UFC 80: Rapid Fire was a mixed martial arts (MMA) event held by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), that took place on January 19, 2008 at the Metro Radio Arena in Newcastle, England.

The main event was originally scheduled as an interim lightweight championship fight; however, then-lightweight champion Sean Sherk was stripped of his title after the California State Athletic Commission upheld his suspension for testing positive for the anabolic steroid Nandrolone. With the lightweight championship vacated, the Penn vs. Stevenson bout was altered to be for the undisputed lightweight championship.

At the end of this event, $35,000 was awarded to each of the fighters who received one of these three awards.

Joseph Christopher Stevenson (born June 15, 1982) is an American mixed martial artist fighting out of Hesperia, California. Competing as a welterweight, he won The Ultimate Fighter 2 welterweight tournament. Stevenson fought most of his UFC career as a lightweight, and made his featherweight debut at UFC Live: Kongo vs. Barry. Stevenson is noted for his effective use of the guillotine choke. 'Daddy' holds notable wins over Melvin Guillard, Yves Edwards, Nate Diaz, Spencer Fisher, Gleison Tibau, and Kurt Pellegrino. He holds an 8-8 record in the promotion.

Stevenson's father died from bone marrow cancer. Stevenson and his first wife, Lisa, have two sons, Joe Jr. and Tyler.

Stevenson and his second wife Maia have two sons, Frankie and Maximus.

He graduated in the class of 2000 from Silverado High School in Victorville, California.

Stevenson began wrestling at the age of 11 and started Jiu Jitsu at the age of 13. He moved to Las Vegas in 2004, and began training at Marc Laimon's Cobra Kai in Las Vegas. In March 2008, Stevenson opened his own school in his hometown of Victorville, California. "Joe Stevenson's Cobra Kai" teaches MMA as well as boxing, kickboxing, wrestling and Jiu Jitsu. On November 8, 2008, Stevenson earned his Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt under Robert Drysdale. After his loss to Diego Sanchez, Stevenson got a call from Rashad Evans for an invite to check out his camp at Jackson's Submission Fighting. After being reluctant at first, he finally joined Greg Jackson's camp in April 2009.

Gabriel Gonzaga-Nogueira (Portuguese pronunciation: [ɡabɾiˈew ɡõˈzaɡɐ]; born May 18, 1979), is a Brazilian professional mixed martial artist who currently competes for the Ultimate Fighting Championship. He holds a black belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, is a former member of Chute Boxe Academy and now fights out of Ludlow, Massachusetts as a part of Team Link. Gonzaga won by a devastating head kick knockout at UFC 70 over MMA legend Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipović on April 21, 2007, which earned him a Heavyweight title shot with former five-time UFC Champion and UFC Hall of Famer Randy Couture. He won a gold medal in the Ultra Heavyweight division at the 2006 Mundials, which is considered to be the top Brazilian Jiu Jitsu competition in the world.

Gonzaga's Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) record is currently 13-6-0 and 8-5-0 in the UFC. He made his MMA debut on April 4, 2003 in Santos, Brazil against Cicero Costa, winning via submission due to punches in the first round.

He made his UFC debut at UFC 56, knocking out Kevin Jordan at 4:39 of the third round. However, Gonzaga had noted that his debut did not come without complications. Weeks before the fight, his pregnant wife started having complications with her pregnancy and lost one of the twins she was carrying. Gonzaga's obligations to his wife during her high risk pregnancy left him unable to train properly.

Mac Danzig (born January 2, 1980) is an American mixed martial artist, who competes as a lightweight in the Ultimate Fighting Championship.

Danzig, of German and Scots-Irish descent, grew up in the greater Pittsburgh area before moving to Los Angeles to pursue his career.

In the past, Danzig was known for his association with R1 fight team (formerly RAW) and had been a student of Iowa wrestling standout Rico Chiapparelli and MMA fighter Frank Trigg. Since then he trained boxing extensively at both the Wild Card gym in Hollywood, California under Freddie Roach assistant Justin Fortune, and more recently under Gil Martinez in Las Vegas, Nevada. Danzig credits Martinez as his only current boxing coach.

While Danzig is known as an impressive grappler, having scored 12 of his victories by submission; he has proven himself to be an adept striker, most notably with his KO victory over Joe Stevenson and his TKO victory over former lightweight champion Takumi Nakayama.

After defeating Royce Gracie black belt Buddy Clinton on August 4, 2006, Danzig increased his winning streak to 12 in a row with a unanimous decision victory over Miletich fighter John Mahlow on September 29 in Calgary, Alberta Canada.

Marcus Paul Davis (born August 24, 1973), is an Irish-American mixed martial artist. He currently fights as a welterweight. He was a contestant on The Ultimate Fighter 2 on Spike TV.

Davis was born in Houlton, Maine. His family comes from Waterford, Ireland.

Marcus began boxing at 14. At the age of 19 Davis began his career with a second round TKO of Luis Guzman in April 1993. He compiled a professional record of 17–1–2 over the next seven years on the New England circuit, where he fought primarily as a junior-middleweight. In his last fight as a boxer, he suffered a TKO loss to 34 year old Ed Bryant which led him to reconsider his future as a successful boxer. He then became excited with the challenge of mixed martial arts, much to the bemusement of his peers. He retired from boxing after the TKO loss in October 2000.

Prior to boxing, Marcus did martial arts from the age of eight. In 1995, Davis, then based in Massachusetts, started grappling training with Joe Maffei. In 1997, he moved back to Bangor and opened up an MMA school, while running a bar. The doormen took classes at the school, one of whom was Tim Sylvia. After Tim joined Miletich Fighting Systems in 2000, Marcus quickly followed. More recently, he has trained with Mark Dellagrotte and his own team in Bangor, Team Sityodtong. He also frequently visits Jorge Gurgel's main MMA academy in West Chester, Ohio.^{[citation needed]}