The Machine
Andy Ristie
Long, rangy power puncher who beat Petrosyan by closing the distance a counter-fighter needs. One of the sport’s great single nights.
Andy Ristie is the fighter who beat Giorgio Petrosyan, which for most of a decade was something nobody managed. The 2013 GLORY tournament in which he knocked Petrosyan down twice and stopped him remains the single most surprising result in modern lightweight kickboxing.
He did it by refusing the range battle Petrosyan controls. Rather than trying to out-time a counter-fighter, Ristie closed and forced exchanges at a distance where Petrosyan's defensive structure had less room to work — the same broad answer Grigorian later used, executed with more finishing power.
He won the tournament outright that night, beating Robin van Roosmalen in the final, which makes it one of the great single-evening performances in the sport's history.