December 31, 2010 - Saitama Super Arena - Finally the day has come. DYNAMITE!! 2010, and did it ever deliver! There were tap outs. There were brutal knockouts. And there were battles that will be talked about for years to come. Belts successfully defended, and new champions crowd. This was a fight-festival for everyone.
The first fight on the card was between occasion MAX fighter, Andy Ologun, and the Japanese baseball player, Katsuaki Furuki. The inexperienced fighter ran at Andy with left hooks from the start, until he found himself in the Thai clinch with his body being tenderized with knees. Andy's superior striking soon had Furuki fish-dancing around the ring before he fell to the mat. Andy jumped on, but due to his inexperience with MMA, was quickly swept and fully mounted.
In the second round, after deciding he wanted no part of Andy's stand up, the Japanese fighter kept it on the ground and got close with a surprising number of submissions. The final round saw Andy managing to stand upright and land a lot more of his shots. He busted open Furuki's left eyebrow quite badly, and made contact with his jaw several times. It was amazing the man remained standing. The judges all thought Andy did enough in the first and third rounds to make up for the second.
The long awaited return of Japanese veteran Caol Uno at a lower weight class was next. He was facing Olympic wrestler, Miyata. Both fighters seemed to be happy to keep it on their feet in the first, and Uno seemed to be a little sharper with his stand up than usual. Miyata went back to his base for the second round, and suplexed Uno once before landing a big high kick that busted open Uno's eye and nose. The wrestler also managed another big slam, and some nice punches while tying up the clothing designer in the corner. The final round was almost identical. Uno had no answers to Miyata's take downs, and found himself suplexed hard once again. Miyata promised yesterday to win the fight via knockout from a suplex, and while he didn't get the knockout they certainly helped lead him to the decision win.
The ever entertaining ex-boxer Kazuhisa Watanabe was next; here to face the ex-cleaner Hideo Tokoro. As expect Tokoro shot in from the start and that set up the tempo for the entire fight. Watanabe had no way to stop himself from being taken down, but his raw power was such that Tokoro couldn't pull off any of his submissions early on. He had both Watanabe's neck and arm cleanly a number of times, but the strength of the skin-headed boxer was more than enough to throw Tokoro off and rag-doll him at will. It took until the third round for him to tire enough for perhaps Tokoro's 76th armbar to finally be enough to stop him.
After losing to Ishii in his last bout, the infamous MINOWAMAN said he had noticed what he needs to improve, and had taken the steps to do so. FEG set him up this time with another Olympic judoka in Horoshi Izumi, however the bout played out much the same way. Sadly for MINOWAMAN fans, Izumi simply had his way with the smaller fighter for much of the regulation time. Once taken down, MINOWAMAN just couldn't get off his back as Izumi's top position control was too good for him. Punch after punch landed, and while they weren't hard, by the third round the audience too was hopping the referee would step in and stop it. Soon after, he mercifully did just that.
DREAM Light Heavyweight Grand Prix runner up Tatsuya Mizuno said he wanted to beat a fighter no Japanese fighter had beaten before. That man was the crazy Russian, Sergey Kharitonov. He made the mistake of standing with the MMA veteran with boxing experience though, and Sergey started to land some serious leather early in the round. The much taller and heavier Russian planted his feet and a massive right punch that rocked the Japanese fighter. It was quickly followed by an Overeem-like knee that stole Mizuno'sSergey later profusely apologized for the late shots.
A very pumped up K-1 Heavyweight Champion was here to take back some of the pride he feels his opponent Gegard Mousasi stole from K-1 fighters 2 years ago. Kyotaro started the fight as he usually does. Running. Gegard used his reach advantage well with his jab and low kicks, which Kyotaro couldn't land. As the round progressed Kyotaro began to use his timing a little better. In the second, Gegard came out hard. He threw several very brutal left hooks that caught air, but seemed to get closer every time. Later in the round he missed with the same punch and caught Kyotaro sleeping with a right hook that put him on Queer Street. He went down hard, and was still on somewhat wobbly legs at the end of the 8 count. He fought on, and while he got tagged several more times he stayed on his feet (apart from Mousasi's takedowns) until the end of the round. In the final round Gegard went more into protection mode. Kyotaro threw everything he had at him, but Gegard's guard was solid and Kyotaro's punches were a little too desperate. Gegard had an easy time avoiding them for the most part, and earned himself his second K-1 victory.
The next bout on the card was the mixed kickboxing/MMA round fight. Yuichiro Nagashima was going to try to take out Shinya Aoki in the first kickboxing rules round, while if Aoki survived it he would try to return the favor in the second MMA round. Unfortunately we didn't get the sportsmanlike fight we were expecting from one of them. Despite the fact the rules were clearly no clinching in the first round, Aoki completely ignored them and did everything he could to hug his way through the round, during the few seconds he was actually off the canvas from "falling over" during kicks. The crowd was booing him, and he seemed to enjoy that even more. The second round was finally under the rules he wanted. MMA. His game face was on, but surprisingly Nagashima didn't look at all nervous. When the gong rang, Aoki shot in for a takedown. Nagashima jumped at him with a knee and cracked it right across the DREAM Lightweight Champion's jaw. He dropped like a sack of potatoes and Nagashima jumped on and pounded him until he was board-stiff. The crowd went berserk with cheers. Nagashima grabbed the microphone and screamed; "K-1 rocks" Don't be looking down at it!!"
Heavyweight fighters around the world refused to fight the 2010 K-1 World Grand Prix Champion Alistair Overeem at DYNAMITE this year, but one man sought the fight out. Ex-UFC fighter Todd Duffee put his hand up and asked for the chance. The fight was announced to be for the DREAM Interim Heavyweight Title. The bout began with Todd quickly closing the distance with some strikes, and they briefly hit the mat before The Reem threw a knee. They broke away from one another and The Reem was the one to advance this time. Todd missed with a left hook, and The Reem tied up and drove in a huge Uber-knee followed by a right hook to the temple and a solid left. Todd crumpled the canvas with half his torso hanging outside the ropes, completely out of it. With this win, Alistair Overeem added a third strap to his collection.
K-1 star Jerome LeBanner was next to come out. He was facing the Japanese hopeful, Satoshi Ishii. Intelligently, Ishii stuck to LeBanner like glue as much as possible. When there was a little distance, Lebanner was throwing knees and punches the likes of which Ishii has never felt before. The Japanese Olympic judo medalist of course had many takedowns over the K-1 fighter, and ground control obviously went to him as well. The crowd seemed to be behind LeBanner far more though, and the times when he rallied some decent offense was when they were screaming. The notice for this fight that the Frenchman had seems like it wasn't enough though, and from midway into the second of three rounds, his tank was empty and all he could do was defend submission attempts from his back. At the end of the bout the crowd booed as each judge announced Ishii as the winner.
For the first time ever Kazushi Sakuraba cut down to welterweight. The reason for this was a title shot against the mini-Crocop, Marius "The WhiteMare" Zaromskis. Marius shot out at the start with a flying kick as usual, and Sakuraba swatted him away with a fast right. He found his mark with that right hand a couple more times and was looking calm. Marius too was fighting cautiously, though both were letting go in the flurries when they met. At one point Sakuraba's right cauliflowered ear began to bleed a little, so the doctor stepped in the check it. Within a handful of flurries after the restart, Sakuraba grabbed his ear in pain and walked away. The doctor looked at it and took what seemed like one tenth of a second before calling it off. It would seem his ear was torn badly in one of the exchanges. He said he still felt good, so he would be back to fight again, before congratulating the reigning champion, Marius Zaromskis.
Next up was some great matchmaking of fighters from mixed backgrounds. DREAM fight Akiyo "Wicky" Nishiura was here to fight K-1 rules against the -63kg MAX Grand Prix Champion, Tetsuya Yamato. Wicky is tricky at the best of times, but when fighting someone used to completely different distancing he makes for a very tough opponent. Yamato did well in keeping the pressure up, and he landed the more technical strikes, mid and low kicks. Wicky landed the flashy punches though, and threatened a knockout at any time. In the third round he drilled Yamato with some bombs and looked like he might finish it, when Yamato returned the favor and had Wicky moon-walking for the remainder of the round. At the end of this battle one judge had Yamato up by a point, while the other two had it as a perfect draw.
Hayato "Mach" Sakurai then came out to face fellow Welterweight Grand Prix participant, Jason High. After some feeling out on the feet it hit the ground with Mach on top. He passed to half guard. Jason tried to get him back into guard, but Mach regained his position and started up with his ground and pound. Eventually it was stood up and Jason was yellow carded for inactivity. In the second Jason tried to quickly take it to the ground, but Mach again spoilt it and landed in the dominant position. He held position until going for a submission. At that time Jason swept him and threw some vicious shots from top position. The remainder of the round, and most of the following was much of the same: each fighting for top position and keeping it as long as possible. In the third though, Mach was yellow carded too, and it seemed to ignite him. Not long after it he lunged in with a hook that rocked Jason, and followed it with a knee to drop him. Once again though, when he jumped on top he was reversed. The round soon ended and this one went through to the judges. They weren't in agreement with who had won the battle. One said Sakurai while the other two thought it was Jason.
Former StrikeForce Champion Josh Thompson came to japan to fight Tatsuya Kawajiri after Gilbert Melendez backed out of the reciprocal fight with the earlier knocked out Shinya Aoki. Both fighters seemed excited about testing themselves against one another. The bout began and it wasn't long before Kawajiri had taken Josh down and moved to full mount. Josh managed to eventually wiggle himself out, but he took some damage doing so and didn't succeed in getting off his back the entire round. In the second he came out with a dangerous high kick that sailed past "Crusher," before the Japanese fighter again took it to the mat, and into full mount. Kawajiri had a side choke in, but couldn't finish Josh, so moved back to mount before losing position in a scramble. Josh came close to taking his back until another slam to the mat temporarily killed his plans. Towards the end of the round he did get Kawajiri's back, but it was too late to do much with it. In the final round the speed of Josh's strikes was scary. Kawajiri wanted no part of them and applied the body lock and took it to safer territory. Josh seemed a little more desperate this round though, and scrambled hard. He did get to his feet and land some serious knees, until the DREAM fighter took it down yet again. The round ended with Josh defending yet another side choke. This time, all three judges agreed Kawajiri was the winner.
The Featherweight Title was on the line tonight too. Defender, Bibiano Fernandes was taking on Hiroyuki Takaya. Each fighter knows the other well after having already fought to a spilt decision in the past. Thus, the first round was pretty much feeling out, and checking distancing with jabs. The referee called for more action more than once. Bibiano did get one brief takedown in the round. In the second they both traded some more committed strikes, and at one point Bibiano cornered Takaya and drove some heavy knees into his thighs and body. Both shot for, and spoilt tackles throughout the round. The final round of this title fight looked like it would play out as the earlier ones had. Takaya then secured top position after a takedown and went to town with ground and pound, and kept it up from early on right up until the end of the round. The judges called the fight 3-0 for Takaya, and in so doing, crowned a new champion.
If you haven't already seen this event, seek it out. There is a great balance of serious bouts, and fantasy fights usually impossible to make. Check back here tomorrow too, as we will be holding a press conference for the winners, and updating you on the condition of some of those that lost.
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