Here’s a picture from the grand opening of the Submission Bar in San Diego from last night. It’s a pretty cool concept, a bar that has a MMA theme to it so they invited a few local gyms to come down and support the opening. They had really nice paintings on the walls of various MMA fighters and a cage where the sofas and seats were. That’s my good friend and training partner Dustin doing his best to look scary and intimidating.
A lot of people have been talking about Cory Hill’s recent injury and I’m definitely feeling for him. On top of being a very good athlete and competitor, he’s also a great guy and while it was not aired on our season of the Ultimate Fighter, he and I had a real good conversation one night where he talked a lot about his wife and kids and I really respected him as more than just a fighter, also as a person.
I got a text message from some fellows at Gracie Tampa and they have begun a fund for Cory as he will be out of action for quite some time so if you are so inclined, stop by the Gracie Tampa website and I believe they have details there on how you can help.
Here’s to a speedy recovery and hope to see Cory back in action soon as possible.
Big congratulations to Efren Escudero for taking the title last night and he has overcome quite a bit of tragedy in his personal life to make it happen. The best thing about Efren is his youthful nature; he’s a great guy to be around with and I know his success will just continue.
I did not get to see any of the fights but I also heard that Vinicius M. lost in the last match but that dude’s grappling skills are truly amazing and I’m sure he will bounce back as well. I happened to officiate one of his matches a few years back when he went against Robert Drysdale at the SUB X and he was definitely fun and exciting to watch.
This is the new Reversal gym which is owned and operated by the man in the middle of the back row, Takehiro. Check out the mural on the wall mat behind us; that’s dope.
Here’s a photo from the tournament with one of the true legends of MMA and BJJ, Yuki Nakai. If you have ever seen the documentary, “Choke”, you’ll recognize Mr. Nakai as the one who despite being eye-gouged and bloodied by Gerard Geardeu, went on to not only beat Gerard but also give a great fight against Rickson Gracie. He’s one of the first BJJ Black Belts in Japan and an inspiration to anybody that has ever seen him compete.
Here’s a group picture of the team from Taiwan that competed at the 2008 Asian Championships two weekends ago in Tokyo, Japan. These are some of the most dedicated martial artists I have come across in a long time; depsite not having a consistent high-level instructor for a couple of years now, they continue to train hard and represent well at grappling tournaments across Asia. This photo was taken inside the venue and as you can see behind us, it was a pretty big event with 8 mats going most of the time. Left to right is Eric, Isaac, Dom, myself, Warren, Dennis, Kai, Rick and Sabrina. All of them had some good matches and as always, great to compete with them.
I apologize for the HUGE lag time between blog entries; just returned from Asia where I was able to not only compete in the IBJJF Asian Championships being held in Tokyo, but also tour Singapore and Malaysia for a few days as well. I ended up staying in Asia for about two weeks and if you have the time, you definitely have to check it out. Not only are the Japanese grappling fanatics, they run one of the best tournaments you could imagine. The tournament went well, met up with about 8 guys and gals from the Taiwan gym and as always, was impressed by how hard they competed in their matches and, of course, how much beer they drank after the tournament! A lot of great competitors at the tournament including Mike Fowler who was amazing while winning one division and having what I thought was the best match of the event when he came from behind to pull off an amazing arm bar with little time left. Daisuke “Amazon” Sugie was another one; he of PRIDE fame was unstoppable and in my opinion the best Black Belt in Japan. Robert Drysdale, the ADCC champion entered as well but had no opponent in his division so was not able to compete. In the above picture that’s me jumping on Miyata’s back and trying to play it cool…