The popularity of combat sports is increasing at an impressive rate with each passing year. This wave of popularity has led to the rise of several new MMA promotions. One such promotion grabbing headlines currently is Karate Combat, based in New York.
The company, which has been hosting events since 2018, was founded by Michael DePietro and Robert Bryan. Although not widely known in the beginning, Karate Combat has been gaining traction recently due to marquee singings like Luke Rockhold.
One of the major elements of running an MMA company is to grow fan bases in different parts of the world. Karate Combat has found a unique solution to this as they frequently host events in new markets that are headlined by bog names or local fighters.
This weekend, Karate Combat will be hosting an event in Dubai, UAE. The fight card will be headlined by Luke Rockhold taking on Joe Schilling. However, it was neither Schilling nor Rockhold that grabbed the attention prior to the event.
In the build-up to the event, Karate Combat hosted a pre-fight press conference with a few fighters in attendance. Subsequently, things got particularly heated between the Indian fighter Rana Singh and Pakistani fighter, Shahzaib Rindh.
Although the two men started trash-talking, keeping the India-Pakistan rivalry in mind, things soon took a turn for the worse. Singh abused Rindh and made some extremely obscene remarks about his mother, as well.
Eventually, the situation reached a tipping point when the two men faced off against each other. Rindh and Singh got physical during the faceoffs and had to be separated by security.
Needless to say, this increases the excitement for the event. Aside from the altercation, Karate Combat 45’s main event is the highlight, featuring an ex-UFC star. Rockhold, an MMA veteran with a 16-6 record, has also dabbled in bare-knuckle boxing. He will now enter the Karate Combat genre.
Luke Rockhold’s journey from the UFC to BKFC and finally Karate Combat
Rockhold was one of the ‘Four Kings’ from the American Kickboxing Academy, along with Daniel Cormier, Khabib Nurmagomedov, and Cain Velasquez. Although he had a successful run in the UFC, the end to it was horrible as he lost four out of his last five fights.
Of the four losses, three ended in devastating knockouts. Hence, following his last fight in the UFC at UFC 278, Rockhold parted ways and enjoyed time off for a while.
After a year on the sidelines, Rockhold returned to the competitive scene in Bare Knuckle Boxing against Mike Perry. Unfortunately, the fight did not go as Rockhold had planned, but with Joe Schilling now in his crosshairs, the star is determined to make an impressive Karate Combat debut.
