Bellator 243: Valerie Loureda says ‘I’m gonna post more TikToks’ after TKO of Tara Graff and celebratory dance
- Former taekwondo star Loureda quips she’s ‘just an Instagram model’ after going 3-0 in MMA with first-round win
- Emotional 22-year-old hits back at critics for saying she ‘demoralised’ the sport by posting videos of herself dancing on social media
Flyweight Valerie Loureda stuck it to her critics with a second-round buzzer-beater TKO of Tara Graff at Bellator 243 – and a celebratory dance – on her return to action after 14 months.
The 22-year-old former taekwondo star out of American Top Team in Florida went 3-0 in MMA and US-based organisation Bellator. The victory on Friday night in Connecticut followed criticism from some of the Cuban-American’s fellow female fighters – including Graff – for posting videos of her dancing skills on social media platform TikTok.
Loureda proceeded to celebrate the win by showing off her dance moves again, this time inside the cage at the Mohegan Sun arena. “Just an ‘IG’ model,” Loureda wrote in a sarcastic tweet afterwards.
“I’m still gonna post TikToks,” she said at her post-fight press conference. “I don’t care what anybody says. Of course that made it personal but I don’t lower myself to her [Graff].
“I waited until the chance I got to fight, when I was healthy, so I could shut her mouth.
“Let me tell you something,” an emotional Loureda added. “This girl, every single day of quarantine, I thought about her face, the moment I get to punch her like that. Extremely necessary like Jorge [Masvidal] would tell me. I don’t care if there’s one second left, I hit her 50 million times so she can’t get up.
