Aliyilmaz Cenik

Turkey has a long warrior tradition that stretches back to the legendary siege of Troy - a city on the ancient Turkish coast - and includes battles with the Romans, Mongols and Persians. It is in this tradition that Ali ‘The Tornado’ Cenik carries the Turkish flag into battle against the best of the kickboxing world. Until recently Cenik was a light-heavyweight fighter but the promise of greater riches and fame at heavyweight prompted him to move up. As such he is at the smaller end of the weight class but he has some advantage in speed and mobility compared to some of the heavyweight division. Power may be an issue against some of the hard-hitters to be found in the GLORY ranks, but Cenik has very fast reflexes for a heavyweight and is unusually evasive for a man of his size. He favours avoiding blows where possible, particularly punches, rather than the standard kick boxer’s tactic of blocking the attack with a tight cover before returning fire. In many ways he is still finding his feet at heavyweight and adapting his strategies. He got a lot of attention when he went to a draw with the highly respected Zabit Samedov in mid-2011 but then he followed that with a decision loss to the decidedly journeyman Sebastian Ciobanu six months later, which makes his GLORY future difficult to predict.