Athletes
Santiago Ponzinibbio | Hungry For That Winning Feeling
Argentine Veteran Talks Frustrations Of Defeat Ahead Of 2025 Debut
In the stick and ball sports, athletes get a myriad of opportunities to have success, both within an individual game and over the course of a season.
Baseball players get three at-bats per game and their teams play 162 regular season games a year. In basketball and hockey, the season is upwards of 80 games, plus playoffs, and the best of the best can be on the ice for 25-percent of the game, if not more. Football is a much more condensed schedule, 17 games without counting the playoffs, but everyone on the field gets numerous chances to succeed each game, and the opportunity to do it all over again a week later, no matter the outcome.
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“We’re competing one time a year, two times a year, and when you don’t have the result that you want,” begins Santiago Ponzinibbio, lounging in his backyard in Florida a few days prior to heading to Las Vegas, where he faces off with Carlston Harris on the main card of Saturday’s first UFC event of the year. “There is so much work behind that, and you need to win for so long, and then you go there again (and lose), it’s ‘F***!’
“It sucks, but this is competition and it is what it is, so you have to adjust as much as you can for the next one.”
Ponzinibbio smiles, but the frustration for his current situation is clear.
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The veteran from Argentina fought once 2023, suffering a third-round knockout loss to Kevin Holland at UFC 287 in a fight he was doing well in right up until he wasn’t. Injuries and being out of sync with the timing of opportunities kept him on the sidelines until this past July, when he ventured to Denver to face off with Muslim Salikhov in a battle of tenured welterweight talents.
Ahead of the contest, the now 38-year-old and I spoke about the sour feeling that lingers with athletes when they’re forced to sit with a loss for an extended period of time. His last win came 19 months earlier against Alex Morono, and the high from that triumph had long passed even before he stepped into the Octagon with Holland.
He viewed Denver as the moment he got to purge the poison of his previous defeat from his system, and replace it, ever so briefly, with the euphoria of a return to the win column, but it wasn’t meant to be.
“It’s terrible,” he says, grinning, when I ask about his loss to Salikhov and the compounding rancid feeling still coursing through his veins as he readies to get an early start on what he hopes will be a far more active 2025 campaign. “Every loss is terrible. Every loss — I can’t talk for other people, but for me, it’s a lot; I’m pretty pissed off.
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“We put so much on the line, we’re working so hard, and especially when they’re coming by split decision — it’s been three times in my last four of five fights.”
The fight with Salikhov was extremely close, with the dissenting judge having the opposite scorecards of his contemporaries, and a majority of media members filing scores to MMADecisions.com, which tracks the official scorecards and media tallies of bouts that go the distance, seeing things in favor of the former TUF Brazil standout.
Rise Of Santiago Ponzinibbio
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Rise Of Santiago Ponzinibbio
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It was, as he mentioned, the third time in his last four defeats that Ponzinibbio has landed on the unhappy side of a two-to-one verdict, with competitive bouts against Michel Pereira and Geoff Neal falling for his opponents, as well.
“It’s a very bad feeling,” he says, his energy and tempo rising. “I had never lost a fight by decision, and then I lose one, two, three — it’s too much, brother. It sucks.
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“It’s not once, but it’s three times, and they’re fights I’m pretty confident I won. Of course we are pissed off, but there is nothing we can do after that happens — just watch it, learn, and say, ‘Okay, what can I do better?’ It doesn’t matter if you think you won — what can you do better to try to finish the fight? What can I do to score more? What I can I do to learn and grow?
“We need to be — what is the word? Pragmatico,” he says. “The emotion is set aside, so what do I need to do better? What do I need to do to score better? What can I do better to have opportunities to finish the fight? Why is this not happening? That’s it.
“In all parts of the game, we have a little piece to adjust; in my grappling, in my striking. There are pieces to adjust to score more and also to finish the fight, to not go to the judges. We try to be more consistent in all moments of the fight.
“All the emotion is to the side,” he adds. “I’m feeling great — much better than I did my last fights — and I’m ready to go there and finish this fight.”
No longer stationed in the Top 15 and having already established himself as a member of the Spanish broadcast team, Ponzinibbio is at a point where he’s not making the walk this weekend out of necessity, but out of desire instead.
He still loves to compete, still loves putting himself through rigorous training camps designed to address those little elements that left him dealing with another agonizing loss rather than relishing a victory.
That’s a special kind of drive and passion, and after having to endure another six months of increased sourness in his belly, Ponzinibbio is more than ready to feel good again.
“I’m super-happy with the preparation, and I’m ready to dance again,” he says, smiling. “I’m very hungry to get back to a win, to try to have an active year.
“I’m ready to have a great performance, a great victory, and move forward. I’m confident with all that we did, so I’m ready.”
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