Akhmed Tazhudinov: The Birth of a Legend

Sitting at #1 in the world at 97 KG and #4 Pound for Pound after winning gold at the 2023 97 KG Senior World Championships, Akhmed Tazhudinov of Bahrain was one of the biggest stories to come out of Belgrade and is one of the most intriguing athletes going into the Paris Olympics. But before he electrified the wrestling world with wins over Olympic Champions Abdulrashid Sadulaev and Kyle Snyder at the 2023 World Championships for Bahrain, Tazhudinov made his name known in Russia in 2022 

In 2022, Tazhudinov, a native of Gergebil, Dagestan, was a young 19 year old wrestler whose best accomplishment to date was a runner-up finish at the 97 KG Junior Russian National championships to Abdulla Kurbanov. While an impressive feat, age group level success is by far no guarantee of an athlete’s ability to perform at the Senior level. 

Tazhudinov’s first senior level competition would be at the first Ivan Poddubny Tournament, a series of tournaments that Russia had started to get their top athletes competition while they were serving their ban from international sport due to the ongoing  Ukraine/Russia conflict. With Russia not being able to send any of their athletes to the World Championships, every Poddubny Tournament was brutally difficult and loaded with elite talent, a miniature national tournament in and of itself.

For his first match, Tazhudinov would be paired against 2021 125 KG Senior Russian National champion and 2020 Olympian Sergey Kozyrev. In 2021 Kozyrev was seen as the future for Russia at heavyweight, a young, mobile, athletic heavyweight with a great high crotch and fireman’s carry who could contend with the best. After not placing in Tokyo, Kozyrev moved down to the 97 KG weight class where he was considered an instant medal contender paired off against the relative unknown Tazhudinov. Tazhudinov stunned everyone when he won 10-8 over the reigning heavyweight national champion. 

Beating Kozyrev by itself was worthy of recognition but Tazhudinov’s hot streak continued. Standing across from him next would be an old foe, Abdulla Kurbanov. Kurbanov was fresh off a Junior National title victory over Tazhudinov and boasted the kind of physicality and finishing ability that had shut down Tazhudinov in their last match. Paying no mind to the past, Tazhudinov won another wild match to beat Kurbanov and move onto the final where he would face his third straight Russian National champion in the form of reigning 97 KG national champ Alikhan Zhabrailov.

A world medalist in 2019 at 92 kilograms, Alikhan Zhabrailov had already won three national titles by the time he would meet Akhmed Tazhudinov in their finals match: two at 92 KG in 2019 and 2020, and one at 97 KG in 2021. Zhabrailov was a well travelled veteran who had beaten the best in the world time and time again and was predicted to be too well rounded, too experienced for the rookie Tazhudinov to beat. As Tazhudinov had done the whole tournament, he proved the doubters wrong yet again, shutting down Zhabrailov’s excellent low singles and far side fireman’s carry in a 6-3 victory with the highlight of the match being an excellent extended sequence where Zhabrailov was working to finish a head outside shot and Tazhudinov continued to threaten a chin whip counter until Zhabrailov bailed on the attack and Tazhudinov immediately countered with an excellent head outside shot to score.

Following Tazhudinov’s performance at the Poddubny, Tazhudinov was seen as the favorite going into the 2022 Russian National Championships in a field without Olympic champion Abdulrashid Sadulaev or three-time champion Alikhan Zhabrailov, but it was not his time, as reigning runner-up Aslanbek Sotiev would upset Tazhudinov in the semifinals on his way to taking gold over Shamil Musaev. 

Since transferring out of Russia at the end of 2022, Tazhudinov has only lost once, to Vladislav Baitsaev in the quarterfinals of the Ibrahim Moustafa Ranking Series Tournament. Following his spectacular gold medal winning performance at the 2023 World Championships with gold medals at the 2023 Asian Games and this year at the Asian Championships and Yasar Dogu, the question of who, if anyone, can beat Tazhudinov looms large on the horizon going into Paris.

Attached is a playlist of Akhmed Tazhudinov’s best matches and the April International Men’s Freestyle Rankings