EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: UFC superstar Alexander Volkanovski visits Lancaster

One of the world's top cage fighters has visited Lancaster to reopen a Mixed Martial Arts gym and he spoke exclusively to Beyond Radio while he was there.

Former UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championship) featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski came to Lancaster on Saturday to re-open the Shay Walsh MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) gym on Mainway, Skerton and hold a training seminar with budding fighters.

Volkanowski, from Australia, was on his first ever visit to Europe.

He also attended the UFC 304 event which took place at Manchester’s Co-Op Live at the weekend.

LISTEN to our interview with Alexander 'The Great' Volkanovski

The Lancaster gym is run by Volkanovski's friend, top MMA fighter and trainer Shay Walsh. 

Alexander told us how he first met Walsh in Thailand.

"There was a Tiger Muay Thai try-out, we both got scholarships and that’s where we ended up hitting it off and becoming friends and training partners," he said.

"He’s been at pretty much all of my fights since.”

Speaking about the gym, Volkanovski said: “It’s no surprise (to see the gym develop) with someone like Shay Walsh coaching them.

“He’s got all the right stuff that can make a champion or create champions.

“It’s no surprise to see some good skills, I was giving them some pretty technical stuff there, I threw a spanner in the works and did a few different things to maybe what they’re used to.”

Volkanovski called rising MMA prodigy Charlie Ash and others who train at the gym “good guys who pick up things straight away”.

Speaking about his time in the UK, he said: "I've never been to England, never been to Europe before and it's been great.

"I want to come back and do a proper tour but for now, we're just doing Manchester and Lancaster which is awesome but I'd love to see more.

"We've seen a lot this morning and last night in the car, we've seen all the buildings.

"We don't have history like you guys have, it doesn't go back that far, it's really impressive."

On when he could next return to the Octagon, the man nicknamed Alexander the Great said: “By the end of the year would be good but I just don’t know if that’s looking likely at the moment, it’s probably looking like early next year.”

Volkanovski, 35, is one of the top pound-for-pound UFC fighters in the world.

He made five successful defences of the UFC Featherweight Title after winning the belt against Max Holloway in 2019, and has 2.4m followers on Instagram.

Shay Walsh's gym, which named Saturday's open day 'The Great Reopening' as a nod to Alexander the Great, had been temporarily closed for redevelopment. 

*Listen to the Saturday Sport Show on Beyond Radio with Alistair Fisher and Ross Chapman on Saturday, August 3 from 9am to hear our full exclusive interview with Alexander “the Great” Volkanovski.

Interviews with Shay Walsh, local MMA rising star Charlie Ash and Jefferson Cartmell from BayFit and ProjectCold are also included in Saturday’s show.