Angela Lee takes inspiration from “mom champ” Julianna Peña

Angela Lee understands the struggles of juggling the responsibility of being a mother and a world champion fighter. As such, she has also found inspiration from someone else in the same situation - reigning UFC women’s bantamweight champion Julianna Peña.

In the latest episode of the MMA documentary channel Anatomy of a Fighter, ‘Unstoppable’ shared that she watched UFC 269 with her family and saw ‘The Venezuelan Vixen’ put an end to a dominant 12-fight win streak held by Amanda Nunes.

“It was awesome to see her against all odds and doing her thing out there. She looked good and became the ‘mom champ'. Seeing her daughter with her in the cage after it was so heartwarming. It’s definitely very inspiring stuff.”

Peña took a two-year hiatus in 2017 as she gave birth to her daughter and worked her way back up to facing Nunes for the world title.

Angela Lee is now on a similar path, as she last competed in the circle in 2019. While she is already the reigning ONE women’s atomweight world champion, and a proud mother to baby Ava Marie, she hopes to emulate Peña’s success by becoming a “mom champ” in her own right.

In the documentary, Lee’s husband, MMA star Bruno Pucci, also shared how much being a mother changed his wife’s mindset:

“Now that we have a family, I feel like her drive is even bigger because she wants to lead by example and she wants to show everybody and [including] our daughter that everything is possible. I think she wants to do it more than before because she wants to show the world that she's a mom champion.”

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Angela Lee lauds ONE Championship’s handling of her journey to motherhood

Becoming a mother can be extremely difficult for female athletes like Angela Lee. It often means that they won’t be able to do their job for the duration of their pregnancy and at least a few months after giving birth.

However, Lee shared that she is extremely grateful to ONE chairman and CEO Chatri Sityodtong and to the ONE Championship organization who supported her throughout her journey:

“Chatri, his vision and what he stands for, he always talks about how equality is so important and he really pushed for that. How the women are treated in the company is unbelievable.”

Angela Lee shared that despite her fears when she broke the news, Sityodtong was just happy for her, knowing that she wanted to be a mom for so long. While the ONE chairman and CEO also assured her that she didn’t need to fight anymore, Lee expressed her desire to make a comeback.

“Just to have his support like ‘you will still have a place here’ meant a lot because I know that so many other women in the world, they don't have that opportunity. They have to choose. Wanting to take care of your child sometimes means having to leave them in order to provide for them so [I’m] just blown away at how ONE Championship handled that.”

Watch the full episode here: