{"id":858623,"date":"2026-08-17T16:04:09","date_gmt":"2026-08-17T16:04:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/858623\/"},"modified":"2026-08-17T16:04:09","modified_gmt":"2026-08-17T16:04:09","slug":"max-holloway-questions-islam-makhachev-walking-around-with-2-belts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/858623\/","title":{"rendered":"Max Holloway questions Islam Makhachev walking around with 2 belts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Max Holloway has some questions about Islam Makhachev\u2019s style choices, namely the choice to carry not one, but two belts on his person.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Makhachev recorded the first successful defense of his welterweight title this past Saturday in the main event of UFC 330 with a unanimous decision win over Ian Machado Garry. Having previously defended the lightweight title four times, Makhachev joined Henry Cejudo, Daniel Cormier, Jon Jones, and Amanda Nunes as the only UFC fighters to successfully defend belts in two weight classes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">However, Makhachev vacated the 155-pound title to move up to 170, and the lightweight title has already been claimed by two other fighters since with Ilia Topuria winning the vacant belt by defeating Charles Oliveira, and now Justin Gaethje currently holding it after upsetting Topuria at UFC White House.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">All of that has Holloway confused as to why Makhachev is still sporting double gold.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">\u201cWhy the f*ck do you have two belts?\u201d Holloway asked on his <a href=\"https:\/\/kick.com\/maxholloway\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Kick<\/a> channel. \u201cFor aura? I mean, it is what it is, like, you are, but you\u2019re not.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">It should be noted that a new UFC belt is made every time a fighter wins a championship for the first time, meaning Makhachev still has his own that he won back in 2022, while a new one was made for Topuria. Makhachev is also not the first fighter to walk around with two belts, though as Holloway points out, it doesn\u2019t appear as if Makhachev has any plans to return to the lightweight division.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">\u201cThat was temporary but now you\u2019re just defending one belt, bro,\u201d Holloway said. \u201cWhy you keep\u2014I don\u2019t know. I don\u2019t know, guys.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1upudxki _174s0un1 _174s0un0 _1mt21p01\">Holloway is no stranger to championship glory, having reigned as featherweight king from 2017-2019. He also won the \u201cBMF\u201d title in 2024 with an all-time great knockout of Justin Gaethje at UFC 300.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Max Holloway has some questions about Islam Makhachev\u2019s style choices, namely the choice to carry not one, but&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":858624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,1347,785,85,787,1396],"class_list":["post-858623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-fighting","tag-latest-news","tag-mma","tag-sports","tag-ufc","tag-ufc-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=858623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/858623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/858624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=858623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=858623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=858623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}