Claudia Gadelha has been a fixture in the Top 5 of the women’s strawweight division since its inception, yet as she readies to face Yan Xiaonan on Saturday night in Las Vegas, the perennial contender feels like a dismissed member of the championship chase.
“I feel like a lot of things happened in the last years of my career,” began the Brazilian veteran. “I lost some fights that I shouldn’t have lost, I went through a lot of challenges switching camps and moving to America, and I feel like I haven’t performed the way I wanted to and that’s probably why they don’t mention me the way they should.