Khamzat Chimaev

Khamzat Khizarovich Chimaev is a Russian-Emirati professional mixed martial artist and freestyle wrestler, born in Gvardeyskoye, Chechnya, on 1 May 1994.¹² He is a three-time Swedish national champion in freestyle wrestling, and in the UFC he won the middleweight championship in August 2025 before losing it in his first defence in May 2026.¹ He is the first Chechen-born fighter to win a UFC championship and, after taking Emirati citizenship in January 2025, the first athlete representing the United Arab Emirates to win one.¹

Chimaev was born in Gvardeyskoye to a Chechen family the English article describes as poor and conservative Muslim, and he started wrestling at the age of five; it has been reported that he won a bronze medal at the Russian junior national championships.¹ In 2013, at eighteen, he emigrated to Sweden with his mother, joining his older brother.¹ In Sweden he won gold at the Swedish freestyle national championships in 2016 and 2017 at 86 kilograms and in 2018 at 92 kilograms, going 12–0 across the three tournaments.¹ Before turning professional in fighting he worked at a poultry factory in Kalmar and did security work.¹

Chimaev entered the UFC in July 2020 and set a modern UFC record by winning twice in ten days, then a third time within 66 days of his debut.¹ He holds wins over three former UFC champions: Kamaru Usman, Robert Whittaker and Dricus du Plessis.¹ On 16 August 2025, at UFC 319, he beat du Plessis by unanimous decision to win the UFC middleweight championship.¹ On 9 May 2026 he lost the title to former champion Sean Strickland by split decision in his first defence, the first loss of his MMA career.¹ In freestyle wrestling he later signed with Real American Freestyle and, at RAF 10 on 13 June 2026, pinned Dillon Danis in 44 seconds, the fastest pin in the promotion's history.¹

The sources report that Chimaev is close to Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who gifted him a Mercedes-Benz and, reportedly, persuaded him in March 2021 not to retire and to return to Chechnya, which led to media speculation about whether he was forced to do so.¹³ In 2022 he began training Kadyrov's two teenage sons and was in the elder son's corner at his professional MMA debut at ACA 150.¹ Chechen dissidents criticised his continued association with Kadyrov in March 2022 because of Kadyrov's repressive rule of the Chechen Republic.¹ He married in Chechnya on 21 May 2022, and the wedding was attended by Kadyrov.¹

This section sets out different positions as reported in the sources. It is not a verdict by the museum. Neither article states Chimaev's own religious affiliation: the English article's only religion statement is its description of his family of birth as "a poor and conservative Muslim Chechen family", which is family background rather than a statement about him.¹ The Arabic article makes no statement of his faith and covers his closeness to Kadyrov as a political matter.³ Wikidata carries no religion value for him at all.² Because family background and milieu are context rather than attestation, his faith is recorded in the museum's data as unknown.¹²

• Khamzat Chimaev — English Wikipedia¹
• Khamzat Chimaev — Arabic Wikipedia³
• Khamzat Chimaev — Wikidata Q76476288²