For every Tatiana Suarez fight, there seems to be a collective inhale. And then the air sits, held hostage in everyone’s lungs.
It’s not just how the undefeated UFC strawweight will perform. The tension and uncertainty are in the whether.
Suarez’s life has been a Sisipyhean struggle to the top, her pursuit for combat sports greatness frequently derailed by physical issues beyond her control.
So when Suarez’s fight with fellow championship contender Virna Jandiroba, set for UFC 310 in December, was scrapped in October, the breaths slowly escaped in the form of CO2 sighs.
Occam’s razor cut deep: Her body had betrayed her again. Or so was the assumption.
In fact, the undefeated Suarez was pulled from the card for good reason and even better fortunes, as her 11-year dream of fighting for gold will become reality Saturday when she challenges 115-pound champion Weili Zhang in the UFC 312 co-main event in Sydney, Australia.
“I feel really good. I feel healthy right now,” Suarez, 34, said in an exclusive interview at UFC 311 on Jan. 18 at Intuit Dome.
“I feel great. I mean, I’ve just evolved. I’ve been training the entire time. So it’s not like I just took time off, so I feel very excited to go out there and do my thing.”
At times, though, perception runs neck-and-neck with reality. Even UFC CEO and President Dana White, after the wildly successful UFC 311 in Inglewood, chimed in about Suarez facing the 35-year-old Chinese star three weeks later.
“I hope she’s healthy for this fight and gets through this,” White told the Southern California News Group.
A neck injury led to a thyroid cancer diagnosis that derailed Suarez’s 2012 Olympic wrestling dreams and steered her toward her pro MMA career. Even this endeavor, ever since taking to her competition on Season 23 of the UFC reality show “The Ultimate Fighter” like a hot knife to butter in 2016, has been slowed by significant neck and knee injuries.
The Covina native and former Northview High wrestling star has been through so much, including not fighting for nearly 45 months, that her story became an HBO documentary, “The Unbreakable Tatiana Suarez,” which aired last year detailing her struggles and unwillingness to let them dictate her life.
Suarez (11-0) admits that being under that kind of spotlight, instead of being under the lights in the Octagon, was “a little strange.”
“Even though it was something that was outside of my comfort zone, it was really awesome because of the feedback that I got because of it,” said Suarez, who last fought in August 2023 when she submitted former champ Jessica Andrade via guillotine choke. “Just how inspired many people were, or, you know, just how they told me it helped them in their life as well. And that’s basically what I want my legacy to be when I’m done fighting.”
All the setbacks led Suarez to making a difficult decision to move from Fontana and relocate to Las Vegas to be closer to the UFC Performance Institute. The groundbreaking facility, which caters to the athletes’ physical, mental and emotional health, has proved to be a game-changer for Suarez.
The relocation to Las Vegas also proved to be a life-changer. There, she met and began dating fellow fighter Patchy Mix while training at Xtreme Couture MMA.
Suarez was in Mix’s corner, literally and figuratively, nearly two years ago when Mix knocked out Raufeon Stots with a first-round knee to win the $1 million Bellator Bantamweight World Grand Prix and become the interim Bellator bantamweight champion.
And now, with her opportunity to win gold, Mix will be in her corner as well.
“I’m just happy that I have him there for me. And I know that it’s a lot for him too, because he’s wanted my dreams, just like I want for him too,” Suarez said. “We’re always there for each other. He’s there always sparring, taking video, coaching.”
Mix went on to unify the Bellator belt in November 2023 with a second-round rear-naked choke submission of Sergio Pettis. In May, just days before his first title defense with a split-decision victory over Magomed Magomedov, he proposed to Suarez in Paris.
It doesn’t get much better than to train and roll with your fiancé who is a world champion – one albeit whose inactivity has created a strained relationship with PFL, which last year bought Bellator and has since absorbed and discontinued it – even if he is your life partner who sometimes has to tell you to pump the brakes.
“When I have a question, even if it’s after all our sessions, and he’s like, ‘Give me a couple hours where you’re not, like, just hyper-fixated on this.’ And I’m like, ‘Let me just try this.’ And he’s all ‘OK, OK,’” Suarez said with a smile
While Suarez says Mix does go easy on her when they train together, the workouts are still a sensational primer for what she will encounter Saturday in Sydney.
Since losing back-to-back title fights to Rose Namajunas in 2021, Zhang (25-3) knocked out former champ Joanna Jedrzejczyk, tapped out champion Carla Esparza to regain her belt and last year dominated in unanimous-decision victories over Amanda Lemos and Yan Xiaonan.
“I think she’s a great fighter,” Suarez said of the two-time champ. “She’s well-rounded, and I think she goes and gets it, and so do I. So I think it makes her a good matchup.”
Even the UFC boss acknowledges this to be a stiff challenge for both fighters.
“First of all, obviously it’s a huge fight for Tatiana to be able to beat Weili Zhang,” White said. “And for Weili Zhang, it’s a really … as (tough) as she is and everything she’s accomplished … this is a huge test for her.”
Suarez doesn’t hold back in her gratitude for at long last receiving a shot at becoming a UFC champion. It’s been a road longer than most, wrought with more valleys than peaks.
She’s conquered cancer. She’s beaten the odds. And Saturday will be just another day in the office.
“I know it’s for the title, but to me, it’s just like another fight. I think everybody that I go against, I take them all so seriously,” she said. “So it’s not like I’m training any differently. Every fight I’ve ever had, I give it my all, and I make sure that when I go out there, I know that I did everything that I could possible to get my hand raised.”
And then everyone can exhale.
UFC 312
Main event: middleweight champion Dricus Du Plessis vs. Sean Strickland
Co-main event: strawweight champion Weili Zhang vs. Tatiana Suarez
When: Starting at 3 p.m. PT Saturday
Where: Qudos Bank Arena, Sydney, Australia
How to watch: early prelims (3 p.m. PT, ESPN+, Disney+); prelims (5 p.m. PT, ESPN2, ESPN+, Disney+); main card (7 p.m. PT, PPV via ESPN+)