Alex Pereira is in unbelievable shape as he prepares to battle Israel Adesanya at UFC 281.

While he may only hold a 6-1 mixed martial arts record as a pro, Alex Pereira is already one of the scariest men in the entire sport. His kickboxing prowess speaks for itself and ever since making the transition over, he’s been able to round out his game to the point whereby he’s already earned a crack at the UFC middleweight championship.

At UFC 281 this November, ‘Poatan’ will go face to face with his old rival Israel Adesanya as he attempts to shock the world and become the new king at 185 pounds. The majority of fans and pundits expect him to be a considerable underdog against ‘The Last Stylebender’ but based on the 35-year-old’s demeanour, we don’t think that’s going to impact him all too much heading into fight night.

At a height of 6 foot 4 inches, it’s not hard to understand why Alex Pereira is so feared - and it’s also believable that he’s 2-0 in his kickboxing series against Izzy, with one of those wins coming via knockout.

Their Madison Square Garden collision is bound to turn some heads and ahead of that showdown, Pereira has been hard at work making sure he can get down to the necessary weight limit.

Alas, in the following photo, you could be forgiven for thinking he’s the light heavyweight and Dominick Reyes is the one competing at middleweight.

Reyes is also set to feature on the very same UFC 281 card when he battles Ryan Spann, hoping to avoid slipping to a four-fight losing streak.

The run so far

It’s been less than a year since Alex Pereira first made that walk to the Octagon and in that time, he’s put together a 3-0 run in the promotion with two of those wins coming by KO.

A flying knee helped him knock off Andreas Michailidis on last year’s MSG card and four months later, he fought to a unanimous decision triumph over Bruno Silva.

That set him up for a huge challenge in the form of Sean Strickland, and it took the Brazilian less than three minutes to knock his fellow contender out cold and earn a shot at the belt.