If you were impressed with the action at the recent UFC show in the Ericsson Globe Arean, wait until you see what happens on May 26. That’s the message from Marcus Luer, president of GLORY Sports International (GSI) who says that fight fans are in for a treat when the GLORY – First 16 commences on May 26. This is quite simply the Formula One of fighting, he says. The absolute best fighters from the absolute best teams competing for a grand prize of $300,000, which is unrivalled in the 70 kilo weight category. The kickboxing world recently went through some turmoil with the decline of K-1. We felt it was essential that there remains a premier league of kickboxing and so GLORY collected all the best fighters, the top names and the top talent, to make the most prestigious fighting tournament of the year.
The UFC visited Stockholm on April 14 and while the show was a big success and an enjoyable event, Luer wonders if the fans got total value for money. I mean no disrespect to any fighters on the UFC card, they are all great athletes and standouts in their weight class, but I have to admit I was a little disappointed in the fact that there were not really any star names at the show.
The tickets were quite expensive - perhaps there’s an element of people paying for the UFC name, he reflects. “Ours are much more reasonably priced and we believe we provide much more value for money. “ With GLORY - the fighters you will be seeing - and paying less for, I might add - are names recognizable to every kickboxing fan in the world. The May 26 event features numerous superstar names that you could previously only see together on one night if you flew to Tokyo. Giorgio Petrosyan and Albert Kraus are two of the all-time greats and future Hall of Fame of the sport, Semmy Schilt is a living legend, Gokhan Saki is carving out his own legend and Sergei Kharitonov basically guarantees knockouts and wars every time he steps into the ring - and those names are only a fraction of our Stockholm card. Luer also noticed something else about the UFCs recent show - it seemed to attract a number of people who would not otherwise normally visit a fight event. He hopes that they had a good experience and that it proved to be an eye-opener for first-timers.
There was a good atmosphere that night and it seemed everybody enjoyed themselves. I can guarantee them that the atmosphere will be even better on May 26 - and so will the action. There is a grace, fluidity and tremendous athleticism to elite kickboxing that any sports fan, man or woman, can immediately appreciate. We also have more entertainment planned between fights. For me, switching back and forth between fights and loud music over the speakers is just very basic level of entertainment and for GLORY that is not enough. We want to give the fans much more of an entertainment experience and not just a pure fighting event.