Igor Vovchanchyn Hangs Them Up

From M-1 Sport:

[quote]February,8, Kharkiv, Ukraine. The finals of the Chest Voina (Warrior’s Honor) Tournament.

Bogdan Khmelnitskiy had an opportunity to catch up with legendary Ukrainian fighter Igor Vovchanchyn. Bogdan asked Igor some pretty interesting questions. Unfortunately the interview is not exhaustive but nevertheless:

Bogdan Khmelnitskiy: Tell me about your schooldays. Did you fight a lot back in the days? When did you start training?

Igor Vovchanchyn: I studied well. Fought a lot, I had beaten everybody back then. Basically, I was a bully (smiles). At school I used to train in athletics. I had trained there for 5 years and I ran faster than anybody. Later on I was invited to box, I used to train there under Oleg Ermakov. Only then someone approached me asking to go train in kickboxing. They looked for a guy of my size so I agreed.

Bogdan Khmelnitskiy: At “Warrior’s Honor” long time ago you got caught with a submission by Andrey Besedin but soon enough during the World Championship in Moscow in 1995 you impressed everyone with a good submission defense. Tell us about your training regimen. How much did your training differ when you just started training from the moment you took part in Pride events?

Igor Vovchanchyn: Well, I came to wrestle with Subbotin straight away after that loss. I spent 1,5 - 2 hours on wrestling. That’s how I learned it. Of course, the training was different. I payed more attention to other disciplines beside striking. I trained twice a day: striking technique and running in te morning, wrestling and striking in the evening.

Bogdan Khmelnitskiy: What do you do for living now? If you are asked to return back in action, will you agree?

Igor Vovchanchyn: I’m a businessman now. I won’t come back. Sure I think about it every once in a while, but I’m 35, you know. The main problem is the injuries. I can’t even strike with my right hand. I got three screws in my right elbow and one in the left. I’m about to undergo an operation on my nose as I can’t breathe right. To sum things up, there is no sense in my comeback.

Bogdan Khmelnitskiy: Any comments on the demise of Pride?

Igor Vovchanchyn: (Confused) Well, it’s bad. Americans trampled down pretty much everything there, and they pay too little. Monopoly is not good in this case. It would be for the best if Pride stayed alive.[/quote]

One of my favorite fighters of all time. Sad to see him go officially, but it was to be expected. So many great memories of Igor, a truly thrilling fighter and one of the greatest bare knuckle vale tudo fighters ever. Great HL of him:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x32uba_igor-vovchanchyn-hl-by-damien_sport

Great highlight, great fighter.

According to Wikipedia the people in his Ukranian village would ring the church bells to warn eachother when Igor was out and in a bad mood.

It’s pretty amazing how he can punch with such abandon and with bare fists! His hands must be made of granite.

Respect for Ice Cold.

Those insane punches apparently ruined his arms, though, at least after 50+ fights. It reminds me of how Tank Abbott would wear gloves before it was even required, just to protect his hands from how hard he could throw punches. Igor is a legend of the sport and it’s a damn shame he never fought Wandy.

Pride was funny. You would have these giant russian dudes fighting skinny japanese people.

He has a fighting style similar to fedor, just go out and swing for the fences, relying on a great chin and awesome wrestling/sambo to take care of the rest.

[quote]baretta wrote:
Pride was funny. You would have these giant russian dudes fighting skinny japanese people.

He has a fighting style similar to fedor, just go out and swing for the fences, relying on a great chin and awesome wrestling/sambo to take care of the rest.[/quote]

Plain wrong in so many ways.

Also: amazing HL reel, muchos gracias!