Ian Garry is an exciting prospect from Ireland looking to take the UFC’s welterweight division by storm. The former Cage Warriors welterweight champion will put his undefeated record on the line against Darian Weeks in the final fight of UFC 273’s preliminary card.
After training at Dublin’s Straight Blast Gym, ‘The Future’ began training at Sanford MMA alongside fellow promotional welterweight standouts like Gilbert Burns and Vicente Luque. Burns faces Khamzat Chimaev at UFC 273, and the two recently ran into each other for the first time at the athlete hotel in Florida.
Ian Garry detailed the encounter and how it came to be. The 24-year-old talked about how both Burns and Chimaev were excited to cross paths, with ‘Borz’ even asking ‘Durinho’ to fight naked, since they were clad in towels.
“We did a workout in the room… Khamzat and Till and all the boys from Allstar were down the hall, we were down in our room working. We all kind of went back, me and Gilbert went down to the room and Gilbert said, ‘Where’s the official scales?’ and I was like, ‘down there’ [pointing towards the opposite end] and I said ‘I’ll go with you’… and then it was like perfect timing, we both walked in on the corner at the same time.”
“Gilbert just had a big smile on his face… and then they just got into a little bit of an engagement together, a little bit of a chat and it was very funny. Khamzat said he wants to fight naked. I said, ‘I’m f**king down.’ Don’t ask for a fight and expect me not to yap back.”
Garry did go on to say that he sees a fight with Chimaev in the future and acknowledges that the Swede is currently far ahead in the division.
“Down the line me and Khamzat are absolutely gonna fight… Obviously he’s way further ahead in his career than I am as of right now. I mean, he’s the No.11th ranked welterweight, but realistically he’s not. I mean, he should be ranked in the top 5 but the only reason is not is purely just due to fights. He hasn’t had enough fights to be ranked in the top 5.”
Garry went on to laud Chimaev’s skills but warned that ‘Borz’ is taking on a “machine” in Gilbert Burns.
Watch our exclusive interview with Ian Garry below:
Ian Garry makes a bold prediction for his upcoming fight
In his UFC debut, Ian Garry scored a knockout finish at the final second of the first round against Jordan Williams. In his upcoming UFC 273 fight, he faces 28-year-old Darian Weeks.
Despite being four years younger, Ian Garry is the more experienced pro fighter, albeit by two fights. Garry holds a perfect record of 8-0 while Weeks has a 5-1 record to his name.
When asked about his prediction for the upcoming fight, Ian Garry boldly claimed he’d finish the fight inside eight minutes.
“I think it’ll be within eight minutes. I think it’s just a case of how long does it take him to get annoyed at what I’m doing, how long does it take me to frustrate him by just jabbing in and out, keeping him at distance. When he tries to take me down and I stuff it and get back into the center of the cage, or maybe I take him down.”
Adding further, Garry said:
“When he starts to get frustrated and he starts to have to mentally change his game and I can see those physically traits changing, that’s when I’ll beat him. Because that’s when people get desperate and that’s when they’re overstretched, or they’ll overshoot or they make those little mistakes that they’re not used to. That’s when I’ll capitalise.”