Slap fighting is having a moment. But is it safe?

At one end of Boxpark Liverpool on a balmy September evening, a temporary stage is being erected. Two burly men silently go about their duties, shuffling a large barrel with black and yellow tape around the rim to the centre of the platform. Overhead, several enormous disco balls dangle from the ceiling. The sickly-sweet aroma of fried chicken and Jägermeister hangs heavy in the air. A spotlight turns the entire room an ominous shade of red. 

As the crowd begin to take their seats, a Robin S. song starts to play, declaring the need to ​‘Show Me Love’. It’s then that it hits: a deep sense of irony – a fitting anthem only in the most paradoxical way. For the next couple of hours, standing either side of the barrel, grown adults will repeatedly strike each other across the face amid a swell of cheers and howls. A man will crash to the floor unconscious. Another will leave with a broken jaw. Two women will make history. 

Welcome to the world of slap fighting: a controversial new combat sport garnering an expanding UK fanbase and, with it, a growing list of staunch critics. ​“A war of focus and force,” is how Josephine describes it. The lingerie model-turned slap fighter has been involved in the sport since 2024 after stumbling across clips online of Power Slap. The US slap fighting company, founded by UFC chief Dana White, enjoyed a brief television run on TBS, but has largely found popularity on YouTube, with a subscriber count, at the time of writing, exceeding 3.5 million. 

“A lot of people look at it and think: ​‘What the hell is going on there?’” Josephine says. ​“But when I first saw it, it took my breath away. I loved it straight away. I was hooked there and then.”

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The rules of slap fighting are simple enough. Competitors exchange blows across five rounds, with each ​‘slap’ scored by a panel of judges. Both feet must remain planted at all times and ​‘clubbing’ – striking an opponent with anything but a flat palm – is forbidden. An unlawful manœuvre results in a fighter forfeiting their next slap, while a knockout effectively ends the contest. Flinching of any kind is strictly prohibited. 

While BritSlap, the UK’s version of Power Slap founded in 2021, has a more underground feel than its polished cousin across the Atlantic, its popularity is on the rise. It’s hardly surprising: with its clippable content and voyeuristic sensibility of watching something you shouldn’t but still being unable to turn away, slap fighting’s stock seems high in an algorithm-driven attention economy. Six live events have so far been staged in the UK – the latest attracting a 200-strong crowd – and this typically male-dominated space is being filled by an increasing number of women looking to compete. 

Along with Josephine – who insists the ​“mental and physical discipline and preparation” is what draws her to slap fighting – another female competitor stepping up to the barrel is Maisie Smith. Hailing from Rotherham, ​‘Crazy Maisie’, previously a boxer and bare knuckle fighter, says combat sports like slap fighting offer an important release. 

“I’ve got a lot of mental health issues, so it is something that helps me get a lot of anger out,” says the 22-year-old. ​“But it’s also something I’m really passionate about. At the end of the day, you’ve got to do what you want to do, no matter anyone’s opinion on it.”

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And opinion is divided. Perhaps unsurprisingly, concussions in slap fighting are common. So much so that each competitor has a team of designated ​‘catchers’ standing behind them for every slap, while a five-strong crew of professional medics assess the participants at the end of each round. 

But it’s the sport’s lack of defensive element, which critics say distinguishes it from the likes of MMA and boxing, that has prompted the biggest backlash. A 2024 study published in the JAMA Surgery journal found that, of the 78 fights analysed, more than half of participants showed visible signs of concussion. In 2021, Polish slap fighter Artur Walczak suffered a brain bleed after being knocked out during a match and later died of multiple organ failure. And, earlier this year, a planned event at the Glasgow University Union was cancelled on health grounds, with researchers at the university’s school of neuroscience urging competitors not to ​“risk their brain health in the name of sport”. Lou DiBella, the American boxing promoter and TV producer, was less tactful in his verdict, calling slap fighting ​“organised brain damage”. 

Vipul Lugade, associate professor of Physical Therapy at New York’s Binghamton University, isn’t quite as brazen in his assessment. Rather, he is keen to highlight the nuances of sport related concussion. ​“You can have a concussion even without impact,” he says. ​“But in the case of slap fighting, you’re getting a direct impact and that could cause a secondary impact on the rebound, so you’re getting a double-whammy which could cause serious injury.”

He adds: ​“It’s great that there are medical professionals at these events but some concussions can cause very subtle changes that are hard to detect. And sometimes the symptoms can occur hours, even days after the initial impact.”

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Unlike some US state athletic commissions, slap fighting in the UK is currently without independent regulation or governance. But BritSlap founder and CEO Josh Skeete insists the safety of the participants is the priority, and he believes the criticism levelled at the sport is oftentimes unwarranted. ​“As with any new sport, it faces scrutiny,” says Skeete. ​“When MMA first came about, people said it was barbaric, that it shouldn’t be considered a sport. But now it’s one of the most mainstream combat sports. 

“In boxing, fighters are going to be taking hundreds of blows to the head per fight. In slap fighting, you’re not going to get anywhere near that. But as with anything new, there are always going to be challenges.”

Back in Liverpool, spirits are high. In an upstairs room, Maisie says that she ​“1000%” acknowledges the criticism, but caveats it with a rather blunt warning: ​“If you don’t know the risks and you still step out on that stage, that’s your own stupidity.” And so it seems that any talk of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), the brain condition linked to repeated head trauma and increasingly associated with contact sports, has been left firmly at the door. A door that, rather tellingly, has an ambulance parked right outside.

Josephine, meanwhile, is fuming. She has travelled several hours from her smallholding in Essex, where she tends to horses and enjoys regular walks beside bulrush-edged lakes, for what BritSlap has billed the first-ever UK female slap fight. But a discrepancy at the weigh-in renders her clash with former Power Slap competitor Kimberley Godfrey a non-starter, meaning the honour of UK slap fighting history-maker is instead bestowed onto Maisie, who will face off against London’s Diamond Saphire. 

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Walking out on stage, Maisie, with striking blue and pink hair, stirs up the crowd with energetic verve, seemingly unperturbed by the fact the preceding contest ended with John ​‘Mad Dog’ Best being knocked clean out. Such warmth and exuberance, however, belies a harrowing backstory: describing years of ​“horrific physical and emotional abuse”. 

She speaks candidly about living with borderline personality disorder, about her numerous run-ins with the law – she is currently serving the second of two suspended sentences – and about her struggles with an eating disorder. She tells of how, in her own words, she used to be ​“a vile human” but is now learning to take back agency and reframe her experiences in a positive light. 

“I’ve been a fighter from a very young age,” she says proudly on the eve of the event. ​“Pain is a normal thing to me. For years that was all I knew. For a long time I didn’t understand that I didn’t deserve it. I think pain had been programmed into me and so I became a self-harmer. I no longer do that but I still enjoy pain. I don’t know how to say it without it sounding weird but the pain excites me.

“I’m not proud of what happened but I’m proud I survived it,” she continues. ​“Because of that, I would never change any of it. The resilience it gave me, knowing I’ll never be as vulnerable as I was back then. I know that no matter what happens I’m strong enough to deal with it.”

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That resilience is evident up there on stage. In her slap fighting debut, Maisie goes the full five rounds, and is crowned the UK’s first female victor after a judges’ decision. But the moment doesn’t quite elicit the loudest reception of the night. That privilege is reserved for Louis ​‘The Razor’ Robinson, the current UK slap fighting male heavyweight champion, who announces he has signed a contract with Power Slap. 

Maisie’s win does, however, prove to be the last truly gripping action of the evening. The main event – a heavyweight match dubbed the ​‘Clash of the Rhinos’ between Wain Morgan and Robinson’s brother, Craig – is something of an anti-climax, ending after just one round when an illegal slap breaks Morgan’s jaw. 

Yet amid the brutality, there is a pervading sense of community to all this. Despite Morgan’s injury, the two fighters are quick to embrace, and leave the arena with their arms over one another’s shoulder. Meanwhile, Josephine, who will now take on Maisie at a future BritSlap event, sticks around to congratulate her fellow fighters. 

The pleasantries may be sincere but, as she reminds me with the crowd beginning to disperse, they don’t detract from her ultimate goal. ​“I want to be the biggest slapper in Britain,” she says with a wry smile. 

And with that, the venue quickly empties, leaving only a handful of straggling drunk 20-somethings huddled round a punching machine. At the same time, tucked away at the side of the stage, two young children stand face to face, palms placed on the other’s cheek.

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George Nash is a freelance journalist. Follow him on X.

Josh Brierley is a sport photographer. Follow him on Instagram.

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