There’s a new man atop the UFC’s rankings ladder.
Following his emphatic first-round TKO win over Charles Oliveira at last weekend’s UFC 317 event in Las Vegas, the newly crowned lightweight champion Ilia Topuria has leapfrogged both the man he succeeded as 155-pound champion, Islam Makhachev, and the recently-retired Jon Jones to land in top spot in the latest edition of the organisation’s pound-for-pound rankings.
The 28-year-old, who is of Georgian and Spanish heritage, increased his record to a perfect 17-0 following his win over Oliveira – which itself following knockout finishes of the highly-regarded duo of Alex Volkanovski and Max Holloway.
In doing so, Topuria becomes the latest member of the UFC’s two-division champion club after having previously won the featherweight title. However, he does not hold the belts simultaneously after he relinquished the crown ahead of his move back to lightweight.
Alex Volkanovski reclaimed the featherweight title by defeating Diego Lopes for the vacant belt at UFC 314 in April.
Elsewhere in the pound-for-pound rankings, Islam Makhachev sits in second place with bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili in third. Welterweight champion Dricus du Plessis and flyweight king Alexandre Pantoja complete the top five.
The full UFC rankings can be viewed here.
