UFC veteran and featherweight MMA fighter Makwan Amirkhani has just left the ADCC North European Open 2023 with a bronze medal on August 19th, 2023. Although has generally competed at featherweight throughout his MMA career, he has gone as low as bantamweight in the past as well. For his surprise appearance at the ADCC North European Open he decided to compete in the under 76kg division, which also happened to be the busiest professional division at the event. He’s known for his submission skills in his MMA career but has also competed in both Freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling in the past, making him the ideal candidate to succeed under ADCC rules.
Amirkhani has been competing in professional MMA since 2010 and he made his way to the UFC in 2015 with a 10-2 professional record at the time. Over the 8 years that he’s competed at the highest level of the sport, he’s been able to improve his record to 17-9 and has shared the cage with some of the best fighters in the division before being released by the promotion earlier this year. Although Makwan Amirkhani has competed at a higher level of combat sports than any of his opponents at the ADCC North European Open 2023, he was also stepping into a specialist area against those who live and breathe the sport.
Amirkhani started out well in his first few matches, winning one by submission and one by points in order to book his place in the semi-final. He came up against top Estonian prospect Tom Maenurm and was submitted, taking him out of the running for the top spot on the podium. That was Maenurm’s fourth submission win of the day and he went on to submit Lemar Khan in the final, taking home the gold medal after a flawless performance. Amirkhani on the other hand dropped into the third place playoff match of the division, where he submitted Tuomo Salo to take home the bronze medal.
