MMA: Russia's Extreme Obsession

101 East investigates the forces at play in the brutal world of mixed martial arts in Russia and the former USSR.

On a Sunday morning in suburban Moscow, a crowd is gathering around a ring.

Fans have come to watch fighters punch, kick and knee their opponents in the brutal sport of mixed martial arts (MMA).

Across Russia and the former USSR, millions share a passion for this extreme sport, with superstar fighters earning a fortune and inspiring a new generation. But critics say political leaders are using the sport to promote their own interests.

Riders Of Destiny: Risking Life as a Child Jockey in Indonesia

Seven-year-old Sila risks life and limb as a child jockey to provide for his family on the island of Sumbawa, Indonesia.

Seven-year-old Sila is a child jockey supporting his family financially on the remote island of Sumbawa, Indonesia.

With the high unemployment rate on Sumbawa, Sila's parents no longer work because the money their young son earns takes care of the whole family.

Each race poses an enormous risk to Sila and the other young jockeys who spend up to 10 days competing in several traditional horse racing tournaments each year. Injuries are common, deaths occur, and Sila is one of the most in-demand jockeys of all the young riders.

How is coronavirus affecting the sport industry?

All major events have been cancelled or postponed as the pandemic takes its toll worldwide.

It is a lucrative business and almost recession-proof. But sport is being dealt a financial blow by the coronavirus.

Major events have been cancelled or postponed for the first time in many years.

From the Tokyo Olympic Games to football championships, fields, arenas and stadiums will be empty for a long time.

Indonesia's Football Fever

101 East follows Indonesia’s die-hard football fans as violence threatens to shut down an entire league.

Football inspires fanaticism in Indonesia. It also inspires danger. Football violence has killed about 75 fans in the past 25 years. Thousands more have been injured.

Popular Indonesian teams travel to matches in armoured personnel carriers and riot police with automatic weapons are regular fixtures. Accusations of match-fixing fuel the anger of football crowds and brawling between fans.

Recently an entire league was suspended for a fortnight due to the violence, which threatens to shut the league down permanently.

Thailand's Football Factory

We meet aspiring African footballers as they try to make it in Thailand's big league. But competition is fierce.

Young West African footballers are leaving their homes and loved ones behind and heading to Thailand.

Arriving with little more than the clothes on their back, they share one dream - to become a professional football player.

Tassirou landed in Bangkok from Senegal on a three-month tourist visa. One month has already passed.

He needs to secure a contract fast, which will allow him to stay in Thailand and achieve his ambitions to play professionally. It will also allow him to repay the loans of family and friends who are supporting him.

Dagestan's Peaceful Warriors

On the edge of Russia, a martial arts expert strives to find a balance between faith and independence.

Hidden in the mountainous republic of Dagestan, Gusein Magomaev runs a famed martial arts school that has produced several European champions, Olympians and the only non-Chinese king of Kung Fu.

Nurturing an array of talent, some 200 children train at the site that provides an escape for the region's disenfranchised youth.

But in a republic with a high concentration of Muslims, outside the school's thick walls a fierce battle for control of the Northern Caucasus is raging between Muslim separatists and the minority Moscow-backed nationalists.

Big Wata: The Surfers of Sierra Leone (video)

Members of Sierra Leone's only surf club dream of putting Africa on the surfing map.

In 2007, the fishermen of a small fishing community in the West African country of Sierra Leone witnessed an unusual sight.

It was an NGO worker in the ocean. But he wasn't swimming. He was standing on top of a board, riding the waves.

The first - and only - surf club in Sierra Leone, it is at the heart of the local community: a source of pride and, occasionally, of tension.

Salma the Boxer: Fighting back in Molenbeek

Young boxers at a Moroccan migrant-founded gym counter stereotypes that their neighbourhood is a 'hotbed of radicalism'.

"Life is a fight," says Mohamed Ma'alem, the founder of the Brussels Boxing Academy (BBA) in Molenbeek. "For everyone, for anyone."

But in 14-year-old Salma Ben Abdesselam, he thinks he has a fighter who might just be up to the challenge.

"She is a force," he says of the schoolgirl whose parents were born in Morocco and who considers herself both Moroccan and Belgian. "She has huge inner strength."

Salma trains every day at the BBA, a club with 600 members located in an old school gym, where her father, Hamid Ben Abdesselam, is one of her coaches.

What will be Russia's World Cup legacy?

Russia hosted what many consider to be an extremely successful World Cup that changed perceptions of many visitors.

For more than a month, people around the world were captivated by a single event,the football World Cup in Russia.

The highs of victory and the lows of defeat were shared by millions of fans watching on television and attending the games.

For host Russia, it has been a resounding success. FIFA's president called it "the best" tournament ever.

Thank You, Football: Yaya Toure and Yacine Brahimi

Cote d'Ivoire captain and Manchester City midfielder Yaya Toure admits to being a dreamer from childhood, "Even wake up, I was dreaming sometimes."

The Ivorian had been training at the MimoSifcom Academy in Cote d'Ivoire - home to the ASEC Mimosas of Abidjan - when he was spotted by former player and coach Jean-Marc Guillou. Toure's brother, Kolo, had already made a splash playing for the Mimosas and soon joined Arsenal in the English Premier League. The two brothers would be reunited later in their careers. 

Guillou noticed the younger Toure's skill and ambition: "When they told me he was Kolo's brother, I said he was better than his brother ... Everything seemed easy for him. He was very determined and knew what he wanted. Back then I said this kid could eventually win the Golden Boot."  

Pigeon Battles of Cairo: Egypt's High-Flying Sport

A pigeon fighter attempts to beat a rival neighbourhood in his final duel before family pressure forces him to quit.

Koka is a respected figure in Cairo's pigeon fighting world. His life revolves around preparing for the contests, in which whole neighbourhoods clash to hunt and capture each other's pigeons. 

Away from the duels, he spends his time caring for the hundreds of pigeons he rears in a ramshackle wooden tower he has built on his roof.  

Like numerous other breeders, Koka treasures the pigeons for their loyalty, discipline and the deep pride they bring him. 

China's Big Goal

How China plans to conquer world football, spending billions on foreign players, coaches and training academies.

China is the world's rising superpower, but there is another area where it wants to excel: world football.

It plans to have 50 million players and 50,000 coaching schools within the next 10 years.

Its goal? To be a world football superpower by 2050.

Pyeongchang 2018: Sport, politics and the media game

The media get caught up in North Korea's diplomatic games at the Winter Olympics. Plus, journalism in post-coup Turkey.

Pyeongchang 2018: Sport, politics and the media games

At the opening ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympics, athletes from two countries still officially at war - North and South Korea - marched into the stadium together, under one flag.

Those images of a momentarily unified Korea were beamed around the world and will have registered in Washington.

Wherever they light the Olympic flame, there are going to be geopolitics in the mix. But these games, given where they are, and the governments involved - have taken Olympic politics to another level.

Sports Doping: The Endless Chase

An investigation into the financial, political and ethical implications of performance-enhancing drugs.

Yuliya Stepanova, Russia's 800-metres champion in 2011, performed among the world's top-flight athletes for five years, while her husband Vitaly was an adviser to the director of the Russian anti-doping agency, RUSADA.

In 2014, the couple decided to go public on the systematic doping of Russian athletes, causing one of the world's biggest sporting scandals - and putting into question Russia's participation in international competition.

"Many champions are not gods, they are not even real champions," says Yuliya. "That's what disgusted me, the lies. These people are admired, but they're just liars and cheats."

Horses of Misfortune

The story of two Moroccan men and how their obsession with betting on horses split their families apart.

Gambling - and particularly sports betting - has taken off around the world. But wagering money or something of value on the outcome of an event is nothing new. The origins of popular modern casino games go back decades if not centuries.

It's hard to quantify exactly what percentage of the gambling industry sports betting makes up - but it has become so popular that governments are reevaluating its legality. In some countries, illegal betting dens are still active - but you can also bet on your phone on the number of corners in a football match, winning margins in cricket, home runs in baseball and the score in the Super Bowl.

Speed Sisters: Palestine's All-Female Racing Car Team (video)

Bold, fearless and tearing up tracks across the West Bank: meet the first all-female racing car team in the Middle East.

Despite a tangle of roadblocks and checkpoints, a thriving street car racing scene has emerged in the occupied West Bank. Held at improvised tracks, the races offer a release from the pressures and uncertainties of life under military occupation. 

Brought together by a common desire to live life on their own terms, the Speed Sisters have joined the ranks of dozens of male drivers competing against each other for the title, for bragging rights for their hometown, and to prove that women can go head-to-head with the guys.

Weaving together their lives on and off the track, Speed Sisters sheds light on the rivalries that exist within the team, the pressures the women feel from their communities, and their drive to go further and faster than anyone thought they could.

China's Big Goal

How China plans to conquer world football, spending billions on foreign players, coaches and training academies.

China is the world's rising superpower, but there is another area where it wants to excel: world football.

It plans to have 50 million players and 50,000 coaching schools within the next 10 years.

Its goal? To be a world football superpower by 2050.

As it spends billions buying up star foreign players, coaches and top European clubs, 101 East follows China's rising football stars to find out whether they can help the country conquer the "beautiful game."

Japan's War Game

In Japan's elite military college, young cadets prepare for battle in a fierce sport steeped in history and tradition.

Every year cadets at Japan's National Defense Academy prepare to battle each other in a fierce sport called Botaoshi.

Up to 300 players square off in an attempt to pull down a three-metre pole held upright by the opposing team.

These young men are training to become future leaders in Japan's Self-Defense Forces, and see the game as a test of their physical strength and strategic abilities.

With Japan recently passing new laws that allow its troops to fight overseas for the first time since World War II, the cadets are more determined than ever to excel.

State of Play: E-Sports in South Korea (Video)

As e-sports boom globally, Lee Jae-dong reveals what it takes to be a champion in S Korea where gamers are celebrities.

Enjoying rock star status with hordes of adoring fans, professional gamers are national celebrities in South Korea.

Attracting millions of spectators and selling out stadiums, Seoul, the South Korean capital, is the Mecca for gamers and the home of the StarCraft pro-gaming tournament.

As top players earn huge sums of money in sponsored teams, being a StarCraft player is not only a wise career move, it is also the path to respect in a highly competitive society.

Samoa's Rugby Super Women

Rugby player Tafale is caught between tradition and her Olympic dreams as she strives to make it onto the national team.

Samoa has produced some of the world's best rugby players. But for decades, cultural norms prevented women from playing the sport.

As a young girl, Tafale longed to play the game, even though her parents discouraged her from taking it up.

Now a single mother, she embraces Samoan customs, known as the Fa'a Samoa, and diligently meets her family responsibilities. But she hasn't given up her rugby dreams. 

When Olympic try-outs are announced, Tafale is determined to make the women's national team. Can she maintain local traditions and still fulfil her ambitions?