Jessica Andrade

Jéssica Andrade is a Brazilian mixed martial artist born on September 25th 1991. She fights in the UFC Women’s strawweight division.

When she was young she did Judo and after finishing high school she was invited to do BJJ. She currently is a blue belt in BJJ and light blue belt in Muay Thai. He nickname “Piledriver” is from from her first BJJ competition where she slammed her opponent to get out of a tough spot, but slamming is illegal so she lost by DQ and was disqualified from the tournament.

Jessica Andrade’s career before the UFC

Jessica Andrade made her MMA debut in September of 2011 and won her first 2 fights. In her 3rd professional fight she suffered her first loss by TKO in the 2nd round. She rebounded with 5 straight wins, all by stoppage, 2 by TKO and 3 by guilliotine submission.

Her 2nd loss came by decision against Jennifer Maia. She won 2 more fights, the last one outside the UFC against tough veteran Milana Dudieva.

Jessica Andrade in UFC

Jessica Andrade made her UFC debut in July of 2013 against title challenger Liz Carmouche. She lost by TKO with one minute left in the first round. Andrade rebounded with wins over Rosie Sexton, Raquel Pennington and Larissa Pacheco. Her 2nd loss in the UFC came to high school teacher Marion “The Belizean Bruiser” Reneau by submission in the 2nd round.

After defeating Sara Moras she rematched Raquel Pennington. This time she lost by submission which prompted a move down to strawweight.

She made her strawweight debut against title challenger Jessica Penne and destroyed her by 2nd round TKO. She won 2 more fights against Joanne Calderwood and Angela Hill to get a shot at UFC gold.

Jessica Andrade vs. Joanna Jedrzejczyk

Jessica Andrade faced champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk for the Women’s Strawweight title at UFC 211 – Miocic vs. dos Santos 2. Andrade didn’t take a step back the whole fight but in the end was no match for the champion. She lost the fight by unanimous decision.