A relentless work effort and desire to perfect her craft has allowed Claressa Shields to achieve as much as she has in the boxing world.

That same mindset has been applied to her mixed martial arts debut, and she can’t understand why anyone would assume she would approach it any other way.

“Any boxer that wants to come to MMA and don’t train in any other arts, those boxers are always going to lose,” Shields noted during a recent Zoom media conference call to discuss her upcoming MMA bout with Brittney Elkin. “Happily, I’m not like that. I’ve been at Jackson Wink (MMA Academy) for the past seven months. I had great sparring, I’ve done some jiu-jitsu, some wrestling.

“I’ve been doing all of the arts and mix them together to be the best fighter that I can be. That’s what we will do on Thursday. We have a game plan and I’m going to follow that game plan.”

Shields (11-0, 2KOs in boxing) will take to the cage for the first time, as she faces Colorado’s Elkin on a Professional Fighters League (PFL) show this Thursday on ESPN2 from Ocean Casino Resort in Atlantic City. The venture is a brief departure from her boxing career, where she has won championships in three weight divisions following a stellar amateur career that saw the Flint, Michigan native become the first-ever American boxer to capture back-to-back Olympic Gold medals.

The decision was a long time coming for Shields, further amplified by a 2020 campaign limited to just one fight—a 10-round shutout of Ivana Habazin last January to become a three-division champion after just 10 pro bouts. Shields has since added a 10-round win over previously unbeaten Marie-Eve Dicaire to become undisputed champion at junior middleweight atop an independent Pay-Per-View event this past March in her Flint hometown.

The show was staged while Shield was also cross training at Jackson Wink MMA Academy in Albuquerque, working with two-sport champion Holly Holm among others at the world class training facility. From there came the opportunity to participate in PFL, as she faces Elkin (3-6 in MMA, 0-1 in PFL) in a non-tournament affair.

“It’s not about training long but training correctly,” notes Shields, who still has designs to return to boxing as long as she is granted fair treatment. “Jackson Wink was the perfect place to help me train correctly. Holly Holm was able to help me. She made the transition to MMA from boxing. I felt like she would be able to help me with my transition.”

Albuquerque’s Holm is the only fighter in history to claim championships in boxing and in Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), and referred to by Shields as “the cheat code” to guide her own transition from the ring to the cage. Holm remains active in UFC, with her MMA career only enduring slight overlap with the end of her boxing career after having walked away from the sport for good in 2013. Her respective title reigns between the two sports are more than seven years apart.

Shields—who still serves as the lineal junior middleweight and middleweight champion in boxing—aims to become the first ever to simultaneously claim championship status in boxing and MMA. It first begins with getting past Elkin, a 34-year-old semi-retired fighter who holds a brown belt in jiu-jitsu.

“I don’t have any nerves because nerves don’t help you in a fight. I’m prepared for this,” insists Shields. “Now, if I had this fight four or five months ago, I would’ve been like ‘Oh my God!’ because I hadn’t really submerged myself in it yet. Now that I’ve been doing it for seven months,

“I’ve had so much training and so much time to learn and understand what I’m doing. I’m completely comfortable going into Thursday night. Instead of having nerves, I’m actually excited about Thursday night.”

Jake Donovan is a senior writer for BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox