Issue 102
June 2013
The unknown fighters who left their mark on the records of mma’s biggest stars
‘Mega Megu’ was undefeated in 22 fights over six years, until she met underdog Zoila Gurgel
Zoila Gurgel never predicted she would fight Megumi Fujii. Months before she met the undefeated Japanese female fighting legend at the apex of a Bellator 115lb tournament in 2010, Zoila Gurgel (then Zoila Frausto) was asked by a fan if she thought she might ever battle Fujii. A woman who’d gone her entire six-year, 22-fight career without a loss. Zoila’s answer, as she recalls, was simple.
“Hell no! She’s a 115lb fighter, I can barely make 125lb.” Not to mention Gurgel as a striker should have been prime fodder for submission-skilled ‘Mega Megu.’ “But when it all started to unfold and I beat Rosi Sexton (Bellator 23) and they invited me to the 115lb tournament… After I got through the first two fights I was like, ‘Wow, I actually am going to fight her.’”
But Gurgel didn’t just fight her, she beat her – decisively. She rocked Fujii on a few occasions and stuffed the vast majority of takedown attempts to earn a five-round judges’ nod. She had beaten the unbeatable female Fedor, Megumi Fujii.
How did you prepare for someone who was, and still is, a legend in female fighting, and MMA as a whole?
“Before the fight I just tried to not psych myself out and tell myself who she was and what she was capable of doing, and what she has done. I just tried to keep all of that out of my mind and just go straight forward just thinking it’s just another fight and I’m going to bring my complete best.”
Did your perceptions of her change throughout the fight?
“In the later rounds when she tried to shoot it was pretty much me muscling through most of it. I could feel her, not so much shutting down but just kind of shutting out. Like every single time I would see her want to shoot in or just the look in her eyes, and I would lift the knee, just her hesitation alone would (say), ‘OK, well the last time it didn’t work out.’ She just slowly stopped shooting in. Any time we did lock up it was just pretty much like pushing her away.
“She tried a couple judo throws and I just shoved her off me. She just couldn’t get me down and I could feel her breaking. That was a good thing for me. All it did was give me confidence.
“I think it was in the second or third round when I rocked her, the same thing, I could feel her confidence breaking just a little. It all helped. At the end of the fight I was wondering, ‘Why didn’t she try even harder to take me down?’ But it wasn’t that she didn’t try. The fighter that she is, she’s pretty tricky and she tried, but she just could not take me down and it just slowly stopped her from wanting to try at all.”
Did you speak to her after the fight?
“I gave my respects. She doesn’t really speak English so I told her coach it was an honour and I thanked them. When I saw her coach again in the lobby the next day, I asked how she was doing and he said she wasn’t doing good. I just said thank you again and he said, ‘Good job.’ And that was it.”
Was it bittersweet knowing it had affected her that much?
“Yeah, I’m not a cold-hearted person, I did feel bad but with every win there has to be a loss, and hers came to my hand. I felt sorry about it but then again I felt it was something I deserved. I felt it was something I worked for, so I was still happy. I felt a little bad for her, but the fighter that she is I knew she was going to come back and do good things again.”
If you had a rematch do you think you might stop her?
“Hopefully, it would be (a finish). I’ve been doing so much better in stand-up and I actually have a little bit of ground, still nothing compared to what she has and what she’s done, but I believe it would be a better fight for me than the first one we had.”
