Held in Nagoya, Japan, the second round of Pride Bushido GP featured the hopeful fighters which that would be fighting at the semifinals and finals of the tournament, on November 5, at Yokohama Arena. Two Japanese, a Brazilian and a Canadian will decide who is the best 185 welterweight fighter in Pride and they are: Akihiro Gono, Kazuo Misaki, Paulo Filho and Denis Kang.

One of the favorites to the title is Brazilian Top Team standout Paulo Filho. After impressively defeating Gregory Bouchelaghem in a tough fight by unanimous decision in the first phase of the tournament, Paulo Filho ran over Japanese Ryo Chonan with relative ease. Not caring that Chonan had defeated fellow Brazilian names such as Anderson Silva, Roan Jucão and Antônio Schembri, Filho controlled the center of the ring, put Chonan down, passed his guard, mounted and from there, applied the fatal arm-lock, obliging the Japanese competitor to tap out. With the result, Filho is one of the favorites to the title.

In the surprise of this GP, current champion Dan Henderson tasted bitter defeat and was eliminated from the competition at the hands of Kazuo Misaki, who imposed a hard game and defeated the champion by unanimous decision. Misaki, who had defeated, in the first phase, one of the favorites to the title, American Phil Baroni did it again and now he has the potential to get the welterweight title. His country mate Akihiro Gono has also performed well in the tournament If he had troubles with Hector Lombard in the first phase, this time, Japanese imposed his game and after exchanging punches, he surprised Gegard Mousasi with an arm-lock in the second round.

One of the revelations of the tournament has been Canadian Denis Kang. In the first phase, held in June, he ran right through Chuteboxer Murilo Ninja and applied one of the fastest KOs of the tournament. This time, he ran into another tough fighter: Amar Suloev, who also gave a hard time to last years Bushido Welterweight runner up Murilo Bustamante, in the first phase. The match between Kang and Suloev was one of the best fights of the tournament. The American Top Team fighter landed sharpened jabs and low-kicks and knocked Suloev down with a straight punch. With the opponent in the ground, Kang passed his guard and caught his back, applying the mortal rear naked choke, in early round 1. Check out below the full results of the competition:

COMPLETE RESULTS:

Pride Bushido 12 - Welterweight GP, Saturday, August 26, 2006, Nagoya, Japan

Super-fights:

- Daisuke Nakamura submitted Seiichi Ikemoto by arm-lock in 1R;

- Hiroyuki Abe drew with Naoki Matsushita;

- Hatsu Hioki defeated Jeff Curran by unanimous decision;

- Shinya Aoki submitted Jason Black by triangle choke in 1R;

- Gilbert Melendez defeated Nobuhiro Obiya by unanimous decision;

- Tatsuya Kawajiri defeated Chris Brennan by KO at 24s in 1R;

- Mitsuhiro Ishida defeated Cristiano Marcello by unanimous decision;

- Hayato Sakurai defeated Luciano Azevedo by doctor’ stoppage in 1R;

- Ikuhisa Minowa submitted Eric Butterbean Esch by arm-lock in 1R;

Welterweight GP:

- Denis Kang submitted Amar Suloev by RNC in 1R;

- Paulo Filho submitted Ryo Chonan by arm-lock in 1R;

- Akihiro Gono submitted Gegard Mousasi by arm-lock in 2R;

- Kazuo Misaki defeated Dan Henderson by unanimous decision;

Super-fight:

- Takanori Gomi submitted David Baron by RNC in 1R.