UFC 249 will be the first mixed martial arts tournament to be kicked off without the concern of Covid-19. The first competition of UFC 249 will be the encounter between Tony Ferguson and Justin Gaethje, both thrive for the interim lightweight title. Gaethje was the former owner of the gold title in mixed martial arts, therefore, it might be the matter of time for him to stake the claim to be one of the best lightweights in the UFC. 

As UFC 249 is the very first big tournament to take place during the outbreak of the pandemic, there were a lot of important points and factors needed to be taken into the account. Below are some of them:

1. Early concerns

During these easy days without the huge impact of the pandemic, UFC 249’s organization department were still in need of keeping an eye on every risk and dangerous factor which can cause negative effects on the card. Nowadays, it has had to be more than what those old days required. It is rumored that every spectators and boxers being at UFC 249 could be tested positive to Covid-19, time might be the answer to all of these unfortunate news. According to ESPN’s Ariel Helwani, many measures such as normal testing and antibody tests had been applied to figure out the truth. 

Below is the result of Ferguson’s test:

On Friday, Jacare Souza and his cornermen came up with a positive result for COVID-19, therefore, he no longer had the right to take part in the card. Previously, he had been scheduled to face Uriah Hall. 

2. A different experience of pay-per-view mixed martial art tournaments: 

Everything should be kept in safe distance, which means that every staff and spectator needs to sit far from each other to take out the duties.