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Unfortunately it has been three long months since the last installment of the Canadian Corner and the Sushiboy is sorry. Too much has transpired on the Canadian scene in that time but some of the best is yet to come. In this installment of the Canadian Corner we have info regarding Jason Thacker from Spike TV's Ultimate Fighter show , upcoming Canadian MMA events such as the King of the Cage in Canada, another Canadian making his way to Pride FC, as well as much more from the land of the rising igloo. -Arnold Lim-
Unfortunately it has been three long months since the last installment of the Canadian Corner and the Sushiboy is sorry. Too much has transpired on the Canadian scene in that time but some of the best is yet to come. In this installment of the Canadian Corner we have info regarding Jason Thacker from Spike TV’s Ultimate Fighter show , upcoming Canadian MMA events such as the King of the Cage in Canada, another Canadian making his way to Pride FC, as well as much more from the land of the rising igloo. -Arnold Lim- TKO 20 “Champion vs. Champion”
TKO will be having their 20th Pro show on April 2nd in Montreal Quebec and will find itself in a different venue this time around. They will make their way to the “Metropolis” in downtown Montreal, a venue that holds approximately 2300 fans. Their next show after this one is rumored to be sometime in May. The card looks like an entertaining one with one of, if not the most anticipated 145 pound fights in Canadian MMA history as Mark Hominick takes on Stephane Vigneault to unify the 145 pound belts. The tentative TKO 20 card looks to be as follows. Card is subject to change. Superlightweight Championship
Mark Hominick vs. Stephane Vigneault
Heavyweight Championship Bout
Iccho Larenas vs. Jacob Conliffe
Lightweight Championship
Donald Ouimet vs. James Martinez
Superlightweight #1 Contendership Bout
Ryan Diaz vs. Phillipe Lagace
Tyler Jackson vs. Sam Stout
Jonathan Goulet vs. TBA
Blake Fredrickson vs. Thierry Quenneville
Aaron Tregear vs. Martin Grandmont
Sonny Leong vs. Dave Parizeau Denis Kang to Fight in Pride FC
Kang will realize a dream and fight for the Pride organization on April 3rd. He will step into the Pride ring representing the Spirit MC organization that has to this point helped cultivate his international career. He will be fighting at 90 kilo’s and will take on Japanese opponent, Takahiro Ohba, who is a Deep veteran who sports a 2-1 record with his only pro loss at the hands of Pride veteran Matt Foki in Australia via decision. Kang tells us training at “ATT" [American Top Team] is like training at the top university for studying MMA. There are always great coaches there everyday, great training partners are there, excellent facility available all the time, it is like being in the NBA for MMA. It is like a huge training camp with excellent training partners.” He is currently training like a mad man for his inaugural Pride appearance, rolling with such American Top Team standouts as Marcel Ferreria, Wilson Gouvaia, Pablo Popovich, Thiago Alves, and Thiago Jambo. He is currently residing with girlfriend and fellow ATT member Shelby Walker. Fighting in Pride is a relief as much as anything and he tells us “In my head all that is going on is…FINALLY! It has been a long time, and the longer I have had to wait the better I will have gotten.” In closing Kang had a comment for his fans in Canada as well as Korea. “I want to tell my fans thanks for being patient, to the people that were waiting and knew I would get there eventually. I am going into Pride to fight for them and to entertain them.” King of the Cage in Canada
It is official; the King of the Cage organization will make their first foray onto Canadian soil on April 16th. With less then a month to go, it appears the province of Alberta will again have Mixed Martial Arts in their capital city. The last MMA event to take place in Edmonton was put on by Mark Pavelich and the Maximum fighting Championships in November of 2002, and the last MMA event in Alberta was in May of 2003. The show will take place at the Agricom in Edmonton on April 16th, the same day as UFC 52, which could see the biggest MMA PPV audience in the history of MMA in North America. Promoter Cory Fischer tells us he is not worried about that however, and says “It is meaningless and it will not take away from our live gate. People want to see a live event much more then they want to see a PPV event anyways.” Promoter Cory Fischer will also be bringing Americans to fight on the card in addition to the plethora of Canadian Talent that will find their way to the King of the Cage event in the Agricom. Rumored Americans that will make their way across the border include, Forrest Petz who is quickly making a name for himself having defeated Charles Bennett and showcasing knock out power in both of his hands. Jason Gilliam who sports an impressive undefeated record with wins over ICE standout Trevor Garrett, and ZST veteran Antoine Skinner who also sports a win over the rugged Trevor Garrett. Some Canadians that are rumored to be fighting on the upcoming card include UFC veteran Ivan Menjivar, Chris Fontaine, Jason MacDonald, former MFC employee Jason St. Louis, and the Canadian bad boy himself Pain Peters. All five fighters are all fighters that have fought for the Alberta Crowd before in the now defunct Maximum Fighting Championships. Mr. Fischer called Edmonton a “good crowd” and seemed excited to bring the KOTC to town, and tells us there were a few reasons for making the trek to the land of the rising igloo. First of all “there is a large response from Canadians that wanted us” and that “Our whole purpose of coming to Canada is to go through the Canadian fight pool and give them an opportunity to fight, and expand to fight in the states.” There will be no championship fights on this show, but Mr. Fischer tells us that he currently has not one, but 3 dates set for Canada. Those three dates will have the King of the Cage coming not only to Edmonton but to other cities in Canada as well, and that is not all. He also mentioned that “We plan on coming up in the next 18 and doing a [KOTC] Pay Per View in Canada”. It seems KOTC is looking to make their mark in the great white north in a big way. WFF 8 "Dominance"
The ongoing saga of “WFF 8, When and Where” has finally been put to rest. The final resting place for the next installment of Shooto Canada will take place at the Croatian Cultural Centre in Vancouver Canada on Saturday March 26th, doors open at 6pm, fights start at 7pm. MMARR”s Sushiboy will be on had to take in the action and award the next installment of the MMA Ring Report Fighter of the Night award. At the last WFF Justin Bruckman took the award home, but with Bruckman not fighting on the card a new winner will be crowned. This is the tentative lineup, card is subject to change. Dan Rizzuto vs. Troy O’Connor
Antonio Carvalho vs. Tommy Lee
Kalib Starnes vs. Nigel Veddergreen
Sal Ram vs. Graydon Tannis
Craig Yee vs. Gerry Elliot
Ben Greer vs. Dan Rashio
George Kassimatis vs. Mike Newton
Tim Jensen vs. Oliver Contreras UCW II “Battle for the belts”
Amid a myriad of date and venue changes it appears the Ultimate Cage Wars, “CAGED INFERNO” is scheduled to take place, June 18th at the Winnipeg Convention Center, a venue that reportedly seats approximately 3000 spectators. Many of the top Canadian teams will be represented at the UCW including, Team Tompkins who will send TKO standout Sam Stout to fight in the cage. The UCW is also rumored to be adding giant screens with a live feed of the fights as well as other big event amenities. There are 13 fights scheduled to be on the card. The tentative card is below, card subject to change. MAIN EVENT
Sam "Hands of Stone" Stout vs. Paulo "Indio" Albuquerque, 155lbs SEMI MAIN EVENT
Lee "Gladiator" Mein vs. Lance "the Snake" Cartwrite, HW Garrett Vernoy vs. Alex Sung WW
Chris Horodecki vs. Derick Perez 155lbs
Alex "Pecker" Gasson vs. Kevin Manderson155lbs
Mike Turner vs. Justin"Houdini" Taverninni 145lbs
Jacob Conliffe vs. Jason "Dooms" Day 205lbs
Chris "Mancy" Clements vs. Brad Calder 185lbs
Bill Boland vs. Jeff "Pizza" Sutherland 140lbs UNDER CARD Lee Gaudete vs. John Henderson 155lbs
Aaron Tregear vs. Jesse Bongdfeldt 170lbs
Scott Gulcan vs. Mike Suetespina 155lbs
Shane Slade vs. Jerin Valel 165lbs Evolution Loses 2 instructors and gains 1 UFC veteran
Evolution/ Shut up and Fight gym has lost both of their MMA instructors. Both long time instructor Jason Darrah and newcomer Jeff Ford are no longer instructors at the gym. It appears that Mr. Darrah’s brother runs a bakery shop and he is going to have him manage the shop for him. Jason Darrah told us “I got a job offer that…I have to think about my family first.” Family came first and Mr. Darrah gave up a job that he himself admits he loves and will be making the move to Langley B.C to provide for his family. He will now be training with Lance Gibson and the boys at Gibson Pankration and also mentioned that this move may also open the door for him to get back into fighting! Although he is leaving Evolution he still very much wants to be a part of it and will continue to help with the promoting end of things when that eventually happens. The Evolution MMA academy recently hired Joe "Dirt" Doerksen to move to Vernon and take over Mr. Darrah’s position. Speaking of Mr. Darrah, Evolution owver Barb Taylor told us “Him [Jason Darrah] and I are good friends and I wish him the best of luck in what he is doing, and I would welcome him back when and if he decides to.” She also went on to tell us that the team had “A lot of hurt emotions, [but] if he decides to join another team everyone would be lucky to get him.” Stand up coach Jeff ford is also no longer with Evolution. The official word comes from gym owner Barb Taylor who told MMARR, “Mr. Ford is no longer with us. He is a great instructor but he could not get back across the border, [ to the USA] he went home for Christmas and could not get back.” Speaking with Evolution owner Barb Taylor it seemed Christmas came early for her too as there is no doubt that she picked up a top notch instructor in Doerksen. Joe Doerksen will be joining the Evolution crew in Vernon B.C as the new head instructor taking over for the departed Jeff Ford and Jason Darrah. Mr. Doerksen told us that Evolution “had been talking about me possibly doing a seminar there... and they asked me if I would be interested in teaching there…” Over time the idea seemed to work itself into his head and now Mr. Doerksen is officially a full fledged member of Evolution. Doerksen says is a totally new experience for him and he is “ looking forward to meeting a bunch of new people, and making new friends.” When asked about the possibility of Doerksen cornering a fighter from Evolution against a fighter from Rodrigo Munduruca, [who is his Brazilian Jiu Jitsu coach] he says “I don’t know if I could say I would have no problem with it… It is not like we are trying to kill each other but I don’t think I would be excited about it. But would we do it… yeah.” He is still in WInnipeg and will be joining Evolution in just two weeks on April 4th, 2005. In addition to Doerksen coming aboard, and Darrah and Ford leaving, another important team member will soon be returning. Leslie Dickens, the spear head in the Evolution gym is set to return to Vernon from U.S police custody. At one point he was rumored to be returning in March but Ms. Taylor told us “He is scheduled to be back in June, and [we are] much looking forward to his homecoming.” Currently the Evolution team consists of the following. Joe Doerksen
Matt Leo
Kevin Barkhouse
Chris Ade Team Tompkins
Much is happening in the land of Team Tomkins and this recap comes from the ringleader of the team, Mr. Shawn Tompkins himself. “Long time Team Tompkins member and Canadian Amateur Welterweight Kickboxing Champion Lorenzo ’the Jackal’ Giancola will be traveling to San Jose, California March 18th to make his pro Muay Thai debut. This will be done on K-1 USA promoters Scott Cokers famous StrikeForce Muay Thai show. Lorenzo sports an amatuer record of 14 wins 3 losses and 6 KO’s and will be facing Michael Manaquil who has 4 wins 0 losses as a pro, from California. This will be a good start for the 143lbs fighter who is toying with possible international bouts coming soon in Japan. Sad news came just one week prior to Sam ’Hands of Stone’ Stout’s debut in the Japanese organization ShootBoxing. Stout was scheduled to face Shootboxing world champion Ogata, when Ogata suffered a broken orbital bone in training. Stout looks forward to facing Ogata in the next Shootboxing show but now has his sites on a new fight. He will be facing a new Gibson Pankration fighter Tyler Jackson in the April 2nd TKO promotion and after this Stout will be competing in Winnipeg’s Ultimate Cage Wars. [It will be a] busy schedule for a hardworking fighter. April 2nd TKO will be home once again for 5 Team Tompkins fighters. Leading off for the Team will be Sonny Leong and Aaron Tregear. Team Tompkins is looking forward to the beginning of a huge future for Tregear who after a loss to Kyle Sanford went back to the drawing board with coach Shawn Tompkins. One year later Tompkins feels he has the next Robbie Lawler only more complete, this kid is fast, strong and just plain mentally tough. Stout is [also] back and looking for a exciting fight as per usual, and to complete the Team our two TKO Champions Jacob ’the Destroyer’ Conliffe, and Mark ’the Machine’ Hominick look to defend their titles and take another huge step in their bright futures.
Be sure to keep updated at www.teamtompkins.com “ MMA Ring Report Fighter of the night.
MMA Ring Report has since handed out the sixth edition of the “MMARR Fighter of the Night” award at TKO 19 in Montreal Quebec. Sam Stout’s impressive victory over Joey Brown almost garnered him a third consecutive MMA Ring Report award but, Georges St. Pierre broke the impressive 2 event consecutive winning streak of Sam "Hands of Stone" Stout by impressively defeating UFC veteran Dave Strasser. Mr. Stout still holds the record for more Awards with two, as well as most consecutive with 2 and will be looking to build on his record at TKO 20. If your event is looking to getting involved in awarding the MMA Ring Report fighter of the night award contact us
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The rundown of past winners of the MMARR fighter of the night award are as follows. 1 - Justin Bruckman - WFF 7 - July 23rd, 2004
2 - Patrick Cote - TKO 16 - May 22nd, 2004
3 - Sam Stout - TKO 17 - Sept 25th, 2004
4 - Matt Horwitch – XFC 3 Oct 16th, 2004
5 - Sam Stout – TKO 18 - Nov 26th, 2004
6 - Georges St. Pierre - Jan 29th 2005
7 - ??? - WFF 8 March 26th 2005
8 - ??? - TKO 20 April 2nd 2005
9 - ??? Apex / On Demand Fight Team
Apex is set to re-emerge in 2005 but at this point no firm date has been confirmed. In the meantime Apex Matchmaker Alex Capporicci is also hard at work on his MMA management team the "On Demand Fight Team" which has recently expanded to include some a solid mix of Canadian and American MMA talent. The lineup up of fighters that are currently on his team are as follows. Steve Berger - Team Vaghi / Jones Boxing - St. Louis, Missouri - WW
Mike Rogers - Team Vaghi / Jones Boxing - St. Louis, LHW/ HW
Dustin Severs - Team Vaghi / Jones Boxing - St. Louis, Missouri - LW
Santino DeFranco - Arizona Combat Sports - Scottsdale, Arizona - LW
Rory Singer - Hardcore Gym - Athens, Georgia - Middleweight
Stephan Potvin - Club de Boxe 454 - Montreal, Quebec - Middleweight
Claude Patrick - Toronto, Ontario - Middleweight
Brent Beauparlant - Montreal, Quebec - Light Heavyweight West Coast Grappling Championships
MMA Ring Report was at the 3rd installment of the Combat Athletics Grappling open, and event put on by Combat Athletics John Cooper and Cody Dillman. The event was a well run affair and “The Sushiboy” Arnold Lim was there and brought MMA Ring Report the full report The next installment will take place in March/April of 2006 but there are rumors of another show sometime in the fall, possible in October or November. Aristeia MMA Management
Ivan Menjivar is no longer a part of Aristeia management. He is currently managing himself and in his own words, “concentrating on school”. It is not out of the question that they will reunite after his layoff. Aristeia currently manages Pain Peters, Chad Hamzeh and Steve Geldert. Epic MMA
Team leader Greg Allen tells us that he has “I have actually discussed and built a new strategy with Bill ( Mahood ). Bill is now moving into a management position and is going to be heading up the lead management role and direct fighter development. This was necessary as I am currently swamped with several film projects... I needed a helping hand. Bill will continue to fight, but he is definitely excited to be taking over the majority of management responsibilities.” Gibson Pankration
The Ultimate Fighter’s Canadian representative, Jason Thacker is training at Gibson Pankration. After the filming of “The Ultimate Fighter” Mr. Thacker joined up with the the forces that be at Gibson Pankration in Port Moody British Columbia to work on his skills. Thacker did train at Gibson Pankration off and on before his inaugural foray on T.V, and returned to polish up on his MMA but is not yet a member of the Gibson Pankration “Fight Team”. He will however be heading up to Las Vegas presumably to fight at the April 9th Spike TV final episode. “ALL” members of “The Ultimate Fighter” show will be competing on the card including Mr. Thacker, but it is unknown at this time who his opponent will be. Gibson Pankration is also gearing up for a busy month as they have their team fighting almost every weekend here on out for over a month. One of the head instructors at Gibson Pankration, Ryan Diaz was in the Tsunami that hit Asia earlier on in the year. He told us his story and we will have the full story in the coming days. Upcoming Canadian events March 26 - WFF 8 - Croatian Cultural Center
April 2 - TKO 19 "Champion vs. Champion", Montreal, The Metropolis
April 16 - King of the Cage - Edmonton
May 28 - Peterec’s Event - Victoria B.C
June 18 - UCW 2 Winnipeg, Winnipeg Convention Center
Fall 2005 - Combat Athletics West Coast Submission Grappling
2005 - Apex 2 So that wraps up another Canadian Corner and you are up to date on the Canadian front. If you have any Canadian news that you would like to let us know about email the Sushiboy HERE… Many more exciting things are scheduled to happen in the coming months, in and around the sport of MMA around the world. There is no doubt that Canada will surely be in the mix, until then this was “The Sushiboy” with the Canadian Corner. -MMARR- |
