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Ilima-Lei Macfarlane is one of the top prospects in women’s mixed martial arts, currently reigning over the Bellator MMA women’s flyweight division. The 28-year-old Hawaii native first burst onto the scene back in January 2015 when she made a remarkable professional debut, scoring a 10 second TKO victory over Katie Castro at Xplode Fight Series – Hurricane.

Since then, she has rattled off another six straight wins under the Bellator banner including four submissions and two decision wins. At Bellator 186 on Nov. 3, 2017, Macfarlane won the inaugural Bellator women’s flyweight world championship with a fifth-round triangle armbar finish of Emily Ducote.

Prior to turning pro, Macfarlane held an amateur record of 5-0.

Macfarlane is also very active in her community, setting up a scholarship fund –The Ilimanator Inaugural Scholarship — that selected five native women to participate in a summer school program. Macfarlane graduated from San Diego State with a master’s degree focused in indigenous studies and hopes to share that knowledge because focusing on indigenous knowledge is “something that’s often overlooked or completely missing from a Western curriculum.”

“I wanted to create the scholarship for these girls to see outside of the world that they know and give them a voice and give them a chance to fight back,” MacFarlane said in an interview with MMAjunkie. “I think that it’s important to be able to use my platform to speak out about things that I feel passionately about.”

For more photos of Macfarlane, check out the gallery above and be sure to head on over to Instagram and click follow to join the growing list of more than 38,000 fans who can’t wait to see her next move.



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