Alex Chambers fighting at UFC 191 for same reason she always has -- love
Chambers did indeed give her MMA dreams her all after that, but they didn't necessarily include making a living from the sport. Had she not been able to make it to the big leagues in MMA, Chambers would have likely still been well-situated to make ends meet from some of her other skills and qualifications.
After all, the fighter has a double-degree in mechatronics engineering and could have chosen to go further in academics or in applied work. However, Chambers rose through the atomweight ranks and went all-in with MMA.
In fact, Alex has always had options in her life. Time and again, she's chosen fighting.
When she struggled to get fights booked or pay the bills, her commitment to the sport didn't change, however. She didn't look at fighting as something that interfered with her studies or even as something she could make a fortune in.
Alex simply looked at fighting the way she had always considered the martial arts -- it was something she had to take part in. "I guess I always knew martial arts was going to be a big part of my life," she says.
"Whether it would be through running a gym, or coaching, or fighting, I always knew it was something I wanted in my life in a big way. So, no, it didn't interfere with my plans of pursuing further education, or physics. I made the decision to make it part of my life a long time ago."
Chambers believes her love of martial arts stems from her general love of learning. "With MMA you feel like you're constantly learning things," she explains.
"The more you learn, the more you realize that you don't know much. There are so many little things involved in each component of MMA. I love to learn. I love learning new things, so it is fun for me."
Alex Chambers (L) works for a Kimura shoulder lock submission on Kailin Curran in their May 10 strawweight bout.
Chambers had fun while she trained and competed in relative obscurity for little money, and she is having fun now, as she readies to take on one of the UFC's brightest new stars on a huge, international stage.
"When things got hard because I couldn't get fights, or didn't know what would happen with it all, they were still never that hard because I didn't ever really think of fighting as something I could potentially really make a career, per se, out of. It was just the same it had always been for me when I did karate," she reasons.
"There was no money in that, but you did the training every day, because you loved it. You competed because you loved it. And, at the end of the day, you were just grateful to be doing something you love, to have that in your life. That's still the way I feel, now. I'm grateful to be doing what I love."
