MMA legend Cat Zingano has just received her BJJ black belt from ATOS founder Andre Galvao. She has been grappling for around three decades now, as she first started combat sports at the age of 12 by joining a wrestling team. She was a four-time NCAA Division III All-American before she eventually made the transition to BJJ in 2007, immediately competing as often as she could. With just a few months of BJJ under her belt, Zingano made her amateur MMA debut and then went 3-1 over the course of less than a year. With enough experience behind her, Zingano turned professional and has never looked back since.
Zingano was one of the earlier pioneers of women’s MMA, competing at a time when the UFC didn’t even have any women’s divisions and it didn’t look like they ever would. She spent the next few years honing her craft and winning titles on the regional MMA circuit, becoming the Fight to Win and Ring of Fire champion in both the flyweight and bantamweight divisions. By the time that the UFC did decide to introduce female weight classes, Zingano was already 7-0 and she was one of the most obvious signings in the world. She competed in only the second women’s fight in UFC history, scoring the first ever TKO against fellow legend Miesha Tate.
Zingano challenged for the UFC bantamweight title before eventually moving to Bellator, where she has since competed for their featherweight title. Zingano still fights at the highest level at the age of 42 and currently holds a 14-5 professional MMA record against some of the best female fighters of all time. The promotion to black belt has come after Cat Zingano has been training in BJJ for around 17 years and it’s incredibly hard-earned. Now that she’s coming off an unsuccessful title-shot against Cristiane ‘Cyborg’ Justino at Bellator 300, it’ll be interesting to see what she chooses to do next in her illustrious career.
Andre Galvao shared the news that he had promoted Cat Zingano to BJJ black belt in a recent post to his official Instagram account:
