UFC 129: Georges St. Pierre Breaking News
By Sean Farrell
The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) has issued a statement in regards to UFC 129. The venue is taking place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on Saturday April 30th, 2011. The UFC announced today that tickets for UFC 129 St. Pierre vs. Shields at the Rogers Centre in Toronto sold out just minutes after being made available to the public. Rogers Centre was originally configured for only 42,000 seats, but the demand for the event was skyrocketing, UFC and Rogers Centre officials then reconfigured the venue to accommodate 55,000.
UFC 129 St. Pierre vs. Shields will be the first major mixed martial arts event to ever be held in Ontario. This event doubles the largest gate and attendance records in UFC history. The gate record for a UFC event prior to this one was $5.4 million, which was set on Dec. 30, 2006 at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas for UFC 66 Liddell vs. Ortiz II. The attendance record was held by UFC 124 St. Pierre vs. Koscheck 2 which was held at the Bell Centre in Montreal on Dec. 11, 2010 with over 23,000 fans attending the venue.
With the April event already demolishing two UFC records already, UFC 129 will also be the largest single-day event in the history of the Rogers Centre, a world renowned arena which has played host to many of the world’s best entertainment artist and sporting events.
UFC President Dana White released a statement regarding the colossal event stating “UFC continues to set new milestones, we’ve sold 55,000 tickets in our first stadium event in Toronto and we continue to take the UFC to the next level.” With Canada showing so much interest in the sport of mixed martial arts, just how long until the rest of the world decides to grab a piece of the pie?
RSR is Now Hiring Boxing Writers (2 Slots Open)