TORQUAY MMA fighter Kim Tran has improved to 4-0 in her professional career after beating Kyrgyzstan’s Almagul Zhorobekova at One Friday Fights 134 last weekend in Bangkok.<\/p>\n
After Zhorobekova started strongly, Tran was able to wear her down and won the match in the second round with an elegant elbow knock out.<\/p>\n
Tran explained she anticipated her opponent’s fast start, which was reflected in her game plan to wear Zhorobekova down with body hits.<\/p>\n
“We just had a really good game plan coming in,” she saud,<\/p>\n
“We knew Zhorobekova was going to be quite heavy on the wrestling, so a lot of our gameplan was to negate that in the first round and then create some openings for the strike.<\/p>\n
“I just went for it and I got the right elbow knock out.<\/p>\n
“The commentators do a pre-fight interview with you and I actually told them that I’m going to knock her out with an elbow, so I was very happy with that!<\/p>\n
“It played out how we thought and I’m super stoked to have gotten the KO as well.”<\/p>\n
The win caps off an impressive first year as a professional MMA fighter for Tran, particularly at such a large-scale event in One Championships.<\/p>\n
“Every fight, the stakes get higher each time,” she said.<\/p>\n
“I wanted to have four fights within the year, which we did, and that’s pretty uncommon for my weight class and being female it’s quite difficult to get fights.<\/p>\n
“We were really grateful that we could get the opportunity to fight on such a big show, and represent Australia on the world stage.”<\/p>\n
Tran said she had recently changed her training focus more to wrestling and grappling with the help of Bones MMA coaches Matt Williams and Jordan Wallace, which put her in good stead for last Friday’s fight.<\/p>\n
“It’s really completely changed my style, I would say, how I grapple – it’s much more heavy on the wrestling,” she explained.<\/p>\n
“It’s just been really fun learning a new style.<\/p>\n
“We didn’t show that much of it, but we still got to show a bit.<\/p>\n
“To be able to defend against a girl that’s a wrestler from Kyrgyzstan really shows I’m getting a lot better at that part of my game.”<\/p>\n
Tran expressed her gratitude for Williams and Wallace’s help throughout her career, and has taken valuable lessons from her amateur fights into life as a professional.<\/p>\n
“They’re just really incredible people, for one, as human beings,”<\/p>\n
she said.<\/p>\n
“Matt really instilled a good attitude in me to take on when I was an amateur, which I feel is a lot different to other coaches and gyms.<\/p>\n
“The idea that amateur fighting is for development and we don’t care if you lose, we just want to see that you are developing and growing and taking the lessons.<\/p>\n
“I lost a lot in amateur career, I think I lost half my fights before I turned pro, but I think having someone like Matt always reminding me of that approach made me see the long game and believe in myself.<\/p>\n
“Now as a pro, I’m having a lot of success and I think that’s due to that attitude and not giving up when I lost.<\/p>\n
“It’s really important to have coaches that you fully trust in your corner, especially with something as crazy as fighting, and I really trust those two and I know that I’m in<\/p>\n
good hands.<\/p>\n
“Win, lose, draw they’re always in my corner, so I’m really happy to be working with them.”<\/p>\n
The 29-year-old will now enjoy a break to rest her body, before launching into another active 2026 campaign where she hopes to continue her professional success.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
TORQUAY MMA fighter Kim Tran has improved to 4-0 in her professional career after beating Kyrgyzstan’s Almagul Zhorobekova at One Friday Fights 134 last weekend in Bangkok. After Zhorobekova started strongly, Tran was able to wear her down and won the match in the second round with an elegant elbow knock out. Tran explained she […]<\/p>\n