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PRIDE Fighting Championships (Pride or Pride FC) was a Japanese mixed martial arts promotion company.  Pride 1, its inaugural event was held at the Tokyo Dome on October 11, 1997. Pride held sixty eight martial arts events, broadcast to about 40 countries worldwide.   PRIDE was one of the most popular MMA organizations in the world until their final event held on April 8, 2007. Many of its stars went on to fight in the UFC, including Anderson Silva, Royce Gracie, Rampage Jackson, Shogun Rua, Mark Coleman, Takanori Gomi, Wanderlei Silva, Dan Henderson, Don Frye, Mirko Cro Cop, Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Mark Hunt and many more. Pride had different rules than UFC in that it allowed soccer kicks and other lethal moves. At the Pride Grand Prix 2000 Finals the legendary fight between Royce Gracie and Kazushi Sakuraba took place. This fight would make the longest fight in professional MMA history at 90 mins!