95 Fun Facts About MMA

Boxer Art Jimmerson famously wore just one of what at UFC 1?

Boxing glove: Jimmerson kept one on his jab hand and left his punching hand bare, but he was taken down and tapped out within minutes, and was known as 'One Glove' ever after.

Which U.S. city hosted the inaugural UFC event?

Denver, Colorado, got UFC 1 because its organizers found that the state's rules would let bare-knuckle fights go ahead at McNichols Sports Arena.

Which women's MMA pioneer went on to star in Haywire and The Mandalorian?

Gina Carano's 2009 title bout on Showtime was the first time two women headlined a major MMA event; two years later Steven Soderbergh built the thriller Haywire around her.

The final of the first UFC tournament ended with which choke, still a staple of MMA?

Rear-naked choke: applied from behind, it made a Dutch savate fighter tap in the UFC 1 final, hours after he had kicked a sumo wrestler's teeth out in the night's opening bout.

What is the widely recognized nickname of the Irish fighter Conor McGregor?

Conor McGregor fights as 'The Notorious'; under that name he won the UFC featherweight title by knocking out José Aldo at UFC 194 in December 2015.

Which promotion did UFC owner Zuffa buy in 2011, then shut down and absorb?

Strikeforce began as Scott Coker's San Jose kickboxing promotion in 1985 and staged MMA only from 2006; Zuffa bought it in March 2011 and folded it after a final show in January 2013.

Ben Askren reached the UFC in 2018 through a fighter trade with which Asian promotion?

ONE Championship let Askren, its retired, unbeaten welterweight champion, go to the UFC and took a former UFC flyweight champion in exchange, a swap of the kind MMA had hardly seen.

How much did the Fertitta brothers pay to buy the UFC in January 2001?

$2 million bought the struggling UFC for Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta in January 2001; in 2016 they sold it to a group led by WME-IMG for about $4 billion.

Which fighter set the UFC record of 11 consecutive title defenses from 2013 to 2017?

Demetrious Johnson passed the old record of 10 with his 11th straight flyweight defense in October 2017, letting go of a suplex in mid-air to snatch an armbar on Ray Borg.

Which ancient Greek Olympic combat sport is often called a forerunner of modern MMA?

Pankration mixed boxing and wrestling and banned only biting and eye-gouging; Pausanias tells of Arrhichion, crowned Olympic champion as a corpse because his opponent gave up first.

Who was the first fighter to win UFC titles in two different weight divisions?

Randy Couture won the heavyweight belt in 1997 and the light heavyweight belt in 2003, retired in 2006, then came back a year later at 43 and beat the 6ft 8in Tim Sylvia to rule the heavyweights again.

Which format do most non-title UFC fights follow?

Three five-minute rounds with a minute's rest between them is the Unified Rules standard; UFC 2 in 1994 had no rounds, no time limit and no judges, so a fight ran until someone quit or was stopped.

Which former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion is famously known by the nickname 'The Iceman'?

Chuck Liddell was named 'The Iceman' by his trainer John Hackleman, who watched him sit calmly in the locker room before an early kickboxing bout, showing no nerves at all.

The UFC's pandemic-era 'Fight Island' cards of 2020 were staged on Yas Island in which city?

Abu Dhabi closed off part of Yas Island as a safe zone in July 2020, so that fighters kept out of the United States by pandemic travel limits could still compete.

Lyoto Machida and Stephen 'Wonderboy' Thompson brought which traditional striking art's style to the UFC?

Karate: Machida learned the Shotokan style from his father, a Japanese master who had emigrated to Brazil, and used it to knock out the unbeaten Rashad Evans for a UFC title in 2009.

Who took the strawweight title from Joanna Jędrzejczyk with a first-round knockout at UFC 217?

Rose Namajunas handed the champion the first defeat of her MMA career in November 2017, ending a run of five title defenses, then won their rematch on points five months later.

Who was appointed UFC president when Zuffa bought the promotion in 2001?

Dana White was managing UFC fighters when he learned the promotion was for sale and alerted Lorenzo Fertitta, whom he had first met at high school in Las Vegas.

Which UFC Lightweight champion retired undefeated at 29-0?

Khabib Nurmagomedov retired in the cage at 29-0 after UFC 254 in October 2020: his father and coach had died that summer, and he had promised his mother this fight would be his last.

What is the name of the cage in which UFC fights take place?

The Octagon won out over wilder ideas for the first UFC event, among them a moat with alligators and an electrified fence; the eight-sided cage is now a UFC trademark.

Who is often referred to as 'The Last Emperor' in the sport of MMA?

Fedor Emelianenko, 'The Last Emperor', went unbeaten for nearly a decade, a run that ended in June 2010 when Fabrício Werdum trapped him in a triangle armbar barely a minute into their fight.

Besides title fights, which UFC bouts run five rounds?

Main events have run to five rounds since UFC 138 in 2011; the first of them, Chris Leben against Mark Muñoz, never needed the extra time, because Leben's corner stopped it after two.

What is the MMA term for taking an opponent down and striking them from a dominant top position?

Ground and pound was developed by wrestling-based UFC pioneers such as Dan Severn and Don Frye, who found that holding a striker down was not enough to win and began punching from the top.

Who is known as 'The Spider' in MMA?

Anderson Silva says he became 'The Spider' after wearing a Spider-Man shirt before a fight, when the ring announcer introduced him as 'Brazil's Spiderman'.

Which network took over the UFC's US broadcasts in 2019 when its seven-year Fox deal ended?

ESPN agreed to pay about $1.5 billion for five years of UFC rights and moved many of the fights, and later every pay-per-view, onto its ESPN+ streaming service.

Which Olympic wrestling gold medalist went on to hold UFC titles in two weight classes at the same time?

Henry Cejudo won freestyle wrestling gold at Beijing 2008 aged 21, then held the UFC flyweight and bantamweight belts together in 2019: three titles, hence his nickname 'Triple C'.

Which featherweight is known as 'The Korean Zombie'?

Chan Sung Jung earned the name for the way he kept walking forward through punches; in 2011 he landed the first twister submission in UFC history.

UFC 306 in September 2024 was the first live sporting event held at which Las Vegas venue?

Sphere, opened in 2023 as a concert hall wrapped in screens, was booked for a one-off card over Mexican Independence Day weekend that the UFC billed as 'Noche UFC'.

Who knocked out Ben Askren with a flying knee five seconds into their UFC 239 bout?

Jorge Masvidal rushed in at the opening bell and caught Ben Askren with a flying knee as he dived for a takedown in July 2019, breaking Duane Ludwig's record for the UFC's fastest knockout.

Which greasy substance does a cutman smear on a fighter's face before a bout?

Petroleum jelly makes the skin slippery, so a glove is more likely to slide off than tear it; too much is frowned on, because it ends up on the gloves and then in a fighter's eyes.

Which striking art, known as 'the art of eight limbs', anchors many MMA fighters' stand-up game?

Muay Thai earns the name because fighters strike with eight points of the body, two each of fists, elbows, knees and shins, where a boxer has only two.

Who is known as 'The Prodigy' in MMA?

BJ Penn earned the nickname before his MMA career, after becoming the first non-Brazilian to win the black-belt world jiu-jitsu championship only a few years after starting the sport.

Which brand's 2015 uniform deal with the UFC ended fighters' personal sponsor logos in the cage?

Reebok became the UFC's exclusive outfitter in July 2015, and athletes were paid by the number of UFC bouts they had fought in place of the sponsor banners they once sold themselves.

Which middleweight striker is nicknamed 'The Last Stylebender'?

Israel Adesanya, a lifelong anime fan, adapted 'The Last Stylebender' from the animated series Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Which pioneer of women's MMA was the first female fighter signed by the UFC?

Ronda Rousey signed in November 2012 and was declared bantamweight champion at a press conference before she had fought in the UFC, then defended the belt in its first women's bout.

Who knocked out Alexander Volkanovski at UFC 298 in 2024 to win the featherweight title?

Ilia Topuria ended Volkanovski's four-year reign with a second-round knockout, then gave the belt up in 2025 to move up a division and won the lightweight title as well.

What is it called when a referee stops a fight because a fighter can no longer defend intelligently, though conscious?

A Technical Knockout (TKO) is the referee's call that a fighter cannot safely continue, even while conscious; a KO means they are out.

Whose 2022 win at UFC 276 gave him the record for most UFC victories outright?

Jim Miller came into UFC 276 tied with Donald Cerrone on 23 UFC wins and settled it against Cerrone himself with a second-round guillotine choke; Cerrone retired in the cage minutes later.

Which comedian began at the UFC as a backstage interviewer in 1997 and became its best-known commentator?

Joe Rogan was starring in the sitcom NewsRadio when he first worked a UFC show; offered the commentary seat in the Zuffa era, he at first declined because he just wanted to watch the fights.

Which Mexican flyweight is known as 'The Assassin Baby'?

Brandon Moreno was cut by the UFC in late 2018, fought his way back within a year and in 2021 became the first Mexican fighter to win a UFC championship.

Which referee, famous for 'Let's get it on!', helped write MMA's Unified Rules?

John McCarthy, a Los Angeles police officer known as 'Big John', refereed from UFC 2 onwards and pushed the promotion to add rules; his cry was a catchphrase boxing referee Mills Lane had used before him.

Which announcer has introduced UFC fighters with the cry 'It's time!' since the 1990s?

Bruce Buffer first announced a UFC bout in 1996; he is the half-brother of boxing's 'Let's get ready to rumble' announcer Michael Buffer, and became his manager in the mid-1990s.

Which lightweight from Lafayette, Louisiana, is nicknamed 'The Diamond'?

Dustin Poirier won the interim UFC lightweight title in 2019 and beat Conor McGregor twice in 2021; he has auctioned his fight-night kits to raise money for causes in his home state.

Which verdict means two judges picked one fighter and the third scored a draw?

Majority decision: Leon Edwards kept his welterweight title this way in London in 2023 despite losing a point for grabbing the fence, as two judges scored it 48-46 for him and the third 47-47.

Which strike to the head of a downed opponent was legal in Japan's Pride but is banned under the Unified Rules?

Soccer kicks, stomps and knees to a grounded fighter's head were all legal in Pride's ring, but for its first show outside Japan, in Las Vegas in 2006, Pride had to give them up under Nevada's rules.

Who is known as 'The Lioness' in women's MMA?

Amanda Nunes fights as 'The Lioness' ('Leoa' in Portuguese); in June 2023 she won a one-sided bantamweight title defense and announced her retirement in the cage moments later.

Ronda Rousey won an Olympic bronze medal in which martial art before switching to MMA?

Judo: Rousey took bronze in the 70 kg class at Beijing 2008, then carried the sport's armbar into the cage, where it became her signature finish.

Which pro wrestling star made his MMA debut at UFC 203 in 2016 and was submitted in the first round?

CM Punk had no professional fights when he faced Mickey Gall; he lost his second UFC bout on points in 2018, a result later changed to a no contest, and never fought again.

Which cable channel first aired The Ultimate Fighter in 2005?

Spike TV wanted sports programming but had no budget for rights fees, while the UFC saw the reality show as a last resort for mainstream exposure; it ran there for fourteen seasons.

Who won the UFC 1 tournament in 1993?

Royce Gracie, the slight Brazilian, submitted three men in one night at UFC 1 and went on to win the UFC 2 and UFC 4 tournaments as well.

Which US senator led a campaign to ban the early UFC as 'human cockfighting'?

Senator John McCain sent letters to the governors of all 50 states in 1996 asking them to ban the UFC, and one state after another went on to outlaw no-holds-barred fighting.

Which state's ban, passed a day before the event, forced UFC 12 to relocate to Dothan, Alabama?

New York outlawed no-holds-barred fighting less than a day before the Niagara Falls show in 1997, so fighters, staff and the cage itself had to get to Alabama overnight.

Which state's athletic board sanctioned UFC 28 in 2000 under the rules that became MMA's Unified Rules?

New Jersey's State Athletic Control Board began allowing MMA in September 2000 and sanctioned UFC 28 in Atlantic City that November; the rules it settled in April 2001 spread across North America.

In 2023 the UFC merged with which company to form TKO Group Holdings?

WWE and the UFC were merged into TKO Group Holdings in September 2023; WWE's Vince McMahon became executive chairman, then resigned in January 2024 amid a sex-trafficking lawsuit.

Which Lion's Den founder was one of the first two UFC Hall of Fame inductees in 2003?

Ken Shamrock, founder of the Lion's Den gym, was inducted at UFC 45 in November 2003; dubbed 'The World's Most Dangerous Man' by ABC News, he spent the late 1990s as a WWF pro wrestler.

Who beat Stephan Bonnar in the famous 2005 Ultimate Fighter season one finale?

Forrest Griffin beat Stephan Bonnar by unanimous decision on April 9, 2005; the UFC gave the loser a contract on the spot too, and both men later entered the UFC Hall of Fame.

Which 2018 event drew a then-record 2.4 million UFC pay-per-view buys?

UFC 229 in October 2018, headlined by Khabib Nurmagomedov against Conor McGregor, sold about 2.4 million pay-per-views, a UFC record at the time; a brawl spilled out of the cage afterwards.

Which former boxing world champion won the UFC bantamweight title in Melbourne in 2015?

Holly Holm, a former multi-division boxing world champion, knocked out the unbeaten Ronda Rousey with a second-round head kick at UFC 193 in November 2015 as a huge underdog.

Pride was created in 1997 to match pro wrestler Nobuhiko Takada against which BJJ star?

Rickson Gracie had become a star in Japan by winning the Vale Tudo Japan tournaments of 1994 and 1995; he beat Takada at the first Pride show and again by armbar a year later.

Which Japanese fighter earned the nickname 'The Gracie Hunter' by beating four members of the family?

Kazushi Sakuraba beat four Gracies between November 1999 and December 2000; one of the bouts, at the 2000 Pride Grand Prix, ran for 90 minutes before his opponent's corner threw in the towel.

Shooto was founded in 1985 by Satoru Sayama, better known as which pro wrestling star?

The original Tiger Mask wanted a realistic fighting system; Shooto became a promotion in 1989, years before the UFC existed.

What does the Brazilian term 'vale tudo' mean in English?

'Vale tudo' is Portuguese for 'anything goes'; in the United States the same near-ruleless format was marketed as 'no holds barred' fighting.

Which Japanese promotion did former Pride boss Nobuyuki Sakakibara launch in 2015 with a New Year's Eve show?

Rizin stages its fights in a roped ring under rules inherited from Pride, and it brought back its predecessor's tradition of holding major cards on New Year's Eve.

Which promotion, founded in 2012, is dedicated entirely to women's MMA?

Invicta FC was founded in 2012 by Shannon Knapp and Janet Martin after women fighters, worried that a 2011 buyout had left them without a stage, began calling Knapp for help.

Who became the first UFC Heavyweight Champion by submitting Dan Severn at UFC 12?

Mark Coleman, an NCAA champion wrestler at Ohio State, made Dan Severn tap to a neck crank at UFC 12 in 1997, and three years later won Pride's first open-weight Grand Prix in Japan.

Who did Jon Jones beat at UFC 128 to win the light heavyweight title aged 23?

Maurício Rua, the Brazilian known as 'Shogun', was stopped in the third round at UFC 128 in March 2011, hours after Jon Jones had helped to catch a robber in a Paterson park that morning.

Jon Jones's 2009 disqualification loss to Matt Hamill was for which illegal technique?

12-to-6 elbows, dropped straight down like a clock hand from twelve to six, got Jones disqualified from a fight he was dominating; the Unified Rules finally legalized the strike in November 2024.

Who knocked out Anderson Silva to take the middleweight title at UFC 162 in 2013?

Chris Weidman knocked out a showboating Anderson Silva with a left hook at UFC 162 in July 2013; in the December rematch Silva's leg broke on a checked kick.

Who became the first British UFC champion by knocking out Luke Rockhold at UFC 199?

Michael Bisping took the UFC 199 fight on 17 days' notice in June 2016 and knocked out Luke Rockhold in the first round, 18 months after Rockhold had choked him out in their first meeting.

Who won the welterweight title at UFC 69 as a huge underdog, one of MMA's biggest upsets?

Matt Serra, a Long Island jiu-jitsu black belt, stopped Georges St-Pierre with punches in the first round at UFC 69 in April 2007, having earned the shot by winning The Ultimate Fighter 4.

Which future UFC heavyweight champion was cut by the NFL's Minnesota Vikings in 2004?

Brock Lesnar had walked away from pro wrestling to try out for the NFL when the Vikings cut him in the 2004 pre-season; four years later he won the UFC heavyweight title in only his fourth MMA fight.

Who lost the UFC women's featherweight title in just 51 seconds at UFC 232?

Cris Cyborg was knocked out by Amanda Nunes in 51 seconds at UFC 232 in December 2018, her first defeat since her 2005 debut; Nunes became the first woman to hold two UFC belts at once.

Who headlined the first MMA card on prime-time network TV, EliteXC: Primetime, in 2008?

Kimbo Slice, the Miami street fighter turned YouTube sensation, beat James Thompson in the main event on May 31, 2008; CBS aired the card as EliteXC Saturday Night Fights.

Whose left high kick was famously summed up as 'right leg, hospital; left leg, cemetery'?

Mirko Cro Cop took his ring name from his day job in Croatia's Lučko anti-terrorist police unit; his left high kick carried him to the 2006 Pride Open-Weight Grand Prix title.

Which Pride star nicknamed 'The Axe Murderer' came out of Chute Boxe Academy in Curitiba?

Wanderlei Silva won the 2003 Pride Middleweight Grand Prix and twice finished Quinton 'Rampage' Jackson with knees from the clinch.

Dwayne Johnson played which MMA pioneer in the 2025 film The Smashing Machine?

Mark Kerr, a two-time UFC tournament winner, let HBO cameras follow his addiction to painkillers for a 2002 documentary of the same name; Benny Safdie's 2025 film retells that story.

Ex-UFC heavyweight champ Francis Ngannou, who boxed Tyson Fury, was born in which country?

Francis Ngannou was born in Batié, Cameroon, and went to work in a sand quarry at the age of 10; as an adult he left for Europe to become a boxer and for a time slept rough in Paris.

Who was the first Chinese fighter to win a UFC championship?

Zhang Weili took the strawweight belt from Jéssica Andrade in 42 seconds in Shenzhen in August 2019 and regained it in November 2022 by submitting Carla Esparza.

Who knocked out Justin Gaethje in the final second of UFC 300 to win the 'BMF' belt?

Max Holloway pointed to the canvas with ten seconds left and knocked Justin Gaethje out at 4:59 of the fifth round at UFC 300 in April 2024, collecting $600,000 in bonuses.

Stipe Miocic kept which day job throughout his UFC heavyweight title reigns?

Stipe Miocic worked part-time as a firefighter and paramedic in the Cleveland suburbs of Oakwood and Valley View all through his title reigns, then went full-time with the service in 2022.

Joanna Jędrzejczyk was the first UFC champion from which country?

Joanna Jędrzejczyk, from Olsztyn, Poland, switched to MMA only in 2012, won her UFC title less than three years later and defended it five times before her first defeat.

Ex-champion Tito Ortiz won a 2020 city council seat in which California city?

Tito Ortiz, 'The Huntington Beach Bad Boy', won a seat on his hometown's council in November 2020 and was sworn in as mayor pro tempore, but resigned less than six months later.

Which country banned MMA as a sport in 2016, then legalized it in 2020?

France formally banned MMA in 2016 and legalized it in January 2020 under the French Boxing Federation; the UFC held its first Paris card in September 2022.

Who replaced injured Rafael dos Anjos on 11 days' notice at UFC 196 and won by submission?

Nate Diaz, the Stockton brawler, took the bout at welterweight with no time to cut weight and choked out featherweight champion Conor McGregor in the second round of UFC 196 in March 2016.

How did Conor McGregor's 2017 boxing match against Floyd Mayweather end?

A tenth-round stoppage: the referee's call took Mayweather's unbeaten record to 50-0, one better than the 49-0 that Rocky Marciano had retired with.

Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton play estranged brothers in which 2011 MMA film?

Warrior, directed by Gavin O'Connor, pits Hardy's Tommy against Edgerton's Brendan Conlon in the Sparta tournament; Nick Nolte earned an Oscar nomination as their father.

Which UFC champion fought under the nickname 'The Nigerian Nightmare'?

Kamaru Usman borrowed the name from Christian Okoye, the Kansas City Chiefs running back of the late 1980s, who holds the trademark on it and gave Usman his blessing.

Leon Edwards, the former welterweight champion raised in Birmingham, was born in which country?

Leon Edwards was born in Kingston, Jamaica, and lived in a one-room house there before his family moved to Birmingham, England, when he was nine.

Before MMA, Alexander Volkanovski played which sport semi-professionally?

Volkanovski played rugby league as a front rower for the Warilla Gorillas at around 97 kg, far above the 66 kg featherweight limit he later made as champion.

Which bantamweight passed Georges St-Pierre in January 2025 for the most takedowns landed in UFC history?

Merab Dvalishvili, 'The Machine', overtook Georges St-Pierre's long-standing mark of 90 UFC takedowns; against Petr Yan in March 2023 he attempted 49 takedowns in one fight, a single-bout record.

Islam Makhachev, UFC lightweight champion from 2022 to 2025, hails from which Russian republic?

Islam Makhachev was born in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan; he won the vacant title in 2022 by submitting Charles Oliveira and gave it up in 2025 to win the welterweight belt.

The UFC 264 main event ended in round one when one fighter broke which bone?

Conor McGregor's left tibia snapped as he stepped back just before the first-round horn against Dustin Poirier at UFC 264 in July 2021; the ringside doctor waved off the trilogy fight.

How many seconds did José Aldo's first UFC title defeat at UFC 194 last?

Conor McGregor's left hand dropped José Aldo 13 seconds into UFC 194 in December 2015, Aldo's first loss in over ten years, snapping an 18-fight winning streak.

Bas Rutten was a three-time 'King' of which Japanese promotion?

Pancrase, founded in 1993 by pro wrestlers Masakatsu Funaki and Minoru Suzuki, staged its first real-fight card in September 1993, weeks before UFC 1; Rutten won the King of Pancrase title three times.

Alex Pereira held two titles at once in which kickboxing promotion before joining the UFC?

Glory crowned Alex Pereira in two weight classes at once, a first for the promotion; he had taken up kickboxing in 2009, aged 21, to beat an alcohol addiction that began in his boyhood.

Which promotion acquired Bellator in November 2023?

PFL bought Bellator from Paramount in November 2023, weeks after Showtime said it was closing its sports division, and retired the Bellator name altogether in January 2025.