Photo via onefc.com
Anatoly Malykhin Talks Kirill Grishenko Interim Title Fight at ONE: Bad Blood
Anatoly Malykhin tests skills with Kirill Grishenko on February 11th at ONE: Bad Blood. This interim ONE heavyweight championship bout transpires at Singapore Indoor Stadium.
I spoke with Malykhin ahead of this fight. Excerpts from our chat are below.
The importance of the great training staff over at Tiger Muay Thai
“Yes, Tiger Muay Thai is the place that I really love. All my friends here recently arrived from Russia. Especially the one I’m training with all the time. Petr Yan as well, the UFC champion. My coach Johnny (Hutchinson) always says that you’re another Mike Tyson, you’re another Muhammad Ali. He motivates me really well. I’m so pumped for that. And of course, I understand I’m not on that level but it gives me that energy. I love to be in this climate. I’m blessed that I’m part of the team.”
Anatoly Malykhin
The back-to-back first-round finishes with strikes and Malykhin’s work with Johnny Hutchinson building to that
“First of all, I’m very happy and blessed to work with Johnny (Hutchinson). Whenever we do the work with him, I want to show people that that’s him. That’s the result of working with him. To tell people about his coaching skills. And of course, wrestling is the trump card. It’s my base. I’ve always been wrestling but in ONE Championship, I’m here to show my striking skills. I’m here to show the knockouts of mine and take all the bonuses that ONE Championship has. That’s my goal.”
ONE Championship recently instantiating 50k post-fight performance bonuses and Malykhin’s thoughts on that
“I was watching the work that Chatri (Sityodtong) is doing and I’ve always been impressed by his work. To see how he cares about his fighters. But now, when I learned about this bonus of course, it’s a good thing to have. All the fighters now will really fight for this bonus and you will see a different level of ONE Championship now. In different spectacular fights in the organization.”
ONE: Bad Blood
Testing positive for COVID 19, as reported by South China Morning Post, and how Anatoly Malykhin has been feeling with the situation
“I’ll tell you this. I’m from Siberia. I’ve choked this COVID-19 twice already. And this is nothing for me. So I’m ready for everything.”
When the offer of an interim title fight got put out to him
“To be honest with you, nothing really changed in my plan. Doesn’t matter to me. Could be Kirill (Grishenko) or the covert (Arjan) Bhullar. For me, I was focused on my training and the most important is not to lose to myself. That’s like the biggest thing for me. Don’t lose for myself. It could be mentally, could be physically. And other than that, I’m ready even to fight two people in the same day.”
The ONE Championship heavyweight division being the deepest that it has ever been
“Honestly, whenever I first came to ONE Championship I was so worried because the heavyweight division was so weak. But now recently, the company signs up a lot of good fighters. Fighters that are not broken. So I’m waiting to break them. Trust me, I’m ready to beat each and everyone in my fights. I’m waiting for that chance.”
Malykhin vs Grishenko
Thoughts on the main stylistic aspects of Kirill Grishenko
“I would say not a bad guy. He is strong. He has a good basing in wrestling and also in striking. But nothing much I would say. Nothing super big things that I could highlight. It’s just normal for me.”
Malykhin’s confidence and where that assuredness in his abilities comes from there
“To be honest, everything comes with my discipline. I am sleeping on time, I’m eating on time, and controlling everything. So physically, mentally, I’m fully prepared already. The most important is actually my wife. My wife gave me that confidence now. She’s that trump card in my life that changed everything in my life.”
“My mentality, how I think. That’s helped me to be more focused to give more happiness to my family, to my wife, to my kids. And if I would be someone as my opponent and look at myself and say should I fight myself or not, I would think twice about that.”
ONE Championship
What kind of hobbies Malykhin has; how he relaxes and decompresses
“Yeah, I have my hobbies, to be honest. And it’s my assembling Lego. But besides that, I also have hobbies with my son. My son is my everything. I always teach him new things in life. Could be new words, can be new kinds of things that I myself learned. I try to share everything, what I learned and experienced, with my son. I try to give him that upbringing to be a very kind person. Very educated.”
Parting thoughts for Anatoly Malykhin
“Yeah, for sure. I want to say thank you. Thank you for bringing me to the ONE Championship family and giving me the best attitude towards me. About my fans, well, don’t blink your eye. Because you will see a lot of good highlights by me very soon.”
