Taking a break

I am living for a short vacation to Riga, Latvia. I will be back on the 1st or 2nd of January and this site won't be updated until then.

I wish you all a happy New Year! :)

WAR Fedor! War Zentsov! :)

K-1 Yarennoka's final fighting card

Here is the final fighting card for the K-1 Yarennoka!! event. The order in which bouts will be fought is:

Roman Zentsov vs Mike Russow
Makoto Takimoto vs Murilo Bustamante
Shinya Aoki vs Jung Bukyung
Mitsuhiro Ishida vs Gilbert Melendez
Tatsuya Kawajiri vs Luiz Azeredo
Hayato Sakurai vs Hidehiko Hasegawa
Kazuo Misaki vs Yoshihiro Akiyama
Fedor Emelianenko vs Hong Man Choi

Finally Roman Zentsov's (16-11) fight against Mike Russow is officially confirmed. Mike Russow is an American fighter with the record of 6-1, with his only lost coming from Russian Pride FC fighter Sergei Kharitonov.

Inside MMA pre-fight interview with Fedor Emelianenko

In a new episode of the Inside MMA, there is a new mini-interview of Fedor Emelianenko where you can also see his pre-fight training.

There is also some comments made by Ken Shamrock and Bas Rutten about the Fedor's fight against Korean Hong Man Choi. The conversation begins at 16:55 into the episode.

The interesting thing no notice is that Fedor is speaking some English in the clip. The lack of English skill has been viewed by many as the biggest obstacle in winning the respect of typical American fans and taking over their hearts and minds, so it is nice to notice that this problem is being handled. The is a lot to do in this field, but the first steps has obviously been taken. In this reportage Fedor also talks about Randy Couture and tells his opinion on how prepared he is for the different aspects of the upcoming fight.

Fedor Emelianenko interview at yarennoka.com

Interview with Fedor Emelianenko in Saitama (thanks flyinpig for translating).

----- How is your conditioning?
Fedor Emelianenko: I think it's good.

----- Did you study Hong Man Choi?
Fedor Emelianenko: I watched videos of his fights and game-planned with my trainer.

----- Do you have any special strategy to deal with the tall Hong Man Choi?
Fedor Emelianenko: My strategy is the same as usual. Strike him, put him down on the mat, and knock him out. That's all.

----- Do you have confidence to knock him down in a stand-up war?
Fedor Emelianenko: Won't know until I try. I can't say that I have confidence.

----- It sounds like you trained intensively on low kicks.
Fedor Emelianenko: No, I trained various things. Perhaps I just happened to be working on low kicks when that Japanese journalist visited my training session.

----- You said you watched video of Hong Man Choi. What is your impression of him?
Fedor Emelianenko: Of course he's quite big, he's good with punches and knees, and he's gotten plenty of knockdowns. I think he's one of the better MMA fighters.

----- Did you spar with tall fighters to simulate Choi's height?
Fedor Emelianenko: As you might expect, there aren't many fighters as large as him.. But I did ask my sparring partners to mimic Choi's skills.

----- What kind of fight would you like to display?
Fedor Emelianenko: I would like to show some new things, the same as every time I fight. The most important thing is to give it everything I've got and make sure the fans are happy.

----- For this fight, knee strikes in a 4-point stance will be illegal. What do you think about that?
Fedor Emelianenko: I don't think there's any problem.

----- Stand-up or ground? Which way is easier to beat Hong Man Choi?
Fedor Emelianenko: I'll make that decision in the first few minutes of the fight. Right now I can't really say.

----- Do you think Choi has any secret plan?
Fedor Emelianenko: Many of the fighter's I've faced up until now also said that kind of thing, so there isn't much to be surprised about. By all means I'd like to see if such secret plan can be worked against me in a fight.

----- You have experience fighting a very tall fighter in Semmy Schilt. Does that fight serve as any reference for the Choi fight in any way?
Fedor Emelianenko: Allow me to answer that question after the fight is over (laughter)

----- Do you have any message for all the fans out there looking forward to your fight?
Fedor Emelianenko: Have a happy new year, everyone. And on New Year's Eve at Saitama Super Anena please cheer for me. I'm always thankful for your support. Thank you.

Fedor Emelianenko training for New Year's Eve Yarennoka! Event

Fedor Emelianenko has posted a new entry in his blog.

A hard week of training behind me. My trainers are building up the intensity in preparation for my NYE fight in Tokyo. This week we spent a lot of time practicing striking techniques and punch combinations together with footwork. My opponent for NYE, Hong-Man Choi is of course a K-1 fighter and has strong boxing and kick techniques.

I am training in Stary Oskol (in Russian: Старый Оскол). Stary Oskol is a city in Belgorod Oblast about 500 km (350mi) south of Moscow, on the Oskol River. Stary Oskol is an important mining town and I often spend my training time here.

My training schedule has been so intense that I don’t do much else at the moment; train, eat, sleep. My daughter is in St. Petersburg so I do not get to see her, but we speak on the phone a lot.

My mind has been focused on training and not so much on the upcoming fight. I love working with my team of trainers and coaches. They are the best. I’m looking forward to seeing my fans again in Tokyo.

Also this week, a camera team from HDNet in the US came to visit and watch me train. The M-1 Global Yarennoka! event on NYE will be broadcasted live in the US. Exciting news. It looks like my next fight will be in the US.

Now back to training. Until next week!

Respect!

FEDOR

"HDNET FIGHTS: FEDOR RETURNS" - MONDAY, DECEMBER 31

It's official now - Fedor Emelianenko will be fighting Hong Man Choi on a NYE Yarennoka! event, which will be shown in the US by the HDNet channel.

Andrew Simon, CEO of HDNet Fights, announced that HDNet will feature the man considered by many to be the greatest fighter in any weight-class, Fedor Emelianenko in a LIVE bout from Japan only available in the United States on HDNet.

"HDNet Fights: Fedor Returns" will air LIVE on Monday, December 31 on HDNet.

This LIVE broadcast is made possible by a partnership between M-1 Global and HDNet Fights.

"Today's announcement with M-1 Global/Fedor clearly demonstrates that HDNet Fights is committed to working on a unified basis to deliver the best fighters and the best fights," said Simon. "HDNet is clearly becoming the home for MMA action and this amazing LIVE event featuring the return of Fedor is our holiday present to HDNet Fights fans. We are working hard every day improving HDNet Fights and this is a great first step in the process."

Mark Cuban, owner of HDNet Fights said, "This announcement reinforces our commitment to becoming the home for LIVE MMA action. No one else but HDNet will have the return of Fedor LIVE from Japan. On December 15th, we'll also have HDNet Fights: Reckless Abandon LIVE from Dallas featuring superstars Jason "Mayhem" Miller and Frank Trigg and then we're ending the month halfway across the world in Japan with the return of the world's best fighter - Fedor. What could be better?"

"Once again, M-1 Global's commitment to working with others has produced major results as MMA fans throughout the U.S. will be able to watch heavyweight sensation Fedor Emelianenko compete live on New Year's Eve on HDNet," said M-1 Global CEO Monte Cox. "The Yarennoka event in Tokyo features a stellar lineup of fighters and will cap the year with Fedor in the main event."

Mitchell Maxwell, Chairman of M-1 Global, stated, "We're elated to be working with Mark Cuban and HDNet. Mark is a big fan of Mixed Martial Arts and Fedor. Our partnership in bringing this Japanese event live to the US meets our mission of promoting the sport and its athletes worldwide."

P.S. Lucky you (Americans)! I myself don't have any other choice but to use torrents or try to watch the video on dailymotion.com or such.

M-1 Global appoints Total Sports Asia as licensing agent in Japan

Tokyo, Japan – M-1 Global LLC, an international mixed martial arts (MMA) organization dedicated to promoting the sport and its athletes worldwide announced today that it has signed an agreement with Total Sports Asia K.K. (TSA) for TSA to represent M-1 Global in Japan. M-1 Global is the newest major MMA organization and announced recently the signing of Fedor Emelianenko, widely regarded as the best heavyweight MMA fighter in the world. Fedor Emelianenko is a household name in Japan, having also won the last heavyweight PRIDE event.

In addition to developing a comprehensive licensing program for M-1 Global in Japan, TSA will be tasked with developing for M-1 Global a Japanese language website, mobile website and fan club targeted towards M-1 Global fans in Japan.
“We are pleased to be working with Total Sports Asia. They have a great reputation in the marketplace and have a good working knowledge of the Japanese market. They will be helping us develop our Asia fan club,” said Bob Clark, COO of M-1 Global.

Chung See LIANG, Managing Director (Korea/Japan) of Total Sports Asia said, "We are very honored and at the same time very excited with this appointment. TSA has been in the forefront of brand-building for numerous international sports entertainment companies in Japan and we see this appointment as a stamp of confidence in our expertise and track
record".

“We are also very impressed with the management of M-1 Global and the speed that M-1 Global is growing. The MMA industry in Japan is massive, and Fedor Emelianenko has a huge following in Japan. We are confident that a combination of M-1 Global’s strong management team, Fedor Emelianenko and TSA’s local expertise in Japan will result in a successful entry into and the growth of the M-1 Global brand in the Japanese market”.

Fedor Emelianenko will fight in his first event on December 31, 2007 at the Saitama Super Arena in Japan since signing up with M-1 Global recently.

About M-1 Global
M-1 Global is an International Mixed Martial Arts “MMA” organization dedicated to promoting the sport and its athletes worldwide through cooperation and alliances with other MMA organizations including both regional and televised world championship fights. Sibling Sports, LLC owned by Garlin Holdings Limited and Sibling Theatricals, Inc. is the sole Managing Member of M-1 Global, LLC. Sibling Theatricals is a live-event production company that produces shows from Broadway to Las Vegas and is wholly owned by Sibling Entertainment Group, Inc. For more information about M-1 Global visit www.M-1Global.com.

About Total Sports Asia
Total Sports Asia is Asia’s leading fully integrated sports marketing company in Asia with offices in Kuala Lumpur (Head Office), Mumbai, Shanghai, Beijing, Tokyo and Dubai. Its innovative and unique approach in providing integrated sports marketing solutions offering services in TV Rights Sales & Marketing, Sponsorship, New Media, Licensing, Event Management and Mobile Content has been the key to its growing success.

Just like I predicted (take a note that these predictions were made even before the M-1 Global's first press-conference): M-1 Global is all about cooperation and working together with the local partners on a markets where M-1 Global people can't pull it off by themselves.

The web site of Total Sports Asia is worth exploring to understand what kind of company it really is.

Inside MMA (HDNet) interviews Monte Cox (M-1 Global). Yarennoka!

Inside MMA interviewed M-1 Global's CEO Monte Cox in their 14th episode (right in the beginning of the show). He talks about Fedor Emelianenko's New Years Eve fight in the Yarennoka! called event against Korean Hong Man Choi as well as about some other things (he mentions that M-1 Global's plans include three fights for Fedor in 2007 as well as organizing other shows where Fedor Emelianenko will not be fighting).

And for those who didn't know already. Inside MMA is an one-hour quality TV program about the Mixed Martial Arts worlds, hosted by MMA legend Bas Rutten and Kenny Rice on HDNet. The program is only a few month old, but is already so successful that its length has been extended from half-an-hour to a full hour. They have interesting interviews, they invite knowledgeable guests, they maintain the best rating of the MMA fighters out there and they have all kind of news about the American MMA world with reports from the MMA organizations and with the fighters you never heard of (an excellent way to be on track on all the new winds in the Mixed Martial Arts world!). And the best thing is that they have all their episodes available for free on their web site!

The official rules has also been reported for the event.

Esquire publishes article about Fedor Emelianenko, UFC, M-1 Global

Esquire published an article about Fedor Emelianenko and his past, present and the future. Nice article spiced up with a humor.

On a side note: I registered RussianMMA.com domain which can be accessed more easily than the old russianmma.blogspot.com URL. Please update your bookmarks and tell me if you have any problems with the new domain (I am new to the domain organization problem and there is quite a chance that I did something wrong).

Edit: and just to clarify. This project is not abandoned - vice versa. The registration of a new domain doesn't mean that http://russianmma.blogspot.com will not be updated. It only means that now you have a shorter address this site can be accessed through. But you still can use the old address - it's still totally functional, and is the same site. Actually, if you try to go to http://russianmma.blogspot.com (old address) you will be redirected to RussianMMA.com. So no changes for you guys (readers) besides having a new, shorter and more convenient (easier to remember) address.

Explanations after a break

Good day my dear readers!

I want to apologize for such a long break since my last post. I certainly didn't want it, but there was little I could do due to the huge technical problems I faced (there was a problem with both RAM memory and hard-drive, for those who are interested).

But now everything is fine and we can begin to cover all these interesting news, which came during the force majeur of mine, which obviously weren't covered here of RussianMMA. So expect a lot of news during next days and weeks!

And Happy and Peaceful Christmas to you all!