OTHER VITALS
CAREER STATUS: Prime
WALKOUT THEME: “Red Kingdom” by Tech N9ne
SPONSORS: Venum
FIGHTING STYLE
PRIMARY: Freestyle Wrestling
SECONDARY: Kickboxing
STANCE: Orthodox
STRENGTHS
Decent Kickboxing
Hyper Aggressive
Powerful Takedowns
WEAKNESSES
Clinch Work
Elementary Jiu Jitsu
Not the Best Chin
STATISTICAL INFORMATION
#1 Punches: 15
#2 Kicks: 13
#3 Clinch Striking: 5
#4 Clinch Grappling: 5
#5 Strength: 12
#6 Agility: 17
#7 Dodging: 18
#8 Takedowns: 20
#9 Takedown Defense: 8
#10 Heart: 15
#11 Ground & Pound: 14
#12 Ground Game: 14
#13 Submissions: 5
#14 Submission Defense: 5
#15 Conditioning: 15
#16 Toughness: 15
#17 Control: 10
#18 Aggressiveness: 10
#19 KO Resistance: 14
CONTRACT
4 FIGHTS – $500,000 (EXCLUSIVE)
(0 FIGHTS LEFT)
CAREER EARNINGS: $6,205,000
ACCOLADES
CHAMPIONSHIPS: 1
1x Everest MMA Featherweight Champion
HONORS: 0
N/A
FIGHT OF THE NIGHT: 0
N/A
PERFORMANCE OF THE NIGHT: 0
N/A
BACKSTORY
The only daughter of her family, born in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada, the early part of Cat Harris’s life would have the entry “nothing special” in the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. A loner throughout most of her childhood, she developed severe self-esteem issues due to being generally bigger and heavier than other girls her age. As a result, she was home schooled for 4 years (5th to 8th grades), before her family relocated to her father’s original home of Kansas City, Missouri.
She re-entered public school in the US, attending Oak Park High School. While there, she was encouraged to join some kind of extracurricular activity–something, anything, to get her out of the house and introduced to her new classmates. Her freshman year, she tried out for both the volleyball and basketball team, but didn’t make either–rather, the school’s wrestling coach offered to let her try out after seeing the dogged determination she put into the other tryouts.
She was…not an instant success, by any means. Especially with no girls’ team at the time, her self-esteem issues reared their heads again, that she’d never really be able to compete with the boys. But the sport did a lot for Catherine–eventually, she became more outgoing, more open and confident with herself, and after 3 years of fluctuating between the various lighter weight classes, she became the Varsity wrestler at 135 lbs her Senior year. She made the state tournament in 2013, ultimately placing 6th.
After high school, she attended Lindenwood University in St. Louis, studying history while competing on the wrestling team–it was the first time in her career that she’d actually had a women’s team, and while she didn’t shoot to superstardom, she was a consistent presence at 157 lbs, earning All-American honors in her junior and senior years, and placing 4th at the national championship her senior year.
She discovered MMA during her time wrestling for Lindenwood, and began training kickboxing once her wrestling career was finished, but she wouldn’t pursue it as a possible career until she got her Master’s degree and a teaching certification in August of 2020; since then, she’s spent her time sharpening her skills, in preparation for a debut with Everest MMA, in their Featherweight Division.
Season 1 was an up and down experience–dominant wins over Kenneth Rodriguez and Francisco Silva, coupled with a grinding Unanimous Decision win over CC Flynn, were book-ended by losses to Fran von Licht by knockout, and Flynn by Unanimous Decision in the vacant Featherweight Championship fight. She didn’t make a decision right away on whether to return to Everest, or move on to something else, but ultimately, her goal is to win the Featherweight Championship before moving on, and she re-signed with Everest for season 2.
