December 14, 2019 and the New UFC Feather Weight Champion of the World Alex Volkanovski defeated Max Holloway
I had wanted to do this interview for some time now and it was made possible by our mutual friend in Dr Steffan Eriksson.
Steffan is a proponent and instructor of my Todd Systems military CQC and military self- defence along with being a doctor to the NRL and an avid fan like me of rugby league.
Alex is of Greek and Macedonian parentage with his father being born in Macedonia and his Mother in Greece.
He was born September 29 1988 in Shellharbour NSW which is 20km South of Wollongong.
He is married to Emma and they have been together over fifteen years and have two daughters, Ariana and Airlie.
He is very much a family man that believes in hard work and fights to provide for his family.
His father was involved in some martial arts training when he was young and was as Alex put it a hard-working man.
He learned the values of hard work and benefits of playing sport from a very young age.
Alex through his father and uncles learned of the warrior spirit, especially with his uncles being passionate about combat sports.
His early sport along with his brother and father was soccer followed by Greco-Roman wrestling at the PCYC in Wollongong.
At the PCYC for between one and two years Alex was involved with physical training that included Greco-Roman wrestling.
He won a lot of gold medals including a national title before he was thirteen and his involvement in Greco-Roman wrestling was not only his first involvement and introduction to combat sports but the practices and principles have proven to provide a valuable base code for him.
Later he started to play rugby league as a lot of his mates were playing and in the off-season started to train in MMA.
At the time he was not only playing rugby league and training in MMA but was also working full-time concreting.
He played semi-professional rugby league for the Warilla Gorillas in the South Coast Rugby League competition
And was awarded the Mick Cronin Medal in 2010 as the league’s best player.
In his final season his team won the group 7 Grand Final and in that game, he scored a 40 m runaway try and was named player of the match.
His involvement in rugby league included playing for representative sides.
Alex started his MMA training at age 22 at Windang NSW based freestyle fighting gym where he still trains today.
He always wanted to be a fighter and as a youngster enjoyed watching boxing, martial arts, kickboxing and MMA.
Even though he was very young when the UFC became mainstream, he dreamed of being a UFC champion.
His coach at the freestyle fighting gym is Joe Lopez and has been so since day one.
He also trains at Tiger Muay Thai Thailand and City Kickboxing in New Zealand.
Along with Muay Thai training at Tiger Muay Thai Alex also undergoes training there under head MMA Coach George Hickman and his brother the head wrestling coach Frank Hickman.
I asked Alex of his strengths and primary techniques that have led to his world championship status in the UFC and he replied, resilience through hard work, plenty of ticker enabling a never give up attitude combined with his wrestling takedowns and ground and pound finishes.
My next question was are there any specific aspects of your MMA capabilities that you would like to develop further.
He told me he is always working hard on developing all aspects of his fight arsenal which includes a focus on the striking and submissions.
I asked Alex of his training regime and preparing for upcoming fights and the following was his answer.
We work on an eight week structure with focus on specific training sessions to best prepare for the upcoming opponent and fight.
We train three hours plus per day, seven days a week, because we fight on a Sunday Australian time.
On Friday, Saturday and Sunday we train half sessions and one week out have the last hard training session.
Alex has a nutritionist to assist with maximising his performance to achieve an important balance so as to be able to cut weight and maintain high level output.
He describes his weight cutting as a combination of diet to lose weight combined with putting in the right fuel and drinking a lot of water.
Then 24 hours before the weigh in, he cuts fluid intake down to a minimum.
His food plan management consists of cutting carbs out over the last for few days before he fights and eating mainly fats and protein.
I asked Alex about any regulations or rules changes that he would like to see bought into MMA.
He replied personally I am not in favour of weight cutting and if I could choose not to cut weight I would prefer that so I feels if weight cutting was not permitted that would be better.
I also think that having a scoring system specific to MMA would be a good option.
On mental preparation Alex said he likes to keep calm and composed controlling hormonal dumping through being exposed to a big crowd on fight night.
He sticks to a game plan through being controlled and keeping calm to ensure he doesn’t just stand flat-footed in front of his opponent.
He wears two crosses around his neck that he gives to his coach for safe keeping backstage and then performs three big jumps on entering the cage in preparation to fight as part of his pre-fight beliefs and making ready to do the business.
In relation to fight game injuries Alex has broken his hand twice in fights and in training and before he fought Darren Elkins he tore his intercostal muscles two days before the fight.
He could barely get out of bed and could not train, and even though he could not strike with his usual power, he fought three hard rounds to get the win by decision.
The main training partner for Alex at the freestyle fighting gym is Colby Thicknesse and at City kick boxing his main training partners include Brad Riddell and Dan Hooker and he does some training with Israel Adesanya.
I asked Alex about any standout memories from his fight career and he said there have been a lot but one that comes to mind is when Chad Mendez knocked him down and he got straight back up looking him in the eyes and could see he was starting to break him down with his resilience, which led to him winning in the second round.
I asked Alex of his thoughts on Eugene Bareman and he could not speak more highly of him and his high level coaching expertise.
He went onto say Eugene is a very detailed person, a very wise man that can break down fights and fighters strengths weaknesses and errors identifying needed changes and adjustments and as such he can make fine tweaks to the fighters skills that make all the difference.
In a code of inches and sometimes millimetres Eugene’s knowledge and expertise can be the difference between winning or losing for fighters fortunate enough to be trained by him.
Alex went onto say he has a level of knowledge he hasn’t seen before.
Alex future goals include achieving the goat status (greatest of all time) in the featherweight division.
When I asked him of his idols or mentors in mixed martial arts, he replied Chuck Liddell, who he had been a big fan of through his early days as an MMA fan and fighter.
He said Chuck was not only an inspiration to him but also fired up the passion and desire he had in becoming a UFC champion.
I asked him to outline the physicality and fitness differences between his rugby league training and playing and his MMA training and competing.
He said his MMA training had to be extremely hard and very much was a case of preparing to achieve the best and being ready for the worst.
You could win in seconds or have to go to war for 25 minutes.
Being an individual sport, you can only rely on yourself.
The rugby league you could play your best game and lose or play poorly and still win as there are 12 other teammates on the field, but in the cage it’s one-on-one.
Alex’s wife Emma has attended most of his 25 amateur and professional fights and is getting used to the realities of MMA.
Alex defeats Jose Aldo UFC 237 May 11, 2019 Rio de Janeiro
Alex has beaten the best being undefeated in his weight division in the UFC. His wins include winning the feather weight title from Max Holloway and then defending it successfully against Max Holloway. His UFC fights before winning the UFC feather weight title include wins against Jose Aldo, Chad Mendes, Darren Elkins, Jeremy Fitz-Kennedy, Shane Young, Mizuto Hirota and Yusuke Kasuya.
Alex on his way to defeating Max Holloway December 14, 2019 Las Vegas for the UFC Feather Weight World Title
While Alex has no current fights scheduled his next opponent could well be the number one contender Brian Ortega.
Outside of his combat sports, Alex enjoys camping and outdoors adventures.
Thanks Alex for this interview and all the best for your MMA future fights.
