It appears former UFC women’s bantamweight Jessica-Rose Clark is done with MMA.
Now out of the leading MMA promotion, Clark wants to divert her focus on the striking arts. Clark didn’t say she’s retired from MMA, but at this point in her fighting career, it’s not something she wants to do.
“Now that I’m not wrestling and doing Muay Thai, I feel like I’m able to train at a much higher level and intensity now that I’m just doing striking sports than when I was doing just MMA,” Clark told MMA Junkie Radio. “MMA was just beating up my body so much, and I was just struggling every day. I think if I stick to striking, I have a couple of years left in me, but that’s also why I didn’t want to sign and commit to a promotion long-term. I don’t know how long I want to fight for.”
Clark said she’s been losing interest in MMA for some time. That’s why the 35-year-old booked a fight with Lion Fight, a Muay Thai promotion, for Sept. 23 against an opponent yet to be determined.
“Honestly, for the last probably three years, I’ve been kind of wanting to exit out of MMA and transitioning to Muay Thai and boxing. So when my (UFC) contract ended after that fight in May, I came back to CSA and I talked to my coach like two weeks after, and he was like, ‘Well, there’s a Lion Fight event.’
“Originally it was supposed to be Aug. 12 was the event date. He was like, ‘There was a Lion Fight event in August, do you want to fight in it? And I said, ‘Yeah, let’s do it.’ He called Scott (Kent) straight away, and he said, ‘I got Jessy ‘Jess.’ She’s a free agent now. Do you want her?’ and he was like, ‘Yeah, let’s do it.’ So that was always the initial plan. We were talking about, you know, do I want to go into pro boxing? Or want to try to go to ONE FC? I also felt like the last few years, because I haven’t been particularly enjoying MMA that much, I’m a little older and my body is just not holding up to the wrestling as well as it used to, it just took a lot of the love out of it.
“I really didn’t want to get stuck in that situation again where I was committed to a sport without trying a bunch of other ones. The plan was always to do a Muay Thai fight first and then do a boxing fight and then test the waters in both and see what I enjoy more. I highly doubt it, but I might hate fighting Muay Thai, I don’t know. I doubt it because that’s already what I do every single day and I love it, but I just didn’t want to get stuck in the same situation.”
Clark is unsure if she’ll stick to Muay Thai or transition to boxing after her fight with Lion Fight. She does know that she wants to stick to striking sports, with the exception of bareknuckle boxing.
What she does know, is that she’s enjoying the freedom that’s come with free agency.
“I was with the UFC for six years or whatever and so committed to that, it kind of feels nice to not have to do anything right now,” Clark said. “We talked about maybe trying to go to Bellator, but I didn’t want to be locked into something.
“I’ve been locked in for the last few years, and I just want to have a little bit of freedom and just do the things that I want to do and don’t be so committed.”
