10 UFC Events That Changed The Game
6. UFC Japan: Ultimate Japan - First Overseas UFC Event
As a British fan, the fact that UFC regularly makes their way over to the likes of London's O2 Arena and the Manchester Arena only fuels the love that your writer has for the combat sport.
This would never have became a reality if - in 1997 - Dana White hadn't quickly realised that his audience far outstretched that of just the U.S. and started to devise a plan to take his burgeoning company around the world.
His first stop?
The MMA worshipping country of Japan.
UFC Japan: Ultimate Japan (or UFC Ultimate Japan) was the first time that White had managed to take his company into another country's backyard and the event was streamed live on PPV back to the States, whilst being made available on cable to viewers in Japan.
This event also unveiled unique music for each fighter as they made their way to the Octagon - another first for the company.
Yokohama's first UFC PPV featured a Heavyweight Championship bout between Randy Couture and Maurice Smith (which Couture would win before being stripped of the title due to a contract dispute at a later stage) and the first ever UFC Middleweight Championship fight (before the division was morphed into the Light Heavyweight weight-class) with Frank Shamrock defeating Kevin Jackson - which would kick off his 703 day reign as champ.
As you can see, this was truly an important event in the company's history and set the tone for UFC in terms or globalisation, pageantry and even involved the formation of one of their stand-out divisions.