She's a Tampa Bay product whose championship fights have aired nationally on FOX Sports, ESPN2, and Pay-Per-View. She's one of just eight female fighters ever featured as a playable character in the EA Sports "Knockout Kings" video game franchise. And she's a four-time boxing world champion, having captured titles with the IBA, IFBA, WIBA and WBAN. Now, Chevelle "Fist of Steel" Hallback has set her sights on conquering the world of the Mixed Martial Arts and she says her goal is to become the first person ever to win five combined world titles in both boxing and in MMA. She'll be making her steel cage debut at Xtreme Fighting Championships (XFC)'s "Salute to Our Armed Forces 6: Clash of the Continents" on Friday, December 5 at the St. Pete Times Forum in downtown Tampa. This will be XFC's fifth fight card at the St. Pete Times Forum; the previous four fight cards drew a combined total of 43,700 fans.
"A five-time world champion in the boxing ring and the MMA steel cage; now that's a legacy!" said Hallback, taking a breather between grueling sparring sessions at the XFC training facilities. With her blinding hand speed and natural punching power, her striking prowess is beyond dispute; it's her wrestling skills and jujitsu technique that require around-the-clock coaching from XFC's fleet of MMA trainers as they help her transition from boxing to cage fighting.
"She's one of those rare, once-in-a-lifetime athletes who can be as good as they want to be," observed XFC president John Prisco, as he watched Hallback practice her ground game with trainer Shah "Hollywood" Bobonis. "In addition to being a championship boxer, she was also the starting running back and star linebacker with the Tampa Bay Force, a professional female football league," Prisco added. "So MMA will actually be her third pro sport and as much as we admire and respect fighters like Gina Carano, there's just not another female fighter on the planet who can match Chevelle's God-given athletic talent. I mean, can you even imagine Carano as a starting strong side linebacker in professional football, or as a four-time world champion in professional boxing? And when you combine Chevelle's off-the-charts athletic ability with the most ferocious killer instinct this side of a Freddy Krueger movie, you've got the makings of something very special. Already, her striking ability is probably best in all of female MMA; even the larger male fighters can't keep up with her during boxing sessions. If she continues to develop her ground game, works hard and maintains her focus, I don't think it's a stretch for Chevelle to be universally recognized as the best pound-for-pound female fighter in the sport by the end of 2009."
Hallback paused for a moment, imagining what it'll be like to step inside the XFC steel cage for the first time and showcase her talents in front of 12,000 friends and neighbors in her hometown of Tampa Bay. "I've boxed in Japan, Canada, California, Las Vegas all over the world, really. I'm so excited to finally be able to show everyone right here in my own backyard what Chevelle Hallback is all about. And what I'm about is world championships. If I can win five combined world titles in boxing and MMA, I'll undeniably go down in history as the greatest female fighter of all time
and that's a legacy worth spilling blood for. 'Cause I absolutely guarantee you, the blood that's spilled won't be my own."