Holly Holm frustrated with retirement questions ahead of Octagon return

It’s been a year and a half since UFC fans saw former women’s bantamweight champion Holly Holm compete inside the octagon.

Back-to-back injuries in 2021 forced Holm out of matchups against now champion Julianna Peña as well as one against Norma Dumont.

A unanimous decision win over Irene Aldana in October 2020 was the last time “The Preacher’s Daughter” fought for the UFC.

“I’m definitely super frustrated, especially when people are like ‘are you retired?’” Holm said in speaking with MMA Fighting. “I’m like no! Not retired! But I can see them maybe thinking that because they haven’t seen me fight. I want to show them what I’ve got and especially because my last fight, I got to show even more of my game from what had been seen before. I get excited cause I want to show more and show more and I keep running into these barriers. It’s definitely frustrating.

“I feel myself getting anxiety sometimes cause it’s like you feel like you want to go and you can. You feel like you’ve got to go and you want to go and you cant. Then you start overthinking things. I’ve learned I just have to take it day-by-day or I’m going to worry myself doing nothing. Not even moving forward. I always want to move forward so I try to stay as positive as I can.”

The former champion, now 40-years of age, returns to the Octagon on May 21 when she meets Ketlen Vierra at 135-pounds.

Fight card:

Holly Holm vs. Ketlen Vieira – 135 lbs
S. Ponzinibbio vs. Michel Pereira – 170 lbs
Eryk Anders vs. Jun Yong Park – 185 lbs
Chase Hooper vs. Felipe Colares – 145 lbs
Polyana Viana vs. Tabatha Ricci – 115 lbs
Omar Morales vs. Uros Medic – 155 lbs
Joseph Holmes vs. Alen Amedovski – 185 lbs
Jailton Almeida vs. Maxim Grishin – 205 lbs
Chidi Njokuani vs. Duško Todorović – 185 lbs

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