Olympic judo champ out to follow Rousey to MMA dominance
Kayla Harrison, a two-time Olympic gold medalist in judo will make her MMA debut Thursday night as part of the Professional Fighters League card in Chicago. NBCSN will televise.
Harrison, who won gold in judo in London and Rio de Janeiro, faces Brittney Elkin (3-4) in a special attraction that will be separate from the competition for regular-season standing in the maleonly PFL.
“She’s a PFL fighter, but we don’t have a season laid out for women yet,” said Carlos Silva, president of the PFL. “That will most likely happen in 2019. But this is a big debut for the two-time gold medalist. We’ve worked with Kayla for a few years. She’s been on the sidelines reporting while training and getting ready. We told her when she was ready to fight, she would tell us and we would help her to build the MMA portion of her career. I think it’s the biggest debut of a fighter ever.”
Harrison, who is from Middletown, Ohio, will draw comparisons to Ronda Rousey, who launched her MMA career after capturing a bronze medal in judo at the Beijing Olympics in 2008. Rousey became a global superstar while becoming the UFC women’s bantamweight champion. She is now performing in the WWE. It was Rousey who proved women in MMA could not just succeed, but headline. Now Harrison is ready to follow in her footsteps while creating her own legacy.
“I was Ronda’s teammate and roommate. I grew up wanting to be her and beat her,” Harrison told reporters. “I already had a Ronda complex because anything she did, I wanted to do better. At the end of the day she opened the door for MMA. I never thought about women’s MMA until Ronda did what she did. I’m thankful for that.”
Harrison said MMA helped with a bout of depression she endured after the Olympics in Rio. Now she’s on a mission to become one of the best in the sport.
“Women’s MMA is the fastest growing sport in the world right now,” she said. “Every day young girls are waking up realizing they don’t want to play with Barbie dolls anymore. I know 50 judo girls, who weigh as much as me who would be killers in MMA.”