Former UFC champion Miesha Tate returns to the Octagon on July 17.
MMA pioneer and former UFC bantamweight champion Miesha Tate last fought in 2016. After time away from competing, to start a family and work on the business side of MMA, Tate is slated to return to the cage this July when she takes on Marion Reneau.
Recently the 34-year-old took to Instagram to let everyone know she was in the best shape of her life.
“I’ve never been in this good of shape,” she wrote. “I’ve never taken my job more seriously. I have tools and resources never available to me before. Everything is on the line. My body has done the most incredible things but the best is yet to come!”
After thanking a slew of coaches and training partners, Tate also send a message to the rest of the field at 135 lbs.
“This is going to be a HOT 2nd run, I’m hitting the ground running.” Tate signed off her message with a hashtag proclaiming she was now ‘Tate 2.0’.
Tate is one of the more significant fighters the sport has known and an originator in the field in woman’s MMA. She first fought way back in 2006. She made her pro debut with HOOKnSHOOT a year later.
In 2011 Tate submitted Marloes Coenen to win the Strikeforce bantamweight title. She lost her first defence to Ronda Rousey. The lead up to that fight sparked what would become one of the more fierce rivalries in the history of women’s MMA.
When the UFC woke up and permitted women to fight in the Octagon in 2013, Tate debuted in opposite Cat Zingano. She lost to ‘Alpha Cat’ in a bout to determine who would coach against Rousey on The Ultimate Fighter. However, due to an injury to Zingano, Tate would end up snagging that coaching spot.
At UFC 168 Tate met Rousey for the UFC bantamweight title. Rousey won that bout with a third round armbar.
Tate then went on a five fight winning streak culminating in her winning the bantamweight title from Holly Holm (who had taken it from Rousey a few months prior) at UFC 196 in 2016.
Unfortunately for Tate her first defence was against women’s MMA’s GOAT Amanda Nunes. Nunes won the belt with a first round submission and hasn’t looked back since. After that loss Tate took a unanimous decision defeat to Raquel Pennington at UFC 205 in 2016.
Tate then announced her retirement from the sport. However, as we know, MMA retirements are not written in stone.
Tate’s comeback fight is scheduled for UFC Fight Night: Makhachev vs. Moises on July 17 at the UFC APEX facility in Vegas.