Tracy Cortez clears up story behind viral Paulo Costa selfie

21/09/2023 14:00

Tracy Cortez isn't above a little online trolling.

MMA fans were buzzing this summer when Cortez was seen in a selfie with fellow UFC fighter and frequent social media instigator Paulo Costa. The photo was completely innocuous — at least as it relates to numerous commenters who wrongly assumed it meant there was a romantic relationship between Cortez and Costa — but Costa later made sure to clarify the situation for anyone that might be confused:

As it turns out, Cortez happened to be training in Brazil with Costa and his team, and the photo was taken when she invited everyone over to an Airbnb to have dinner and watch a UFC pay-per-view. When Costa discovered they had a shared associate in manager Tiki Ghosn, he decided they should take a picture together and the rest was history.

"Costa goes, 'Hey, I didn't know you were managed by Tiki,'" Cortez said on The MMA Hour following a win over Jasmine Jasudavicius at Noche UFC. "I said, 'Yeah, that's my manager, let's send him a picture.' You can just see it, it's like a quick, 'alright,' and I keep going about my day. Then Tiki texted him and they're showing me and we're laughing, and two weeks later I come back to the States and then Paulo posts that photo. Right? It was just like, 'Happy Friday from Tracy and me,' literally, and I woke up the next morning, 'Oh my God.'

"I kind of just stayed quiet. Then Costa and his fiancee [Tamara Alves] called me, 'Oh my God, it blew up.' And she knows what she's doing too, Tamara. They're like, 'We'll address it.' I go, 'Alright, thank you. It's funny, but you guys address it.' And they let it run. Oh my God. Then I let it run too. It is what it is now, there's no going back. So I didn't address it, I didn't care, I said I'm going to run with it too. Have some fun, have a good laugh. And that was it. That was literally it, that was the backstory. A picture from a manager and that was it."

With Cortez, Costa, and Costa's fiancee all in on the joke, they simply let the imagination of the fans run wild until it was time to throw water on any unsavory rumors. For Cortez, who overall speaks positively about her relationship with the online MMA community, she didn't mind harmlessly leading people on for a few days.

"He's just funny," Cortez said. "He doesn't take it serious, he doesn't take social media serious, it's all laughs. I mean, I think people knew [the truth], the fans knew. Nevertheless, who doesn't love to troll?"

Cortez has few regrets about being active on social media, though she plans to dial it back going forward as her UFC career progresses. She is now 5-0 in the UFC after scoring a unanimous decision win over Jasudavicius.

As much as she enjoyed how much her selfie with Costa messed with people's heads, she's also taking it as a learning experience.

"It's just one of those things where everything from here on out it is just lessons, trials, and tribulations," Cortez said. "What I like, what I don't like, what I'll do again, what I won't do again. It's one of those things where I noticed where if there's a photo of me, it might go viral. Why? I don't know. Just a simple selfie, it went viral.

"Me, I am a very private person. I have a very small circle that I consider friends. So anything personal life, I think I'll just stay to myself from now on. Lesson learned."