Saturday’s “UFC 129 Prelims Live” broadcast on Spike TV drew a 1.0 household rating with 1.5 million viewers, the network said Tuesday.
The broadcast, which emanated from Rogers Centre in Toronto, featured three bouts: Welterweight fights between Jake Ellenberger and Sean Pierson and then Rory MacDonald and Nate Diaz and also included an earlier bantamweight bout between Ivan Menjivar and Charlie Valencia.
The show was the first UFC prelims special to air at 8 p.m. ET instead of the usual start time of 9 p.m. ET due to the UFC moving the start of its pay-per-view broadcasts to 9 p.m. ET.
The show drew a 1.3 rating in males 18-49 and a 1.5 in males 18-34. Spike was the No. 1 basic cable network in those demographics during the timespan.
According to numbers compiled by MMA Junkie, the UFC 129 prelims broadcast is tied for the fourth-most watched special since the UFC started with its “Prelims Live” broadcast on Spike TV prior to the UFC 103 pay-per-view broadcast in September 2009.
1) UFC 126 (February 2011): 2 million viewers
2) UFC 109 (February 2010): 1.7 million
3) UFC 114 (May 2010): 1.6 million
4) UFC 129 (April 2011): 1.5 million
4) UFC 108 (January 2010): 1.5 million
4) UFC 121 (October 2010): 1.5 million
4) UFC 123 (November 2010): 1.5 million
8) UFC 104 (October 2009): 1.4 million
8) UFC 103 (September 2009): 1.4 million
10) UFC 128 (March 2011): 1.3 million
10) UFC 119 (September 2010): 1.3 million
10) UFC 116 (July 2010): 1.3 million
10) UFC 115 (June 2010): 1.3 million
10) UFC 106 (November 2009): 1.3 million
15) UFC 111 (March 2010): 1.2 million
16) UFC 118 (August 2010): 1.1 million