Nick Newell

Nicholas George Newell (born March 17, 1986, in Milford, Connecticut) is an American mixed martial artist, who competes in the lightweight division.

Newell was born with congenital amputation of his left arm, which ends just below his elbow.

Newell has a very short yet muscular stump of his forearm which he learned from a young age to grasp objects with.

Newell was born with his stump and therefore learned to use it like a hand from birth.

Newell grew up playing first soccer and then baseball, but pivoted to high school wrestling in Jonathan Law High School.

Upon joining his wrestling team, he thought about quitting after his very first session because it was "the hardest thing I had done in my life", but his mother did not allow him to, and instead he worked hard from then on.

After graduating from high school, Newell attended Western New England University where he continued wrestling.

He has over 300 victories between high school and college in wrestling (if you include non competition matches in college).

Newell stated that while growing up, he idolized former Yankees pitcher Jim Abbott, who has no right hand and was an inspiration for Newell to challenge himself.

His roommate in college was former WWE wrestler Curt Hawkins.

They would watch The Ultimate Fighter, which was on the same channel right after WWE Raw, and Newell has said this is what inspired him to take up MMA.

Before turning professional, he amassed an amateur record of 5 wins, 1 loss.

He describes his early MMA career as a struggle, not because he could not win, but because other fighters did not want to fight a one armed fighter.

The potential opponents who turned down fights against him felt that it would be a lose-lose situation for them, as if they won, it would've been against a one-armed fighter; if they lost, it would've been against a fighter with one arm.

As such, finding quality opponents became a struggle for Newell.

In 2011, Newell signed a multi-fight deal with both Shark Fights and Xtreme Fighting Championships.

He was supposed to have made his Shark Fights debut at Shark Fights 19, however an injury resulted in him being left off the card.

He had his first bout with XFC at XFC 15: Tribute.

The event was renamed 'Tribute' in honour of Nick's friend and fellow XFC signee Abi Mestre, who was killed in a motorcycle accident.

Mestre was a close friend and teammate of Newell's who joined Nick last year at the open tryouts for the XFC.

Newell defeated Denis Hernandez at XFC 15 with a dominant 71 second submission (heel hook) victory.

Multiple videos and sources covered the fight, with many videos of the whole fight being posted on multiple MMA websites, as well as being shared across many Facebook and Twitter pages worldwide.

He did an interview with Bleacher Report to talk about the fame he has been getting since his first televised fight at the XFC event.

According to him, all the videos of the fight combined have reached around 4,500,000 views.

Newell then defeated Chris Coggins via majority decision in what was Newell's biggest test in his MMA career so far.

Newell defeated David Mays at XFC 19 after landing a big left knee on Mays chin, rendering him unconscious.

He next fought for the vacated XFC Lightweight title at XFC 21 against Bellator veteran Eric Reynolds.

Newell won the fight via submission in the first round and took the XFC Lightweight Title in the process.

On June 14, he was scheduled to defend his XFC title against Scott Holtzman, however Newell turned down the fight stating that he only wants to fight ex-UFC fighters.

Newell would be stripped of his belt.

On May 28, 2013, Newell signed a multi-fight contract with World Series of Fighting.

WSOF President Ray Sefo hinted that Newell will be featured on the upcoming WSOF 4 & 5 cards against an opponent who has yet to be named.

On June 20, it was announced that Newell would fight Keon Caldwell at World Series of Fighting 4.

He won the fight via submission in the first round.

For his second fight with the promotion, Newell faced Sabah Fadai at World Series of Fighting 7: Karakhanyan vs. Palmer on December 7, 2013.

Again, he won the fight via submission in the first round.

Newell challenged Justin Gaethje for the WSOF Lightweight Championship at WSOF 11.

He lost the fight via knockout in the second round, suffering the first defeat of his professional career.

On February 13, 2015, it was announced that Newell has signed a new four-fight contract with WSOF.

After his first loss, Newell returned to the promotion on April 10, 2015, at WSOF 20.