It seems like everybody who trains with Khamzat Chimaev has got nothing but great things to say about him. When “Borz” first arrived in the UFC, there was an unmatched aura around him.
The undefeated contender was dominating opponents without taking any damage whilst competing at both welterweight and middleweight. His run of being ready to take on and run straight through anyone in the world encountered some speed bumps along the way but despite this, Chimaev is finally in the middleweight title picture after debuting inside the Octagon back in 2020.
For all of his health issues that have prevented him from being overly active, no one has been able to solve the unique puzzle that he brings to the table as of yet and his latest win over Robert Whittaker at UFC 308 showed just how dangerous Chimaev still is. A huge part of the boogeyman atmosphere surrounding him in the early days of his UFC career were the stories that you heard from training partners.
In a recent interview with Dylan Bowker, Matěj Peňáz gave his insight on what it is like to train alongside a man who fight fans still have so many questions about. Peňáz is a very dangerous striker who currently competes in OKTAGON with the only loss of his pro career coming on Dana White’s Contender Series back in 2022 where he was submitted by Sedriques Dumas.
Unsurprisingly, the Czech athlete had glowing reviews for Chimaev as he spoke about his experience working with him on the mats in Sweden.
“Oh with Khamzat [Chimaev], we train together in Allstars gym in Sweden. Yeah, Khamzat is a really hard worker. He’s like; he’s the guy who is like first in the gym and last. So yeah, it was very good experience for me. His wrestling is amazing. He’s like really; I never met anybody with wrestling like this.
“He is so fast and so; he has like such good skills in the wrestling. He’s really good fighter and I’m always looking for his fights. How he can dominate his opponents and he [does] not [make] mistake[s].”
