- The grudge between Thailand's top MMA teams Tiger Muay Thai and Phuket Top Team are getting uglier and uglier. If you haven't heard about any of the details yet, Tiger Muay Thai was where Roger Huerta and Mike Swick used to train at in Thailand. Here's Ray Elbe of TMT talking about his disappointment that both MMA stars were leaving to create their own gym after receiving 'VIP Treatment' and free housing during their stay in Thailand.
- For his upcoming bout against War Machine, Roger Huerta is now training with Phuket Top Team, a rival gym that's just around 100 (Updated via PTT) 1.5k meters away or so from Tiger Muay Thai. Things get even uglier when Tiger Muay Thai offered War Machine to train him to prepare for Huerta. He replied with a simple query: "If he trained with you guys for a year why would you wanna help me beat him?"
- There were a bunch of nasty rumors coming out of both camps which involved trying to muddy each other up by having different accusations about various stuff from training permits to even firearms. These apparently led to death threats and a camp being raided cause of this. Pretty ugly stuff, but I'd rather not focus on those rumors, so let's move on and check out Mike Swick talking about Tiger's beef with him and Roger Huerta. He also addresses the accusations of them trying to steal trainers for their gym. Here's a snippet (You can read his entire account here):
Tiger Muay Thai is claiming that Roger and I are traitors, like Aldrich Ames in the 80's, since we have trained at their facility before and are now doing our own gym in Thailand. Ray Elbe(Tiger Head MMA Trainer, Spokesperson) has been maliciously bad mouthing us to everyone at Tiger and to anyone that will listen, though after we announced we were doing this, we met with him and came to an agreement in which he was very respectful and understanding in person. Soon as we left Thailand we were traders and had disrespected Tiger. It is uber sad considering what all we have done for Tiger and done for free.
...We are not trying to take Tigers customers or trainers. That is just silly! There are a ton of great fighters that become trainers everyday in Bangkok plus trainers move like vintage David Caradine in Kung Fu. In the 4 years I was in Phuket, I can't tell you how many trainers came and went from all the gyms.
Anyway, now that we've got all those beef and controversy out of the way, there are much more Asian MMA news about PXC, Legend FC, One FC, and Lakay Wushu after the jump....We are not trying to take Tigers customers or trainers. That is just silly! There are a ton of great fighters that become trainers everyday in Bangkok plus trainers move like vintage David Caradine in Kung Fu. In the 4 years I was in Phuket, I can't tell you how many trainers came and went from all the gyms.
Eduard Folayang, who suffered a broken nose last month on One FC, is already out there competing in Turkey, for the World Wushu Championships. He says it hasn't healed up completely, and was still hurting, but he still went out there to represent the country anyway. Crazy if you ask me, but that's Eduard and his fighting spirit for you. Despite this, he beat his French opponent and joined two of his other teammates, Benjie Rivera, and Mark Eddiva (who also competes in MMA) who advanced to the round of 16.
Yesterday, I reported about Victor Cui's trip to the Philippines where in the One FC head signed a partnership deal with the URCC. Among the details I mentioned on the article, is his visit to Team Lakay, where he was looking to finalize deals with the Philippines' top MMA camp as well. Well it looks like they're not the only promotion looking for their services.
Team Lakay has produced multiple champions such as Eduard Folayang, Kevin Belingon, Roy Docyogen, and Honorio Banario among others. This makes them the most sought after team in the country. A day after Victor Cui's visit, Mike Haskamp of fellow Asian MMA promotion Legend FC, also visited the camp. Yesterday, Lakay also announced that Guam-based promotion, Pacific Xtreme Combat or PXC will be meeting with them soon as well.
Speaking of Legend FC, they have finalized their fight card for Legend FC 6 and it's a pretty good one. They have six fighters from New Zealand or Australia, and this is because the show will be available on Australian PPV. Check out the promo and fight card below:
Legend FC 6
October 30, 2011 - Macau
- Jadamba Narantungalag vs. Adrian Pang [Legend FC Lightweight Championship]
- Liu Wenbo vs. Sam Brown
- Wang Guan vs. Koji Ando
- Song Un Sik vs. Rob Hill
- Lee Yong Jae vs. Rod MacSwain
- Ji Xian vs. Michael Mortimer
- Wu Chengjie vs. Yusuke Kawanago
- Kim Hoon vs. Robert Whittaker
- Danaa Batgerel vs. Vincent Siu
October 30, 2011 - Macau
- Jadamba Narantungalag vs. Adrian Pang [Legend FC Lightweight Championship]
- Liu Wenbo vs. Sam Brown
- Wang Guan vs. Koji Ando
- Song Un Sik vs. Rob Hill
- Lee Yong Jae vs. Rod MacSwain
- Ji Xian vs. Michael Mortimer
- Wu Chengjie vs. Yusuke Kawanago
- Kim Hoon vs. Robert Whittaker
- Danaa Batgerel vs. Vincent Siu
- With the help of Legend FC, Team Quest's Pat Healy and Brad Hannah ran a no-gi grappling workshop to help raise proceeds for anti-slavery charity The Mekong Club. Check out the footage below:
- PXC's first Philippine event, PXC 24 (check out the BE exclusive photo gallery of the show), was featured on the latest issue of Fight! Magazine. Here's an exclusive sneak peak on it:
