Yan, still four months away from his 30th birthday, has the resume to back up his claims. Ten UFC fights, with eight wins over the likes of John Dodson, Jimmie Rivera, Urijah Faber, Jose Aldo and Cory Sandhagen. It’s been quite a run thus far.
“I would describe my four years in UFC as an incredible journey,” he said. “My career progressed very quickly, so I had to deal with many new challenges that I didn’t face before, but that made me smarter and wiser in a short period of time, so I’m glad how everything played out.”
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There is no growth without having to deal with adversity, though, and Yan has had that in the form of his only two UFC losses, which came against current champion Aljamain Sterling – the first via disqualification and the second a close split decision.
If those defeats are haunting the former champ from Yekaterinburg, Russia, he’s not showing it, but he does want to get his belt back, and he thinks that a win over O’Malley will put him back in a title fight against the winner of Saturday’s co-main event clash between Sterling and TJ Dillashaw.
