Following last night’s UFC 306 event the recipients of the evening’s $50,000 bonus awards were announced.
Earning ‘Fight Of The Night’ honors were handed to the main card scrap between Esteban Ribovics and Daniel Zellhuber, which proved to be a three-round stand-up thriller that’s also now been tipped to also be a ‘Fight of The Year’ contender.
The fight was back-and-forth throughout, with Zellhuber having the size and reach advantage to aid his striking from range, but Ribovics was always willing to press forward into closer quarters to land his impactful offense. The third round in particular was remarkable, with Zellhuber managing to floor his opponent with a big elbow strike, only for Ribovics to then get back up and seize the momentum soon after by rocking the Mexican with an overhand right.
With Zellhuber on wobbly legs and Ribovics absolutely teeing off on him with a seemingly endless barrage of heavy blows it seemed almost inevitable that a finish was on the card, but on Mexican Independence Day Zellhuber showed the famed warrior spirit of his people to weather the storm and continue battling on until the end, with both men landing more big punches before the final horn sounded. The close nature of the fight overall led to a split-decision verdict, with Ribovics emerging the winner (29-28 x2, 28-29).
One of two ‘Performance Of The Night’ bonuses went to prelim fighter Ketlen Souza, who dropped Yazmin Jauregui with a right hook in the opening round and then managed to sink in a fight-ending rear-naked choke on the mat soon after.
Also earning a performance bonus was Ignacoi Bahamondes, who sent the onrushing Manuel Torres crashing to the canvas twice in quick succession in the first round, with the latter leading to follow-up punches on the mat to seal a TKO victory.
