Julianna Pena stays grounded ahead of UFC 269 title fight: 'Keep it simple, stupid'

LAS VEGAS – The moment Julianna Pena has worked for her entire career is just three days away, and the next UFC women’s bantamweight title challenger is trying to keep herself grounded despite the bright lights.

At UFC 269 on Saturday, Pena (10-4 MMA, 6-2 UFC) will take on two-division champion Amanda Nunes (21-4 MMA, 14-1 UFC) in the pay-per-view co-main event. Because of the long, delayed build-up and championship stakes, Pena aims to not let the attention get to her in order to perform at her best.

“I’m excited, and I’m ready,” Pena told MMA Junkie on Wednesday at a pre-fight news conference. “Like you said, I have been working for this my entire career. … I absolutely try to normalize it. Keep it simple, stupid. It’s just another fight at the end of the day. If you get a belt at the end of the night, that’s cute. I don’t want to make it bigger than what it is and let the media and everything like that get to me. I just need to focus on what I do and go to work.”

Since March, Pena has engaged in two separate stretches of lobbying for a fight with Nunes. The two were booked for August, but Nunes withdrew after testing positive for COVID-19. In order to get the rematch, Pena once again hit social media to talk some smack, sell the fight, and ensure she didn’t lose the opportunity. Despite her comments, Pena indicated she has no personal beef with Nunes.

“I always knew that this moment would get here, and I wasn’t concerned. ‘Mouth of the South’ over here had to do what I had to do to get the fight,” Pena said. “Now that I’ve got the fight, and I knew the fight was going to happen, I knew that a month from now, two months from now, in the past, whatever, eventually the fight was going to happen. I just needed to be patient, and we’re here.

“… It’s nothing personal. When you become the champ, you have a target put on your back. I would expect nothing less. You’ve got to assume people are going to want to gun for your spot. That’s just the nature of the beast and how this thing works.”

Though she has an opportunity to be champion, the prospect of becoming the first woman since September 2014 to take down the consensus greatest female mixed martial artist ever holds more value to Pena.

“Any time you can take out the GOAT, that’s just obviously the feather in the cap there,” Pena said. “I truly am ready to step into the light of becoming the new bantamweight world champion. I’m ready to be that role model for young women, for young men, just to let them know from a little, tiny garage in Spokane, Washington, you can make it. You can make your dreams come true. I’m ready to step into that light.”

UFC 269 takes place Saturday at T-Mobile Arena. The main card streams on ESPN+ pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and early prelims on ESPN+.