From the lowest of lows to a BKFC main event fight.
Outwardly, Paul Venis might present precisely as you would think the man who was once called Britain’s Hardest Doorman would look. The bulging muscles threatening to burst through a heavily logoed t-shirt and the collage of tattoos on his arms, the dots of ink on his face and the hands that look like a cricket batting gloves. It’s the body of a man who has been through some things, more than most, one that has seen the darkest places of humanity and lived to tell about it.
But when he does tell you about it, it’s as if the messaging were coming from a different person. The bright smile rarely leaves his face as he sits in front of a floral wall in his Middlesborough home. Not the kind you force upon your cheeks while you’re doing press obligations either, the kind that develops when you have truly found the light.
"I've always said, my best ability is getting hit. I'm durable, I'm powerful, and if you can't put me away, then you're fucked,” said Venis. “I’ve always lived by that.”
That mantra has proven true in his fighting career, where he was undefeated in 32 outings in K-1 style kickboxing on the British circuit, and undefeated in unlicensed pro-style boxing as well. Only twice has an arranged fight of his gone the distance. But it’s also been the case in his life outside the ring, one that was once governed by hardship, violence and addiction. The title of Hardest Doorman was bestowed upon him after winning a white collar boxing match against Wes Smith. What could have been a moment that catapulted him into a formal boxing career instead sent him spiralling down a near-lethal path.
"At the beginning, when all of this started, the reputation, the ego, the desire to be the biggest and baddest in town, in any town, led me to some really dark places. It took me to some real dark places, it got me involved in drugs, crime, to the point that I was in flat out addiction,” said Venis.
A constant cocktail of crack, cocaine, mephedrone and testosterone fuelled a bender of crime and violence in the wake of the Smith bout. One night, Venis’ family home was shot at, bullets flying through his front door. The incident had a “catastrophic” effect according to Venis’ defense lawyer at the time. Venis decided to acquire a replica Glock pistol and go on the hunt for revenge, but before anything could happen, was pulled over while in a taxi by local police officers who discovered the blank gun and a gram and a half of cocaine.
"When I got out, I just couldn't go back to that lifestyle. I knew who I was. I didn't want to die. I wanted to be a Dad, I wanted to be there for my wife. She deserved me, she deserved a good man. But also, I needed it for me. I didn't like who I'd become,” Venis told podcast host James English in 2022.
Venis served three years in jail, at certain points contemplating suicide, before committing to reforming his life entirely—but for one exception. The violence could stay, it just had to be in the ring.
Venis’ grandfather was a founder of the Narcotics Anonymous branch in his hometown, one that helped save the life of his mother. Venis entered the program, and committed himself to K-1 kickboxing, where he flourished on a national level.
“When I got out of prison, fighting saved me. It gave me something to build on. I had that thing that fighters are born with, that grit, that warrior spirit, that heart, that do-or-die stuff that I already had in me. It set me up to change. It set me up on a path to become a professional athlete,” said Venis.
After roughly seven years on the kickboxing circuit, Venis felt he’d hit a wall, after international offers to fight were stymied due to his criminal record. He stepped away from the ring, and dedicated himself to YouTube and content creation, centered around discussions of mental health, addiction recovery and autism awareness. In this new community, he found a lot of similar, and even familiar faces, such as BKFC contender Danny Christie, who has also been very public about his recovery.
But Venis still felt as though something was missing, and found himself struggling with his mental health once again. It didn’t take long for him to realize that what was missing was fighting. Not just the act itself, but the structure it provided and the animalistic euphoria it created inside of him as he traded blows. He started sparring with Christie and longtime friend-turned BKFC heavyweight champion Mick Terrill, and gave a good account of himself.
"It lit a fire in me,” said Venis.” I said, I need to fight. I'm ready, get me a fight.”
A throughline in Venis’ new life has been tapping into his past to create something positive in the present. Growing up, Venis was deeply entrenched in the culture of bare knuckle fighting in the UK. Everyone he knew was “at least five, six bare knuckle fights deep” by the time they were a young man.
"We grew up living by these rules,” he said. The bare knuckle fighting, the arranged fights, barns, fields, Traveler camps. We grew up in this culture where if you have beef with people, you meet up, have a bare knuckle fight and sort your differences out, for free. That's how I grew up. It's just, 4 o'clock, see you there tomorrow. This is what we were born into. This is our culture."
BKFC expressed interest in Venis, and the interest was mutual. A chance to do what he once did in empty fields after schools on an international broadcast in front of thousands of fans? It’s the dream come true his sponsor had promised him.
The 38-year old Venis headlines BKFC Prospects Newcastle against cruiserweight Stanoy Tabakov this weekend, a 42-year old Bulgarian who scored a first-round stoppage in his BKFC debut over Petr Beranek in March of this year. His friend Danny Christie will take on Jimmy Millar in one of the night’s feature bouts as well.
It will be Venis’ first fight in the better part of a decade, one he’s effectively been preparing for over the last year, particularly rewiring his kickboxing approach for a more western boxing-rooted approach for BKFC. Venis says that he’s had to unwire the kickboxing habit of shelling up to merely catch punches and get back into the habit of slipping, rolling and establishing angles. But Venis insists that his prodigious punching power has never lapsed.
"I'm just born different. Once I connect with this power, it's game over," he said. "All that stuff is coming back to me. I love it so much. I've never felt more alive."
Venis finding salvation in a sport as brutal as bare knuckle may seem odd to some. One would assume a fighter has to go to a dark place mentally in order to knuckle up, a place that would seem oddly close to the territory he was in when he was making decisions that were leading him down a road to an early grave, one way or another. It would also seem unusual to anyone who meets Venis in 2024 that the saccharinely positive family man who spends his time helping addicts and parents of autistic children would even be able to return to that place. But Venis insists that’s not where he’s headed at all. Rather, the bare knuckle ring is the last piece of a fully realized life, the final step to ensure that his past didn’t ultimately define his future, that he wouldn’t have to say “what if?”
"It's nowhere near as dark as the places I have to be in to go through the prison system, struggling with drugs, struggling with alcohol, struggling with all that stuff. This stuff is nowhere near as dark as that,” said Venis. That's why I'm able to do this comfortably, with a smile on my face," said Venis. "This is why we do this. It's for these emotions, it's for these feelings. Our kids can make us feel alive, our loved ones can make us feel alive, but these take us to the very top of the planet. This is where we thrive. So this is why I'm back. For that feeling. It's not so much a dark place for me, it's a bright place for me."
All photos courtesy of @paulvenisofficial22 on Instagram.
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