The Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship had a great September. The promotion held its 50th event a few weeks ago in Denver and it is expecting a great rest of the year with events held across the country as well as in Bulgaria and Thailand. BKFC was held on Sept. 29 in Salem, Virginia. It was headlined by a Women’s Strawweight Championship bout between defending champion Britain Hart and Melanie Shah as well as a bout between UFC vet Dustin Pague and Joe “Hitman” Elmore.
In the preliminary bouts, Ka’Sim Ruffin and Rick Caruso gained TKO victories over Daniel Gary and Landon Williams respectively. In the main card, Brett Fields gained a similar TKO victory with massive punches to Kaine Tomlinson, giving him his first win in Bare Knuckle Boxing. In the next bout, a war took place between Brian Maxwell and Harris Stephenson which ended once Maxwell was disqualified after he landed an illegal strike to a downed Stephenson in the fifth round. “The Dark Knight” Joseph Creer also knocked out his opponent, Ronnie Glass after a vicious three round bout. In an interview between fights, Taylor “Killa Bee” Starling announced that she wanted to challenge for the Strawweight Championship, resulting in a call out to Jenny Savage. Both women have been with BKFC for years and followers of the company have been wanting this fight for a long time.
Bruce Abramski downed Mark Culp to get the TKO win 43 seconds into the bout. Moldovan fighter Stanislav Grosu also gained a TKO win one minute and 51 seconds into round two over Blake LaCaze. The Co-Main Event between Dustin Pague and Joe Elmore was an insane bout that went all five rounds where both men were immensely challenged. However, one fighter had to win and Pague came out on top. This marked Pague’s 3rd straight win in BKFC and in a post-fight interview, he praised Elmore and made it clear that a gold belt was on his mind.
The main event between Strawweight Champion Britain Hart and the undefeated Melanie Shah was a bloodbath. Both women tore each other up and left the other covered in blood. Ultimately, Hart was able to dominate each round. This became evident when she took some of Shah’s teeth out to get a unanimous decision win. Even with this brutal win and retaining her gold belt, Hart told interviewers that she will not be satisfied until she knocks an opponent out.
BKFC’s next bout, BKFC 52, will be held in Columbia, South Carolina on Oct. 20. You can watch Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship via FITE TV, the BKFC App, FuboTV, and other streaming platforms.
