Khamzat Chimaev has been putting in some incredible performances as he makes his way up the UFC rankings in both the welterweight and middleweight divisions, demolishing several BJJ black belts as he does so. Now his BJJ coach, former top competitor Alan ‘Finfou’ Nascimento, has spoken out about the work that his student has been putting in during his UFC career. Nascimento is in a good position to talk about the topic as well, given that he managed to win IBJJF world championships at several coloured belt levels and the IBJJF european championships at black belts more than once.
Nascimento managed to register a number of victories over elite grapplers throughout his career like Victor Estima, Jake McKenzie, and AJ Agazarm. It’s clear that Nascimento has high standards for his students, especially considering the fact that Chimaev wasn’t even a blue belt at the start of his UFC career and was only given one shortly afterward. Khamzat Chimaev finished all four of his first UFC opponents, including two BJJ black belts in Gerald Meerschaert and Li Jingliang. He also took some time away from MMA to compete in a freestyle wrestling match against fellow UFC veteran Jack Hermansson, which he dominated from start to finish and won on points.
It wasn’t even until Chimaev was scheduled to fight BJJ legend Gilbert Burns that his coach Nascimento started to discuss promoting him to purple belt. Not only did he beat Burns by decision, but he also went on to submit another BJJ black belt in Kevin Holland. Alan ‘Finfou’ Nascimento recently spoke to BJJEE about Khamzat Chimaev and his stellar UFC run, giving out a stern warning to any ‘fake black belts’ in BJJ that compete in the UFC:
“I’m making Khamzat expose all the fake black belts in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu that is in the MMA. Why? Because nowadays people just get belts like they go to McDonald’s. They don’t do the job. You know, he just got his purple belt. How many black belts in his career has he finished? So that shows. I’m using him to expose many guys. If you’re legit, doesn’t fit for you. But if you’re not, you better run.”
All of the previous fights that Khamzat Chimaev has had with BJJ black belts are available to watch on UFC FightPass, click here to subscribe and watch.
