INTERVIEW: “The weekend’s protests were the Russian people's, not the opposition’s” – Maxim Reznik
Western Balkans citizens legally resident in EU equal to 14% of region’s population
International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) has stripped Belarus of the right to hold the World Championship this year
Alexei Navalny arrested on arrival as he returns home
@russian_market sacked by UBS for supporting Navalny
Elbrus Capital attracts major international players to invest in the Russian digital sphere
Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Joe Biden have first phone call, extend START II treaty for five years
ING: Russian budget’s modest deficit leaves fiscal room for 2021
Public support is collapsing for The People’s Servant Party
Ukraine’s industrial output jumped 4.8% y/y in December
State-owned Ukrgasbank signs off on convertible €30mn IFC loan ahead of its privatisation
National Bank of Ukraine retains a key policy rate at 6%, the outlook of the CPI deteriorates
Estonia's two big parties agree on grand coalition
VISEGRAD BLOG: Central Europe's populists need a new strategy for Biden
LONG READ: The oligarch problem
OUTLOOK 2021 Lithuania
Czech billionaire Kellner´s PPF makes another bid for Moneta Money Bank
Czech MPs pass protectionist food law in violation of EU rules
M&A in Central and Eastern Europe fell 16% in value in 2020, says CMS report
Hungarian vehicle makers hit by supply chain shortage
COVID-19 and Trump’s indifference helped human rights abusers in 2020
Polish parcel locker operator InPost soars in Euronext Amsterdam debut
Polish industrial production continues boom in December
OUTLOOK 2021 Poland
OUTLOOK 2021 Slovakia
BRICKS & MORTAR: Rosier future beckons for CEE retailers after year of change and disruption
FDI inflows to CEE down 58% in 1H20 but rebound expected
BALKAN BLOG: Only better waste management can clean rivers of trash
Pandemic pushes public debt close to 80% of GDP in Albania and Montenegro
BALKAN BLOG: Superstition and resentment surround vaccination plans
Albania needs reforms for e-commerce to thrive, says World Bank
Bosnia's exports in 2020 amounted to BAM10.5bn, trade deficit to BAM6.3bn
Bulgaria’s latest nuclear u-turn
Retailers and restaurant owners threaten protests in Bulgaria if reopening is delayed
Bulgaria's Biodit first company to IPO on new BEAM market
Spring lockdown caused spike in online transactions in Croatia
ING: Growth in the Balkans: from zero to hero again?
Labour demand down 28% y/y in Croatia in 2020
Kosovo’s biggest opposition party risks being unable to run in general election
OUTLOOK 2021 Moldova
Storming parliaments: New Europe's greatest hits
World Bank revises projection for Moldova’s 2020 GDP decline to 7.2%
Montenegro’s special prosecution probes finance minister over €750mn Eurobond issue
North Macedonia’s state-owned loss-makers await new owners
North Macedonia plans to cut personal income tax in IT sector to zero in 2023
Romanian cybersecurity company Safetech floats shares amid rising investor interest
Romania government to pursue “ambitious” timetable for justice reforms
Private finance mobilised by development banks up 9% to $175bn in 2019
EBRD and WBIF support fast broadband in rural Serbia
Slovenia plans region's longest-tenor Eurobond
Slovenian crypto payment system enters Thai market
Slovenia’s economic sentiment indicator up 2.2 pp m/m in January
Slovenia lost €10bn by neglecting wood industry for decades
D’S Damat franchise deals ‘show Turkey’s hard-pressed mall operators becoming their own tenants’
Turkey’s benchmark rate held as concerns over faltering recovery come to fore
Turkish lira breaches HSBC’s stop-loss, Turkey ETF signalling outflows
Following war with Armenia, Azerbaijan gains control of lucrative gold mines
CAUCASUS BLOG : What can Biden offer the Caucasus and Stans, all but forgotten about by Trump?
Armenia ‘to extend life of its 1970s Metsamor nuclear power plant after 2026’
OUTLOOK 2021 Azerbaijan
OUTLOOK 2021 Georgia
“Try me” not telecoms minister Iran’s president tells hardliners in internet row
Iran’s President Khamenei menaces private citizen Trump
Iran’s technology minister indicted for failing to properly implement internet censorship
No US move to rejoin Iran nuclear deal imminent, say Biden national security nominees
Central Asia vaccination plans underwhelm, but governments look unruffled
Fears of authoritarianism as Kyrgyz populist wins landslide and backing for ‘Khanstitution’
COMMENT: Mongolia is an island of democracy
OUTLOOK 2021 Mongolia
Mongolia's PM quits amid protests over treatment of mother with coronavirus and newborn baby
Mongolia's winter dzud set to be one of most extreme on record says Red Cross
Tajikistan: Writing for the president is on the wall (and then scrubbed off)
OUTLOOK 2021 Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan: How the Grinch stole New Year
COMMENT: Uzbekistan is being transformed, but where are the democratic reforms?
Download the pdf version
More...
“When a boy is born on the steppes, he is a wrestler.” Old Mongolian saying. Many believe that this centuries-old wrestling tradition can be translated to Mongolian domination of professional mixed martial arts (MMA).
In a wrestling gym in Ulaanbaatar, a 15-year-old boy, who weighs about 65 kilograms takes his turn going against the assistant coach, an adult, a 30-year veteran of the sport who is exactly double the boy’s weight. Far from taking it easy on the boy, the coach throws him, tosses him and man-handles him, slamming him down on the mat, again and again. But each time, the boy gets up and charges at the coach, with a look of pure fire in his eyes. The bout goes on, non-stop, for more than 20 minutes. This scene which repeats itself, day after day, encapsulates the spirit, determination and lack of fear in the Mongolian wrestlers.
It also illustrates the culture. From a young age, boys are treated as men and are expected to endure hardship and pain without showing signs of weakness.
Mongolian wrestlers are renowned for their spirit, determination and lack of fear.
Across town, in a commercial fitness gym which has a wrestling room, huge Mongolian adults, the smallest of whom weighs about 100 kilograms, while the others are about 120, practice belt wrestling. The traditional Mongolian wrestling, bökh, has no time limits and no weight limits, and bouts end when one of the opponents hits the ground. Bökh requires briefs and an open-chested shirt, which can be gripped for throwing. Rather than have to carry their wrestling gear around with them everywhere they go, Mongolian men often just throw on a judo or karate belt, over their exercise clothes, and practice belt wrestling with the same rules as bökh. After a few rounds, they normally go to the other room and lift weights.
Mongolian fighters at Shiren Beelii MMA club.
With temperatures ranging from -40 in winter to plus 35 in summer, Mongolia has an extreme and inhospitable climate where only the hardiest survive. Forty percent of the population still live as nomadic herders. Growing up on the steppes, boys begin riding horses at age three and wrestling at age five. Working as herders means constantly having to wrestle the animals.
Mendbagana Tovuujav (Bagna for short), a Mongolian who wrestled for George Mason University, becoming an All-American, joked: “It’s like progressive weight training. When you’re little, they make you wrestle sheep. When you get older you wrestle horses, and finally, you wrestle camels.”
The nomads live in gers (yurts) which do not have running water; consequently, according to Bagna, carrying the family’s water ration is one of the chores that contributes to the strength of the young countryside boys. “I had to go get water for the family every day 10 litres on each side, from age six or seven. It was like 200 metres for me, but every day, and even in winter,” said Bagna.
Riding a horse all day and walking up and down the hills, chasing after sheep, gives the Mongolians superhuman thighs. People often see pictures of the Mongolian wrestlers and ask about their thigh routine. “How can I get thighs like that?” The answer is simple. “You just need to be born on the steppes, ride horses and wrestle from pre-school age and eat a diet consisting of only milk and meat.”
In China the national level wrestlers generally grow up in a sports school, specialising in a single wrestling style, whereas in Mongolia the wrestlers compete in everything.
Dandar, head coach at the only specialized wrestling high school, in Ulaanbaatar, told about how during his long wrestling career, he had competed in traditional wrestling, freestyle, and sambo. And this is a huge difference between wrestlers in Mongolia and other parts of Asia. In China, for example, the national level wrestlers generally grow up in a sports school, specialising in a single wrestling style, whereas in Mongolia the wrestlers compete in everything. Several of Dandar’s students have been selected to go to Japan to compete in sumo, while those who remain in Mongolia compete, not only in traditional wrestling, freestyle, and sambo but also judo and Brazilian jujitsu. This is one of the factors that speaks in favour of Mongolians being able to transition to international MMA, because most MMA fighters train and compete in almost any code of fighting they have the opportunity to.
When Mongolians predict a Mongolian wave in MMA, they generally cite two examples, sumo and judo. Zorigt Zorky Ulaankhuu, who has a number of Mongolian MMA fighters fighting in large promotions around the world, said: “It’s up to the UFC. If they let us fight, we will dominate, just like sumo.”
In 1992, the first recruitment competition was held for Mongolian boys to wrestle for a chance to go to Japan and become sumo trainees. Of more than 100 boys, five were chosen. Since that time, Mongolians have completely dominated Japan’s most prestigious sport. This small country has produced four Yokozuna, grand champions: Asashoryu Akinori, Hakuho Sho, Harumafuji Kohei, and Kakuryu Rikisaburo. In fact, in the past 20 years, only one Japanese was promoted to the rank of Yokozuna, but he had to retire shortly after, due to injuries.
Mongolian judo, with the patronage of the country's head of state who is a former wrestling, sambo and judo champion, has steadily improved in the past decade.
Similarly, in recent years, Mongolians have done incredibly well in judo. Mongolia’s president Khaltmaa Battulga, nicknamed “the judo president”, is a former wrestling champion, sambo champion, and judo champion. While serving as president of the nation, he also serves as president of the Mongolian Judo Association, to which he has given a great deal of support, both moral and financial. Consequently, Mongolian judo has steadily improved since 2009, when Tsagaanbaatar Khashbaatar won the judo world title. Next, Mongolia made it to the finals of the Olympics in 2012. Urantsetseg Munkhbat won a world title in 2013 and Ganbat Boldbaatar won the world title in 2014. In the 2016 Olympics, Sumiya Dorjsuren won the silver. And in 2017, Dorjsuren won six medals, including the world title.
Money matters
Turbat, the head coach of Shiren Beelii MMA club said that finances are one of the biggest obstacles standing in the way of the Mongolians taking their natural talents in wrestling and transitioning to becoming professional MMA champions. Healthy food, nutrition, and equipment are all in short supply, and even taking a taxi across town to the training hall is out of reach for some of the fighters. Foreign coaches are unaffordable, and there are only a few Mongolians at this point who have significant overseas fight and training experience to share with their countrymen. The MMA clubs are privately funded and have limited opening and training hours. Additionally, the athletes have to maintain fulltime jobs to survive, preventing them from training more than once a day. When they go to fight overseas, private contracts have to be arranged for the cost of the visas, plane tickets, hotel and other expenses.
Finances are one of the biggest obstacles in the way of the Mongolians taking their natural talents in wrestling and becoming professional MMA champions.
A Mongol MMA invasion?
The Mongolians are very much aware of UFC champion Khabib Nurmagomedov and the Dagestani invasion which he led. Just a few years ago, most people in the West had never heard of Dagestan, but now, there are about 20 Dagestanis in the UFC. Dagestan is a Central Asian republic, part of the Russian Federation, very similar to Mongolia in terms of culture and climate. Both Dagestan and Mongolia have a population of around three million people and both have wrestling as their primary sport. People from both countries are known to be physically tough and have a fighting spirit. One significant difference between Dagestani MMA fighters and Mongolians, however, is that the Dagestani fighters can largely trace their lineage to Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov, the father of Khabib. Not only was Abdulmanap Nurmagomedov an exceptional coach with an incredibly long history of competition and training in sambo, judo, wrestling, san da and other fight sports, but he also ran a live-in fight academy for teenagers. In that regard, the training in Dagestan is similar to the sumo training in Japan. Fighters live under strict discipline, eating, training, sleeping and competing on a schedule. Now that the Dagestanis have done so well in MMA, there is also government support for such training facilities.
Many Mongolians are convinced there will be a Mongolian wave in MMA.
Register here to continue reading this article and 5 more for free or purchase 12 months full website access including the bne Magazine for just $250/year.
Register to read the bne monthly magazine for free:
Already registered
Password could contain only a-z0-9\+*?[^]$(){}=!<>|:-_ characters and have 8-20 symbols length.
Please complete your registration by confirming your email address.
A confirmation email has been sent to the email address you provided.
Forgotten password?
Email field can't be empty.
No user with this email address.
Access recovery request has expired, or you are using the wrong recovery token. Please, try again.
Access recover request has expired. Please, try again.
To continue viewing our content you need to complete the registration process.
Please look for an email that was sent to with the subject line "Confirmation bne IntelliNews access". This email will have instructions on how to complete registration process. Please check in your "Junk" folder in case this communication was misdirected in your email system.
If you have any questions please contact us at sales@intellinews.com
Sorry, but you have used all your free articles fro this month for bne IntelliNews. Subscribe to continue reading for only $119 per year.
Your subscription includes:
For the meantime we are also offering a free subscription to bne's digital weekly newspaper to subscribers to the online package.
Click here for more subscription options, including to the print version of our flagship monthly magazine:
More subscription options
Take a trial to our premium daily news service aimed at professional investors that covers the 30 countries of emerging Europe:
Get IntelliNews PRO
For any other enquiries about our products or corporate discounts please contact us at sales@intellinews.com
If you no longer wish to receive our emails, unsubscribe here.
Magazine annual electronic subscription
Magazine annual print subscription
Website & Archive annual subscription
Combined package: web access & magazine print annual subscription