Via Rolling Stone:
David Feldman, the founder of the Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship (BKFC), the fastest-growing combat sport in the world, is facing the fight of his life: therapy.
“I go once a week and within two minutes I’m crying like fuck,” he says. “I just keep uncovering everything.”
It’s a 72-degree day in March 2024, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Cloudless skies. Sunbaked stores. Craggy mountain vistas. Feldman, 53, is sitting in the lobby of a hotel on the northern outskirts of town. Cauliflower-ear fighters, announcers in baggy suits, and ponytailed techs wander around him, prepping for tonight’s bare-knuckle event at an 11,000-seat arena. Feldman — trim, muscled, dark-haired handsome in a form-fitting suit — ignores them all. Just another stop on the endless BKFC traveling circus.
“We’re on the road 40 percent of the month,” he says, rubbing his eyes, his smartphone vibrating ding, ding, ding, but remaining unanswered unless it’s (a) his wife, Christina, or (b) his accountant. “But it’ll be worth it. In five years, this company will be worth billions.”
Bare-knuckle fighting is becoming the biggest fight-world sensation in decades, drawing comparisons to an early-stage Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC). In 2018, the company made $500,000 in revenue. Now, BKFC is valued at $411 million. “If Dave Feldman stays in it for the long haul, he could make a billion bucks,” says Art Davie, the founder of the UFC. “Now, audiences are used to more violence, so he needs to push the brutality of it.”
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