Mackenzie Dern is arguably the biggest female competitor in the bjj community. Her appeal extends even beyond bjj with her increasingly greater performances in the octagon at Legacy Fighting Championships.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q-pHd2yMy_M
Dern’s next opponent will be Katherine Roy, a 31-year-old U.S. Army SGT veteran and 2015 Golden Gloves champion who scored a decision victory over May Ooi (2-2) in her July 2016 pro debut at WSOF-GC 3 in the Philippines.
Katherine Roy
And of course Dern’s managed to place 3rd in the IBJJF Europeans absolute in addition to conquering her own weight class! She was tempted to pack on some pounds for the absolute but due to her mma career she opted not to:
“I’ve accomplished a lot of the things in featherweight but with me fighting MMA it’s better to keep my weight low and be a little bit faster. I think that’ll be kinda my advantage fighting absolute is my goal. My 2017 goal is to win more absolute divisions. “
Dern was also noted saying she’s expecting her next MMA match to be sometime later this Spring!
And as far as training as a girl goes, Dern told galerr:
“The greatest piece of advice I could give a new female BJJ practitioner is not to be afraid to sweat and get really close to the guys, because this is grappling, so you need to lose that discomfort of the person being really close to you, on top of you. We often feel that the guy only does that position because he’s muscling, or because he’s much bigger. But it is a type of self-defense. At the right time it will start falling into place. Sometimes you won’t understand anything, but stay consistent; don’t stop training. Don’t lose motivation. I see many women who lose motivation in the first year of BJJ, and then in time everything will start working out; you will see that we have flexibility, we have speed — we have qualities that help our BJJ be high-level too.”
Dern just posted a very interesting segment from her match with the vastly bigger Dominyka Obelenyte, Marcelo Garcia’s first female black belt!
And of course she’s kept on her tradition of entertaining Sunday nights dance classes as a way ot condition and relax at the same time!
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