YouTuber turned boxer Jake Paul is doing something that all can finally agree on when he donated $5,000 to UFC flyweight Sarah Alpar through her GoFundMe page on Wednesday, something that left the 30-year-old fighter in shock.
His good will prompted Triller Fight Club, Paul’s old promoter, and others to donate to her campaign as well — which raised over her goal of $30,000.
“We are honored to help Sarah as she continues her march towards becoming a world champion,” “Sarah and many underpaid UFC fighters are starting at a disadvantage when they have to work multiple other jobs while putting their bodies and brains through the most rigorous training one could imagine. It’s sad to see such talented fighters making less than the UFC ring/round card girls.”
Sarah Alpar had this to say:
“I got this message and it was this person that I saw a little check mark, and it said, ‘Jake Paul sent you a message,’” Alpar said, via MMA Fighting. “I was like, ‘What? You know my existence?’”
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Alpar, a former LFA women’s bantamweight champion who earned a UFC contract after a successful appearance on the Contender Series, said she was embarrassed to ask for help through an online fundraiser.
“I turned 30, and I don’t know, it was a midlife crisis moment? Who knows what the reason was, but I was like, I need to make this happen,” she said. “I’m not getting any younger. What to I need to do?”
She had been struggling to make ends meet and the global pandemic did not help her cause at all.
With no fights coming her way, she had to rely on her barista job at Starbucks and teaching the occasional jiu-jitsu private lesson.
“What I thought it would be that, “Oh, everything’s taken care of and I can just train full time and then my life is complete,’” she said. “And it’s not that way. Just being a fighter in general, you don’t get paid anything leading up, like the other organizations … we’re making pennies, and that’s compared to what UFC gives us.
“I don’t have anything on UFC. I got in there and tried to fight, and this happens and that happens. It’s just business. They’ve given me more than any other organization has. I can’t attack them for anything. It’s not their fault that [opponent] Stephanie [Egger] got COVID and couldn’t fight. They tried to find me somebody. I don’t blame them for my situation, I’m just in the situation that I’m in. It is what it is. But I’m trying the best I can, and I want to do great big things and I want to be a role model and I love to fight. So this is what I chose, and I asked for some help.”
