In a conversation with Lex Fridman, Khabib Nurmagomedov shared a detailed look at how his relationship with grappling took shape.

Watching his brother Abdurakhman submit an opponent with a triangle choke made clear to him how decisive ground combat could be:

I realized that no matter how strong the wrestler is, lying on the back is where the wrestling normally ends, but MMA only begins there.

Khabib went on to compete across a wide range of grappling disciplines:

I competed in all kinds of sports. Everything that involves wrestling and fighting. I competed everywhere.
I competed in freestyle, in judo, in grappling, in combat Sambo. I competed in sport Sambo, in hand-to-hand combat, in pankration…

Khabib also praised legendary BJJ coach John Danaher, pointing to the results as proof of the system’s quality:

John has one of the best students in the world, and after all, they don’t just take some random place. I mean, they’re not somewhere in the middle.
They’re at the top – and look at their whole approach.

When Fridman brought up Roger Gracie, Khabib immediately placed him in the same tier of greatness:

Roger, he’s the greatest, too. He’s the greatest in his own sport.
What makes a person unique is his style, his style and his approach to his work.

Asked about his own well-known top pressure, Khabib described it as an extension of aikido’s core philosophy, using an opponent’s own force against them:

I’ve learned to use my strength properly.
There’s this sport called aikido. I don’t like it much, but I like their philosophy, where your strength might work against you.

I think for a lot of listeners, this is gonna be a brand-new sport. But there is this sport called aikido, and the whole philosophy behind it is using your opponent’s force against them.
That’s what I learned to do.

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