{"id":930812,"date":"2026-10-12T23:40:09","date_gmt":"2026-10-12T23:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/930812\/"},"modified":"2026-10-12T23:40:09","modified_gmt":"2026-10-12T23:40:09","slug":"julianna-pena-set-for-combat-sports-return-after-17-month-layoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/930812\/","title":{"rendered":"Julianna Pena set for combat sports return after 17-month layoff"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Former two-time UFC champion Julianna Pe\u00f1a is getting back to competition, but it will be on the wrestling mats.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Real American Freestyle announced Monday that Pe\u00f1a is set to make her promotional debut at RAF Abu Dhabi, which takes place Nov. 14 at Etihad Arena. Pe\u00f1a faces Diana Avsaragova in a middleweight matchup.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Pe\u00f1a is set to compete in combat sports action for the first time in 17 months. In her most recent outing, \u201cThe Venezuelan Vixen\u201d lost the UFC bantamweight title via second-round submission to Kayla Harrison at UFC 316 in June 2025. Pe\u00f1a has been a color commentator for RAF since its inception.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Avsaragova makes her second RAF appearance at the event. The Bellator and PFL vet suffered a tech fall loss to RAF middleweight champ Kennedy Blades at RAF 13 in September.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Other matchups announced for the card include Abdulrashid Sudulaev vs. Dauren Kurugliev and Osama Elsaidy vs. Murtaza Talha in light heavyweight action, a cruiserweight contest between Zahid Valencia and Khidir Saipudinov, and a lightweight tilt between Hamza Kooheji and Ali AlQaisi.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">RAF Abu Dhabi is headlined by Colby Covington vs. Khamzat Chimaev for the cruiserweight crossover title.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former two-time UFC champion Julianna Pe\u00f1a is getting back to competition, but it will be on the wrestling&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":930813,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,701,638,168750,168751,82,640,702],"class_list":["post-930812","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-raf-wrestling","tag-raf-wrestling-news","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930812","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=930812"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/930812\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/930813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=930812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=930812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=930812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}