We’re getting pretty accustomed to seeing Buakaw at Thai Fight these days. He won Thai Fight’s 70kg tournament last year and has two wins in the promotion this year.
Buakaw will be entering this year’s Thai Fight 70kg tournament, and it starts on October 23 in Bangkok, Thailand. Once again, he’s fighting an opponent that really is nowhere near his caliber in Mauro Serra of Italy. As per usual with Thai Fight, they’re a bit of a joke when it comes to pretty basic stuff like letting people know what the fight card is so this fight is obviously subject to change.
What we do know for sure about the card is that it will be the beginning of the Thai Fight 70kg and 67kg tournaments. Singmanee Kaewsamrit will be featuredas the Thai in the 67kg tournament.
Here’s a tentative lineup for the 67kg and 70kg tournaments, although when Thai Fight comes around, don’t be surprised if there are a lot of changes.
K-1 has announced the match-ups for their MAX Final 8 tournament happening on December 15 in Athens, Greece. The tournament will feature the winners from the First 16 event in Madrid that took place earlier this year, including Liverkick top 10 fighters Artur Kyshenko, Andy Souwer, and Andy Ristie, who entered the Final 8 with wins over Su Hwan Lee, Abraham Roqueni, and Gago Drago, respectively. Mike Zambidis enters the tournaments riding a win over Chahid in what might have been the fight of the year, and a solid performance against Fadi Merza back in April. He’ll certainly have the fans behind him fighting in his home country. Also on the card is former It’s Showtime champion Chris Ngimbi, Murthel Groenhart, Reece McAllister, and Yasuhiro Kido. Most interesting perhaps is the inclusion of both Ristie and Groenhart, who competed on the GLORY 2 Brussels card in October and were presumed to be under contract with the rival organization.
In the first fight of the tournament Mike Zambidis takes on Reece McAllister, followed by Yasuhiro Kido against Murthel Groenhart, Artur Kyshenko vs. Chris Ngimbi, and Andy Souwer vs. Andy Ristie. This is a very interesting field. While Artur Kyshenko is most likely the favorite to win, Mike Zambidis, Chris Ngimbi, Andy Souwer are the clearest opposition. Plus, Andy Ristie has been on fire lately, knocking out most of his opponents in the first few seconds of the first round, so it’s never wise to count him out. Don’t sleep on Groenhart either. He’s an absolutely massive middleweight and packs a ton of punch.
The 8 man single-elimination tournament will culminate in 7 fights over the course of one day, with the winner receiving a grand prize of $300,000. The tournament will operate in bracket form, with the winner of fight one facing the winner of fight two, the winner of fight three facing the winner of fight four, and the winners of fights five and six meeting in the finals.
Official Fight Card
Mike Zambidis (Greece) vs. Reece McAllister (UK)
Yasuhiro Kido (Japan) vs. Murthel Groenhart (Netherlands)
Artur Kyshenko (Ukraine) vs. Chris Ngimbi (Congo)
Andy Souwer (Netherlands) vs. Andy Ristie (Suriname)
We’re going to start highlighting a selection of fights to watch monthly from now on. This month is a lot like last month where there’s so many good fights that it’s hard to squeeze them all into one article so this will be Part 1, featuring ten fights. Part 2 will come shortly after and will feature ten more fights.
For Part 1 and for the majority of these posts in general, I’ve decided to focus more on fights that people might not know about, as opposed to ones that are on the big shows that most of our readers will be familiar with. Since I’m calling these fights to watch, some have wondered just how to watch them, and well, the answer is pretty much YouTube for most of them.
November 2: Sam-A Gaiyanghadaogym vs. Petpanomrung Wor Sungprapai – Lumpinee Stadium – Bangkok, Thailand
The rematch with Penek continues to elude Sam-A, who lost to Penek back in May and is seeking to avenge that loss. Sam-A still remains one of the best fighters in the world and is faced with Petpanomrung, who he defeated in March. Petpanomrung is still very young and definitely has a bright future, already hanging with the top fighters, recently defeating Yodkhunpol Sitmonchai in September and losing to Pokaew in October. Sam-A and Petpanomrung are two of the more technical fighters so this fight, although it probably won’t be a barn burner or anything, should be a very intriguing tactical display.
November 8: Roman Mailov vs Armin Pumphanmuang – W5 Fighter 8 – Moscow, Russia
Roman Mailov looks to continue his rise at 70kg, now facing Armin Pumphanmuang, who has made a name for himself this year at Thai Fight. The fight will be under kickboxing rules, so Armin will be at a disadvantage, but Mailov himself comes from Muay Thai, although he’s fought a lot of kickboxing lately and has adapted to the ruleset. Mailov is only 20 and by no means would a loss hurt his career. He’s being steadily built up on W5 shows in Russia, and ventured to Germany two months ago where he defeated Leo Zulic. Armin is by no means a top Thai but should at least provide a test for Mailov.
November 10: Masaaki Noiri vs. Yetkin Ozkul – Krush.24 – Tokyo, Japan
This is a battle of LiverKick’s #1 and #4 lightweights, holding huge implications in the lightweight division. Ozkul takes the #1 spot if he wins. Ozkul is at a significant size disadvantage in this fight, with it being at 63kg, along with the height advantage that Noiri has over him. Both fighters’ strengths and weaknesses play right into the others’, so the winner will be the one that is able to better assert their strength and take advantage of the opponent’s weakness. Ozkul’s known for his heavy punches, and Noiri’s main flaw happens to be punchers. Ozkul is most susceptible to tall fighters with strong and dynamic knees, something Noiri fits the bill of very well. Noiri has to be favored here, especially being on home turf, but if Ozkul lands with one of his power punches, Noiri will be in trouble.
November 10: Saenchai vs. Pakorn – Super Showdown – Glasgow, Scotland
November is a busy month for Saenchai, and this will be his first fight of the month. It’s not too often that you see two Thais fighting in a foreign country, let alone two top Thais. Pakorn comes off a loss to Mongkolchai Phetsuphapan in October can be a very tactical fighter at times and can go from being a technician to engaging in a fire fight. With Saenchai the latter is almost guaranteed not to happen, and not many can out-technique Saenchai. With Pakorn, it’s unlikely that he’ll win but simply the scenario of the fight and that Pakorn atleast should be competitive make it a very fun fight.
November 10: Sahak Parparyan vs. Alex Sandro Pereira – It’s Showtime Brazil – Sao Paolo, Brazil
Sahak’s It’s Showtime 85kg world title is on the line here. Pereira comes off two tournament wins in Brazil, with the second one qualifying him for this fight and spot on It’s Showtime. Pereira definitely isn’t the prettiest fighter in terms of technique and style, but I think he has a lot of potential. Whether he can beat Sahak or not, I do think he’ll at least be competitive, especially if he has the conditioning to go five strong rounds. This is a great 85kg fight featuring one of the division’s top fighters, also allowing us to gauge how good Pereira is when fighting against top competition.
November 16: Alex Harris vs. Madsua – Rumble of the Kings 2012 – Linkoping, Sweden
Rumble of the Kings is back with their annual November card, and one of the interesting fights on the event is this one. Alex Harris made a name for himself last year when he defeated Yoshihiro Sato, and then made an appearance at GLORY in Stockholm this year, losing to Nieky Holzken despite a valiant effort. Harris is back in Muay Thai rules for this fight and against Madsua, who’s been a tough out for the likes of John Wayne Parr and Jordan Watson, defeating both of them. Harris will need to stay out of the clinch if he wants to win this one, though Madsua can still be a problem outside of the clinch for him as well.
November 17: Javier Hernandez vs. Michael Peynaud – Heroes IV – Cordoba, Spain
Although he got stopped from low kicks by Yuki a week ago, Hernandez will move on and still fight. Peynaud is another formidable opponent and won’t be an easy opponent at all. This time Javier won’t have to worry about travel or jetlag, being in his hometown. It’s a very interesting match-up as Peynaud doesn’t pose the same problems that Yuki did and his style is one in which it’s unlikely that anyone will dominate this fight. It should be action packed with Peynaud looking to notch a marquee win and Hernandez looking to get back on track.
November 22: Saenchai vs. Damien Alamos – Best of Siam 2 – Paris, France
This is Saenchai’s second fight of the month, and against the Lumpinee Stadium light welterweight champion. Damien Alamos is coming off a loss to Diesellek Aoodonmuang. Saenchai is smaller than Diesellek but that doesn’t really matter as he’s beaten opponents that are even bigger than Alamos and at or near a similar level to him. This is a fight that a lot of people have wanted to see ever since Damien became Lumpinee champion. Saenchai and the top fighters around 130-135 are just so good that many can beat larger opponents, and that will probably be the case here with Saenchai most likely winning in a fun fight.
November 24: Liam Harrison vs. Kaopon Lek – Thai Boxe Mania – Torino, Italy
Kaopon Lek is a former Lumpinee champion and former Fight of the Year in Thailand, with those accolades coming from the ’90s, amazingly. What else is amazing is that he’s only 35 years old and still going strong no less. He comfortably beat Andrei Kulebin last year, still showcasing what level he’s at after all these years and living in Italy for quite some time. Liam Harrison has had some fights fall through due to injury but returned last month with a stoppage over Angelo Campoli, showcasing the low kicks that destroyed Andrei Kulebin. Harrison is a very dangerous fighter and this along with Kaopon Lek’s ring savvy provides for a very intriguing fight.
November 24: Karim Bennoui vs Thomas Adamandopoulos – La Nuit des Champions – Marseilles, France
This fight pits LiverKick’s #3 and #6 lightweights against each other. They faced off at almost exactly the same time last year on the same event, in the same place, with Bennoui getting a split decision win that many thought Adamandopoulos should’ve gotten. Bennoui hasn’t fought since January, while Adamandopoulos rebounded from the losses to Bennoui and Ozkul with a big KO win over Ryuji Kajiwara and a win last month over Cyril Abbas. This fight is sure to provide some great action, much like the last one and will again be five rounds.
Enfusion’s third season comes to an end today with two tournaments. At 85kg for the men, Sahak Parparyan, Andrew Tate, Franci Grajs and Ritchie Hocking all advanced to the finals on the show and are in a four man, one night tournament. The women’s tournament is the same format, and features Denise Kielholtz, Lindsay Scheer, Chajmaa Bellakhal and Lucy Payne.
The event starts live at 1:00PM ET/10:00 AM PT in North America, or 19:00 CET in Europe. Fight Network will be airing the event live in Canada and the United States while it’ll be on Orange Sport in Europe. I’ll be doing live play by play of the event on twitter at @rianscalia.
75kg: Miljan Vidovic def. Grega Smole by unanimous decision.
88kg: Tadej Toplak def. Ivan Stanic by unanimous decision.
71kg: Mirko Vorkapic def. Luke Whelan by unanimous decision.
As we know, GLORY will be running a series of “Road to GLORY” events in the United States and Japan this year, with the objective of finding talent from those respective countries. The Road to GLORY shows will feature eight man tournaments, with the winners getting prize money and a GLORY contract.
So far, there hasn’t been much official information released but things seem to be coming together. The first Road to GLORY USA event will take place on February 1 in Tulsa, Oklahoma with an eight man heavyweight tournament featuring Randy Blake. This event has been known about for a while now and will be put on also by Dale Cook’s Xtreme Fight Night promotion at The Joint at the Hard Rock in Tulsa. The eight fighters seem to be set but as of now there are no match-ups in place:
Randy Blake
Brian Collette
Myron Dennis
Manuel Quezada
Daniel Brison
Kyle Martin
Jeremy Freitag
Roy Boughton
Recently word also got out that the second Road to GLORY USA event will be on February 9 in Los Angeles, with fighters Afam Egbochuku and Mike Lemaire being in the tournament. From these fighters we can conclude that the tournament will be at 85kg. This event takes place at the Hollywood Park Casino in Inglewood.
After that, there appears to be another Road to GLORY USA in New York City on March 22. This news comes via fighter Chris Clodfelter, who says he’s in the tournament. Assuming that this is all true, it would appear that this event would be the 77kg tournament.
Finally, word today got out that there will be a Road to GLORY USA event in Milwaukee in early May. Duke Roufus talked about the news and how he was working with GLORY to put on the event, which will have the 70kg tournament.
That’s all we can piece together for now. Official announcements should be coming soon from GLORY, considering that some of these events aren’t too far away.
GLORY will be attempting to find talent in the United States with their Road to GLORY series of events and the first one, as we’ve known for a while, takes place on February 1 in Tulsa, Oklahoma under Dale Cook’s Xtreme Fight Night promotional banner.
A few things have been officially confirmed today. First off, the tournament will indeed be at 95kg/209lbs. Second, the official lineup of the eight tournament fighters has been confirmed:
Randy Blake
Myron Dennis
Brian Collette
Manuel Quezada
Kyle Martin
Roy Boughton
Daniel Brison
Jeremy Freitag
No fights have been announced yet.
The familiar name will of course be Randy Blake, the hometown fighter, who fought for K-1 last year. Myron Dennis has fought and lost to Randy Blake twice, including by split decision in their first encounter. Brian Collette is seen as one of the best up and coming heavyweights in the United States, and I was actually surprised that he’d be fighting at this weight. Manuel Quezada is mostly known as a pro boxer, but he was also a kickboxer before that and fought on some of the old K-1 USA shows back in the day. Roy Boughton is an experienced MMA fighter who’s fought for Bellator, Shark Fights and Score Fighting series.
Those three fighters would be the most familiar ones. There isn’t much information on the remaining three fighters. Freitag has a lot of MMA experience. Kyle Martin was undefeated as an amateur in kickboxing and is from New Orleans, Louisiana. Daniel Brison has a few pro boxing wins but also has experience in Muay Thai and kickboxing.
The first edition of Road to GLORY went down yesterday in Tulsa, Oklahoma, USA and featured a one night, eight man tournament at 95kg/209lbs. The winner walked away with $20 000 and a contract with GLORY.
I’ll just start off by saying that the winner of the tournament came as a complete surprise. Not because anyone counted him out, but just because no one even knew he was in the tournament. Dustin Jacoby, a former UFC fighter, replaced Manuel Quezada on just 24 hours notice, driving to Tulsa overnight and stopping three opponents in one night to win the tournament.
What’s even more surprising about Jacoby’s run in the tournament is that he beat the two favorites. In his quarter final match-up, he faced the hometown fighter and K-1 veteran Randy Blake. Jacoby stopped Blake, scoring a third round TKO. In the semi finals, Jacoby would face Roy Boughton, who defeated Daniel Brison in the quarter finals. Jacoby knocked out Boughton in the first round.
Then in the finals, Jacoby faced Brian Collette, who had also stopped both of his opponents, Jeremy Freitag and Kyle Martin respectively. Collette was certainly one of the favorites to win this tournament. Jacoby knocked out Collette in the first round, with one second left.
Full results below with what we’ve been able to put together. We also just got video footage thanks to MMAtopics.net, which can be seen below as well.
Quarter Finals: Kyle Martin def. Myron Dennis by split decision. Dustin Jacoby def. Randy Blake by TKO in Round 3. Brian Collette def. Jeremy Freitag by KO in Round 1. Roy Boughton def. Daniel Brison
Semi Finals: Brian Collette def. Kyle Martin by TKO Dustin Jacoby def. Roy Boughton by KO in Round 1.
Finals: Dustin Jacoby def. Brian Collette by KO in Round 1.
Peter Aerts might be getting up there in age in the fight world, but that doesn’t mean that he plans on slowing down any time soon. Mr. K-1 himself, Peter Aerts is set to take on the young Jamal Ben Saddik who last fought at Glory 4 Tokyo’s Grand Slam tournament and had a strong showing with wins over Errol Zimmerman and Remy Bonjasky before losing to Daniel Ghita.
Aerts has been rumored for the event for a while now and now Jamal Ben Saddik has confirmed the fight on his Facebook this morning. It should be a tough fight for both men in very different ways, as Aerts is going to be going into the fight with a fully healed right hand for the first time in years, but will still have to fight age and coming off of a disappointing 2012, while Saddik has to not take Aerts lightly.
This weekend Jerome Le Banner continued his march of dominance over moderately decent competition as he fought against the promising up-and-comer that is Vitaly Akhramenko in France at Fight Night San Tropez. The fight was for the WKN Super Heavyweight Championship, which saw Le Banner stop Akhramenko in the second round in a fight that had a lot of fight fans interested. Akhramenko was a step up from some of the other competition that we’ve seen Le Banner against and this is a fantastic warm-up for his fight against Sergei Kharitonov at GLORY 10 Los Angeles.
The event also saw Emmanuel Payet defeating Arnold Oborotov by decision for the WKN Light Heavyweight World Title, Vladimir Mineev defeated Thiago Beowulf for the WKN Heavyweight World title and Nicolas Wambas stopping former K-1 great Stefan Leko in the fourth round in a Super Fight. Another highlight for the event was that Sylvester Stallone was in attendance at the event, most likely checking out what Jerome Le Banner does best in his home of France.
When it comes to GLORY events, semantics are vital. Numbered GLORY events have been airing on Spike TV and television around the world while the undercards are the GLORY SuperFight Series. When it comes to GLORY 17 Los Angeles things are going to be a little bit different. GLORY 17 Los Angeles will air on Spike TV, like usual, but this time around that will not be the main attraction. Oh no.
The main attraction?
The GLORY Last Man Standing Middleweight tournament on PPV. We told you that GLORY PPV was coming and here it is. This will be an 8-man tournament, which GLORY has announced six of the names thus far. Those names are as follows; Joe Schilling, Simon Marcus, Alex Pereira, Bogdan Stoica, Melvin Manhoef and Wayne Barrett. The big surprise is the inclusion of Simon Marcus, who has a long history with GLORY 10 Middleweight tournament winner Joe Schilling. The new names are Bogdan Stoica, brother of Andrei Stoica and Melvin Manhoef. We all know Melvin.
This is a huge deal, obviously, we’ll have more information when it becomes available.
