Luana Carolina botched weight cut scraps fight with Montana De La Rosa at UFC Fight Night 253
LAS VEGAS – Saturday’s UFC return to Las Vegas will be one fight short of what was expected at the start of the week.
Thanks to a weight cut that went awry and a reportedly potential massive miss on the scale, Luana Carolina (11-4 MMA, 6-3 UFC) is out of her women’s flyweight fight against Montana De La Rosa (13-9-1 MMA, 6-5-1 UFC). The bout was set to open UFC Fight Night 253 at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas.
Two people with knowledge of the situation informed MMA Junkie of the cancellation but asked to remain anonymous because the promotion has yet to make an official announcement. Ag. Fight first reported the news.
This is nothing new for Carolina, a 31-year-old from Brazil. She got to the UFC through DWCS as a bantamweight in 2018, but debuted in the promotion at flyweight in May 2019. She missed weight in 2021 for a split decision win over Poliana Botelho. A little more than a year ago, she missed by two pounds for a win over Julija Stoliarenko. This cancellation gives her three weight issues in less than four years.
Carolina was set to come into the fight with De La Rosa on a three-fight winning streak. Along with a third-round TKO win over Stoliarenko, she had decisions over Ivana Petrovic and Lucie Pudilova.
De La Rosa was ready to return for the first time since a June 2024 split decision win over Andrea Lee, which snapped a three-fight skid against Maycee Barber, recent title challenger Tatiana Suarez and JJ Aldrich. She weighed in Friday to make her half of the fight official for contractual purposes, but now will wait to see when she can go after her first winning streak since 2019.
The UFC Fight Night 253 lineup now includes:
MAIN CARD (ESPN+, 7 p.m. ET)
- Manel Kape vs. Asu Almabayev
- Cody Brundage vs. Julian Marquez
- Nasrat Haqparast vs. Esteban Ribovics
- Hyder Amil vs. William Gomis
- Danny Barlow vs. Sam Patterson
PRELIMINARY CARD (ESPN+, 4 p.m. ET)
- Austen Lane vs. Mario Pinto
- Chepe Mariscal vs. Ricardo Ramos
- Lucas Almeida vs. Danny Silva
- JJ Aldrich vs. Andrea Lee
- Charles Johnson vs. Ramazan Temirov
For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC Fight Night 253.