The season premier for season thirteen of “The Ultimate Fighter” aired Wednesday night on Spike TV featuring coaches Brock Lesnar and Junior dos Santos. This seasons cast features a group of 14 welterweight fighters battling out for the “TUF” contract.
Last nights season opener pulled in an average audience of 1.5 million viewers, which was slightly lower than the number of viewers who tuned in for last seasons premier with 1.6 million viewers. Season 12 of “TUF” featured UFC champ Georges St-Pierre and Josh Koscheck, averaging 1.7 million viewers per episode.
This years show began at 9PM EST instead of the traditional 10PM EST on Spike TV.
The opening episode saw Team Dos Santos score the first victory after Shamar Bailey’s two round unanimous victory over Team Lesnar fighter Nordin Asrih.
It will be interesting to see what the ratings will look like for future episodes with coaches Lesnar and Dos Santos taking a gentler, kinder attitude towards one another, unlike last seasons series.