The journey of a female MMA athlete is filled with a lot of adversity. Aside from the challenging nature of the sport itself, they also have to contend with external influences as well. As such, UFC star Diana Belbita has given insight into one of such external influences.
For the most part, there is a lot of heckling that female MMA athletes have to deal with. Whilst there is a part of the population that believes women do not belong in MMA, there are some who are completely fine with it. At the same time, others on the opposite side of the spectrum are borderline obsessed with female fighters.
If you’ve ever wondered what kind of messages women fighters get, here’s an example: pic.twitter.com/cuytQhRjLf
— Diana Belbiță (@DianaBelbita) December 7, 2023
Recently, Diana Belbita took to social media to share screenshots of disturbing emails she received. In the rather grim fan interaction, a Florida man offered to pay Diana to “inflict serious pain” on him. As the mail continues, the 52-year-old man states how he wishes ‘The Warrior Princess‘ would “overpower” and “torture” him.
Further, the man, who refers to himself as Dan, reveals that he wishes to be kicked, punched, choked, and put in armbars. According to the fan, he wished for a certain level of pain to be inflicted upon him by Belbita. Understandably, it was a very off-putting experience for Diana, who will be looking to put this event in the past.
Diana Belbita UFC record and stats
Thus, we’ve just seen one such example of the things female MMA athletes have to put up with. Notably, whilst she is in the UFC, Diana is not even the most talked-about female athlete either. Although she has had some promising results in the past, she has yet to break into the women’s bantamweight rankings.
In the past, Belbita has gathered extensive experience fighting in numerous MMA promotions across the globe. Fighting in the UFC since 2019, the Romanian fighter made her debut against the British sensation Molly McCann. On the night, ‘Meatball‘ managed to clinch a unanimous decision win after Diana had a pint deduction for grabbing the fence.
An all-European rematch!
🏴 @MeatballMolly returns to face @DianaBelbita 🇷🇴 on Feb 3! pic.twitter.com/oOQ1uQgDCt
— UFC Europe (@UFCEurope) December 6, 2023
Since the loss to McCann, the 27-year-old has gone 2-3 in her last five fights, bringing her UFC tally to 2-4. In her latest outing, Belbita suffered another decision loss at the hands of Karolina Kowalkiewicz in October 2023. Before that, she did not exactly set the world on fire with her performances against Maria Oliveira, Gloria de Paula, and Hannah Goldy. Having started off at flyweight, Belbita has yet to find her weight class.
Currently, Diana is set to rematch Molly McCann at strawweight on February 3, 2024. In what will be a move back down to strawweight, Molly will be hoping to recover from her recent losses. As for Belbita, she will be looking to get her revenge and establish herself in the division. With that said, level your thoughts on the fight and the fan interaction in the comments below.