UFC Fight Night 28 results: Lucas Martins chokes out Ramiro Hernandez in first

BELO HORIZONTE, Brazil – Lucas Martins might wish he had dropped a couple weight classes a while ago. He made bantamweight look easy.

Martins, fighting at 135 pounds for the first time after his first two UFC bouts at lightweight, made quick work of Ramiro Hernandez with a first-round submission win.

The bantamweight bout was part of the preliminary card of today’s UFC Fight Night 28 event at Mineirinho Arena in Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil. It aired on FOX Sports 1 following an additional prelim on Facebook and ahead of a main card on FOX Sports 1.

Martins landed a leg kick early, then tried a front kick. He dodged out of the way of a Hernandez kick and stayed busy with kicks of his own. Hernandez tried to get inside, but it was Martins who fired off a series of winging punches. Hernandez landed a right hand – but Martins walked right through it and landed a 1-2 combination that put Hernandez on his knees.

When he popped back up, Martins quickly latched on to his neck to go and moved to his back on the feet, going after a rear-naked choke. He dropped to the ground and and Hernandez tried to escape, Martins tightened the hold. Hernandez tried to punch his way out, but referee Herb Dean checked on his and knew he was out just 70 seconds into the fight.

“There’s no way to describe how it is to fight in my home down,” Martins said. “(The weight cut) was difficult, but with my camp supporting me it was OK – and it will be easier in the future.”

“I was very happy when I saw the fight would involve more striking, but I didn’t want to go all-out right at the beginning,” Martins said. “Since I’m dropping weight classes, I was afraid of gassing out. But I was always confident, and I think I found my division.”

Martins (14-1 MMA, 2-1 UFC), fighting in his home state in Brazil, won for the second straight time after a knockout win over Jeremy Larsen in Brazil in May. Hernandez (13-5 MMA, 0-1 UFC), an American Top Team-trained fighter, had a two-fight winning streak snapped in his UFC debut.

Up-to-the-minute UFC Fight Night 28 results include:

• Lucas Martins def. Ramiro Hernandez via technical submission (rear-naked choke) – Round 1, 1:10
• Elias Silverio def. Joao Zeferino via unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 30-27)
• Ivan Jorge def. Keith Wisniewski via unanimous decision (29-28, 30-27, 29-28)
• Sean Spencer def. Yuri Villefort via split decision (30-27, 28-29, 29-28)

For complete coverage of UFC Fight Night 28, stay tuned to the UFC Events section of the site.

John Morgan contributed to this report on-site in Belo Horizonte.