Saturday Night's Alright For Fighting

Yesterday night, Jules took me out to my very first MMA live event. The day started off with a meal in our new favourite restaurant, followed by a beautiful walk from Greenwich through to Blackheath. Then it was off to Wembley for the fight.

"Wembley!", I heard you think. "That's the famous world class football (soccer) stadium that could seat 90,000 people! Awesome!"

Uh... we thought so too. But then the closer we got to the stadium, the more I wondered "how in the world could a fight promotion smaller then the UFC fill such a large stadium?"

Then we saw this and made our hearts sink a bit:

Turns out Cage Rage 25 was being held in an arena right NEXT to the famed Stadium. We checked out tickets again and it clearly says Wembley Arena, *not* Stadium. I didn't know Wembley had two venues... ah well, time for a re-pose.

Like a champ, Jules sat with me through the whole event and we had a great time. I highly recommend MMA fans to check out a Cage Rage event if you're ever in town, because our "cheap seats" were amazing. There's no way you can get that value with UFC events.

Here are some highlights:

• Almost all the pre-lim fights ended in the first round due to ground and pound
• As expected, football like chants were heard throughout the evening
• Crazy knockout by Tom "Kong" Watson on Pierre Goulette while on his back. Tom also wins the "best fans" award with a large section of fans bringing in inflatable bananas to support him. Kong, who comes out in a monkey mask for his entrance, also has a man dressed in a full body banana suit in his corner. Awesome.
• Ryan Shamrock, Ken's 19 year old son, looked pretty good in his fight but broke his hand and couldn't continue
• Ryan's old man, Ken Shamrock, looked better in his fight against British heavyweight Robert "Buzz" Berry then he did in his fights against Tito Ortiz. By that I mean he lasted past the 2 minute mark, then got knocked out silly
• Masakazu Imanari is your new hero

above: Robert "Buzz" Berry celebrates a historical knockout

above: the crowd on their feet after Berry buries Shamrock

Masakazu Imanari vs Jean Silva
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Cage Rage 25 Ken Shamrock vs Buzz Berry-1
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