Cost of Training for a Fight - Who Pays?

As people know, the UFC disclose the purse of fighters for some fights but there are more 'behind door' bonuses given to most fighters.

I always wondered if on top of their purse, the UFC pay for the fighters cost of their training camp including their travel and accommodation to the actual fights?

The latest Fighters Only mag states that the average cost of an average top-card UFC fighter's training camp including coaches, agents, flights etc is $127,025.

Average top-card guys i.e. not GSP, Silva, Lesnar etc will probably earn anywhere between $75-250k (never really understood their pay structure between different fighters!) and therefore I can only assume that the training camp costs is funded by the UFC in addition to their disclosed purse?

I would be very grateful if someone has any insight into this.

Often wondered this myself. Not a clue! They must get money from sponsers as well thou, that would explain the big posters they put behind themselves for each fight.

Soldier_Of_Fortune wrote:Often wondered this myself. Not a clue! They must get money from sponsers as well thou, that would explain the big posters they put behind themselves for each fight.

Yeah they get sponsor money as well. I'm sure they must get their training costs or at least a large % paid by the UFC because for example some UK guys have fought in Australia for £10,000 and the cost of flights and say a 7 days hotel for him and his corner would exceed that alone!

Hopefully someone will enlighten us........

Fighters pay for their own camps using sponsor money and their purse. I know this as I watched an interview with Rampage where he commented on how good his sponsors are as they pay for his training camps.

easthfc wrote:Fighters pay for their own camps using sponsor money and their purse. I know this as I watched an interview with Rampage where he commented on how good his sponsors are as they pay for his training camps.

Cheers, I wonder how the low-end fighters i.e. on the prelim card afford it as I can't imagine sponsorship for that level to be high?

For example, UK fighter Ross Pearson. He got the Fight of The Night bonus at UFC 134 but no one knew so take that out and his disclosed pay was $8,000, yes dollars and he had to somehow pay for his training camp and his team to fly to Brazil and stay there for I guess a good week and this is his full time job so I guess there are many hidden benefits they get?

There is definately an issue here that there is a massive gap in pay between the top end fighters and the low end fighters. I remember Tom "Kong" Watson saying that when he works it all out and after he has paid all of his expenses (traverling, training camps etc) he can earn less then someone working in Mcdonalds.

I'm not too sure about the costs etc of a camp. But I do know that the disclosed figures posted in the media are way off what fighters actually get.

Interesting stuff guys, lots of questions there. The pay structure seems to be all over the place.