ONE Championship

Two World Titles in five months is the kind of run that usually takes fighters years to assemble.

Stella Hemetsberger makes the first defense of her ONE Women’s Strawweight Muay Thai World Title against Natalia Diachkova in the main event of ONE Fight Night 46, broadcasting live in US primetime this Friday, August 14, from Bangkok’s Lumpinee Stadium. The RS-GYM and Phuket Fight Club representative first beat Jackie Buntan at ONE Fight Night 35 to capture the vacant Muay Thai crown, then dethroned her again five months later for the kickboxing title in another five-round battle.

That double triumph made Hemetsberger just the third female athlete in ONE Championship history to hold titles in two disciplines, joining Stamp Fairtex and Janet Todd. The path there traces back to 2022, when she walked into Phuket Fight Club as an amateur and began drawing inspiration from training alongside ONE Women’s Atomweight Muay Thai World Champion Allycia Hellen Rodrigues.

“I think that experience of becoming a double champion gives me the motivation to always get better and become a better fighter. Each fight, I’m aiming to get better and better until I’m the best version of myself,” she said.

Stella Hemetsberger stays grounded in new spotlight

That same trajectory now places Hemetsberger among the sport’s most closely watched champions, a level of attention that took some getting used to for someone who spent years quietly climbing the ranks in relative anonymity.

Rodrigues’ influence on her development has never faded, even as Hemetsberger has since matched and, in the eyes of some, surpassed her one-time training partner’s standing in the sport.

“Honestly, I feel very weird talking about myself, like, as a star, because I feel like I’m still the same person. Like, for me, it hasn’t changed that much. But yeah, it’s cool to have achieved those goals in ONE Championship,” she said.

This article appeared first on BJPENN.COM