Nina-Marie Daniele discloses how Alex Pereira kept his broken toe a secret while filming sparring session
Nina-Marie Daniele recently opened up about her sparring session with Alex Pereira and detailed how the UFC light heavyweight champion hid his broken toe during their lighthearted training bout.
For context, Daniele roped in Pereira for one of her humorous vlogs before the UFC 300 event. 'Poatan' gave her the rundown on kickboxing and showed her how to throw a left hook, his signature weapon. Later, they playfully sparred, and Pereira pretended to get knocked out by the influencer.
It recently came to light that Pereira suffered a broken toe while training for his title defense against Jamahal Hill in the main event of UFC 300. Despite being injured, Pereira obliged Daniele's wish to train with him and film her vlogs.
After finding that out, the MMA influencer was unsurprisingly blown away and recently expressed her gratitude in a social media post. In an X post, she posted some footage of their sparring and wrote:
"The fact that Alex Pereira was cool enough to do this training vlog with me with a broken toe is insane. I remember I was joking about him wearing socks while training and little did I know he was hiding his toe, I thought he just didn’t want to risk foot fungus lol. True definition of warrior! @AlexPereiraUFC."
Alex Pereira on Nina-Marie Daniele learning how to throw a left hook
Alex Pereira had nothing but praise for Nina-Marie Daniele after their sparring session before the Brazilian's light heavyweight title defense against Jamahal Hill at UFC 300.
As mentioned above, Daniele and Pereira filmed a fun vlog for the UFC Embedded series, and the influencer learned many new things about striking. Pereira also taught her how to set up and throw his signature left hook. It appears Pereira was impressed by how quickly his student absorbed her lessons and showered praise on her for being a quick learner.
In UFC Embedded: Vlog Series - Episode 3, Pereira shared his thoughts on his session with Daniele and said:
"She wanted to learn the left hook. Everyone talks about it. Many people say I'm strong. But it's like I showed her, I instructed her like she was a professional fighter. I instructed the same way. Of course, it's not easy for her as she's not a fighter, but she did well. In a few minutes, she got it."
Catch Alex Pereira's comments below (1:45):