Khamzat Chimaev finally lived up to his early promise on Saturday night, utterly dominating Dricus du Plessis to claim the UFC middleweight championship at UFC 319.
Chimaev won by unanimous decision having been in complete control throughout the contest, landing a UFC-record 529 strikes on his South African opponent.
Du Plessis – who was making the third defense of his belt – had no answer to Chimaev’s grappling and found himself on the mat within the opening minute of the fight. He survived that time, but ended up being taken down again in each of the following rounds.
Chimaev was particularly dominant in the third round, landing 156 strikes – more than three times as many as du Plessis managed in the entire fight.
Despite having 21 minutes and 40 seconds of control time – the second most ever in a UFC fight behind the 22 minutes 18 seconds Sean Sherk managed against Hermes França in 2007 – Chimaev was unable to finish off his opponent.
But, even with a late fightback from du Plessis, all three judges scored the fight 50 to 44 in Chimaev’s favor.
“I never game-plan,” Chimaev said afterward. “I just came in, work like I do in the gym. That guy is strong, I couldn’t finish, respect that guy, he’s the only champion who was saying my name. This guy has real heart, a real lion, a real African lion.”
Having been touted as a future champion since his UFC debut in 2020, this victory represents the biggest win of Chimaev’s career.
The Chechen-born fighter is now 15-0-0 but, due to injury and illness, fought just twice in 2023 and 2024.
Chimaev has also struggled to obtain a visa for the US during that time but in early August, the 31-year-old credited President Donald Trump with helping him to secure the visa which allowed him to appear on Saturday’s card, his first fight on American soil in nearly three years.
The last few years have seen Chimaev face criticism due to his ties to notorious Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov – the two have posed together for photos and Kadyrov attended Chimaev’s wedding in 2022.
