The Maximum Fighting Championships returned to their hometown with their first show in over two years and made their “resurrection” at the Shaw Conference center, in downtown Edmonton. The MFC would make their return on the same evening as the rematch in the Labour Day classic between the Edmonton Eskimos and Calgary Stampeders who regularly draw 60,000 fans to their home and home series and despite the competition the crowd was healthy and the fights were entertaining.

In the main event of the evening, Jason Macdonald defeated Chris Fontaine in a thrilling main event that went back and forth until the end came with MacDonald winning by rear naked choke in the second round. Flurries of punches were exchanged sporadically throughout the fight but much of it was spent on the ground where Chris Fontaine started strong controlling the action from the mat and taking the back of MacDonald and working for the rear naked choke that appeared inevitable. Fontaine held on like an anaconda looking for the fight finishing choke but MacDonald stayed composed and despite the precarious position, patiently defended, and eventually got the reversal he was looking for and immediately went to work dropping solid punches and elbows into Fontaine and driving his head into the mat several times from his guard. It looked like the tide was turning but the bell ended to end the first round with both fighters having opportunities to garner the victory. MacDonald turned it up a notch in the second and took the back of Fontaine when it went to the mat and secured the rear naked choke in an entertaining affair to end his losing streak at 4 and garner the MMA Ring Report Fighter of the night award in the process. Despite the loss Fontaine was game and the former TKO middleweight champion proved that he was a fighter to be reckoned with.

In what was by far the least entertaining fight of the night Victor “The Matrix” Valimaki got the unanimous decision victory over UFC legend Dan “The Beast” Severn despite being outweighed by about 40 pounds. The first round saw Valimaki stay to the outside and land sporadically cutting Severn with one blow but landing little else in a rather uneventful first stanza. The second round saw Severn get the takedown and lay on top of Valimaki and for his part, offering little effective offense of his own. Almost the whole round had Severn on top but he never forced the issue and the referee could have stepped in at least twice to stand the fighters up but the standup never came. The third round was much like the first with neither fighter really committing to any effective offense but Valimaki kept the fight standing and landed a few punches to take the round. During the fight the crowd chanted “Boring, boring” but still neither fighter engaged and the fight continued it’s plodding pace and ended up with Valimaki winning the contest 29-28, 29-28, 29-28 on all three judges cards. Look for Video interviews with both Valimaki and Severn in the coming to MMA Ring report in the coming days.

In an entertaining bout Blake Fredrickson got the victory over Kevin Manderson with a first round ref stoppage TKO that ended with a bit of controversy. The bout started with Fredrickson, who appeared to be the bigger and stronger of the two fighters, controlling the tempo of the stand up fight with well timed punches. Manderson was game for his part and worked the punches over the top when Fredrickson would tie up for the clinch landing some solid blows but it appeared thatt “The Snake” was willing to take one to give one and punished Manderson to the body with firm knee’s that found their mark early and often every time he ate a punch upstairs. Fredrickson finally caught Manderson with a punch that stumbled him and Fredrickson smelling blood, charged his opponent and here was where the controversy ensued. Manderson appeared to be on all fours, when Fredrickson stood over him and drove hard knee’s to his head. Knee strikes to the head are illegal in the MFC to a grounded opponent but the referee stepped in and stopped the fight in favor of Fredrickson. There was no video replay so it was unofficial whether the knee strikes indeed met their mark with Manderson on all fours or with his hands coming off the mat. But in the end, and to the chagrin of the Munduruca camp, the fight was awarded to Fredrickson at 3:33 of the first round.

In a light heavyweight contest, Travis Galbraith barely broke a sweat in his foray into the heavier weight class and won at twenty two seconds of the first round over an overmatched Chris Wilson. Galbraith came out and dropped Wilson right off the bat with a punch and pounced on his prone opponent firing devastating hammerfists onto his defenseless adversary until the ref stepped in to prevent further harm. After the fight MFC veteran Jason St. Louis challenged Galbraith to a fight and it appears that St. Louis will be make his return to the MFC ring at some point in the near future.

Mike Bell and Wilf Betz engaged in one of the best fights of the night. Mike Bell came out the aggressor and looked to be the much stronger of the two fighters, firing off high kicks and hard punches looking for the knockout blow. While Betz appeared to be the smaller of the two fighters he picked his spots and began to connect from the feet forcing Bell to engage and force the issue on the ground with a takedown. From the mat Betz began working the submission attempts back and forth and Bell was forced to the defensive powering out of several submission holds.

As the fight wore on Bell began to tire and his strength began to leave him and it was from here that Betz found his mark working his way to the mount position in the second round and grinding his opponent with punches and elbows for almost the whole second round. Bell showed heart absorbing the punishment but offered no offense of his own for almost the whole round and wearily made his way to the 3rd and final stanza. The fight would not see the end of the 3rd round as Betz again found his way to the top position and worked his way to a reverse triangle that didn’t appear to be super tight but the exhausted Bell was forced to tap out and Betz wins at 2:37 of the third round.

Kevin Dolan defeated Lance Gibson trained fighter Nick Perry in one of  the six fights to end in the first round. Dolan in typical “Doomsday” fashion charged out of his corner looking for the early KO, as they met near the corner they tied up and ended on the mat with Dolan on top. He dropped some punches down to the body of his opponent but Perry was able to pull out a nice reversal to find his way on top. It appeared that Perry was in a good positing but in the process of his reversal he left his neck exposed and Dolan took advantage sinking in the guillotine choke at 32 seconds of the first round.

In another quick contest Chris Ade took out Kyle Cheyne at 47 seconds of the first round. Ade rushed out of his corner at the sound of the bell and both fighters engaged in a fierce battle of position with both fighters battling to take the superior position from the upper body tie up. Eventually the fight fell to the ground and from the ensuing scramble Ade was able to take the back and transition into the fight finishing armbar to take out his nemesis early in the first.

Jordan McKay made his presence known in the Shaw Conference centre with one of the more impressive performances of the evening, taking out Graydon Tannis with an armbar in the second stanza in a dominating performance. Tannis came in looking like he was in the best shape of his career but McKay was the stronger wrestler of the two fighters and used it to good effect on several occasions taking Tannis down with leg takedowns as well as upper body throws at will. Not only was McKay the stronger wrestler he also controlled the tempo for most of the stand up exchanges landing telling blows on Tannis who battled valiantly but was never able to land the tempo changing blow on McKay. At one point Tannis was on the ground with McKay standing over top of him with his knee cocked and it looked like McKay was waiting for his opponent to get off his hands before sending the knee careening into Tannis’s face, but when he launched the attack the referee thought otherwise and called a timeout to give Tannis time to recover from what he deemed an illegal knee. In the second round the fight found itself on the ground where McKay took Tannis’s back and transitioned into a very tight armbar, although Tannis fought bravely to escape it was not meant to be and McKay won impressively at 1:20 of the second stanza.

Craig Sloan stopped the game and very hard headed Yoosef Penny in the first round of the second fight of the evening. The compact Craig Sloan started off quickly driving through a takedown and getting the fight to the mat where he began dominating with well timed punches and push off elbows to the face that made loud thudding sounds when they found their mark on Penny’s face. For his part Penny never quit despite the punishment and was able to stave off a leg lock attempt and get a reversal and get back to his feet at one point where he was able to launch offense of his own but it was not long before Sloan was able to get the fight to the mat once more and after working a Kimura, neatly transitioned into an armbar and took the victory at 4:47 of round one.

Darran Apels defeated Jim Dobson by KO in the first round. Dobson looked strong in the early goings charging in with wild punches and got a nice upper body takedown but when the fight found it’s way to the mat he was the man bleeding. The referee stepped in and checked the cut and after the restart Apels defended another Dobson charge before catching him with a punch that sent him to the canvass and ended the fight at 2:26 of round one.

Looking back the MFC appears to have picked up right where they left and it looks like they are here to stay. Several fighters were particularly impressive and leading that list is Jordan McKay who was impressive and if I had to pick one fighter to be the breakout fighter of the MFC 8 event it would have to be him. He put on a dominating performance against Graydon Tannis who continues to show the heart of a Lion every single fight.

MMA Ring Report awarded their 11th Fighter of the night award to Jason “The Athlete” MacDonald who made his way back from the brink of losing via rear naked choke and ironically came back to win via the same choke to take the victory and get on the winning track. Due to a mistake on the part of a party that will remain unnamed (Me) the award didn’t make it’s way out to Edmonton in time for the event, so MMARR will be sending out the award to Mr. Macdonald in the coming week.

The crowd that appeared approach the 2000 mark was vocal throughout the event and appeared entertained with the prospect of seeing more MMA in the province’s capital. The event came together smoothly and with their return show in the bag, the only question is when the next MFC will take place. It is still up in the air at this point but look for the MFC to make their return sometime in 2006 with their first ever championship fights.  –MMARR-