The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) has come a long way since being all but banned from television towards the end of the 1990s. A raft of new regulations, an image overhaul and a long-running reality television series have ensured that the UFC is now the fastest growing sports league on the planet.

“There are so many misconceptions about our sport that the only way to break those down is to let people see it,” explains Marshall Zelaznik, the UK president of the world’s leading mixed martial arts (MMA) series, the Ultimate Fighting Championship; a series that has been derided as brutally violent and akin to human cockfighting in the past. “This is the most exciting sporting event you’ll ever go to,” he says, “and I’ve been to all of them.”

With a reported US$44 million in losses by 2004, battered by an international media that wasn’t willing to look beyond its own sensationalist headlines, the UFC was on the brink of a collapse five years ago. Since then, however, an image makeover and a remarkable change of fortunes has seen the popularity of the series, and mixed martial arts fighting in general, catapulted to levels equivalent to the likes of any major sport around the world. The UFC has become arguably the fastest growing sports league anywhere in the world, and with it many of those misconceptions are being shattered.

“There are now 134 different countries and territories that show the UFC,” says Zelaznik. “It’s available to around 400 million people around the world and we’re pretty proud of those numbers. They’re up there with any of the biggest sports brands that you could imagine. We now have that kind of TV clearance.”

The UFC’s is a genuine story of rags to riches success. The Ultimate Fighting Championship was founded in Denver in 1993 by a group of businessmen who wanted to find the world’s best fighters regardless of their fighting style. Advertising executive Art Davie, jiu-jitsu instructor Rorion Gracie and entrepreneur Bob Meyrowithz decided to put on the event, which was run in a tournament format with the winner progressing to the next round, at the McNichols Sports Arena in Denver in a bid to find answers to questions such as, ‘can a wrestler beat a boxer?’ Although a number of rules were prescribed, the one-off fights were billed as ‘no holds barred’ with all fighting styles – boxing, kickboxing, wrestling, judo, jiu-jitsu etc – allowed. WOW (War of the Worlds) Promotions, the company that was set up to promote the event, eventually found a television partner in SEG, a pioneer in pay-per-view broadcasting. The idea was to establish the championship as a television franchise. 

The event met with instant success, attracting just under 87,000 pay-per-view subscribers, and soon enough similar events were being held, to crowds of between 2,000 and 5,000, on a fairly regular basis. Although there were in fact a handful of rules – no biting, no eye-gouging, with hair pulling, head butting, groin striking and fish hooking all frowned upon – the fact that WOW Promotions were playing on the ‘no holds barred’ element began to court controversy.

As the early incarnation of the UFC slowly built its fanbase, so the criticisms began to swell. One of the most outspoken and influential critics was US senator John McCain. In the autumn of 1996, McCain publically denounced the fledgling series as “barbaric” and no better than “human cockfighting”. He sent letters to all 50 US states urging them to take immediate steps to have the UFC restricted in their jurisdictions.

McCain’s political clout prevailed and the UFC, or at least ‘no holds barred’ fighting, was consequently banned in 36 states. Suggestions began to surface that McCain had received financial support from boxing promoters worried by the growing popularity of a rival sport. But finger-pointing was the last thing on the UFC’s mind. Indeed, alarmingly for the promoters, the UFC was also dropped from its pay-per-view deal. Meanwhile Davie, Gracie and co. had jumped ship, selling off the enterprise to SEG, a company that would soon be unable to broadcast its own product.

Knowing full well that a sport that is denied the oxygen of television publicity will suffocate quickly, SEG undertook a partial revamp of the series. Gone were the more unpalatable aspects of the sport. Defined weight classes were implemented for the first time, gloves became mandatory and kicks to a downed opponent, hair pulling, head butting and groin striking were officially outlawed. A greater emphasis was put on safety and an appeal was made to state athletic commissions throughout the country. Having agreed to adhere to the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board's unified rules of mixed martial arts combat, gradually and with little tweaks here and there, the UFC began to rebrand itself as a sport rather than a fairly violent, gladiatorial spectacle. The ‘no holds barred’ tag was dropped and the ‘mixed martial arts’ banner was adopted.

In 2001, persuaded by their friend Dana White who, in his job as an aerobic instructor had come into contact with the UFC and saw the burgeoning potential of the series, casino moguls Lorenzo and Frank Fertitta bought the UFC from SEG for the knockdown price of US$2 million. White was immediately installed as president. Spurred by the involvement of Lorenzo Fertitta, a former member, the Nevada State Athletic Commission gave the reborn series a major boost by voting to sanction its shows within the state. A new pay-per-view deal followed shortly afterwards. Las Vegas has been the UFC’s home ever since and, in truth, the series has never looked back.

Although the sport is still viewed as excessively violent in some quarters, it is at least viewed as a sport. The rule revamps, insists Zelaznik, “were everything. There was a time when the UFC was so abhorrent, it was like, ‘who would want this?’ They had porn on television in the US but God forbid you had the UFC. The regulation of the sport really saved the UFC because, without it, they would have lost all television distribution. That change allowed more fighters to come in because they could see that it wasn’t just a spectacle; it was a sport. That made more arenas want it; that made more groups willing to associate themselves with it and, by that, I mean sponsors.”