Want to know how serious Claressa Shields is about mixed martial arts training?
Well, the GWOAT is about to soak up MMA game from the GOAT.
After facing Ivana Habazin for the vacant WBC and WBO junior middleweight titles Friday night, Shields, the self-proclaimed “Greatest Woman of All Time,” plans on entering an MMA training camp with Jon Jones. The UFC light heavyweight champion is widely regarded as the greatest MMA fighter of all time, and Shields can’t wait to learn from the best.
“After this fight, I have a small camp with Jonny ‘Bones’ and we’re going to do a camp for about a week or two to see if I could just get the hang of freaking MMA and jiu-jitsu and see if I could even train to do that stuff and how it makes my body feel,” Shields told DAZN News on Tuesday.
“Man, he’s so great at what he does,” she continued moments later. “When you have greats like that, they could teach it. From seeing him fight and following his Instagram page, he’s constantly training, constantly in the gym, constantly learning and he wants to teach me his way, so I could be as great as him.
“So, I’m definitely open-minded to it. You train with the best, you become the best, so that’s all I’m looking forward to.”
Last summer, Shields told Sporting News that she’d be willing to not only have a boxing bout with Amanda Nunes, but also cross over for an MMA fight with the UFC women’s double champ as well. Shields even attended UFC 245 last month on a personal invite from Dana White and told DAZN News that Nunes is slated to attend her fight against Habazin in Atlantic City, N.J., on Friday night.
Training with Jones should only bolster Shields’ MMA fighting game from the initial training that she has undergone with five-time wrestling world champion and 2016 Olympian Adeline Gray.
“I think I’m gonna do great because I thought wrestling would be the hardest part for me, but I did maybe a two-hour session with Adeline Gray and when I left, I wasn’t annoyed because she was grabbing me and I kind of had to get out of stuff,” Shields said. “She showed me how she did everything, and I had to do it back on her, and I just remember it being so fun.
“And I hate people grabbing me in boxing,” she added, “but if we’re practicing wrestling, it makes it more enjoyable.”
Following the training camp with Jones, who defends his title against Dominick Reyes on Feb. 8, and subsequent training to come, Shields plans on making her MMA debut late this year — regardless if it's against Nunes or not.
“I’m trying to do end of the year 2020 — have my first MMA fight,” said the undisputed middleweight champion and two-time Olympic gold medalist. “I don’t know with what organization, but I definitely want to do it and of course win.”
First, however, the 24-year-old Shields (9-0, 2 KOs) will look to become the fastest boxer — woman or man — to become a three-division world champ with a win over Habazin.