Former Stripper Vanessa Demopoulos Became A UFC Fighter After Facing Lot. Take A Look At Her Background

The journey of UFC fighter Vanessa Demopoulos to the octagon has been, to put it mildly, fascinating. She did not spend countless hours practicing mixed martial arts as a child. Even the 35-year-old’s initial career wasn’t in fighting.

She first climbed the stripper pole when she was 18 years old, but she didn’t begin training until she was 21. When she originally began her mixed martial arts career, she was still stripping, even while she prepared for her UFC debut.

Demopoulos decided it was time to start devoting all of his attention to fighting after his first UFC fight, which ended in defeat, in August 2021. After more than ten years on the pole, she decided to hang up her stilettos six weeks before her second bout at UFC 270.

That battle was the start of what ended up being a three-fight winning streak for her. Demopoulos contends that her seamless transition from stripper to fighter was made possible by the length of time she spent on the stripper pole.

“When I turned 18, I started dancing as a stripper, as a pole dancer, and then someone saw me in the club and said, ‘If you put that same skill that you put towards pole dancing into fighting, you might do something with it,” she said.

“So, I was like, ‘Cool. Teach me how to fight.’ That was when I was 21 years old, and I never looked back. I loved it!”

The inspiring tale of Vanessa Demopoulos, who went from stripper to UFC fighter

Demopoulos claims that switching to Jiu-Jitsu was simple because of the flexibility required for her previous work as a dancer. She continued to strike the pole while also using her MMA talents to good effect.

“I’ve had to choke a couple of guys unconscious at work, you know,” she claimed. “They would try to run off on me without paying me or something and didn’t know they were messing with the wrong chick. They’d end up waking up and politely giving me my money.”

It’s difficult to disagree with her that her transition from stripper to fighter has been a success. She competes in the UFC, not some neighborhood brawl.

She also doesn’t serve as a tomato can for candidates. Prior to her unanimous decision loss in May to Karolina Kowalkiewicz, she had won three straight fights in the octagon.

She is still pursuing her ultimate aim of being a champion despite that setback. On Saturday at UFC Fight Night in Las Vegas, she will return to combat with the goal of winning again.

“I was built in the trenches,” she said. “I was built before anybody saw me. I was the person in the gym doing the work when no one was watching. I don’t care about the lights and the media and all the interviews. I mean, they’re amazing and I love them so much. I love the attention, but that’s not what I’m about.”

It’s difficult not to admire such a mentality. The kind of success story that we can all support is one in which a former stripper becomes a champion.

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