“It isn’t easy to put yourself out there” - Angela Lee makes her mark in the submission grappling scene at IBJJF Jiu-Jitsu Con

Angela Lee may have retired from mixed martial arts, but that doesn't mean the competitive drive left her entirely.

The inaugural ONE women's atomweight MMA world champion recently secured a silver medal in the IBJJF Jiu-Jitsu Con No-Gi International 2024 this past weekend in Las Vegas.

Lee settled for the second-place finish in the adult female black belt lightweight division after falling to Beatrice Z Jin in the final.

In an Instagram post, Angela Lee expressed her joy in securing a medal in her first BJJ competition since retiring from MMA in 2023.

She wrote:

"Yesterday I competed alongside our teammates and students at the @ibjjf Jiu Jitsu Con International 💪🏼❤️‍🔥 It isn't easy to put yourself out there. There is no effort without error and shortcomings. But if we never try, we never know! The true challenge is overcoming our fears and testing ourselves. The true victory is showing up through the fear and nerves and doing it anyways!"

Lee added:

"So incredibly proud of our team @unitedbjjhawaii Everyone's courage is incredibly admirable. What I love most is the strong bonds we all have with one another 🤜🏼❤️🤛🏼 #UnitedFamily #UnitedBJJHawaii"

Lee spent her entire professional career at ONE Championship and left MMA with an impressive 11-3 record and was a perfect 5-0 in her world title matches. Her last match saw her suffer a unanimous decision loss against Xiong Jing Nan in October 2022.

Lee, 28, retired from MMA in September 2023, nine months after the tragic passing of her younger sister Victoria in December 2022.

Coincidentally, Stamp is now the reigning ONE women's atomweight MMA world champion after she stopped Ham Seo Hee at ONE Fight Night 14.

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Angela Lee says her introduction to MMA started from her desire to learn self-defense

Angela Lee grew up with martial arts being part of her daily life, but her introduction to MMA began from a desire to learn self-defense.

The woman who grew up to become 'Unstoppable' initially wanted to learn self-defense from her martial artist parents Ken and Jewelz Lee.

Those early lessons, however, grew into a passion, which she then used to carve a career in ONE Championship.

In an interview with ONE flyweight MMA world champion Demetrious Johnson's MightyCast podcast, Angela Lee said:

"It was straight into MMA, yeah. And because they had the whole concept of, Okay, we're gonna teach you self-defense, and in order to do that, we have to teach you everything from striking to the groundwork and everything in [between]. For me, I got most of my experience in grappling. My dad would put me in tournaments, a lot of them would be jiu-jitsu tournaments and so forth, judo and stuff."

Watch Lee's entire interview with Johnson below: