UFC Heading To China This November

[No More Sorrow]

After being on the radar screen for a while, and talked about more prominently over the last several months, China will finally get its first UFC event.


The UFC on Nov. 10 will head to Macau for UFC on FUEL TV 6. The news was announced Tuesday night on "UFC Tonight" on FUEL TV.


No fights have yet been named for the event, but the main card will air on FUEL TV and prelims, as with past FUEL events, are likely to stream on Facebook.


Macau, with a population of around 550,000, is similar to Hong Kong in that it operates as a special administrative region of China, which has an overall population of more than 1.3 billion.


The event will take place at The Venetian Macao-Resort-Hotel, a 40-story property that opened in 2007 with a $2.4 billion price tag. The property, which is modeled after The Venetian hotel-resort in Las Vegas, features the world's largest casino and is one of Macau's most popular tourism destinations. The resort also is home to CotaiArena (previously Venetian Arena), a 15,000-seat indoor arena that in the past has hosted boxing events.


Nearly two years ago, the UFC announced a dedicated Asian operations branch with Mark Fischer as the executive vice president and managing director, the first step in a push toward bringing an event to China.


"It's a major step in the development if the UFC brand in China and across Asia, for that matter," Fischer said. "Ticket and fight card details are yet to come. We'll be announcing that at a later date, so stay tuned."


"Breaking into a market with a population of over 1.3 billion is both a testament to the growth of our sport and a long-term challenge we are excited to undertake," UFC CEO Lorenzo Fertitta stated. "This is just the first of many world-class fights we plan to hold over the coming years in China, one of the birthplaces of martial arts."


Earlier this year, UFC president Dana White said he expected an event in China to happen in 2012, and that will be the case.


"Very soon," White told MMAjunkie.com (UFC blog for UFC news, UFC rumors, fighter interviews and event previews/recaps | MMAjunkie.com) in March. "It will happen this year. We're this close. We are going to do a fight in China."


Tuesday night, following the announcement on FUEL TV, White said on Twitter: "We finally got China done!"

Too bad it's only going to be a Fuel show, this is the test to see if there's really a market their for UFC.

 

[Kiffy Lube]

Yeah, I bet this will be as bad the WWE house shows that they've done in China that I actually downloaded. Of course at least you probably won't have anything like Mark Henry suffering from jet leg trying to wrestle a 10+ minute match.

 

[rcoot93]

I think they could end up doing quite well in China if they can get a tv deal in place

 

[No More Sorrow]

Was just reading a pretty big rumor for this show, supposedly Jose Aldo and The Korean Zombie have been approached for a fight for the championship on this card.