LONDON – Veronica Hardy beat Juliana Miller with a unanimous decision Saturday to open up the preliminary card at UFC 286 at The O2 in London.
Take a look inside the fight with Hardy, who returned from a three-year retirement with an upset win.
Veronica Hardy vs. Juliana Miller
Result: Veronica Hardy def. Juliana Miller via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
Updated records: Hardy (7-4-1 MMA, 2-4 UFC), Miller (3-2 MMA, 1-1 UFC)
Key stat: Hardy landed four takedowns, had 7:36 of total control time and landed more than 80 percent of her total strikes.
Hardy on the fight's key moment
“I am just grateful to be here. It’s been three years, and I’ve looked at the sport and I’ve looked at other people training and fighting and looked at them do it, and I just wanted to be back here again, regardless of what happened. This is what I love to do, and I feel like I belong here because I work hard for it.”
Hardy on training with husband Dan Hardy
“I feel like it’s like a cheat code to the game – you have a video game and you found the cheat code and you’re like, ‘Whoa – this dude has all the answers,’ and if he can’t show you the way that he wants to do it, he can find a fighter and find me an example and find me ways that other people have applied it, even if it’s something that’s not his strong suit. Or he’ll take me to a different gym. He’s put so much of his life aside to help me out that it’s unbelievable and it gave me so much strength, because I’m like, ‘Dan doesn’t need to do this. He has so much more important stuff to do. If he’s taking the time to put all this energy into me, I’m going to give it my all.'”
Hardy on what she wants next
“I feel like a lot of it had to do with my lack of preparation, had to do with my lack of stability, my lack of understanding the game. It didn’t matter who I faced, I felt like I would lose to amateurs if it came to it if I didn’t fix those things. So it’s good to see that I am taking the steps in the right direction to get that way, because at the end of the day, I just want to be the best version of myself that I can be.”
To hear more from Hardy, check out the video of the full post-fight interview above.
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC 286.
