UFC 193

UFC 193: Rousey vs. Holm was a mixed martial arts event held on 15 November 2015 at Etihad Stadium in Melbourne, Australia. It is the most attended UFC event in the history of the company, with 56,214 people filling the stadium. Although Ronda Rousey was heavily favored to defeat Holly Holm, Holm gave Rousey her first career defeat. The event is currently the 3rd most bought UFC pay-per-view of all time with a buyrate of 1.1 million.

Background

The event was the first that the promotion has held in Melbourne. Etihad Stadium was the third stadium venue to host a UFC event after UFC 129 at the Rogers Centre in Canada and UFC on Fox: Gustafsson vs. Johnson held at Tele2 Arena in Sweden. The announced attendance set a new record for the promotion, with 56,214 people attending the event.

The event was expected to be headlined by a UFC Welterweight Championship bout between current champion Robbie Lawler and Carlos Condit, a former WEC Welterweight champion and former interim UFC Welterweight champion. However, the bout was removed from the event after Lawler suffered a thumb injury stemming back from his high school wrestling career. Subsequently, a UFC Women's Bantamweight Championship bout between then champion Ronda Rousey and former 18-time boxing world champion in three weight classes Holly Holm, originally scheduled for UFC 195, was announced as the new headliner for this event. The Lawler/Condit bout was eventually rescheduled to UFC 195.

Ultimate Fighting Championship

The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is a mixed martial arts promotion company. It is the largest in the world and features most of the top-ranked fighters in the sport. Based in the United States, the UFC produces events worldwide that showcase ten weight divisions and abide by the Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts. The UFC has held over 300 events to date. Dana White serves as the president of the UFC while brothers Frank and Lorenzo Fertitta control the UFC's parent company, Zuffa, LLC.

The first Ultimate Fighting Championship event was held on November 12, 1993 at the McNichols Sports Arena in Denver, Colorado. The purpose of the early Ultimate Fighting Championship competitions were to identify the most effective martial art in a fight, with minimal rules, between competitors of different fighting disciplines, including boxing, Brazilian jiu-jitsu, Sambo, wrestling, Muay Thai, karate, judo, and other styles. In subsequent competitions, fighters began adopting effective techniques from more than one discipline, which indirectly helped create an entirely separate style of fighting known as present-day mixed martial arts.

Holly Holm

Holly Holm (born October 17, 1981) is an American mixed martial artist who competes in the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) bantamweight division. She is the current UFC Bantamweight Champion. Holm is also a former professional boxer and kickboxer. She was a multiple-time world champion in boxing, defending her titles 18 times in three weight classes, and was a two-time Ring magazine fighter of the year (2005, 2006).

Her most notable win in mixed martial arts (MMA) occurred at UFC 193, in front of a record-breaking crowd for a UFC event (56,214 people) in Melbourne, when she captured the bantamweight title and gave Ronda Rousey her first loss in the sport. The fight is considered one of the biggest upsets in the history of sports.

Holm is the first person to win championships in both boxing and mixed martial arts. She is the consensus #1 female bantamweight fighter in the world. Fight Matrix also lists her as the #1 pound-for-pound female fighter in the world, while Sherdog lists her at #2, and ESPN at #3. Holm is the only female fighter to be listed in Sports Illustrated's mixed gender pound-for-pound ranking at #10. UFC fighter and teammate Jon Jones has called Holm the greatest female athlete in the history of combat sports. Outside of MMA, she appears in the 2016 feature film Fight Valley.

Ronda Rousey

Ronda Jean Rousey (/ˈraʊzi/ born February 1, 1987) is an American mixed martial artist, judoka, and actress. She is the former UFC Women's Bantamweight Champion, as well as the last Strikeforce Women's Bantamweight Champion. She has won eleven of her fights in the first round, nine of them by armbar. Rousey was the first U.S. woman to earn an Olympic medal in judo (Bronze) at the Summer Olympics in Beijing in 2008. Rousey trains under Gokor Chivichyan of the Hayastan MMA Academy, and Edmond Tarverdyan of the Glendale Fighting Club. In 2015, she was the third most searched person on Google.

As of December 2015, Rousey is ranked the #1 female bantamweight fighter in the world according to the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), and #2 by Sherdog and Fight Matrix. Sherdog lists her as the #3 Pound for Pound Women's MMA fighter in the world, while ESPN and Fight Matrix list her #4 female Pound for Pound fighter.

In May 2015, two magazines ranked Rousey as the most "dominant" active athlete. Rousey was voted on an ESPN poll as the Best Female Athlete Ever. In September 2015, she claimed that she is currently the UFC's highest paid fighter, male or female. Rousey's first feature film role was the 2014 film The Expendables 3. In 2015, she had roles in the films Furious 7 and Entourage.