Aiemann Zahabi began 'embracing the fear' to reach UFC Freedom 250

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Beneath the warm glow of Madison Square Garden’s spiderweb ceiling, cruising to a decision victory while carrying the confidence of a fighter who’d never lost before, Aiemann Zahabi pressed his opponent into the fence with a flurry, seeking to set up a left hook.

It’s the last thing he remembers. A half hour of Zahabi’s memory is lost, from eating a Ricardo Ramos spinning back elbow on the button, to the crown of his head bouncing off the canvas, to walking backstage and speaking to doctors while they shone a flashlight in his pupils and glided fingers along his jawbone.

Zahabi’s next recollection comes in the back of an ambulance, being transported to the hospital while realizing he’d lost his undefeated MMA record, suffered the first knockout of his life, and ceded the career momentum he’d built over the last half-decade all at once. 

“I’d never tasted defeat — never been concussed or rocked or dropped in training ever,” Zahabi says, reflecting on that 2017 loss to Ramos at UFC 217. “I lost my confidence.”

It took a full 18 months for the consequences of that experience to materialize at a UFC Fight Night in Ottawa, when Zahabi, who dealt with significant post-concussion symptoms for the better part of a year following his knockout, finally returned to the octagon to face UFC newcomer Vince Morales.

Fighting timidly without the self-assurance that once defined him, Zahabi left his corner all three rounds, thinking about how to prevent his opponent from knocking him out rather than the opposite. Hesitant to move forward and pull the trigger, he landed single-digit strike totals in each of his first two rounds and whiffed on four of five half-hearted takedown attempts, dropping a unanimous decision to a fighter beneath his true talent level.

Without those two losses, and nearly two full years of soul searching that followed, Zahabi doesn’t believe he’d be here now, preparing to put a seven-fight win streak on the line against one of the UFC’s most marketable stars — with a bantamweight title shot hanging in the balance — at the company’s marquee event of 2026.

“I feel that way because both losses were at opposite ends of the same spectrum,” says Zahabi, who will fight ostentatious former champion Sean O’Malley Saturday at UFC Freedom 250 on the White House’s south lawn. “One of them, I went out because of my arrogance. I disregarded my defence and took too much risk. And the next one, I was a shell of myself. I couldn't open up. I didn't take any risk at all.”

The son of Lebanese immigrants who fled Beirut in the 1970’s during the country’s civil war, Zahabi grew up in Laval, QC, the youngest of four brothers who all pursued martial arts in their youth. Their father — Ismat, a mechanic and taxi driver who worked around the clock to support the family — insisted they learn self-defence to deter being bullied at school.

That brought a 13-year-old Zahabi to the hole-in-the-wall Tristar Gym in a then-underdeveloped area of Montreal now known as The Triangle. Even while escorted by the next youngest of the brothers, Firas, Zahabi was intimidated. 

Everyone was in their 20’s and had no interest in working with a 5’0, 120-lbs. teenager. Zahabi was often left to train with Firas, who, at 21-years-old, was forging his own path as a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt and coach to a stable of young fighters, including a local nightclub bouncer by the name of Georges St-Pierre.

A byproduct of Zahabi spending so much time under his brother’s tutelage was rapid improvement and skill development, particularly in Muay Thai, where his size mattered less than in grappling and jiu-jitsu. (It didn’t hurt that legendary Muay Thai master Peter Sisomphou, mentor to generations of professional fighters, was also instructing at Tristar at the time.)  

By 16, Zahabi was already filling in for Firas, teaching classes to casual amateurs while his brother was guiding fighters at competitions. And at 18, he began tagging along with his brother to corner professionals. 

Zahabi was with David Loiseau as he was stacking wins on his way to a middleweight title shot against Rich Franklin at UFC 58. He rode with Rory MacDonald when he got big opportunities against Carlos Condit, Nate Diaz, and BJ Penn. He was in Miguel Torres’ corner when he lost to Demetrious Johnson in a bantamweight title eliminator.

All the while, Zahabi was teaching classes at Tristar to make ends meet while studying commerce at McGill University and living in a cluttered apartment beneath the gym with his future wife, Sylva, and training partner, Mandel Nallo. But as coaching and cornering got busier, time to study evaporated, and Zahabi’s grades dipped. 

Meanwhile, professional fighters he trained and felt were just as skilled as he were seeing success. Some even reached the UFC. On a whim one day in 2012, Zahabi marched into his brother’s office — as he built his coaching business, Firas slowly accumulated equity in Tristar, which he now owns outright — to announce he was going pro himself.

“Firas didn’t really want me to fight, because there was no money in fighting at the time,” Zahabi says. “There was more money in teaching and running classes. But I was like, ‘You know what, man? I’m only going to be young once. Let me take this chance. And if I don’t make it to the UFC by 30, I’ll go back to school.’”

Five years later, just nine months shy of his 30th birthday, Zahabi made his UFC debut with a unanimous decision victory over Reginaldo Vieira. Earning $12,000 to show and $12,000 to win on his entry-level contract, Zahabi was still running a deficit. But after making $750 to show and $750 to win in his final fight before joining the organization, it still felt like he’d finally made it and the rest would be easy.

“I got lost in the hype and the theatrics of it all. I got carried away in my success. I was distracted from what was important,” Zahabi says. “I’d never lost, never been hurt. I thought nobody could touch me. I wasn't staying on top of my game.”

The reality check came quickly in the form of that Ramos spinning back elbow at Madison Square Garden. And after nearly two years off, Zahabi returned passive and gun-shy, dropping the unanimous decision to Morales. He’d gone from unbeatable to a place many never return from by his third UFC fight.

That caused him to rethink everything. Zahabi dove into psychology and personal development. He stuck his nose in a pile of books, from Geoffrey Colvin’s Talent is Overrated to Carol Dweck’s Mindset. 

He started training under renowned grappling coach John Danahar at Renzo Gracie’s academy in New York, driving six hours from Montreal every Sunday, getting in three training sessions within 24 hours, and returning home Monday night so he could turn up for sparring at Tristar on Tuesday mornings. 

“I had to level up. I had no choice,” Zahabi says. “I took the time that I needed to come back with a vengeance. I put my blinders on, and I did the work that I had to do.”

Back in the octagon for the first time in nearly two years at UFC’s cavernous Apex facility in February 2021 — fighting Drako Rodriguez, a Contender Series winner over a decade his junior — Zahabi began tentatively again. He circled the perimeter, letting Rodriguez control the centre.

But two minutes into the first round, after sitting on the wrong end of one-way traffic, something changed. Zahabi caged cut to the middle and pushed forward into range with a combination. And a minute later, he followed a jab with an overhand right that dropped Rodriguez with a thud.

Among the books Zahabi read during his soul-searching period was Phil Stutz’s The Tools, which helped him form the mantra he credits not only for finding that punch, but helping turn his career around and anchor everything he’s done since: I love the fear; the fear will set me free.

“I just started to do everything I can to face my demons. I started embracing the fear as much as possible and doing things I didn't like to do or that I was afraid of trying,” Zahabi says. “I was taking on more risk. But not so much risk that I end up like the Ramos fight.”

A performance of the night bonus helped send Zahabi home with a six-figure payday more than triple his career earnings. That, plus Sylva’s job as an administrative director at her father’s autobody shop, brought flexibility and allowed Zahabi to reduce distractions in his life outside training.

Soon, the ball was really rolling. He won six straight, punctuated by a statement performance during his biggest opportunity yet — fighting living legend Jose Aldo in front of a home crowd at UFC 315 in Montreal, when Zahabi rallied from a third-round knockdown to pour on late volume and win unanimously.

That bought another name-brand test with Marlon “Chito” Vera five months later in Vancouver. Again, Zahabi overcame a flash knockdown — plus a fractured ulna in his left arm suffered during the second round — to out-strike his opponent and finish stronger, eking out a split decision.

Which is how Zahabi, now 38, ended up booked for the White House lawn against one of the most recognizable fighters on this weekend’s card. And if he can extend his win streak to eight — particularly if it’s emphatically — he’ll be as well positioned as anybody in his division for the next shot at 135-lbs. champion Petr Yan, who’s already beaten three of the five fighters currently ranked ahead of No. 6 Zahabi.

Of course, O’Malley’s track record — he won and defended UFC’s bantamweight title prior to his 30th birthday, leaving a highlight reel of knockouts along the way — plus the UFC’s obvious desire to return him to relevancy, after a deflating, 15-month period defined by consecutive high-profile losses to Merab Dvalishvili, means Zahabi will enter the fight as a substantial underdog. Not that it’s anything new.

“Everyone thinks I suck. Everyone counts me out every fight. I feel like they see me as the bottom of the barrel and that I get lucky,” Zahabi says. “And nobody counts me as a striker. I find that so funny. When it comes down to it, I fought the two deadliest strikers in the division — Aldo and Chito, who have the most knockdowns in my weight class.

“Aldo missed weight by eight pounds. I took the fight, and I didn’t wrestle him. I broke my arm fighting Chito, still didn’t wrestle him. And in both performances, I came back after getting dropped. That’s why I got this fight. The UFC trusts that I’m going to show up and perform. They trust that I’m going to give them a hell of a fight.”

Which brings us back to that balance between reservation and risk. The octagon is littered with what Zahabi calls “banana peels.” The misstep that puts you off balance directly into a big shot. The injury that compromises your ability to fight the way you need to. The fine line between measured aggressiveness and wild overzealousness.

Trying to create a hell of a fight means embracing a great deal of the risk Zahabi’s spent his 30’s learning how to manage. And taking the wrong chances can carry dramatic consequences against a sniper like O’Malley.

But if Zahabi learned one thing from his last time on a stage this grand, over-pursuing Ramos beneath that warm glow of the Garden, it’s that he needs to embrace the fear of opening up against a championship-level striker like O’Malley. He needs to love it. Because the fear will set him free.

“Fighting, it’s a beautiful thing, man. It takes all three facets of the human experience — mental, physical, and spiritual,” Zahabi says. “You have to be intelligent. You have to be strong. And you have to believe, really believe, you can get to the other side of whatever hell you’re going through. If you want to make it, you’ve gotta jump. That’s life.”