My First Trip to a MMA Event

Hans and I got to go to the UCFC event held at the Carnes center on Friday the 13th. The big draw was the Travis "the Terror" Clark fight as this was to be his last amature fight before turning pro in June. It was really packed, I was surprised given the current economic condition. Hans ran into a bunch of people he knew, I didn't know many people. We got there late at like 7:45 or so and fights were supposed to start at 7:30, but I don't think anyone ended up fighting until after 8:00. The whole thing only took about 3 and half hours, I guess if you showed up at 6:30 though when seating opened up you could have spent about 5 hours there. It seemed like when the fights started everyone would get caught in a guillotine choke and the fight would be over in about 2 min. The second fight ended kind of funny, but other than that there were about 10 good fights. Two were really good and one was pretty close behind and the rest were kind of like I said. One fight didn't happen cause the guy didn't make weight, but I thought they could have fought anyway. I mean the guy had to at least be close to weight, even if it was to be for a belt you should still fight. The most exciting fight other than the main event with Clark was probably the Newman / Russell fight. Newman started out throwing hay makers and kind of overwhelmed Russell, but he was being real cocky and the crowd turned on him. Then it seemed like Russell settled down and started to take control and he ended up submitting the guy which was great and the crowd just exploded. And a couple of the people that were with Newman were kind of behind us a little, got up and left and then we took their seats. After the fight they talked to Russell, and I don't think he had a nickname but I would call him Scott "the Chainsaw" Russell cause he cuts through the competition. It's pretty cool to just give people nicknames. The Clark fight was cool because when he came out everyone was on their feet. It was like a really amped up Ohio Valley wrestling match because the other guy was from Cambridge, even though I don't think many people were rooting for him. No offense to the guy he seemed like a good guy, but after people drop $2o on a shirt they want to see that guy win. Clark ended up getting cut pretty bad in the first round, but caught the guy with a right hand and took the fight to the ground where he was able to end with a rear naked choke in the second round. They pretty much had everything there to make a good event - they had the wide screens set up where you could still see the action after they went to the mat, plus announcers and ring girls and what not. The only thing they really need to work on is the timing. I know they probably didn't want every fight to end in the first round, but hey its MMA, just keep bringing 'em out and let 'em fight. We don't need any filler. Also they need to get the heights and weights right on the displays they put up. I swear everyone fighting from 135 lbs. up to 350 lbs. was 6'2". I said it was like a carnival ride or something were you had to be 6'2" to fight. Other than that I thought they did a good job. One guy did get hurt pretty bad though and they had to take him out on a stretcher, I hope he is okay. Oh and one of the fighters after he lost came out and was sitting in the crowd right by us. When he got up to leave I patted him on the back and told him good job. That was neat. And he did do a good job he just had to fight a guy who was 80 lbs. heavier than him and I think it ended up wearing him down. Well that will do for tonight, as I think of things that were neat about this experience I will continue to update this post.

Travis "the Terror" Clark is set to have his first pro fight in Pittsburgh sometime in June. Perhaps Hans and I will head up to check it out. It was funny during the fights, the announcer said something about the super bowl and everyone started booing. I guess MMA fans don't care for the black and yellow. Just another reason to like fighting.