Sergej Maslobojev was on cloud nine when he won the GLORY light heavyweight championship in 2022, only to come crashing back to Earth when he lost the belt one fight later due to a doctor’s stoppage.
Losing a title due to a cut on his shin was hard to swallow for Maslobojev, a talented martial artist who has competed professionally in boxing, kickboxing, and MMA. He returns this Saturday at GLORY 100, looking to right that wrong against the same man he originally won the belt from: Tarik Khbabez.
“It ate me a lot. At that moment, I couldn’t recognize myself actually. I felt like my baby was taken from me,” Maslobojev told Cageside Press in a recent exclusive interview. “I was dreaming about that belt for many, many, many years, maybe even a decade. First defense and boom, I had a stoppage, a championship fight in the fourth round, lose a championship because of a cut on the shin? It was chaos.”
Admittedly, Maslobojev did not handle the loss well. It was so bad, in fact, that he left the promotion for a time. “Actually I was really rude to everyone and told everyone from the organization that I was hating my life and and everything that was happening around me at the moment. It was almost one and a half years that I didn’t fight in GLORY, but I came back, I came back strong and showed them that I’m still in the market.”
Despite feeling like his baby was taken away, Sergej Maslobojev would later decide that chasing the title just wasn’t the answer. In essence, he’d become to focused on the goal, and neglected the journey.
“After my last fight in GLORY I said that I stopped running after the title,” he noted. “Before, I was sick about the title. Title, title, title all the time. But now I just want to enjoy the process, enjoy my road and give a beautiful show and beautiful dance of kickboxing for the audience.”
“The title is a big bonus. Of course it puts some weight on my shoulders as well, but the main thing is just to be happy. Just to do what you love and do it with all your heart.”
Watch our full interview with GLORY 100’s Sergej Maslobojev above.
