At UFC on ESPN 31, Guida (37-21 MMA, 18-15 UFC) once again showed his heart, determination and will, when he bounced back from the brink of defeat to tire, out-grapple and submit Leonardo Santos (18-5-1 MMA, 7-2-1 UFC) in Round 2.
In the opening round, Guida was pummeled with dozens of strikes and received several warnings from referee Keith Peterson. Someway, somehow, Guida survived – something fight fans have become accustomed to him doing.
“I was literally laughing,” Guida told MMA Junkie at a post-fight news conference. “I’m like, ‘This is not how this year is supposed to end, not in front of the first crowd … I’ve been able to fight in front of since 2019. Not in front of my parents, coaches, on national television on ESPN. Like, ‘Come on, Clay. Get your crap together.'”
Through the craziness, Guida said he never lost focus. He paid attention to his corner’s advice and stuck to the course. The encouragement and instruction, when matched with Guida’s fortitude, paid off for the team.
“We stayed calm in there,” Guida said. “Like I said, I listened to my coaches. I could hear everything clear as a bell. They said, ‘He’s breaking. He’s tired. He blew it already and just stay on him,’ and that’s what we did. I had to weather the storm. There’s no such thing as quit. I don’t know the definition of that. We don’t know the definition of ‘get tired’ or ‘stop.’ It’s all due to wrestling.”
One of the longest-tenured fighters on the UFC roster, Guida is still winning inside the cage nearly two decades after his professional MMA debut. Even though he’s picked up so many victories over the years, Guida deemed Saturday’s win up there among his favorites.
“Man, I tell you what, if there were fans, it would be right up there with our UFC debut back in 2006 against Justin James, who was a very crafty jiu-jitsu guy,” Guida said. “We won via rear-naked choke. We got ‘Submission of the Night.’ We got the cool Tapout glass trophy that they gave us. It was definitely an awesome, awesome victory.”
UFC on ESPN 31 took place Saturday at the UFC Apex and aired on ESPN and streamed on ESPN+.
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