At a glance
- MMA and boxing YouTube channel of Russian daily Sport-Express
- Exclusive interviews, features and short-form clips
- Associated with journalist Ilya Andreev
Overview
Ushatayka is the MMA and boxing YouTube channel of Sport-Express, one of Russia's oldest sports publications. It takes the paper's martial arts section, found at sport-express.ru, into video. The content is in Russian and covers MMA and professional boxing, with a strong focus on Russian fighters.
The channel is associated with journalist Ilya Andreev, who handles a share of the interviews and whose name is tied to the channel's sit-down format. The Sports.ru report on Russian MMA media lists it among the channels that drove the audience's shift to YouTube. That places Ushatayka among the video outlets Russian fans turn to for interviews.
What you'll find
You'll find exclusive interviews with fighters, coaches and people across the sport, along with features and short clips built for quick viewing. Long sit-downs give Russian and international fighters room to talk, and the short clips pull out the key moments.
In September 2026 the channel published several interviews, including a conversation with Mark Hunt marking Fedor Emelianenko's 50th birthday. Interviews with retired fighters often look back at big nights from the past and at the careers of major Russian names. Content like this shows the newsroom's access to historic names in MMA, beyond the news around upcoming cards. The martial arts section of the Sport-Express website backs the channel up with articles and results.
Why follow
Ushatayka pairs an established sports newsroom with a video format. Interviews draw on the Sport-Express network, which opens doors to guests an independent channel would struggle to book. You hear Russian fighters in their own language, with nothing lost in translation. The short clips also let you keep up with the channel without committing an hour to every upload.
If you don't speak Russian, YouTube's auto-generated subtitles let you follow the gist of an interview. For results and written news, keep an eye on sport-express.ru/martial, which the channel complements with video. The two together give you written news and on-camera interviews from a single newsroom.
MMA Official's take
Ushatayka is for fans who like long-form interviews and want to hear Russian and international MMA figures speak in Russian. Start with the Mark Hunt interview on Fedor Emelianenko's 50th birthday, then browse the short clips to discover the channel's other guests.
If you prefer reading, start with the martial arts section of sport-express.ru, which runs the articles and results tied to the videos. Then move to the channel for the full interviews.