SALT LAKE CITY – Gabriel Bonfim has a job to do Saturday in Utah. He no doubt knows that.
But that doesn’t mean the unbeaten 25-year-old Brazilian can’t be a little bit future-minded. He sees the calendar and knows the UFC has a return to his home country planned for November in Sao Paulo. It’s not hard to connect the dots.
“I’m winning here,” Bonfim said at Wednesday’s media day for UFC 291. “I would like to fight a ranked guy. If someone wants to face me, if that’s a possibility, I want to fight an opponent like that – and if possible, in November in Brazil with my brother.”
For Bonfim (14-0 MMA, 1-0 UFC), his “winning here” welterweight attempt will come against the seasoned Trevin Giles (16-4 MMA, 7-4 UFC) to close out the ABC- and ESPN-broadcast prelims from Delta Center in Salt Lake City ahead of the main card on pay-per-view.
Bonfim got to the UFC through Dana White’s Contender Series in 2022 along with his brother, Ismael, on the same episode. They debuted at UFC 283 in Rio de Janeiro in January, where Gabriel submitted Mounir Lazzez in 49 seconds. Ismael picked up a second-round knockout, but lost his follow-up in July.
Gabriel hopes a win over Giles sets him up for Brazil, and if things go the way he’s accustomed to, he might be ready to make the turnaround without taking a ton of damage. Bonfim has all 14 of his pro wins by finish, including 11 submissions.
Still, he said he’s ready to go the full 15 if he has to for the first time.
“I’ve had that train of thought in my life before of I knew that the fight was going to finish early,” Bonfim said. “But now I’ve changed. I want to finish, but I can go the distance. I can fight three rounds. I can fight five rounds. I go with that mindset. But always (so far), something happened, some opportunity, and I just took advantage of it and I finished (the fights).”
Check out Bonfim’s full pre-fight interview in the video above.
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 291.
