Khabib Nurmagomedov, Khamzat Chimaev and the differences in their grappling and wrestling

A closer look at how the two Russian stars differ when it comes to grappling and wrestling techniques.

Khamzat Chimaev burst into the scene in 2020 during the promotion’s initial Fight Island stint. He has since essentially run through everyone he has fought (save for Gilbert Burns), often winning without even absorbing a single strike while setting impressive records along the way such as the shortest time in between UFC wins (10 days).

Due to his dominance, style of grappling and shared Russian nationality, Chimaev has drawn comparisons to former UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov. In this article, we’ll explore these comparisons and gauge just how similar (if at all) the two Russian stars really are.

Open space wrestling

In the open space, we’ve seen Chimaev shoot into reactive double legs or body locks as he ducks under punches — a tactic used in his UFC debut against John Phillips as well as his Brave CF fight with Sidney Wheeler.

Alternatively, he proactively shoots singles, or into body locks like in his fights with Kevin Holland or Rhys McKee. From these takedowns, he will then drag his opponent to the cage or carry them there, usually to his own corner if it’s a body lock he's established.

Nurmagomedov, on the other hand, will mostly shoot when he has pressured an opponent behind the “black line of doom” — a demarcation line on the canvas of the octagon that fans recognise Khabib does his best work behind as he will aim to put an opponent on the fence with wrestling shots to start his intricate chain wrestling sequences.

However, this isn’t to say Khabib never shoots in the open space — he shot low single legs against Al Iaquinta and Conor McGregor just to name a few examples. But it’s definitely a rarity in his game.

Fence wrestling and the dilemma of Khabib Nurmagomedov

Wall walking is the current meta and best way for fighters to get back to their feet. This plays into a great dilemma of Nurmagomedov as the wall walk will put you into his preferred domain. Khabib will trap fighters on the fence and mat return them before establishing top pinning positions and going back to work with ground and pound — this is a sure way to demoralise his opponents and zap their gas tanks as we saw in his fight with Edson Barboza.

Khabib will also either use opponents scooting back to the cage to start the wall walk to pin them to the fence in an upright position, or turn them into the fence himself to apply a figure four around their legs to completely disable them and start landing strikes.

Chimaev also loves to pin opponents to the fence and taking advantage opponents of wall walking, but prefers to pin them to the fence on his and threaten back takes or force people into turtles like in his fight with John Phillips.

The Dagestani handcuff

The Dagestani handcuff — or wrist riding — is an old wrestling technique which is popularised by the likes of Nurmagomedov and Islam Makhachev, but we’re yet to see Chimaev deploy this tactic on a consistent basis. (Yes, we know he’s from Chechnya — it’s just a name for the technique).

Using wrist rides allows you to keep the opponent’s arm pinned which prevents them from building to an elbow and eventually getting back to their feet. It also stops them from being able to defend themselves properly as they’ve only got one arm to defend themselves as you can rain punches and keep them pinned.

In just his second professional bout back in 2018, Khamzat did use a variation of a handcuff against Ole Magnor, but interestingly, he end up trapping what was initially the top arm instead of the bottom arm trap we’re now accustomed to seeing. This was because Magnor initially held on to Khamzat’s wrist who quickly stripped his grip and applied the handcuff before going to work.

Going back to the McKee fight, Chimaev also used a wrist ride extensively the second the fight hit the floor as he punished the Irishman on his way to a TKO finish. This time, he used a more traditional wrist ride.

In essence, it’s easy to say that Nurmagomedov and Chimaev like to smash their opponents and while there are similarities in their respective games, there are also quite a few differences in how they go about it which you have hopefully learned from reading this article.

Bonus content: Khabib Nurmagomedov’s rare but excellent guard

Throughout Khabib Nurmagomedov’s entire UFC career, he’s been rightfully associated with world class wrestling, guard passing, and top pinning. However, in his fight with Abel Trujillo, we were able to get a rare glimpse of Khabib’s guard play.

Right after being taken down, The Eagle quickly wraps an overhook Trujillo’s right arm and keeps it controlled.

Khabib then removes Trujillo’s arm from the equation and locks a high guard, now having a multitude of options including the classic armbar/omoplata/triangle trilemma.

After Trujillo makes his way back to two feet which creates space, presenting