Best Combat Sambo Fighters in MMA/ UFC History (Top 11)

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Martial Arts Unleashed

8 min readSep 29, 2021

Combat Sambo is not as popular in MMA like wrestling or some other arts. This is mainly because the sport itself is not well spread across the world, and there are not many sambo fighters in MMA. But make no mistakes about it, Sambo works really well in MMA. And over the years, there have been many great fighters with a strong base in this art.

Founded in the 1920s in Russia, Sambo has two main forms and in some way, it resembles modern MMA fighting. It was one of the very first arts to mix together techniques from multiple arts into one style of fighting. This is the main reason why MMA fighters with a strong base in Sambo are so good and tough matchups for anyone.

In this article, we are bringing you the best sambo fighters in MMA / UFC history, and their stories.

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11. Dennis Siver

Siver is a UFC veteran who also has a strong background in Sambo. Although most people know him for his loss to Conor McGregor, Siver has had a long UFC career. He joined the company in 2007, went on to fight 21 times, and score 12 wins. In his prime, Siver was a tough matchup for anyone and he beat some big names like Charles Rosa and B.J. Penn.

Siver started his martial art career at a very young age training in Sambo and Judo. Later on, he would switch to kickboxing where he competed as a pro and Taekwondo.

10. Merab Dvalishvili

Dvalishvili is often seen as the Khabib of the 135 lbs weight class and there is some truth in that. The man is a wrestling machine and is capable of pushing a similar pace as Khabib for an entire fight. Although he is not a finisher, Dvalishvili mauls people inside the cage. What sets him above the other grapplers on the 135 lbs roster are his Sambo and Judo skills.

He grew up in Georgia where he started training in sambo and judo at a young age. At first, he trained to learn self-defense tactics, but at the age of 21, he would move to the U.S. and started competing.

In 2019, he finished second at World Sambo Championships. Bear in mind that he achieved this while already fighting in the UFC. He won two fights in the UFC the same year he won the silver medal in sambo. Amazing.

9. Blagoy Ivanov

Ivanov is a UFC fighter and a former WSOF and PFL heavyweight champ who is best known for his iron chin. Don’t get us wrong, he is a great fighter and his story is very inspiring. But when you survive more than 20 direct hits from Derrick Lewis, people will remember you for that.

While growing up, Ivanov trained in Judo before shifting to Combat Sambo. The biggest moment of his career came when he beat Fedor Emelianenko in the 2008 World Sambo Championships. Ivanov went on to win the world title that year and retire from the sport shortly after.

Over the next years, he had a lot of success fighting in Bellator, PFL, and WSOF before signing with the UFC in 2018. But despite having strong sambo skills, Ivanov is a striker. He rarely uses any grappling, which cost him a better UFC career, that’s for sure.

8. Oleg Taktarov

Oleg Taktarov is one of the pioneers of modern MMA. He is also a quite famous actor in Russia. He fought back in the early days when there were no rules, weight classes, or even time limits. In his career, he beat some big names like Marco Ruas, Tank Abbott and won the UFC 6 tournament.

During the early days, MMA fighters were one-dimensional and experts in just one fighting style. Each fighter came into MMA representing their martial art background and so was Taktarov. He joined MMA as a skilled judoka and was perhaps the first fighter to show the power of Sambo in the sport of MMA. At one point, he even trained with the great Royce Gracie to teach the Gracie legend sambo leg lock techniques.

7. Alexey Oleynik

Oleynik is an MMA veteran and one of the best grapplers in the history of the sport. He was the first fighter to compete across four different decades, fighting against the top competition all the time. Things go to another level when you see that he has nearly 50 submission wins. Fans don’t call him “The Boa Constrictor” for nothing.

Oleynik is an expert in multiple martial arts. He is a black belt in BJJ, Judo, and a master of sport in Combat Sambo. In his sambo career, he became the world champ in 2005, and the European champ in 2001.

6. Yaroslav Asomov

Amosov is a four-time world champion in Combat Sambo and the Bellator 170 pound champion. While some other fighters changed their style when moving from sambo to MMA, Amosov has not. If you want to see how good Sambo is for MMA, just watch any of his matches. The man is all about Sambo inside the cage and getting that takedown and top control.

However, what people often miss about Amosov is the fact that he didn’t train Sambo as a kid. No, unlike other fighters, Amosov got into Sambo at the age of 15. But this didn’t stop him from becoming a world champ four times, beating people who grew up on the Sambo mats.

After putting together an undefeated record of 19–0, Amosov signed with Bellator in 2018. He needed less than 3 years to win seven fights in a row, and become a 170 lbs champ by beating Douglas Lima at Bellator 260.

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5. Andrei Arlovski

Arlovski is a UFC veteran who is still active and competing. He has been with the UFC for over two decades, always battling against the best fighters. Just as you think he is about to retire, the pitbull goes on to beat a young prospect to show us all that he still got it.

Even though most fans know him as a vicious striker who can shut your lights out with a single touch, Arlovski has a strong sambo background. A little-known fact about him is that he got into martial art quite late at the age of 16. He started by training sambo, judo, and kickboxing, which back in the day was an ideal mix of skills for MMA. In his sambo career, he won:

Sambo World Cup Silver Medalist (2x)
European Youth World Sambo Champion (1999)
World Youth Sambo Champion (1999)

4. Dan Severn

Dan Severn is one of the pioneers of MMA who fought back in the 90s, where there were few rules. He has over 127 fights on his record, with 101 wins and 77 finishes. Most MMA fans know him as one of the best wrestlers to ever compete in MMA and a member of the US Olympic team. But, he was also a master of various other fighting styles like Judo and Russian Sambo. In fact, his Sambo story is very interesting.

While wrestling at college, Severn used to train Judo to improve his grappling game. He would later use this unique mix of skills to switch over to compete in Sambo where he enjoyed solid success. And we don’t have to spend too many words on what happened when he later moved into MMA. Let the results speak instead:

UFC Hall of Famer
UFC 5 Tournament Winner
First-ever UFC fighter to receive a belt
Triple Crown Champion

3. Islam Makhachev

Makhachev is one of the best UFC fighters and a close friend of Khabib Nurmagomedov. These two grew up together and used to train and compete in wrestling and Sambo. In fact, they had the same coach who was Khabib’s father, Abdulmanap.

Like most kids in Dagestan, Makhachev got into combat sports, notably sambo, at a very young age. He spent his youth grappling on the mats and working hard to succeed in sambo and MMA. And for many years, he used to fight both in Sambo and MMA at the same time. He fully committed to MMA shortly after he won the world title in Sambo in 2016.

It was around this time that he also signed with the UFC. And like Khabib, he too moved his life to the US to train in the famous AKA gym under Javier Mendez.

2. Khabib Nurmagomedov

Khabib deserves a lot of credit for putting Combat Sambo on the map when it comes to MMA. There were Sambo fighters before him, but Khabib is the first name that comes to our minds when we hear the word “Sambo”. And let’s not forget the rage he triggered with that t-shirt that said “if sambo was easy, it would be called jiu-jitsu”.

Khabib got into martial arts at an early age training wrestling before moving to Judo. Later on, he would start training in combat sambo under his father who at the time was the main coach of the national team. In his sambo career, Khabib became the world champ two times, and the champion of Russia in 2009. Around this time, he decided to retire from Sambo and put his entire focus on pursuing a career in MMA.

In 2020, he retired as a lightweight UFC champ with two title defenses and an undefeated record of 29.

1. Fedor Emelianenko

Fedor Emelianenko is often seen as the greatest heavyweight in MMA, and it’s really hard to argue against that. The man used to be a myth for more than a decade, and on a 27 fight winning streak. What made him so dominant is still a tough puzzle waiting to be solved, but one of the key parts are his Combat Sambo skills. In fact, the Russian is one of the most successful Sambo fighters in the history of this sport:

Sambo World Champion (4x)
European Champion
Russian Champion (6x)

Fedor left the Russian national sambo team in 2000 to pursue a pro career in MMA. In the first two years, he would fight 11 times (10–1) before signing with PRIDE where he became a huge star and a champion. He went on to score 14 wins in PRIDE against some legends like Mirko CroCop, Marck Coleman, and Antonio Noguera.