How the armbar instantly made Ronda Rousey a starJeff WagenheimMay 8, 2026, 06:00 AM ETMultiple Authors
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Ronda Rousey was one of a kind as a one-trick pony. That’s a term typically used to diminish someone for their limitations, but Rousey found unlimited success in her one trick. There was an aura of invincibility to her race to the front of the MMA pack. She didn’t break stride on the way to saddling up the shiniest star power the sport had ever seen. Rousey performed a magic act with just that one trick.
The armbar.
Rousey brought the finishing move with her from judo, the sport in which she won Olympic bronze in 2008. The technique, which involves isolating an opponent’s arm and using leverage to hyperextend the elbow joint and force a submission, was her go-to maneuver from the moment she transitioned to MMA. After winning three amateur fights, all by armbar in under a minute, Rousey turned professional in 2011 and continued collecting arms in no time. She won her first eight pro fights by armbar, all but one of those finishes coming in the opening round. Five times she twisted her opponent into submission in less than a minute.
The Rousey armbar became MMA’s version of the Mike Tyson knockout punch. For opponents, the finish was inevitable, but at least over quickly. For fans, the inevitable finish left them wanting more.
Rousey became the biggest crossover star the UFC had seen, at least until Conor McGregor pranced onto the stage in 2013. It wasn’t entirely about the armbar. Rousey’s steely-eyed, double-time strut to the cage set to Joan Jett’s “Bad Reputation” was iconic. But the Rousey mystique wouldn’t have heated up if she weren’t cooking opponents as fast as a microwave. No one finished fights like she did. One trick did the trick.
You’ve probably noticed that this story has thus far referred to Rousey’s fighting career in the past tense. That’s because she has not competed in a decade. But that will change on May 16, when Rousey, 39, faces Gina Carano, 44, in a meeting of retired legends of women’s MMA.
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Carano, who last fought nearly 17 years ago, was a pioneer of the sport and someone Rousey has credited with inspiring her MMA career. Carano’s popularity served as a jumping-off point for Rousey, but that is where the comparison ends. Their fighting styles could not have been more different. Carano came from Muay Thai kickboxing, and three of her seven MMA wins were by knockout. It remains to be seen if her hands will be as fast as they were back in the day, but her best chance to win would be if Rousey engages her in a standup fight.
That is not out of the question, as Rousey became enamored by boxing late in her UFC run and got away from her bread-and-butter grappling. It was much to her demise. In her final two appearances inside the Octagon, Rousey was brutally beaten to the punch in knockout losses to Holly Holm and Amanda Nunes.
Against Carano, it would be wise for Rousey to pull the armbar out of her room-for-just-one bag of tricks. It has been a while, but some things you never forget. It’s like riding a bicycle — if the point of the ride is to make the handlebar tap out. Carano never had to deal with an armbar in any of her fights, but would it matter if she had?
Knowing what’s coming has never been much help for Rousey’s opponents. Take Sarah Kaufman, for example. They fought in August 2012 in the final Strikeforce women’s bout before Rousey moved on to be part of the first women’s UFC fight. Kaufman was Rousey’s sixth professional opponent. All five before her had lost by armbar. Kaufman’s strategy was obvious.
“I think if there was any pressure on me at that time, it was to not let her armbar me because she had done it to all these people,” Kaufman told ESPN in 2015. “‘That’s ridiculous and I’m too good for that. You know what she’s doing, so don’t let her do it.’ That kind of thing. And that way of thinking almost lets it happen. I had a game plan of how to win, but that [armbar] was in my head so much. I just wanted to counter what she was doing.”
Kaufman didn’t have time to counter. She got armbarred in 54 seconds.As the sub-one-minute finishes piled up, there was a strong case to be made that the Rousey armbar was the greatest finishing move in MMA history. It certainly was the most consistent and efficient. Consider these superlatives compiled by ESPN Research.Four fights, four armbars, total fight time 138 secondsRousey’s first four professional fights ended by armbar in 25, 49, 25 and 39 seconds. That’s a total fight time of 2 minutes, 18 seconds. After making quick work of Julia Budd for her fourth win, Rousey told an interviewer, “We did the math and figured out how much I got paid per second, and it was pretty cool.”
That Rousey did this should come as no surprise. By the time she signed with the UFC, the armbar already was her signature. She had won six pro and three amateur fights, all by armbar. How else could fans have envisioned a Rousey fight playing out?
“She’s very technical,” Ediane Gomes, Rousey’s first professional opponent, told Bleacher Report in 2015, reflecting on her 25-second loss four years earlier. “She is several steps ahead. She’s like a razor, so fast. You don’t even notice what she is doing until it has happened.”
Rousey’s 14-second finish of Cat Zingano in February 2015 is the quickest by armbar in an era that began at the start of the century with the implementation of the Unified Rules of MMA. It’s tied for fastest armbar in the UFC’s entire history — Joe Charles submitted Kevin Rosier in 14 seconds at UFC 4 in 1994.
The instantaneous finish at UFC 184 was the byproduct of Zingano’s aggressive strategy. She came charging out of her corner and attempted to take Rousey to the canvas.
“I decided to go out and try something that hadn’t been done before,” Zingano told ESPN months after the fight. “If anyone knew how to beat Ronda, they would have done it by now. People have tried different approaches. My approach was, ‘OK, no one has ever gone at her, guns blazing, before.’ Obviously, it didn’t work out.”
Rousey defended the takedown try by scrambling into top position and immediately securing the submission.
“That approach can be checked off the list, I guess,” Zingano mentioned.
Did I mention that in the 14-second armbar finish, Rousey did not attempt a single significant strike? One trick was enough.
Ronda Rousey’s armbar did more than finish fights, it created a star and took her from judo, to MMA, to WWE and to late night TV. Photo by Theo Wargo/NBC/Getty ImagesThe armbar finishes of Liz Carmouche, Miesha Tate and Zingano put Rousey in a tie with current women’s bantamweight champion Mackenzie Dern and onetime title challenger Mayra Bueno Silva.
Carmouche, the other half of the first women’s fight in UFC history, took solace in at least putting Rousey in trouble before succumbing to the inevitable. In the opening minute of their fight, she gained standing back position and attempted a rear-naked choke on Rousey.
“I’m one of her only opponents that she didn’t take down,” Carmouche, who is still an active fighter at 42 years old, told ESPN in 2015. “When it came to me going down, it was her shaking me off from her back. So, that’s something I did correctly.”
On the way to a defeat in 4:49.
Rousey won her first six fights in the Octagon, three by armbar submission and three by knockout.
After entering the UFC off a dominant run in Strikeforce and other promotions — six first-round armbar wins, all but one in the first minute — Rousey needed nearly the entire first round to beat Carmouche, then was taken to Round 3 by Tate. After that, the fast finishes resumed. Rousey scored her first non-armbar win, beating Sara McMann by TKO in just over a minute. Then she posted the record three sub-minute finishes: Alexis Davis (KO in 16 seconds), Zingano (armbar in 14 seconds) and Bethe Correia (TKO in 34 seconds).
No one in UFC history, man or woman, has had more finishes in under 35 seconds.
“What impresses me is how fast she finishes people,” McMann told ESPN in 2015. “She’s going for every chance and she’s setting a pace that is really hard for people to maintain. She knows she doesn’t have to set it for 25 minutes, because she’s finishing people.”
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