Light heavyweight fighter Carlos Ulberg scored his second victory inside the Octagon on Saturday at UFC Vegas 57 against Tafon Nchukwi. But before his entry into professional fighting, the 31-year-old held a job in another realm of entertainment.
Speaking to reporters during his post-fight scrum, “Black Jag” Ulberg, who also goes by the nickname “Ladies Night,” explained the origins of this moniker.
“I used to do ‘ladies nights’ in Australia. I used to travel around Australia and New Zealand doing ladies’ nights and strip, pretty much. And then a guy, one of the announcers back home, local, heard of that and gave me that name,” he said (quotes via MMA Fighting).
“I was a rugby player and I needed a bit of extra money and I found that this was — more than extra money. I was traveling, they put me on billboards and all that sort of thing. It was similar to the [Las Vegas-based Thunder From Down Under show] that they have here.
“So I was doing that, partying, getting paid, I was loving it — I was young — until I found that I was good at fighting. So I gave that up pretty quickly.”
Ulberg isn’t the only UFC fighter with an exotic dancing background on that fight card. Strawweight fighter Vanessa Demopolous shares a similar past and as she revealed in January after her UFC 270 win, it was a job she’d just left eight weeks prior to allow her to focus on MMA full-time. She beat Jinh Yu Frey by decision earlier at UFC Vegas 57.
As for Ulberg, he’s now 2-1 in the UFC since his entry via Dana White’s Contender Series in 2020. After his first-round TKO win over Nchukwi, he now improves to a record of 5-1.
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