Ufc Meet-n-greet In Boston
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From Josh Hedges of Zuffa/UFC:  UFC Meet-n-Greet in Boston  On Thursday, January 3rd, The Ultimate Fighting Championship will be hosting a “meet-n-greet” event at the Times Irish Bar in Boston, Massachusetts. UFC light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz and UFC President Dana White will be in attendance to hang out, sign autographs, answer questions, and take pictures. Merchandise and tickets to UFC: Throw Down will be given away at the event. Thursday, January 3, 2002 |
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A Glimmer Of Hope: NHB Fighting To Stay Legal In Sao Paulo By Eduardo Alonso After the terrible blow suffered by NHB in Brazil, with the sport’s ban in Sao Paulo, most of the NHB community in the country is joining forces to change this scenario and get NHB back to the country’s biggest city. On December 6th, the mayor of Sao Paulo, Mrs. Marta Suplicy, sanctioned a law, written by a councilman named Arselino Tatto, prohibiting any NHB event from being held in the city, therefore banning the sport from Brazil’s biggest and most financially important city. This represented a huge step back for all the efforts the NHB community in Brazil has been making to improve the sport’s image with the public. After reading the councilman’s statements on the subject, in which he admitted never to have watched an NHB event in his life, every serious professional that is involved with the sport joined in a common cause: Get NHB back to legality in Sao Paulo. As a result of all these efforts, most of the media in Brazil started to talk about the subject on TV shows broadcast all over the country. With some help from FCF in Brazil, and counting on the prestige of people like Royler Gracie, Fabio Gurgel, Wallid Ismail and Jorge "Macaco" Patino, among others, the arbitrariness of this absurd decision was exposed to the public, and the councilman started to admit the possibility of meeting NHB representatives to discuss the law and further chances of the sport coming back to life in Sao Paulo. As life takes some funny turns, on December 20th, some rumors of corruption involving Mr. Arselino Tatto’s name started to appear in the Brazilian press. The secrecy of the councilman’s bank accounts has been suspended, and he is under investigation for alleged corruption charges brought by a former secretary of his. We hope that this situation will be cleared up as soon as possible, and our sport will not suffer any longer from this kind of reasonless acts made by people who don’t belong with NHB. Check out the January issue of FCF for more on the situation. |
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From the event’s promoter:  HOOKnSHOOT SETS SPOTLIGHT ON THE WOMEN OF MMA!!! HOOKnSHOOT "REVOLUTION" scheduled for April 13th, 2001 will be a very interesting event to say the least. The promotion is stepping into new territory with an all-women MMA event which will be the first of it’s kind in United States. The formula has proven to be a hot commodity in Japan where the REMIX shows were visually successful but from all accounts paid their fighters more than they could handle and went out of business. Can a women’s event survive in the MMA industry in the United States? Judy Neff, one of the top fighters in the United States, voiced her opinion before her fight at the HOOKnSHOOT November 17 show:
Many have mixed feelings about women and MMA. Many men who weren’t too crazy about women in the sport got a tape of the REMIX event and changed their mind! "When you get the right athletes, you can’t go wrong," said promoter Jeff Osborne. "I’ve shown the REMIX video to a ton of people and they’re all captivated for some reason. Even people who care nothing about MMA watched it. I truly believe that this show will be a groundbreaking event for women," Osborne says. The top fighters have been contacted and many have committed. Erin Toughill (pro boxer/REMIX Superfight Champion), Jennifer Howe, Judy Neff, Marloes Conen (REMIX tournament champion), Becky Levi, Debi Purcell and even BJJ stars Leka Vieira and Erica Montoya have expressed their interests at being in this show that will "revolution"ize MMA. The show is also offering many newcomers a great opportunity to get in. Many fighters such as Shannon Hooper (Josh Barnett’s girlfriend), Tara LaRosa, Jessica Ross and Shelby Walker (both have faced Judy Neff in HnS before), Betta Yeung (Superbrawl), a team of women from AMC Pankration are just to name a few. Those who are interested in this project can contact hooknshoot@aol.com. HnS says it will release a full lineup of names and matches down the road but with the event being over 4 months away, they don’t want to jump the gun. |
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Fightworld: What are your thoughts on your opponents and how do you train? Judy Neff: I go into every fight with the same expectations. I don’t really put much thinking into what my opponents credentials are or what style they are, what kind of belt or what color of belt they are. I just go out there, put on a pounding and try to put on a show for the crowd and give 100% ever time. Fightworld: It seems that women fighters are just now starting to get respect. You have just as much skills as the men do. Do you think, with HnS doing women’s matches, they’re talking about doing an all-women show. How do you feel about that? |
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MOTI HORENSTEIN ON "NO HOLDS BARRED NEWS" ON WBAI’S "LIGHTSHOW" By Eddie Goldman Last week, on Dec. 20, we traveled to the Brighton Beach neighborhood in Brooklyn (by subway on the Q train — how else?) to cover the International Fight Night 4. The main event, billed as the "Battle of Titans," featured two big pros fighters, Moti Horenstein and John Dixson, punching, kicking, and kneeing each other for the newly-created USKBA Muay Thai International Superheavyweight Championship. Moti emerged victorious, and today we hear from him about his plans in both kickboxing and mixed martial arts. We will also comment on the dispute and lawsuit between two of our previous guests, Bernard "The Executioner" Hopkins and Lou DiBella. "Lightshow" airs weekly late Friday night/early Saturday morning, 3-5 AM Eastern Time. The "No Holds Barred News" segment usually airs in the second hour of the show, between 4 AM and 5 AM EST, early Saturday morning, December 29. This week’s segment is prerecorded. WBAI broadcasts in New York on 99.5 FM. For those not in the New York area, WBAI can also be heard live on the Internet. There are two sites that stream the signal: http://www.wbai.org/ and http://www.2600.com/wbai. At this time broadcasts of "Lightshow" are not archived, but we are working on getting these audio interviews posted. |
