Sports

ABU DHABI — The Abu Dhabi Grand Slam opens Thursday with a bigger field than earlier entry lists showed. The IJF calendar now shows 397 athletes from 61 nations. The judoka list on the same site had counted 293 athletes from 45 countries. The three-day event runs Oct. 29-31. Local reports say IJF President Marius Vizer praised the Emirates federation's preparations and called the meet the penultimate stop of the 2026 World Judo Tour. They add that more than 60 national teams are competing for ranking points toward the next Olympic Games. The Emirates federation has said the tournament gives its national team another chance to earn qualifying points. Tokyo's Grand Slam closes the circuit in December. World Judo Day falls on Wednesday, Oct. 28.

RICHMOND, B.C. — ADCC Canada staged its Vancouver Open on Saturday at the Richmond Olympic Oval. The Smoothcomp event page listed 539 registered athletes. The event was no-gi only and used ADCC rules and legal techniques. Divisions were double elimination, with a match for third place and no shared bronze. Medalists earn ADCC Open points, awarded as nine for gold, three for silver and one for bronze. FloGrappling streamed the event, and match clips from the day, including Fontaine-Costain and Mo-Connelly, were posted. Division winners were not confirmed at the time of writing. The ADCC says Canadian Open results serve as tiebreakers when it picks invitees to its Youth World Championship. The next Open on FloGrappling's calendar is ADCC Latinoamerica in Caracas.

ABU DHABI — UFC chief Dana White has confirmed what was previously only reported about Islam Makhachev's absence from UFC 336. At the UFC 333 press conference he said the welterweight champion was slated to headline the Jan. 30 card at Scotiabank Arena in Toronto, then said he did not want to fight until after Ramadan. Asked for a reason, White said there was none. The UFC instead booked Carlos Prates against Michael Morales for an interim welterweight title as the co-main event. Joshua Van and Manel Kape will headline for the flyweight title. White said the division can't be held up. Ramadan starts Feb. 8, and ESPN reports Makhachev's return could not come before May. Makhachev, who has fought once this year, wrote that he will be back once the real contender is known. Prates responded publicly that he would knock out Morales and then take the belt from Makhachev.

ABU DHABI — Petr Yan kept the UFC bantamweight title in the UFC 333 co-main event, beating Merab Dvalishvili by unanimous decision with three 48-47 scorecards. All three judges gave Dvalishvili the first two rounds, then gave Yan rounds three through five. Yan's body shots and his defense against takedowns turned the fight over the closing rounds. Yan now leads the series 2-1. The scoring of round three drew criticism from several fighters on social media, and some thought Dvalishvili had won. Others, including Aiemann Zahabi, backed Yan, and Dvalishvili himself said Yan was the better man on the night. The UFC gave both men Fight of the Night bonuses of $100,000. Yan said he would take anybody next.