K1 fighting

I went to a K1 fight a few weeks ago. It was 6 hours of fighting. They let us in at around 3 pm and by 4 pm the under-under cards had started. While I was initially disappointed with our seats, they were a mile away, but it wasn’t too bad because they had a jumbo screen that showed close up action. So here are the top five things about a K1 fight in Japan. (Making lists is so much easier that “good” writing and I think they’re more fun to read).

5) The theatrics

They open the fights (the real under-cards, after the place is packed) with huge introductions of everyone involved. We got the names of the Ring Girls, the judges (they bowed) the refs and the announcer. They flew in the guy from Las Vegas to say “Let’s get ready to ruuuuuuuummmmmmmbllllllleeeee!!!” which was pretty cool.

Before any of the fights, though, there was a magic show. I had actually seen this guy on TV here before. He’s kind of like the David Blain of Japan—he does really good street magic, and makes all the girls scream. Anyway, he blew himself up into a huge fireball, then traveled across the entire arena in about 4 seconds and reappeared. That was pretty cool.

They also set off fireworks before the show—INSIDE THE TOKYO DOME.

This left a hazy fog for at least an hour, and it scared the crap out of me because I had no idea they were going to do it.

4) Music

It reminded me of WWF pro-wrestling because each fighter had his own entrance music. Most songs were from their respected countries, but everyone once in a while there was a really funny one. One guy came out to Eminem’s “Mockingbird” and another guy came out to Lil John screaming F-bombs and such. I don’t think anyone else understood how offensive the lyrics were but, I thought it was pretty funny.

8) Concession Stand

I really wanted a beer because watching fighting is even more fun while drunk. But, just like America, beer was over priced. A normal beer was about 6 bucks and a big one was about 8. We had to eat dinner there eventually, and I saw lots of people eating hamburgers, so I waited in line myself. As I got closer, I saw that they had meal plans for different prices. The hamburger with drink was about 5 bucks, and the hamburger with beer set was about 8. I had no idea why it was so cheap so I ordered it. I was surprised to find a regular sized beer, hamburger, AND chicken nuggets in my set. Okay Japan, how do you sell a beer for 8 bucks, while also selling Burgers, nuggets AND beer for 8 bucks? I was pleased.

3) Engrish

While it is technically not English, this was still pretty funny. Stefan “Blitz” Leko was coming out with his entrance music and his own video on the big screen showing him beating up a bunch of people. But when his video was over, the Tokyo Dome played their own video about him. Instead of writing “Blitz” all over the place like his video did, they wrote “Britz”. I’m sure that pissed him off. Japanese really can’t tell the difference between L’s and R’s, but that’s just funny.

2) The actual fights

There was 6 hours of fighting. Because it was a tournament for the 2006 championship, there were 8 men competing for the title, and the matched up until there was only one left (ie, the winner had to win three fights). Mixed in with these “main” fights were under cards that still featured very famous and very talented fighters—they had just not been in the top 8 this year.

Highlights include this crazy fight involving this guy named Remy. Remy happened to be the only fighter I had seen on TV in America, so I knew he was really good. He was one of the 8 main fighters. In the opening moments of the first round, he goes for a high kick, and his opponent kicks him in the nuts. The ref stopped the fight while Remy recovered (it’s an illegal blow, and I honestly think it WAS actually an accident) but I have not seen someone is so much pain before. The huge screen had a close up on this poor man’s face as is his grimacing and tearing.

He’s lying like a lump in the middle of the ring, when all the doctors come to try to help him. Over the PA system, they announce in Japanese that they are going to “Give the Athlete 3 minutes to recover.” So we’re watching as this team of doctors, which reminded me of a pit crew for NASCAR or something, were working on trying to “fix” him. One doctor had his hand down Remy’s pants, others were telling him to jump up and down. He still wasn’t looking very good, so the PA announced that he’ll be given one additional minute.

When it became obvious he was still in too much pain, they gave him a break by postponing his fight until after a few more under-cards. Half an hour later the fight resumed, still in the first round. This time, about 30 seconds after the fight resumed, the other guy does a spinning heel kick and gets Remy in the nuts again. This time Remy steps back, looks at the ref, and just falls over. He looks like he’s going to throw up. Immediately, the PA announces that they’ll give the 3 minutes to recover. Ouch.

Remy ends up toughing it out, and beats the other guy to win—but he cannot continue. He has to go to the hospital, so they take this fighter from the under-cards who won and elevate him into the real tournament.

This new guy, Peter Artes, was my favorite guy they whole night. He’s older than most of the fighters, and when he did his fight, way back several hours ago, he just beat the crap out of his opponent. He was a three time champion of K-1 but those were from the mid-1990’s, over 10 years ago, like starting in 1992. He’s so much older then the current fighters, but he’s much more charismatic (he winked at the camera right before the fight) and he doesn’t get caught up in the jumping and dancing most of the other guys do.

Anyway, he takes Remy’s spot in the semi-final round, and manages to knock out the other guy. (The other guy had won in about 15 seconds in the first round to get there and had looked unbeatable before Artes kicked his ass). So now Artes, who’s nickname is the lumberjack (he wears a plaid vest and hat after he wins and, since I call myself a lumberjack it’s obvious I like him the most) makes it to the final round. Before the final fight, they announce the fighter’s records in K-1 competitions. The defending champ, some guy named Semmy, has 16 victories in his K-1 career. The lumberjack has 84. Anyway, the Japanese crowd latched onto the lumberjack because of the underdog aspect, but in the end, Semmy was just too strong, and won by decision. Considering Semmy had knocked out all his other opponents, I felt Artes did a pretty good job. Now image watching 6 hours of this.

1) Audience

The crowd was pretty funny. There was a guy a few rows BEHIND us (remember we’re a mile a way) yelling the whole time at the fighters in Japanese. I expected much larger reactions from the replays of Remy getting nailed, but the crowed was mostly quiet. Everyone took smoke breaks between fights. They all used their cell phones to take pictures.

There was this woman behind us screaming the whole time during the fights. She kept saying “itasouu” which means “It looks like it hurts”. Image a Japanese girl saying this over and over every time someone got hit during a 6 hour kickboxing tournament. I wanted to turn around and say something, or at least see what kind of guy brings his girlfriend to these things. Anyway, there was this one fighter who took about 6 minutes to make his way down to the ring, and was singing along with his entrance music. I couldn’t have been more pissed off at this guy. He took forever to get there, he thought he was the greatest fighter there (even though he was a stupid undercard right before the final event), we were about 5 and a half hours into the tournament and we just wanted to him to hurry up. So that’s exactly what I stood up and yelled from my seat. He may not have heard me, but everyone in my section did, and all the Japanese people laughed. That was satisfying. Wheh. Longest post. Ever.