Canada’s Randa Markos was dominant in the grappling department en route to a unanimous decision win on Saturday at UFC on FOX 27
Strawweight Randa Markos was back in action at UFC on FOX 27 on Saturday in Charlotte, NC. Part of the televised preliminary card on Fox Sports 1, the fight saw Markos, who had traded wins and losses ever since The Ultimate Fighter 20, looking to get back in the win column. Opposite her in the cage was Julianna Lima, also looking to bounce back from a loss, in her case to Tecia Torres.
Lima opened with a high front kick that missed, and the strawweights were underway. Markos managed to bully her way inside, and drove Lima into the cage, unleashing a number of knees. Lima reversed, only to be reversed herself with Markos again pressing her into the fence. Markos easily took the majority of the grappling exchanges, and very little action took place out in the open. When they did go to the ground, Lima had top control only briefly, as Markos quickly reversed and dropped elbows to the body.
It was Markos on the bottom early in the round two, trapping Lima’s legs to prevent her from mounting. With Lima unable to make any progress the ref opted to stand them up. Markos launched a few punches that came up short, then clinched off the next exchange and dragged Lima down. She got mount, and managed to drop a few hard shots before Lima got her back in half-guard. Markos was able to land more short punches, however, and Lima finished the round on her back, trying to trap Markos in a triangle, or at least prevent any more damage.
Markos used a whizzer to set up a throw early in the third, and immediately went to work raining down punches. Markos controlled her opponent for much of the remainder of the round. When she wasn’t scoring damage via ground n’ pound she had completely nuetralized her foe. Towards the end of the frame Lima was able to use the fence to walk around Markos and make it back to her feet. However, she needed a Hail Mary to have any chance of winning, and it just didn’t happen.
Randa Markos def. Julianna Lima by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
