Respect Fighting Championship (RESPECT.FC) is a

mixed martial arts Mixed martial arts (MMA), sometimes referred to as cage fighting, no holds barred (NHB), and ultimate fighting, and originally referred to as Vale Tudo is a full-contact combat sport based on striking, grappling and ground fighting, inc ...

organization in Germany. It has won the GNP Award for the best German promotion in 2009, 2010 and 2011 Especially noteworthy in this context is that RESPECT.FC has beaten the

Ultimate Fighting Championship The Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) is an American mixed martial arts (MMA) promotion company based in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is owned and operated by Zuffa, a wholly owned subsidiary of Endeavor Group Holdings. It is the largest MMA ...

(the biggest

organization in the world), who was nominated with their first German based event

UFC 99 ''UFC 99: The Comeback'' was a mixed martial arts event held by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) on June 13, 2009 in Cologne, Germany. Background This event was the first UFC event held in Germany, as well as the first in mainland Europe ...

. The events are broadcast by Fightcast.tv.

History

Partnership with Battle of the South (Netherlands)

On April 2, 2011, a 'RESPECT.FC Title Contender Fight' between Ben Boekee and Denis Oliwka took place at "Battle of the South", one of the biggest MMA Events in the Netherlands. That was the first and only co-promotion for RESPECT.FC so far.

Rules

RESPECT.FC's rules differ somewhat from the North American Unified Rules. Among the differences are the allowance of knees to the head of downed opponent and stomp kicks to the body, while elbows to the head of downed opponent and soccer kicks are prohibited. Similar to the Unified Rules, fights have 3 rounds each lasting 5 minutes. Title Fights are 5 rounds.

Current champions

Championship history

Heavyweight Championship

Cruiserweight Championship

Middleweight Championship

Welterweight Championship

Lightweight Championship

Featherweight Championship

Notable fighters

* Björn Schmiedeberg - #1 ranked German HW fighter, RESPECT.FC Heavyweight Champion * Ben Boekee - WFCA Dutch Featherweight Champion, RESPECT.FC Featherweight Champion * Cengiz Dana -

M-1 Global M-1 Global (Mixfight-1) or MMA-1 (Mixed martial arts-1) is a mixed martial arts promotion based in St. Petersburg, Russia which organizes between 10 and 20 competitions per year. It hosted its first major show (rather than co-promoting with othe ...

, KSW and

Cage Warriors Cage Warriors (CW) is an Irish owned mixed martial arts promotion, based in London, England. The promotion was established in 2001 and staged its first MMA event in London in July, 2002. Many MMA stars have made their names under the Cage Warrio ...

veteran, RESPECT.FC Lightweight Champion * Sascha Weinpolter - #1 ranked Austrian HW fighter, Austria MMA Heavyweight Champion * Andreas Kraniotakes - #3 ranked German HW fighter,

veteran, appears as a character in

EA Sports MMA ''EA Sports MMA'' is a 2010 sports video game which was developed by EA Tiburon and published by EA Sports. It was released for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 on October 19, 2010, in North America and October 22, 2010, everywhere else. Online serv ...

video game * Danny Hoyer - IKF

Sanshou Sanda (), formerly Sanshou (), also known as Chinese boxing or Chinese kickboxing, is the official Chinese kickboxing full-contact combat sport. Sanda is a fighting system which was originally developed by the Chinese military based upon the s ...

Super-Welterweight World Champion * Janosch Stefan - 2nd Place

Combat Sambo , aka = Sombo (in English-speaking countries) , focus = Hybrid , country = Soviet Union , pioneers = Viktor Spiridonov, Vasili Oshchepkov, Anatoly Kharlampiev , famous_pract = List of Practitioners , olympi ...

World Championships 2008 * Nordin Asrih - TUF Season 13 contestant and

veteran *

Alexandra Sanchez Alexandra Baron is a German female mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter. She won Jewels' tournament Rough Stone Grand Prix 2009 at the -60 kg category. Background Baron was born on in Hamburg, Germany. Her birth name is Alexandra Sanchez, and ...

Jewels A gemstone (also called a fine gem, jewel, precious stone, or semiprecious stone) is a piece of mineral crystal which, in cut and polished form, is used to make jewelry or other adornments. However, certain rocks (such as lapis lazuli, opal, a ...

Rough Stone Grand Prix 2009 Champion * Raymond Jarman -

Shooto Shooto is a combat sport and mixed martial arts organization that is governed by the ''Shooto Association'' and the ''International Shooto Commission''. Shooto was originally formed in 1985, first as a particular fighting system and then in 198 ...

veteran *

Nick Hein Nick Hein (born April 24, 1984) is a German retired mixed martial artist and actor, who is best known for appearing in the German television show Diese Kaminskis. Before Hein became an actor, he was also a national judo champion and police offic ...

- European

Judo is an unarmed gendai budō, modern Japanese martial art, Olympic sport (since 1964), and the most prominent form of jacket wrestling competed internationally.『日本大百科全書』電子版【柔道】(CD-ROM version of Encyclopedia Nipponi ...

Champion 2006 * Jesse-Björn Buckler -

and

SLAMM!! Events SLAMM!! Events was a Netherlands based mixed martial arts and Muay Thai promotion based in Almere, Netherlands. They organized their flagship "Nederland vs Thailand" series, a ten-hour marathon of mixed martial arts and kickboxing fights as well ...

veteran

Events

References

External links

RESPECT.FC event results on Sherdog
{{MMA organizations Organizations established in 2009 2009 establishments in Germany Mixed martial arts organizations Mixed martial arts in Germany Companies based in Essen