights, only two have actually gone the distance.

With eight UFC wins in total, seven of them coming from submissions, the canvas is most likely where Oliveira will be looking for this fight to go to. Holloway will be probably looking to keep the fight on the feet, he proved how cynical a striker he is when he finished Akira Corasanni in brutal fashion in Stockholm last October, and also in how he dismantled Cub Swanson on the feet in New Jersey in April before submitting him in the third round.

This will be a very difficult fight to call but given both of their records, the difference in fighting styles and the massive opportunity to move into title contention in what is now the hottest division in the UFC. Both men should be fired up to make a huge statement. Should Holloway continue his impressive streak this Sunday, it is safe to say that a rematch with Conor McGregor may soon be on the cards for the young Hawaiian. Nobody who is asking for a rematch against Conor would deserve it more.

Prediction. Holloway by TKO.

UFC Saskatoon Fight Pass Prelims begins 11pm on Sunday Irish Time. Prelims start at Midnight on Sunday on BT Sport 2 and the Main Card begins at 2am on Monday morning on BT Sport 2.

Gunnar Nelson. Who is next for the UFC Welterweight No.11?

In my third preview post for the UFC Dublin card, I will look at a fighter whose name has not yet made it on to the card, but one who is top on most Irish MMA fans to see make the walk to the Octagon on October 24th.

Gunnar ‘Gunni’ Nelson (14-1-1), the Icelandic UFC Welterweight and honorary Irish man is that man. Currently without an opponent for the UFC Dublin event on October 24th. Gunni, has been competing in the UFC since September 2012 when he made his debut against DaMarques Johnson. Last month at UFC 189, Gunni made one of the biggest statements of his career when he submitted feared striker Brandon Thatch. Nelson has always been known for his grappling expertise but it was his next level striking that brought Thatch to the canvas and the fight to a first round finish.

It certainly is no secret. Nelson is a big deal in Ireland and to the Irish fans. He trains in SBG Ireland with John Kavanagh, he is the sparring partner of UFC Interim Featherweight Champion Conor McGregor. Their stand up styles mirror each other. Conor’s owes a lot of his own success to having such a high calibre training partner in Gunnar Nelson.

The UFC Commentator Joe Rogan commented at UFC 189 about how Gunni was receiving the trickle down effect of support from the Irish fans. As Rogan was not calling the fights at UFC Dublin in 2014, its safe to say he didn’t understand how big a deal Nelson is to the Irish fans. Nelson got one of the loudest cheers of the night when he finished Zac Cummins in the Co-Main event by his now signature rear naked choke in the second round. It would have been a safe bet to assume after the reception he received last year from the Irish fans and coming through the Thatch fight uninjured that Gunnar Nelson would be on the UFC Dublin Card. As of right now there is no sign of Gunnar on the card. His Coach John Kavanagh has tweeted about it.

Gunni has big fan base here because he trains in Ireland a lot, fought a third of his pro fights here yet still not matched for #UFCDublin??

— Coach JK (@John_Kavanagh) August 14, 2015

With nine fights now scheduled for the show in the Three Arena, space is now limited for a Welterweight bout for Gunni, especially when Irish fighters such as Neil Seery, Paul Redmond and Aisling Daly have not had bouts announced and would all fancy places on the card.

So who would make sense for Gunni to fight at Dublin? Ranked number 11 in the Welterweight division and after such an impressive victory at UFC 189, a top ten contender would be the logical next step for the SBG man, however with the majority of the top ten either booked for fights or out injured, options for a bout for Nelson are limited at this point.

Number six Demian Maia (21-6) and number nine Stephen ‘Wonderboy’ Thompson (11-1) had both been touted to face Nelson but Maia has a staph infection and Wonderboy won’t be fit to compete by October.

The highest ranked and as of right now unmatched contender would be Belgian number eight ranked Tarec Saffiedine (15-4). Saffiedine is coming off a third round TKO loss to title challenger Rory McDonald last October in Nova Scotia, Canada. The same night Gunni had his first professional loss of his career to Rick Story in Stockholm.

A Strikeforce Champion, Tarek had been on a five fight win streak prior to meeting Rory McDonald. Following the loss to McDonald, Tarec was scheduled to fight fellow Welterweight top 10 Matt Brown at UFC Fight Night in Broomfield, Colorado but had to pull out due to a groin injury.

The fight between Gunni and Tarec makes sense for a couple of reasons. Firstly they are both the highest ranked contenders in the Welterweight Division that are not matched up or injured. Both men are very high profile European fighters which is one thing the UFC needs right now to grow the EMEA Scene. Also there are only three fighters out of eighteen that are ranked on the whole UFC Dublin card. Poirier, Miocic and Rothwell. Adding two more ranked fighters in Tarec and Gunni would boost the profile of the Dublin show and give the Irish fans the high profile fights they deserve.

Follow me on Twitter @MMA_ANDY