LAS VEGAS – Yuneisy Duben had it all mapped out.
The knockout that got Duben (6-0) a UFC contract at Tuesday’s Dana White’s Contender Series 70 might’ve been a shock to the MMA world and a giant upset to the oddsmakers, but not for the undefeated Venezuelan. Duben put out the lights on Shannon Clark (5-1) with a brutal right hand that left Clark stiff on the canvas. It was a brutal finish and one that she saw coming.
“Not just there (backstage) but also in my dreams and my thoughts,” Duben told reporters at the DWCS 70 post-fight news conference. “Every day I was visualizing that. Right in the locker room, I was saying to myself, ‘I’m going to knock her out. I’m going to knock her out.’ I would raise my own hand, and I just always had that in mind, and that’s what happened.”
Earning a UFC contract and a first-round finish is the ideal outcome for the fighters competing at DWCS. However, that moment was extra special for Duben as she comes from an impoverished family.
“For me, making a name for myself and being the only one in my family, both from my mom and dad’s side, to have this much success,” Duben said. “My family is not well economically, and now they have a family member that’s famous, and that’s doing things well.”
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