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After 17 years of professional fighting, Rory MacDonald is hanging up his gloves.
The Kelowna native, who now calls Montreal home, took to social media on Sunday to announce his retirement from mixed martial arts.
He expressed gratitude for the sport and the people he met on his near-two-decade journey as a fighter.
“I started this sport as a 14-year-old kid,” wrote the now-33-year-old. “I still remember my first day and knowing this is what I (want to) spend my life doing.”
MacDonald’s announcement came in the wake of his upset first-round loss to Dilano Taylor in the Professional Fighters League (PFL) semi final in Wales over the weekend.
Taylor was a third-choice alternate who stepped in to the spot on Thursday after MacDonald’s original opponent, Russian Magomed Umalatov, was unable to get into Britain due to visa issues.
It was the Canadian’s fourth loss in his last five fights, which dropped his record to 23-10-1, but there was a time where MacDonald was near the top of the MMA world.
In July 2015, he fought for the welterweight title at UFC 189, but lost the bloody bout via TKO in the fifth round.
MacDonald fought one more time in the UFC before moving over to Bellator, where he won the welterweight belt with a win over Douglas Lima at Bellator 192 in January 2018.
His short-lived PFL career was delayed due to COVID-19 and he went 2-4 in PFL fights over 15 months.
MacDonald’s skills were originally honed under David Lea at Toshido MMA in Kelowna and he stayed with Lea even after moving to Montreal to train alongside Georges St. Pierre.
“I’m so thankful to God for putting that gym, Toshido MMA in Kelowna, in my path,” MacDonald wrote in his retirement post. “It truly changed the direction of my life and saved me!”