Friday is a huge night for Invicta Fighting Championships. It’s a new start for the promotion that I founded almost a decade ago. We make our debut on U.S. television – on AXS TV – with two title fights, plus the card will be streamed to every fan in the world live and free on YouTube.

Invicta’s new era is headlined by two of the best flyweights in the world, as Karina Rodriguez and Daiana Torquato battle for the 125-pound title. In our co-main event, our atomweight champion, Alesha Zappitella, defends her belt against No. 1 contender Jessica Delboni.

Although the COVID-19 pandemic will prevent us from having fans in the building for this event, more fans will be able to enjoy this Invicta card than any of the previous 46.

Truthfully, this is one of the most exciting weeks of my time in the sport, and I’ve been part of MMA for a long time. I’m not sure if fight fans know how I got my start in this business or how Invicta came to be. I worked closely with two legends of the sport – Randy Couture and Bas Rutten – before becoming a broadcaster and commentator. Eventually I moved behind the camera and got into matchmaking and talent relations for the IFL, Affliction MMA and Strikeforce.

It was at Strikeforce that I first really paid attention to female fighters and female divisions. Being a woman in a male-dominated industry is tough. When the decision was made to feature – and I quote – “hot chick fights,” I was … let’s say I wasn’t happy. I didn’t want anything to do with sideshows.

But that was the task in front of me, so I found myself literally Googling “hot female MMA fighters.” When I took the time to watch fight footage, scout these women at regional events and went to gyms to see them train, I realized just how wrong I’d had it.

Real women fighters were out there. They were training in whatever gym that would have them, fighting in “smokers” and working twice as hard for less than half the opportunities. Marloes Coenen had already been at it for a decade. Cris Cyborg’s commitment in the gym was incredible to witness. These athletes deserved a platform to compete.

In early 2010, Strikeforce announced a project two years in the making: a heavyweight grand prix featuring most of the best heavyweights in the world, including Fedor Emelianenko, “Bigfoot” Silva, Fabricio Werdum, Alistair Overeem, Andrei Arlovski, and a newcomer named Daniel Cormier.

The grand prix and the women’s division had helped Strikeforce explode. But then came the news the promotion had been sold to the UFC. Almost immediately, the UFC began to take heavyweights out of the grand prix and into the UFC roster.

I was deflated. I’d worked for the UFC years before and had a good relationship there, but then the calls started coming in from the female fighters. If Strikeforce was going away – and the UFC was still publicly against adding women’s divisions at that time – where did that leave them?

I heard it all. The toughest women on the planet were pouring their hearts out.

“I don’t want to go back to fighting in smokers.”

“We’ve come so far, how can this happen?”

“How many times do we have to prove ourselves?”

“I can’t train if I don’t know if I’ll ever get a fight.”

That’s how Invicta FC was born. In late 2011, I announced I was going to start my own promotion, an all-female promotion. I was going to team up with these amazing athletes and – together – we were going to create our own platform. We would make sure there was a home for female talent. We were going to take on the world.

It was hard, and I knew it would be.

People in the industry laughed. “You’re gonna do WHAT? All-female MMA shows? Women’s fights are sideshows! No one wants to see a whole card of women.”

Over the last nine years, we’ve held 46 events with over 300 athletes. We’ve featured the sport’s all-time greats inside the Invicta cage. We’ve innovated with open scoring, one-night tournaments, and so much more. Every fight fan has heard the name Invicta. We have done everything we can to prove the doubters wrong.

And on Friday night, we start a new era – and we’ll prove them wrong all over again.

Shannon Knapp is is the president of Invicta FC. “Invicta on AXS TV: Rodriguez vs. Torquato” airs live Friday on AXS TV. The full event streams live at 7 p.m. ET and will also be available on demand following its completion here: