UFC heavyweight contender Alex Pereira has been working with MMA legend Cain Velasquez to shore up his wrestling skills ahead of UFC 335.
Pereira returns to the Octagon against Sergei Pavlovich in a likely No. 1 contender bout at UFC 335, which takes place on December 12 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Ahead of the bout, the Brazilian MMA star is training with one of the sport’s all-time greatest heavweights, Velasquez, to work on his wrestling skills.
Alex Pereira Training With Cain Velasquez
Taking to his social media to share footage of himself helping out Pereira with his wrestling, Velasquez showed a video of some of the skills that he is teaching him.
“Chama por vida,” Velasquez wrote on his Instagram.
Cain Velasquez is a UFC Legend
The 44-year-old Velasquez began his MMA career in 2006 fighting for Strikeforce. He then joined the UFC in 2008 and immediately showed the potential to be a UFC heavyweight champion, a feat that he accomplished in his seventh UFC fight at UFC 121 in October 2010, when he knocked out Brock Lesnar to win the belt.
A year later, Velasquez lost the title in his first title defense when Junior dos Santos knocked him out in just 1:04 at UFC on FOX 1 in November 2011. But after stopping Bigfoot Silva in his next fight, Velasquez won the belt back from dos Santos in the pair’s rematch, and then defended it twice successfully against Silva in their rematch and dos Santos in their trilogy.
Velasquez lost the belt to Fabricio Werdum in his next fight, and then, following a win over Travis Browne and a knockout loss to Francis Ngannou after that, he retired from the UFC in 2019.
After leaving the world of MMA, Velasquez tried his hand at pro wrestling and had a cup of coffee in WWE.
In 2022, Velasquez was arrested on an attempted murder charge. He was later sentenced to five years in jail with time served, but was released in February 2026.
Since leaving prison, Velasquez has gotten his feet wet in the MMA world, making an appearance at MVP MMA in May and now training Pereira in wrestling.
Cain Velasquez Teaching Alex Pereira Wrestling Before UFC 335