Highlights! De Ridder Scores Slick Submission To Defend ONE Title

Reinier de Ridder remained undefeated earlier today (Fri., July 22, 2022) at ONE Championship 159 when he submitted Vitaly Bigdash with a beautiful first-round inverted triangle choke. As a result, de Ridder retained his ONE Championship middleweight title. He is also the promotion’s undisputed light heavyweight champion.

The stoppage occurred with just under two minutes left in the first round. Bigdash, who was coming off an impressive decision win over former ONE Championship titleholder Aung La N Sang in his last fight, had top control. That’s when de Ridder launched up the inverted triangle, caught Bigdash sleeping, and finished the fight in dramatic fashion.

Check it out above courtesy of ONE.

“Anybody in the world – anybody in the world, I’ll finish,” de Ridder said in his post-fight interview. “I’ll strangle anybody on the planet. I got him a little earlier than I thought. I had to wear him out a little bit. I was thinking it would be in the second round, but I got him. … That’s what I do: I choke people out. That’s what I do.”

De Ridder, 31, continues to prove he’s one of the best fighters in mixed martial arts (MMA) today. The undefeated two-division ONE champion is now 16-0 in his professional career with 14 equally-impressive finishes. Friday’s win marked his second-straight middleweight title defense of 2022 and his fourth-straight title fight win overall.

It will be exciting to watch de Ridder moving forward as he actively defends two separate title and looks to keep his perfect MMA record in tact.