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Khabib’s father explains why his son wrestled a bear as a child

UFC lightweight Khabib Nurmagomedov’s father, Abdulmanap, explains why he had his son train with bears at nine years old.

17 years ago, a young Khabib Nurmagomedov befriended a bear cub that he would use as a wrestling partner in his hometown in Dagestan. Little did he know that a ‘secret video' had been taken of him, one that would leak when Khabib began his undefeated streak under the UFC banner.

The video shocked a certain segment of the MMA community, but it also garnered a fair bit of admiration for the stone-cold Dagestani and his unorthodox training regimen.