Former UFC women’s strawweight world champion Joanna Jedrejczyk has just received her blue belt in BJJ, courtesy of her coach Arrachion Olzstyn. Jedrejczyk is most definitely best known for her record-setting run as the champion which stretched across five title-fights between 2014 and 2017. It was a monumental achievement, especially considering that at the time only one other woman had ever achieved such a feat, Ronda Rousey. Since then, two more women have joined them with five or more title-defenses, Valentina Shevchenko and the greatest female MMA fighter of all time, Amanda Nunes.
Jedrejczyk lost her title to Rose Namajunas when she suffered a knockout at UFC 217 and although she was given an immediate rematch, she wasn’t able to recapture the title she’d lost. After bouncing back with a decision victory over perennial top-ranked competitor Tecia Torres she then moved up to the Flyweight division for the opportunity to fight Shevchenko for the vacant title. She dropped a decision to the bigger woman and although she did put in a solid effort, she soon returned to the strawweight division regardless.
Since then, she’s righted the ship with a win against Michelle Waterson before having the consensus fight of the year against Zhang Weili. Although she lost that fight in a valiant effort, the winner Weili then went on to immediately challenge her old foe Namajunas for the title and emerge victorious. It’s these kinds of performances that have led to Joanna Jedrejczyk maintaining her position in the UFC rankings, and developing her BJJ is only going to improve her chances of recovering her status as champion, especially considering the level of grappling talent that now resides in the promotion.
Joanna Jedrejczyk announced the news of her belt promotion in BJJ in a post to her official Instagram account, where she also discussed her current place in the UFC rankings as the second in the division and fifth pound-for-pound:
