At UFC 299 on Saturday, Joanne Wood announced her retirement after a rallying comeback against Maryna Moroz.
Coming into the fight the flyweight hailing from Scotland made it clear this would be the final fight of her 12-year mixed martial arts career.
The first round didn’t go her way and she seemingly looked as though she’d be in for a long 15 minutes, with Moroz having a lot of success with her grappling through the first five minutes. Round two saw ‘JoJo’ find a lot more success with her striking and she managed to stuff most takedown attempts that came her way.
In the final proceedings of round three, Wood came inches away from finishing the fight after landing a hellacious spinning back first, that momentarily dropped her Ukrainian opponent to her backside. Somehow Moroz stayed in it and made it to the final bell.
Her last fight came in March last year where she picked up another split decision, against Luana Carolina at UFC 286 in London.
Fittingly, her first MMA loss came at the hands of Maryna Moroz when the two met back in 2015, at UFC Fight Night 64. Following that, ‘JoJo’ Wood went on to become a permanent fixture of women’s MMA, fighting at both 115lbs and 125lbs, before making flyweight her preferred weigh-class.
Wood was scheduled to fight then-champion, Valentina Shevchenko, back in 2020, but ‘Bullet’ withdrew from the fight and the title shot never came back around.
Fans react to Joanne Wood retiring with a win
It has become a rare occurrence that a fighter retires on a win, but the 38-year-old can do just that, knowing she pioneered women’s MMA in the UK.
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Wood’s MMA career began back in 2012 on the Scottish regional scene. Shortly after, she began making the travel over to the United States as the women’s scene offered her more opportunities.
She competed on back-to-back Invicta events, but shortly after returned to the UK to compete at Cage Warriors.