Search icon

Sport

05th Nov 2017

Brutal spinning elbow only the second UFC knockout of its kind

You don't see these too often

Ben Kiely

If someone’s 0 must go, it might as well go via spinning elbow KO.

The highly anticipated UFC 217 card kicked off with a battle between two rising stars of the bantamweight division.

Aiemann Zahabi, the brother of Tristar head coach Firas, who is in George St Pierre’s corner for the main event, entered into the bantamweight contest with a pristine 7-1 record. His opponent, 22-year-old Ricardo Ramos, had only one loss in 11 professional bouts prior to fight night.

Zahabi had slightly more success on the feet, but lost the round on takedowns, while the second stanza was a closely contested affair that he may have edged with his striking. However, it was all over in the third.

Ramos tried a spinning elbow but missed on the first attempt. He made no mistake with his second effort, sending the Canadian to the shadow realm with a perfectly placed elbow.

The spinning elbow KO is an extremely rare finish in the world’s largest MMA promotion. In fact, this was just the second in UFC  history.

Dong Hyun Kim (the welterweight Dong Hyun Kim) is the proud owner of the first. He secured that accolade against John Hathaway in 2014.

spinning elbow

Ramos may want to learn from Kim’s mistakes though. Kim infamously attempted the same move against Tyron Woodley in his next trip to the Octagon.

“The Chosen One” read it and absolutely flattened him to earn a first-round knockout.