The UFC will now team up with Riyadh Season for their much talked about UFC 306 event at The Sphere in Las Vegas to celebrate Mexican Independence Day on September 14th.
And in a highly unusual move for the company that means that the event will now be known as ‘Riyadh Season Noche UFC’.
“This will be one of the biggest sporting events of all time,” UFC CEO Dana White said in a statement. “What we’re going to pull off at Sphere will never be done again. This will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience for sports fans. At the same time, this is going to be an incredible tribute to the Mexican people for their extraordinary contributions to combat sports. We’re thrilled that Turki Alalshikh and the Saudi General Entertainment Authority have stepped up to partner with us to make this the greatest event in the history of combat sports. Their participation shows just how massive the interest is from all over the world. Riyadh Season Noche UFC will be unforgettable.”
“This will be a milestone moment as it will be the first sporting event to take place at Sphere in Las Vegas,” Turki Alalshikh, Saudi Arabia’s chairman of the general entertainment authority for entertainment said. “The UFC brand is recognized globally with its huge fanbase, and this aligns with our own vision for Riyadh Season to collaborate to create and stage world-class events.”
White had recently talked about how the UFC had already spent a fortune on the event, which at this stage doesn’t have any fights booked, but is expected to be a visual spectacle.
“I’m already $17 million into this thing, and it’s not ’til September,” White told The Hollywood Reporter. “And when you think about U2 going in there, the money that they spent was amortized over 40 shows. We’re going in one time, one night, and that’s it. So, it’s crazy.”
