Ilia Topuria’s former coach speaks on split: ‘He’s always going to be our son’

Jorge Climent opened up on Ilia Topuria leaving Climent Club, giving his thoughts on the reasons why and how ‘El Matador’ will do moving forward.

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Team Topuria has undergone a big switch-up in the past week. After spending a year in Spanish cities four hours apart, Ilia Topuria has decided to officially leave Climent Club, run by Jorge and Agustin Climent. Now his team consists of his brother Aleks Topuria, Javi Climent (no relation), the Ribeiro brothers, and Jesus Gallo.

The split was reportedly amicable, and Jorge Climent confirmed that in a new interview with Submission Radio.

“He went to live to Madrid, and I have my own project here with my brother,” Climent explained. “We have our family. We have our group. We have a lot of fighters. We have our promotion. Ilia went to Madrid. He has his own gym in his house, and he want all the energy on him, you know? And we decided, like gentlemen, to have our own way.”

Asked if they’d still occasionally train Topuria, Climent said no.

“We don’t work anymore together. He’s going on his own,” he said.

“This is not good for the sentimental thing, but that’s life,” Climent added. “We go with him on the journey, and now he’s grown and he wants to fly away. We are very proud to go all the way with him. We are very proud for everything he’s done ... Of course, we are a little sad. But I want everything in his life to continue going well. I want all good for him and his brother, and I think they do the same for us.”

“We decided like last week,” he said of the timeline. “We got all together. We talked about it, and we decided.”

This won’t be too big of a switch for Topuria coming into his UFC 317 fight against Charles Oliveira on June 28th. He went through his training camp for Max Holloway in Madrid, so is already used to the current configuration in his camp. And with nothing but positive vibes regarding this breakup (at least in public), there are no extra distractions.

“Of course, we are friends,” Climent concluded. “We love him. We love his brother. We know he’s going to win, everybody will try to fight with him because he’s the best. And he’s always going to be our son.”