The Ukrainian roots of Mixed Martial Arts’ most feared Russian fighters
The career of the former UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, who is often seen as an icon of Russian power, can actually be traced back to Ukraine.
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For many years, Vladimir Putin has sought to use sports as a symbol of Russian might – a tradition that goes back to Soviet-era Olympics showdowns with the West.
And lately the Russian Republic of Dagestan has been producing some of the country’s finest athletes in Mixed Martial Arts, a combat sport that combines elements from multiple different fighting disciplines.
Many Dagestani fighters have become among the best in the world’s premiere MMA promotion, the Ultimate Fighting Championship or UFC.
These include such famous fighters as Khabib Nurmagomedov, his younger brother Usman Nurmagomedov, and his friend Islam Makhachev.
Khabib became the UFC lightweight champion in 2018, and is widely considered one of the greatest fighters ever.
His rise to stardom did not go unnoticed by the Kremlin, where the popularity and authority of Dagestani athletes are viewed as a valuable resource for achieving political aims. Putin and his inner circle attribute individual athletic successes to the state, pushing the narrative of a ‘strong Russia.’
Yet, there's a lesser-known part of Khabib’s life: his career got its start in Ukraine, using a method taught by his first coach from a small Ukrainian town. After the full-scale invasion, athletes like Khabib appear to avoid publicly mentioning their past in Ukraine. On the world stage, Khabib is perceived as purely Russian.
But Khabib repeatedly applied for Ukrainian citizenship – but failed to do so.
The omission of his Ukrainian ties helps bolster Russia’s reputation on the world stage. And ultimately, Russian leaders seem to be acutely aware that today's sympathy for a sports champion can turn into tomorrow's tolerance for the authoritarian state.
After the fighter’s 2018 victory to become the UFC’s lightweight champion, during a meeting with Putin, the Russian president emphasized that Khabib was competing as a symbol of Russian might:
"Yes, of course, you weren't competing for any team, you were there in a personal capacity, not even representing the country. You performed in a personal capacity, but you are, after all, a citizen of Russia.”
But in reality, the roots of Khabib’s skills and knowledge can be traced back to Ukraine. For example, Khabib's debut fight was in the Ukrainian city of Poltava on September 13, 2008. He lived here for some time and visited frequently afterward. This is also the city where his uncles and his father, his head coach, began their careers.
The Russian champion’s Ukrainian roots:
Khabib Nurmagomedov's career was largely shaped by his father Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, who was himself an elite athlete and Khabib’s personal coach.
His father, as well as his uncles – Abdulnasir and Nurmagomed – were born in Dagestan. During the Soviet era, they all moved to the Ukrainian city of Poltava, where they enrolled in what is now the Poltava University of Economics and Trade.
Around that time, alongside their studies, they began practicing martial arts. At different times, they all trained with the same Ukrainian coach – Petro Butrii, now a 74-year-old master of Sambo and Judo.
"He [Abdulmanap, Khabib's father] came to train, and in four years of training, he achieved great success in Sambo and Judo," Butrii told The Counteroffensive.
According to Butrii, Abdulmanap's mother fell ill in the ‘90s, so at her request, Abdulmanap returned to Dagestan. He still traveled to Ukraine several times a year, though, and brought Khabib with him when he was a young boy.
During one of these visits, Butrii gifted him tatami mats, Japanese straw mats for covering the floor. Khabib's father took them to Dagestan and used them to equip his gym. He also utilized Butrii's training methodology, which he had learned at a Ukrainian university during the Soviet era.
Khabib's uncle also confirmed this: "Petr Ivanovych was constantly with us as a coach. Abdulmanap is currently training [in 2018] Khabib using the same methods. When it was difficult for him, he would bring his son here [to Ukraine]," Abdulnasir said in a 2018 interview with Sport Express.
The Ukrainian Butrii and the Russian Khabib family had a remarkably close relationship.
"They [Abdulmanap and Khabib] would come to me and train at my club and lived across the street... They have a very respectable, hardworking family... They treated me like a father. Even their grandfather, when he was here, once gathered them and said that their father was not him, but Petro Ivanovych was," Butrii said.
Eventually, Khabib Nurmagomedov also started training with Butrii as he got older.
"Then, as Khabib began his journey to the top, we constantly communicated, had conversations about his mistakes... We constantly analyzed each of his fights," Butrii told The Counteroffensive.
In 2008, Khabib began his professional career. That same year, in Poltava, he won his first fight, for which he earned approximately $2,000. After that fight, he gifted Petro Butrii a cup painted in the Dagestani style.
Competing for a Ukrainian club, and then applying for Ukrainian citizenship:
After that, Khabib trained in his homeland for a while. In 2009, he won the M-1 Global mixed martial arts competition in Russia. The next year, he won the same competition again, but this time in Ukraine, representing the Kyiv club 'Combat-Dobro.'
Overall, between 2010 and 2011, he had nine professional fights representing the Kyiv club. While in Poltava, Khabib trained continuously for four years, and for six years altogether.
He would eventually move to California, winning his debut fight in the UFC.
But Khabib continued to visit Ukraine. In 2016, he came to Poltava to see his two uncles, Abdulnasir and Nurmagomed, who are citizens of Ukraine.
Khabib also wanted to become a citizen of Ukraine but was repeatedly denied.
"We put in maximum effort for Khabib to receive Ukrainian citizenship. We value, love, and respect Ukraine and its people... I don't know how they considered it, but there was always a refusal. And it wasn't just once, but four or five times. So we stopped asking," Abdulnasir said in 2018.
Abdulnasir, who with Khabib's other uncle Nurmagomed moved to Germany after the full-scale invasion started, told The Counteroffensive the family unsuccessfully tried to get citizenship for Khabib around 2006-2007.
Rizvan Magomedov, Khabib's manager, did not respond to a request for comment from The Counteroffensive on the athlete's citizenship and stance on the war.
Ukraine's State Migration Service and Ministry of Internal Affairs said they can't disclose the reason Khabib Nurmagomedov was denied Ukrainian citizenship without his personal consent.
Khabib's last public visit to Ukraine was in 2018. At that time, he visited athletes at the 'Hermes' and 'Combat-Dobro' clubs, for which he had previously competed.
Putin’s usage of Khabib’s prestige for Russian pride
Despite these long-standing, deep ties with Ukraine, and even the desire at one point to obtain citizenship, Khabib continued to meet with Putin.
Recognizing the influence of Khabib and other athletes on youth in Russia and their international prestige, Putin used him for imperial benefit. His public dealings with Putin began in 2018, shortly after his victory over Irish MMA fighter Conor McGregor. Putin congratulated Khabib by phone, and they later met in person. During their televised meeting, Putin stressed that the athlete represented Russia and played up their 'familial' unity.
"We, within the country – I believe we are one big family," Putin said.
Later that same year, Khabib Nurmagomedov was a speaker at the Synergy Global Forum, one of Russia's largest business forums. This event was organized by Synergy University, a private Russian university that partially received Russian state funding and has indirect ties to the Kremlin.
During the event, Khabib presented his autobiography, 'Khabib Time,' in which Putin's 2018 call and support for Khabib feature prominently.
"Public meetings with such athletes are part of the image of a 'strong Russiaʼ that values its own and nurtures values. Obviously, Russia is the last country that values its own and nurtures anything human, but the authorities regularly use athletes, both domestic and foreign, to create the image they need," Rozanov told The Counteroffensive.
In addition to Putin, Khabib met in 2018-2019 with the head of the Chechen Republic, Ramzan Kadyrov. His troops have fought in Ukraine and were implicated in the looting, torture, and killing of Ukrainian civilians in the Kyiv region in March 2022.
In October 2020, Khabib defended his championship of the UFC title for the third time and was invited by Putin to meet in the Kremlin once more, though the meeting never took place. Immediately after that fight, Khabib announced his retirement.
"He made a promise to his mother and on top of that, he’s 36 years old, now going to be 37. He always said 35 was the year he would retire," Javier Mendez, Khabib's former coach, told The Counteroffensive.
Khabib since Russia’s invasion:
Since Russia launched its full-scale war against Ukraine in early 2022, Khabib has maintained a silent stance. He has neither spoken with, nor met with Putin or Kadyrov, at least not publicly.
He has, however, found himself thrust into politics.
In June 2024, during a UFC tournament in New Jersey, footage captured a moment of Khabib speaking with Donald Trump. The athlete expressed hope that Trump could stop the war in Gaza.
Later, on the Impaulsive podcast, Trump clarified that Khabib had spoken about wars in the plural.
Also, according to Trump, Khabib is close to Putin.
"I think he's friends or was friends, but I think he is friends with Putin very much. But he said we have to stop the killing," Trump said.
Despite Khabib's past connections to Ukraine, he has stayed mum on the killings of civilians by Putin's army, even in Ukrainian cities that had once been his home away from home.
This silence is particularly striking given his previous stay in Poltava, a city now subjected to Russian shelling of civilian infrastructure.
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NEWS OF THE DAY:
Good morning to readers; Kyiv remains in Ukrainian hands.
CHINA OPPOSES EU SANCTIONS TARGETING RUSSIA: Earlier this week, the EU adopted the 17th package of sanctions against Russia’s shadow fleet and companies supplying components used to manufacture drones. Chinese and UAE enterprises were on that list, too.
A China spokesperson stated that China is promoting peace talks and “never provided lethal weapons to parties to the conflict and strictly controls the export of dual-use articles.”
However, it was reported that China is the leading supplier of critical components for Russian weaponry. Moreover, Ukrainian Armed Forces have captured Chinese soldiers fighting against Ukraine.
UKRAINE TO WITHDRAW FROM TREATIES WITH RUSSIA, BELARUS: The Ukrainian government has approved termination, withdrawal and denunciation of eight international agreements with Russia and Belarus, signed within the CIS – an organization created to regulate cooperation between post-Soviet states.
One of these agreements with Russia is reserve of supplies and payment for Russian natural gas to Ukraine. Amid EU’s and UK’s tightened sanctions, Ukraine is cutting all ties with Russia and terminating the treaties that have been ratified and in force.
RUSSIA GROWS MILITARY PRESENCE NEAR FINLAND: Russia is building up its troops and infrastructure near the border with Finland, The Guardian reported.
On Wednesday, Finland finished the first 35 kilometers of the fence on the border with Russia, out of 200 planned. This construction is intended to protect Finland from Russian immigrants, who Finland believes are deliberately redirected there by the Kremlin as part of a ‘hybrid operation.’ The fence is equipped with cameras and sensors that distinguish between people and animals.
Finland joined the alliance in 2023 and has significantly increased the presence of NATO troops on its territory. Each new NATO member is automatically at risk of a strike or attack from Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, deputy head of Russia's Security Council, said in late April this year.
DOG OF WAR:
Today’s dog of war is this little dog who patiently waited while his owner did the shopping. He approved Zoriana’s grocery haul with a bark as she exited the store.
Stay safe out there.
Best,
Veronika
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The unholy alliance between sports and authoritarian regimes is in full display again. In the US, we also throw lots of money and certain cultural codes into the mix. Thank you again for the insightful reporting.
Informative and well-written as usual.