Athletes
Rafael Fiziev | Prepared To Push in 2026
Top 10 Standout Keen On Chasing Down Championship Gold This Year
There were three lightweight fights on the main card at UFC 313 last year: Mauricio Ruffy knocked out King Green to open up the pay-per-view portion of the evening, Ignacio Bahamondes tapped out Jalin Turner in the, and in the co-main event of the evening, Justin Gaethje got the better of Rafael Fiziev in their short-notice rematch.
Of the five lightweights sharing the card with him, Fiziev had already faced two of them, having bested Green at UFC 265 and losing to Gaethje via majority decision loss at UFC 286. The affable Fiziev chatted with all of his contemporaries and got a sense he would be meeting a couple of them in the future.
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“When I talked with Bahamondes, I felt ‘maybe I’m gonna fight with you soon.’ I had some feelings when I talked with Bahamondes. When I talked with Ruffy, I was also like, ‘We’re gonna fight one day, for sure.’” Fiziev said, who beat Bahamondes via decision in June 2025 and now faces Ruffy as part of the UFC 325 main card at Qudos Bank Arena. “We talked good with him. I told him ‘I like your style. You have a very good style — very beautiful to watch people who have this style.’ He puts his hands down, strong hands, counterattacks, kicks, and now we fight. It’s so beautiful.”
With a fight against Ruffy on tap for this weekend, that means the only one from the card left for Fiziev to face is Turner, so could “The Tarantula” be next?
Rafael Fiziev Fight Week Interview | UFC 325
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Rafael Fiziev Fight Week Interview | UFC 325
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“I’ve talked with him a little bit, but I don’t have a feeling like I’m fighting with him soon,” Fiziev said with a smile.
Fiziev has always understood the reality that the fight gods will humble you if you get ahead of yourself, but he was reminded of it last fall when he was forced to withdraw from a main event assignment opposite Charles Oliveira in Rio de Janeiro due to a knee injury.
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“We don’t know what tomorrow is going to be,” he said. “Before, I think I’m gonna fight with Charles in Rio and after I’m gonna call out the champion or the top guys, and my knee said to me, ‘Shut up and go sit your a** down!’ … I was so mad when this happened; I feel like I lost this fight,” Fiziev continued. “This opportunity was so big — it’s a dream for all fighters and a dream for me, but this is what it is. We have to care about our health and my knee, I’ve already had surgery twice — reconstruction of the ACL, twice; the same knee, the same surgery — and when I showed the paper from the doctor after the MRI to my coaches, everybody (was shocked).
“I was still pushing the last two weeks before I had to pull out of the fight, but I remember I came into the gym one day and I could not do anything: I could not wrestle, I could not do drills, stand up, nothing. You cannot go fight against Charles in this condition.
“Honestly, all my life, I open my eye and look to the problem and I understand the problem,” he added when asked about the difficulty of making the decision to withdraw. “I cannot fight in this condition against Charles because he’s gonna pressure me, he’s gonna wrestle me, and I have to stay strong on my legs, and my legs are not strong. I made the decision that I had to make my knee stronger, heal it.”
Now three months removed from the injury setback, the 32-year-old striker is eager to return to action and fueled by motivation from a close friend’s success.
“Now I’m feeling very strong, very motivated, and my buddy Petr Yan, he gave me a lot of motivation after his fight against Merab (Dvalishvili),” Fiziev said of his former Tiger Muay Thai teammate, who conducted a masterclass to reclaim the bantamweight title at UFC 323. “I’m more than motivated right now.”
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Inspired by the efforts of his “legendary” friend and eager to build of his strong performance againt Bahamondes in Baku last June, Fiziev is ready to share the Octagon with the highly regarded Fighting Nerds representative this weekend and show that while Ruffy has some flashy moves, he is on another level than is Brazilian opponent.
“Honestly, for me, he’s like Bahamondes,” Fiziev said. “Everything is almost the same except Bahamondes is longer and Ruffy is (shorter). They both love counterattack, but Ruffy, he likes to counter more than Bahamondes, but all of my life, I’ve fought with strikers.
“I fought with Lumpinee champions in Thailand. I smashed Lumpinee champions, have a lot of elite level strikers in my life (that I’ve beaten). I just have to be smart. He’s a dangerous fighter — he has strong hands and he can turn off the lights also — but I’m built different.”
Despite missing out on a big opportunity last year, Fiziev heads into his first appearance of 2026 in a good position, stationed inside the Top 10 and staring down an opportunity to register a quality win over a dangerous opponent on the second card of the year. A win on Saturday over Ruffy may not move him forward in the rankings, but it would keep him in line for another marquee assignment whenever he’s able to return. With the division in a bit of an unsettled phase at the moment, the chance to shake things up and go on a run could be there for him if things break right this weekend.
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But true to his ways, Fiziev has no interest in getting into specifics or speculating about how this year could map out. Instead, he’ll march to the Octagon this weekend bent on handling his business, and as for the rest of the year, he’s going to do whatever it takes to get closer to reaching his goal.
“I’m gonna push myself to red zone all year,” he said with a smile, excited by the thought. “I don’t have a lot of time in this game. I don’t want to stay until I get old. I want to make (use of) all of the energy I have right now. I’m 32, 33 in the next couple months, so I think I’m on the top right now, physically, mentally. I feel very strong and I’m ready to push anybody who is in front of me in the cage.
“My goal is the belt, is the gold like all of the fighters… It’s a bad soldier if he doesn’t want to be a general, you know? So this is my goal.”
UFC 325: Volkanovski vs Lopes 2 took place live from Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, Australia on January 31, 2026. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!
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