Jump to
Excellent card announced for Honor Submission Challenge Italy
Honor Submission Challenge are making the trip to Italy on July 1st, 2023 and the promotion has put together a superb card full of matches. Headlining the event is a 4-man tournament at 70kg which will feature a pair of ADCC veterans in Keith Krikorian and Fabricio Andrey, alongside two top European competitors in Alessio Sachetti and Owen Jones. Although Krikorian and Andrey are the favourites, their opponents are capable of providing the upset.
Andrey’s teammate Diogo Reis is also competing, as he takes on rising UK talent Jack Sear in a superfight. There’s several other big names that have been booked to compete at the event too, with Kywan Gracie facing Marco Aurelio and Jonnatas Gracie set to stand across from Charles Negromonte. Lucas Alexandre and Jed Hue will no doubt be producing some fireworks too, and there’s plenty of fun matches set to take place earlier on in the night too.
Gordon Ryan explains his absence from competition in 2023
Gordon Ryan has been making his case as the greatest no gi grappler on the planet for several years now and ADCC 2022 was the moment when he made that undeniable. Although he continued his incredible winning streak through to the end of the year, he’s been absent from competition so far in 2023. Ryan was scheduled to compete in his fourth match against Felipe Pena at the beginning of the year, but had to withdraw due to sickness just a matter of days before the event.
There’s been no news on any further matches since then, and Ryan has now broken his silence to explain exactly why that is. Shortly after the match with Pena fell through, Ryan contracted Strep throat along with a series of other issues. This led to a resurgence of the stomach issues that have already plagued him throughout his career and at the time of his update, he was going in for a tonsillectomy and surgery to fix a deviated septum so was unable to pinpoint a date for his return.
Two up-and-coming competitors earn title shots at Finishers 20
Finishers 20 featured the return of one of the promotion’s most interesting and unique concepts, one borrowed from professional wrestling. It was their second ‘Money in the Bank’ event, where a group of competitors battle it out in a round-robin format in order to earn the right to claim a title-shot in that weight class. This time it was four women competing at 125lbs and four men competing at 185lbs, with plenty of superfights spaced in between.
The best performance of the night undoubtedly came from the young Laylah Watkins, as she submitted all three of her opponents in less than five minutes in total to win the women’s tournament. The men’s tournament was significantly closer though, with both Luke Shiomos and Enrique Galarza winning their first two matches by submission. That set up a tough final match between them, but Galarza got yet another submission win and earned himself a title-shot.
Full results for the event can be found here.
Joe Pyfer vs. Gerald Meerschaert – UFC vets battle at Fury Pro Grappling 7
There was plenty of great matches to look forward to on Fury Pro Grappling 7, and several elite grapplers were eager to put on a show at the event. Kevin Dantzler and JM Holland had a frantic match that saw Dantzler hit a superb armbar set-up, and Brad Boulton landed the quickest submission of the night with a straight ankle-lock in just 13 seconds. Fury Pro Grappling veteran Andrew Kochel made a statement in his match, submitting UFC featherweight Bill Algeo with a straight ankle-lock.
10th Planet black belt Rene Sousa has been making a name for himself lately and he continued that run by submitting up-and-coming UFC middleweight Andre Petroski with a straight ankle-lock in the co-main event. The main event was a fun rematch between Joe Pyfer and Gerald Meerschaert after the two battled it out at UFC 287, but Meerschaert wasn’t able to get revenge as he lost a unanimous decision to his opponent.
Full results for the event can be found here.
Quick Hits
- Ffion Davies just received the first degree on her BJJ black belt from the head coach at Essential Jiu-Jitsu, ADCC legend JT Torres.
- Mikey Musumeci shared the results of his most recent PED test, taken in-competition during the defence of his flyweight submission grappling title at ONE Fight Night 10.
- Marcelo Garcia gave fans a positive update on how his cancer treatment has progressed ahead of a scheduled surgery.
- Former UFC lightweight world champion and MMA legend Frankie Edgar was promoted to third degree BJJ black belt by Ricardo Almeida.
Technique Corner
Submission options from S-mount
Triangle choke from Spider guard
Calf-slicer counter to Single-leg takedown
Meme of the Week
We are aiming to offer the best grappling and technique writing of any MMA news site. If you want to see more of this kind of work, please subscribe to the Bloody Elbow newsletter and learn how you can support the site.
About the author
