The second UFC Performance Institute is set to open on Monday, June 17, in Shanghai, China.
Celebrating the launch of the new 93,000 square foot facility, athletes from some of the best gyms in China have been invited to participate in the inaugural UFC Academy Combine on June 17-18.
The 50 athletes who are participating in the UFC Academy Combine will have the opportunity to earn a scholarship into the UFC Academy, a mixed martial arts talent development program that has been initiated by the UFC Performance Insitute.
The two-day showcase will enable staff of the Performance Insitute to collect data and insights from participating athletes, allowing comparison of striking, grappling, and wrestling ability, as well as other categories including strength, combat agility, and mechanical power. Staff will also consider clinical evaluation, cognitive evaluation, anthropometry, alactic energy production, lactic energy production and reaction/cognitive processing. At the end of the two days, each athlete will receive an overall UFC Academy combine ranking.
“The UFC Academy Combine has been developed to support the assessment of MMA talent using a series of skill-based evaluations, profiling exams, and physical performance tests,” Dr. Duncan French, the UFC Vice President of Performance at the UFC Performance Institute stated in a press release.
“The first iteration of the UFC Academy Combine will be structured so we can conduct it ‘in-house’ at one of our facilities. The larger vision is to then develop a ‘field-based’ version of the combine, which can be implemented anywhere around the world and generate scores for comparison between MMA fighters from different countries.”
The promotion’s first UFC Performance Institute opened in Las Vegas in 2017 and has now seen more than 400 athletes from the UFC roster utilize the facility and services.
Follow The Body Lock for more updates regarding the UFC’s new Performance Insitute in Shanghai, China.