UFC Star Tatiana Suarez in Workout Gear Says “Good To Be Back”

Tatiana Suarez is ready to rumble again after injuring her knee in December—to add insult to injury, it happened on her birthday! Suarez, 33, shared a picture of herself wearing shorts and a black t-shirt, jumping during an intense group training session. “Good to be back 🙏🏽🙌🏽 Let’s go! #champ #hardwork #mma #ufc #wmma,” she captioned the post. “Can’t wait for the title run!!” Suarez is becoming legendary for getting injured and getting back up again, time after time. Here’s what Suarez’s diet and training looks like.

1. Cardio and Strength Training

Tatiana Suarez/Instagram

Suarez trains seven days a week, doing a combination of cardio and strength training. “I'm a great wrestler, I know I'm great at jiu-jitsu, I'm great at kicking," she told Women’s Health. "So right now, I've been focusing a lot on boxing because I know that it's probably my weakest thing. It's also given me a newfound respect for boxers. I can't wrestle yet. I drill it, but I can't bend my knee all the way. When I'm in [training] camp, there's not so much emphasis on cardio just because I do cardio throughout my workouts."

2. High-Protein Diet

Suarez avoids processed foods and sugar. "I ate a lot of high-protein foods and healthy fats like olive oil on salad, chicken, steak, eggs, and avocado," she told Women’s Health. "I also incorporated fish oil, creatine for when I spar, and Thorne's Curcumin Phytosome, which helps a lot with my inflammation."

3. Proud To Fight

Suarez is proud of how many women are entering the fighting world. “I think women in combative sports has drawn a new way of how women are viewed,” she told Forbes. “It was once taboo for women to be in combative sports. Now, people believe every woman should be able to defend themselves. What was once viewed as ‘manly’ is now viewed as strong and beautiful.”

4. Subhead Goes Right Here

Shutterstock

Suarez injured her neck in 2011, after which doctors found a cancerous growth on her thyroid. Then in 2021 she had to take a step back after the ACL, LCL and MCL injuries. Recovery was not easy. "I had to keep my diet a certain way, and I had to do certain exercises for my neck every day, and they were so tedious and boring," she told Women’s Health. "Not only that, but I couldn't do what I love, which is to go live and do my sport. At that point, I was like, 'I thought that patience was the lesson that I was supposed to be learning when I was going through my neck injury. And then I hurt my knee, and thought, 'Well, I don't get it. What more could I have done?'"

5. Knee Injury Recovery

Suarez was careful not to push herself too hard after her knee injury. “The good thing is that there’s nothing actually anatomically wrong with my knee,” she said on The MMA Hour. “So that’s a good thing. But I just didn’t want to go ahead and try to push through something that wasn’t doing what it [was supposed to], because my knee was really inflamed and I didn’t want to try to grapple through something and then actually hurt my knee badly. Because it is the knee that I had surgery on, so I just didn’t want to go ahead and mess with that, especially because my actual injury was so severe. I mean, I tore every ligament in my knee.”

WWE star Zelina Vega is showing off the impressive results of her intense training routine, on social media. Vega, 33, posted highlights of her life recently, including a stunning snap of her posing in gray sweats and a matching sports bra, looking strong and toned. “Thank you all for the bday love yesterday. Means more than you know. Never know what helps fuel a person to keep fighting. Or just to simply not feel alone. Love you guys. Now, back to work💪🏽,” she captioned the post. Vega works hard to stay strong and ready for the ring—here’s how she does it.

1. HIIT and Muay Thai

Vega does plenty of HIIT workouts mixed up with martial arts. “I workout probably, like, six days a week,” she told Muscle & Fitness. “My husband [Malakai Black] likes to make these, like, powerlifting routines for me and then we also mix it up with Muay Thai. So, it’s a lot of different things that I feel like helps me a lot in the ring, whether it’s strength-wise, speed-wise, so yeah, it’s tough but you gotta fit it in.”

2. Diet Advice From The Rock

Shutterstock

Vega enjoys a vegan diet, and brings her own food on the road. “It is very difficult to eat though, I will say that, because you are just so busy running around all the time,” she told Muscle & Fitness. “Like even with [media calls], I completely forgot to eat, but I learned this from Dwayne Johnson: He had a timer on his phone that showed ‘OK, it’s time to eat’ and he would stop what he was doing and he’d make sure he gets his meals in, and then he would continue doing what he was doing.”

3. Video Game Star

Shutterstock

Vega appeared in the Street Fighter 6 video game as a commentator, and would love to expand to other games. “I've always loved Mortal Kombat and Tekken 2,” she told Screen Rant. “I think what's cool about the fighting game community is that I think we just kind of support all games. It's not even just after one, that's all you can ever be. But also, I would love to be a part of something that has to do with Naruto or Demon Slayer or something like that, because I'm such a big anime head that I'd love to kind of blend those two. Because obviously, I've played Naruto and Ninja Storm, stuff like that. So in some ways, I'd like to find a way to blend the anime gaming space there.”

4. Puerto Rico Pride

Vega is thrilled about the increased diversity in the wrestling world. “It has always been important to me. I’m Puerto Rican from New York,” she told TV Insider. “We’re all very proud of who we are. My family, I’m proud of them and feel like I’m representing them. I’m also representing the culture while I’m doing what I’m doing. I want that to reflect well on all of us as Latinos and Latinas. You think of Eddie [Guerrero] and Rey [Mysterio], but I wanted people to initially, especially in NXT, to think of me. That was a huge thing for us.”

5. Pre-Fight Ritual

Vega has a moving ritual before she gets in the ring for a fight. “I have a moment where I talk to my dad,” she told HOLA! USA. “I call my guardian angels. I go through my list: my dad, my uncle, my grandfather. I mean, even my little puppy that I lost. So I get to talk to them and tell them to be there with me because, without them, I wouldn’t be where I am. And even though they’re gone, I feel them making sure that I’m safe in the ring. I always say, ‘Make sure I’m safe, make sure I remember everything, make sure that the fans love it.’”

Professional wrestler Valerie Loureda encouraged fans to watch both UFC and WWE NXT Great American Bash 2023 via a social media update. Loureda, 25, shared a video of herself looking fit and beautiful in an aquamarine bikini with matching coverup, telling fans who her picks are for the fights. “I’ve been working hard to bring a different touch to WWE that they’re never seen before,” she explained in the video. How does she stay so fit? Read on to see 5 ways Loureda stays in shape and the photos that prove they work.

1. Proud of Her Roots

Loureda is proud and confident about her fighting skills. “I’m an amazing wrestler,” she says. “Cuban wrestling is very different, and I was lucky enough to be taught wrestling by Yoel Romero and Alexis Villa and Gustavito (Balart), a lot of Olympic wrestlers, so they really taught me that Cuban wrestling, and I’m gonna take it into the cage. I just haven’t been given a chance to show it because I’m playing my game, but the moment I get the opportunity to show it, people are gonna be shocked by my wrestling skills.”

2. Taekwondo Background

Loureda grew up doing taekwondo, which set the tone for her future career as a fighter. “I never in my life thought for one second this is eventually what I would do,” she says. “I always had the vision of the Olympic dream [in taekwondo] in my mind, but at some point… that changed, and I saw MMA on TV. I saw the way it was blowing up, and people were falling in love with it. I said, ‘Wow, I can do that. I could fight like that. I could beat those girls, and I could change the world one day with that platform and all their viewers.’ So I was very excited about MMA, and that’s when it was born for me.”

3. Wrestling Training

Shutterstock

Loureda says switching from MMA to wrestling was no joke. “It’s extremely tough. For me, it’s actually harder than MMA,” she says. “My first bump, I just knew I could do it. I had this feeling in my gut and my first bump, hitting the ropes, I just fell in love with it and I knew I could do it. It’s tough, it’s a hard transition, it’s different than what I’m used to, but if you can rewire your brain and change your mentality and realize what this is and how to be the best at it, you can be successful. I was with coach (Norman) Smiley the whole time and he was amazing and taught me so much. He stayed in an open ring after for like two hours and we worked and he taught me stuff and taught me different things that would work with my style.”

4. Building Muscle

Loureda is careful to build muscle rather than lose weight as a result of MMA/wrestling training. “I might not be sparring as much, but I’m doing physical training (and) conditioning,” she says. “I lost a lot of weight after ‘Exatlon,’ and in these times, I’ve used time to concentrate on what I want to do with my life. While many are eating and gaining weight at home, I’ve been working to be on weight and be ready for this fight. So I haven’t had many partners for this training camp, but I’m very confident in my level and the years of training in martial arts.”

5. Beautiful and Strong

Loureda has neither time nor patience for those who criticize female athletes for bikini pictures. “If women do it, it’s being seen as doing it for social media and doing it to be an object for men and marketing. And that’s not the case,” she says. “It’s not for any man, it’s for us as women showing we can be badass and beautiful and strong, and we could still be animals in the cage and know how to defend ourselves.”