A month-long Ramadan period doesn’t necessarily prevent a challenger from competing for the Ultimate Fighting Championship belt, according to a coach familiar with the matter.
The main events for the first two UFC pay-per-views of 2025 have already been decided, with UFC 311 featuring Islam Makhachev vs. Arman Tsarukyan, co-mains Merab Dvalishvili vs. Umar Nurmagomedov, and UFC 312 featuring Doricus Do is performed. Precis defended his title against Sean Strickland and the co-headliner was Suarez in a contest between Weili Zhang and Tatiana – speculation quickly turning to the next March card. UFC 313 will be held on March 8th at T-Mobile Arena, a regular venue for the UFC, but the marquee match has yet to be announced.
Light heavyweight kingpin Alex Pereira recently said he plans to return in March or April, with his expected opponent being Magomed Ankalaev. Some have questioned how the UFC will handle this year’s Ramadan, the holy month in which Muslims fast from sunrise to sunset. Ramadan begins on February 28th and ends on March 29th. After all, rumors swirled that Ankalaev, a Muslim, might not be his next opponent, eventually pointing to fellow Muslim Khamzat Chimaev. Sherdog turned to Marcos da Matta, chief coach of American Top Team, which has a long history of training Muslim fighters in recent years, for answers.
“In recent years, I have trained dozens of Islamic fighters, so I am very familiar with Ramadan issues,” da Matta said. “In fact, Muslims must fast for four weeks. Orthodox men will not change the set dates this year from February 28 to March 29, but if the men are not so Orthodox I’ve seen a lot of athletes do this, but there must be some real reason, whether it’s illness or professional issues. .in this case, [not following the exact days of Ramadan] Not “Haram”
[sin]”
The coach further explained that while start and end dates can be moved if there is a valid reason, there are limits.
“Muslim fighters scheduled to fight against Poitan, whether Chimaev or Ankalaev on March 8th, can postpone the start of their fast by 10 days. For example, from the 9th to April 9th. I think so. It will be more complicated for them to fight at UFC 314. [expected for April 5]For example, if you have to break your fast in the middle of camping. I’d even wager there won’t be any Muslims on this Miami card, but the March card will. ”
Da Matta made it clear that he doesn’t buy that Chimaev should be in the UFC light heavyweight title fight, but he knows that in this day and age of the UFC, you never know what can happen. ”
“Obviously it’s possible [for Chimaev to fight for the 205-pound
belt]” said Da Matta. “RIZIN’s top category champion was brought in to fight Pantoja head-to-head for the belt. Despite never having fought in a light heavyweight bout, Chimaev is undefeated and has over 900 followers on Instagram. Millions, Ankalaev 1 million. Now, if you ask me if I think that’s fair, obviously not, but I think it’s a complete disrespect to Ankalaev, who has already beaten everyone and shown that he deserves the title. We’ll see in the next few weeks.”
