Austin Hubbard | Back And Better Than Ever

It took a lot of hard work, blood, sweat and tears, and any cliché phrase you can think of to describe the simple fact that Hubbard took the long road to get here. The 33-year-old paid all his dues, even when he didn’t know what the end result would be, in or out of competition. But he soldiered on, earning a second stint with the UFC through The Ultimate Fighter in 2023. At the time of filming for the reality series, Hubbard didn’t know what awaited him or where he was going.

“I am so far better off now than where I was going into that show,” he said. “I was really down and out in a bad way. My brother passed and I was just a few months into that, and I was super broke from being released (from the UFC) and then trying to get fights to get back into UFC, but living out in Colorado was super expensive and having to move back home to Illinois, I was just in a really bad place all the way around when I went into The Ultimate Fighter.” 

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Hubbard’s first run in the UFC wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great, either, as he posted a 3-4 record from 2019 to 2021. Upon his release, he tried to get fights that would put him in the promotion’s sights once more, but it wasn’t easy. He did win a pair of decisions on the regional scene in 2022, and that ultimately led to the call for TUF. And, despite all the inner turmoil, he defeated Aaron McKenzie and Roosevelt Roberts to make his way to the series final against Kurt Holobaugh.

He would lose that return to the UFC, but since then, he defeated Michal Figlak and lost a highly competitive split decision to Alexander Hernandez. Add in the settled home situation, a more reasonable cost of living in Dixon, and a backup plan to work with his father-in-law’s business if necessary, and Hubbard is in a situation where he can focus on fighting, and not everything else. That makes him a dangerous young man in the Octagon. And while there’s still some traveling (okay, a lot of traveling) into Chicago to train with the Valle Flow Striking team, he’s not complaining in the slightest.

“I feel like there's a lot of pressure off of me,” he said. “I can just go out there and be me and not feel so much forced pressure that I need to do this or I have no other options. From where I've come from this dark hole, I'm just so thankful to be where I'm at right now. I know it's kind of cliche to say, but it's one fight at a time.”

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Add those fights up, and is Hubbard seeing a path to a title in his future, or is he satisfied making a living as a prizefighter, and whatever comes with that comes? He admits it’s a little bit of both, so while he’s realistic about where he is at the moment, the dream to carry a world championship belt will never fade.

“That's always a goal,” he said. “You want to be the best what you do. I've won many titles on the regional scene before getting to the UFC and, honestly, it was never like a goal, like I'm going to go win this and I'm going to go get that belt. It was just one fight at a time. You win that fight and then you take on the next challenge and then you win that fight. Take on the next challenge, win that fight, take on the next challenge and the next thing you know…in my case, I had four different regional titles, and before I got to the UFC, I had more title fights than regular three-round fights. So it's kind of just working my way back to that sort of thing, and what needs to come first is winning my next fight. Then I go from there, win that one, go from there, win that one. And I just had another daughter, she's nine months old now, and having a family and ahome, I'm just trying to make money. If I'm providing a good life for my family and getting the bills paid and we're taken care of, that's first and foremost more than anything. So when I say it's a little bit of both, that's what I mean.”