Alexander Volkanovski is a 31-year-old Australian mixed martial artist and kickboxer. He is also a former Australian Fighting featherweight champion. As for now, he is competing in the UFC.
As of May 15, 2019, he is #1 in the UFC featherweight rankings.
Volkanovski has ridden a huge wave of a championship all the way to #4 in the UFC ranking. He is unbeaten in his last 16 fights, the last six of which were of the UFC. He is the one who can complete MMA on his feet or on the ground. The recent victory over Chad Mendes has put him within striking distance of a title shot later in the year. He has also been implementing the titleholder declaring he fights in the style that has not really been fought yet. As coming out of this, the year seems to be very promising for the MMA athlete.
Early Career
It is all about Alexander and his early ages and career when it was already showing up that there was something greater coming out of him. Freestyle Fighting Gym trainer Joe Lopez said Volkanovski, who was a man of the match in the 2011 Group Seven grand final when Warilla beat Gerringong, started training in MMA at the age of 22 and Greco-Roman wrestling to keep fit for rugby league, where he weighed 97 kg.
Despite the success in freestyle wresting Volkanovski soon discovered that he had a great passion for the sports and wanted to push himself further and go deeper into the sports. He then took the decision to switch to combat sports in 2012. He fought in the middleweight division and further moved to the lightweight and featherweight divisions. Volkanovski is a good counter striker with powerful overhand right ad a fantastic offensive wrestler.
Starting as an amateur, at middleweight, going 4–0 before turning professional. Volkanovski has fought in various MMA organizations in the Oceania region in Asia from 2012 to July 2016 prior to signed with UFC. He won Pacific Xtreme Combat (PCX) and two times Australian Fighting Championship Featherweight titles. Volkanovski amassed a record of 13–1 with 10 straight wins prior to joining the UFC.
The Way It Is
Volkanovski is not the one from very talkative persons and it is not usual to have his interviews published on the platform. Though, there have been a couple of them stating his current being and general outlook on the profession as well as his personal performance.
He has been described as a man who has a clear focus and goals as he continues to progress through his tenure and represents one of the many bright stars currently residing Down Under.
Volkanovski is also characterized as the one not to play any character as many other sportsmen do in these sports. Instead, he just wants to go out there and lay down the law – well, most preferably to the loudmouths currently residing in his weight class.
With coming to the sports Alex has introduced a fresh perspective and attitude and in sport, that evolves as quickly as MMA, which is always fantastic to see and well, ‘The Great Volkanovski’ is definitely not the one who will allow others to dictate what and when to do. He is the creator of his own story.
“Even these guys that are marketing themselves as such, they probably aren’t bullies in real life. But they just like to trash talk, and I sort of hate that. Look, I don’t mind people marketing themselves, that’s brilliant, but everyone’s trying to do it. I’m starting to cringe every time I see it now, and those are the guys I want.”