Watch: A tour inside UFC's Fight Island set up
The video gives a behind the scenes glimpse of the fight festival’s final preparations…
As by now most of us are fully aware, Yas Island is hosting the upcoming UFC event, Fight Island.
It’s a huge mixed martial arts (MMA) festival, sealed off from the rest of the world to provide a pandemic era safe zone for the fighters, coaching teams and event staff.
Here we get a tantalising glimpse of Fight Island’s layout, and a quick visiual tour of both the Flash Arena (where the fights will take place) and the very Enter The Dragon looking Beach Octagon.
The great news for athletes (and bad news for Bruce Lee fans) is that the Beach Octagon will only be used for training sessions.
تتواصل الاستعدادات لاستضافة فعاليات جزيرة النزال من “يو إف سي” في #أبوظبي، فيما تم الإعلان عن إغلاق مسافة 11 كيلومتراً في جزيرة ياس تمثل امتداد المنطقة الآمنة المخصصة لأكثر من 2500 شخص من القائمين على الفعالية. pic.twitter.com/SSL7hm3Vto
— مكتب أبوظبي الإعلامي (@admediaoffice) July 5, 2020
Who’s fighting
There are four separate events taking place over the course of this Fight Island festival, comprised of 47 fights in 15 days.
It begins with UFC 251 on July 12, with three follow-up Fight Nights taking place on July 16, July 19 and July 26.
In a dramatic turn of events, one of the fighters in the healdline bout for UFC251, the Brazillian, Gilbert Burns tested positive for Covid-19 before travelling to the UAE, so he will have to sit this event out.
Instead, American Jorge Masvidal will now take on Kamaru Usman for the welterweight crown in Sunday’s event.
Other big fights on July 12 include: a featherweight title contention match between Alexander Volkanovski and Max Holloway and a bantamweight title bout between Petr Yan and UFC legend Jose Aldo.
On July 16 we get to see fights between Carla Esparza and Marina Rodriguez; and Calvin Kattar and Dan Ige.
Headlining the July 19 fight night is a flyweight title fight between Deiveson Figueiredo and Joseph Benavidez.
And topping the bill for that July 26 engagement is a middleweight fight between former champion Robert Whittaker and Brit contender Darren Till.
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For a full list of confirmed fights check out our guide.
How to watch
UAE fans will be able to watch all the fights via the welcome.ufcarabia.com app.
UFC 251 begins at 2am local time on Sunday, July 12 and will be screened on Pay Per View internationally.
ESPN will then screen the remaining Fight Nights.
The first being in Thursday, July 16 at 3am local time; the next on Sunday, July 19 from 1am local time; and the final one on Sunday, July 26 from 1am local time.
Images: Twitter