Team Spirit spent the weekend in Nagoya, I drove everyone down in my car Saturday morning and then Maruyama had to fight Tsuboi in a 3 rounds kickboxing rules match in the OCTAGON!
That is right, HEAT has the last 2 tournaments been held in an OCTAGON! It is quite a thing to see a kickboxing rules fight in such a ring! Maruyama has been with us for quite some time now and has had a few fights, this time he was going up against Tsuboi a veteran shootboxer. First round went according to plan, nothing but clean shots to the legs and damage was done. Second round a couple of kicks misplaced and the fight got stopped 2 times to let Tsuboi recover from the low blows. But then Maruyama placed a perfect lowkick and down he went! I was at the perfect angle to see it, but the ref. was on the other side? So he thought that it was another low blow...he was down for more than 20 sec. when it was finally called as a down, and although he got up and fought till the end of the fight. That lowkick was a K.O. ! we won the fight and that was more important than anything else. I don't have any pictures from the event yet, but if I get some I will post them. It was definitely a different kind of event to see it fought in the OCTAGON! Look forward to HEAT 6 next year in March or April!
That is right, HEAT has the last 2 tournaments been held in an OCTAGON! It is quite a thing to see a kickboxing rules fight in such a ring! Maruyama has been with us for quite some time now and has had a few fights, this time he was going up against Tsuboi a veteran shootboxer. First round went according to plan, nothing but clean shots to the legs and damage was done. Second round a couple of kicks misplaced and the fight got stopped 2 times to let Tsuboi recover from the low blows. But then Maruyama placed a perfect lowkick and down he went! I was at the perfect angle to see it, but the ref. was on the other side? So he thought that it was another low blow...he was down for more than 20 sec. when it was finally called as a down, and although he got up and fought till the end of the fight. That lowkick was a K.O. ! we won the fight and that was more important than anything else. I don't have any pictures from the event yet, but if I get some I will post them. It was definitely a different kind of event to see it fought in the OCTAGON! Look forward to HEAT 6 next year in March or April!
