Paige VanZant to Headline First BKFC Card in Britain on July 9

Paige VanZant will once again be the top name on a marquee, capping off the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship’s first foray into Great Britain this July.

First reported by Ariel Helwani, BKFC head David Feldman announced on the BKFC Show on Thursday that VanZant (0-2 BK) will be headlining the first BKFC event held in Europe. The fight card will be held on July 9 at the Alexandra Palace in London. No additional bouts have been announced, nor did Feldman state the name of her opponent. Feldman also stated that the European tour would continue with a show in Rotterdam, Netherlands, on Aug. 6.

Despite going 0-2 in her first pair of fights under the BKFC banner, she will be competing in the main event of this fight night. The flyweight known as “12 Gauge” left the Ultimate Fighting Championship after losing three of her last four, and she debuted with the bare-knuckle league in February 2021. VanZant dropped a unanimous decision to Britain Hart, and then came back several months later to rematch Rachael Ostovich in the “squared circle.” VanZant lost that fight as well on the scorecards.

BKFC has traveled abroad in the past, putting on BKFC Thailand 1 in December, which was held at the Royal Cliffs Hotels Group in Pattaya, Thailand. It will be returning to the Kingdom of Thailand on May 7 for its second card there, and a pair of BKFC Thailand titles will be on the line that night. The promotion last staged an event in New York on March 12, and an interim bantamweight strap went to Jared Grant after a hard-fought decision over Anthony Retic.