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Vitor "Shaolin" Ribeiro (top)

The Brazilian media reports that Vitor 'Shaolin' Ribeiro has signed a deal with the K-1 promotion.

Nino "Elvis" Schembri

The Brazilian media reports that Nino 'Elvis' Schembri has left the Chute Boxe team, and will be joining the newly formed 'Black House' team.

According to Schembri, the split with Chute Boxe was on friendly terms, and that he wanted to live closer to his family in Rio de Janeiro, as well.

The 'Black House' team was recently formed by Jorge Guimaraes, Carlos Baretto, and Rogerio Camoes.

Ivan "Pitbull" Iberico (left) landing a strike on Fernando Martinez.

The Brazilian media reports that undefeated Peruvian fighter Ivan 'Pitbull' Iberico won his main event fight against Argentinian Fernando Martinez in the Inka Fight event in Peru.

Iberico has been training with Alexandro 'Pequeno' Nogueira for the past year. His training also includes a wrestling background and extensive boxing training in Cuba.

The IFL announced the following:


NEW YORK, December 14, 2006- Two of the International Fight League's (OTC.BB: IFLI) legendary coaches, Renzo Gracie, world Jiu-Jitsu champion and coach of the IFLs New York-based Pitbulls team, and Pat Miletich, coach of the IFLs Moline, Illinois-based Silverbacks team, were prominently featured in Scott Pelley's report on the growth of Mixed Martial Arts on 60 Minutes on Sunday, December 10, on CBS. The show earned a top-five ratings finish for the week. The show also finished first in its time period in households, viewers and adults 25-54.

Among the key Nielsen Media Research figures released were:

For the first time this season, 60 Minutes finished as one of the five most-watched programs for the week" on Sunday.

The program "finished the week at number three in households (10.5/17) and number four in viewers (15.83m)."

60 Minutes had been in the top 10 four times this season, but in the top five just once.

The 60 Minutes page on Yahoo.com received more votes and message posts for the MMA piece than any other 60 Minutes sports story listed, including pieces on Dale Earnhardt Jr., Tiger Woods, Michael Jordan and the New York Yankees.

Pelley trained with both Gracie and Miletich, and the 60 Minutes cameras were on site when their teams met at The MARK in Moline, Illinois, on September 23, the same night Gracie took on Miletich in the main event Superfight. The piece also featured UFC champion Matt Hughes, his career and his relationship with Miletich.

The IFL, the worlds first team-based professional mixed martial arts league, will hold the finals of its World Team Championship tournament on Friday, December 29, at Mohegan Sun Arena in Uncasville, Connecticut. Miletichs Silverbacks will take on Olympic silver medalist Matt Lindlands Wolfpack, while Gracie will battle world champion and coach of the IFLs Toronto-based Dragons, Carlos Newton, in one of a series of additional Superfights.

The first full 11-date, 12-team IFL season will begin at the ORACLE Arena in Oakland, California on Friday, January 19, 2007. The slate includes events in eight different states and kicks off with the Nevada-based Lions (coached by legend Ken Shamrock) facing the San Jose-based Razorclaws (coached by his brother, world champion Frank Shamrock) in Oakland. The Seattle-based Tigersharks (coached by world kickboxing champion Maurice Smith) take on the Southern California-based Condors (coached by world champion Marco Ruas) to round out the team matchups in the opener, with a to-be-announced Superfight included as well.

Renzo Gracie and Frank Shamrock pose for the cameras during today's press conference.

The Showtime network held a press conference today to officially announce the main event matchup of Frank Shamrock vs. Renzo Gracie for their MMA card on February 10th, 2007.

Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic

By Tape Lord


Hello my friends, my postal connections in both the DSE/PRIDE organization and Croatia are telling me that DSE/PRIDE is currently in advanced negotiations with the management of Mirko 'Cro Cop' Filipovic, and that they are about to make a very substantial offer to Cro Cop that both parties feel will see him remain with the PRIDE promotion.

The offer is supposedly going to be worth more then USD$2.5 million per fight. Both parties expect to have the contract signed this week, and the announcement will supposedly be officially made on PRIDE's December 31st card.

Once a Boxercise instructor, Dana White is now UFC president.

'The Wrestling Observer' reports thet following:


"Dana White, Joe Rogan and Kurt Angle all appear on tonight's Video Game Awards show after the UFC on Spike. From a live report, we were told that nobody knew who White or Rogan were.

Kurt Angle was a presenter and tore off his shirt and started yelling, which nobody live understood. The show will also air a preview of the new TNA Impact video game trailer, which I was told was good."

Diego Sanchez

UFC: 'Fight Night 8'
December 13th, 2006
Marine Corps Air Station Miramar
San Diego, CA


Diego Sanchez defeats Joe Riggs by KO at 1:45, RD 1.
Josh Koscheck defeats Jeff Joslin by unanimous decision.
Karo Parisyan defeats Drew Fickett by unanimous decision.
Marcus Davis defeats Shonie Carter by unanimous decision.
David Heath defeats Victor Valimaki by split decision.
Alan Belcher defeats Jorge Santiago by KO at 2:45, RD 3.
Luigi Fioravanti defeats Dave Menne by TKO at 4:44, RD 1.
Brock Larson defeats Keita Nakamura by unanimous decision.
Logan Clark defeats Steve Byrnes by unanimous decision.

Ikuhisa Minowa and Kiyoshi Tamura.

DSE/PRIDE announced the matchup of Ikuhisa Minowa vs. Kiyoshi Tamura for their card on December 31st.

Fedor Emelianenko

Fedor Emelianeko announced on his official website that he has signed a new 2-year contract with the DSE/PRIDE organization. The deal will see Fedor continue fighting for the promotion until the end of 2008.

Fedor stated the following regarding the signing:


The negotiations regarding my future with PRIDE are completed! I will soon be fighting in PRIDE again, next year, and the year after the next. I want to make my fans happy, and defend my belt!" -Fedor Emelianenko

Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipovic

Mirko 'Cro Cop' Filipovic announced on his official website that he has pulled out of his scheduled fight on the PRIDE card on December 31st.

Cro Cop stated that he is still recovering from surgery on his ankle and that he can still not kick the way he'd like to. It was rumored in the Japanese media that Cro Cop's opponent was supposedly going to be the Korean giant Hong-Man Choi.

Gesias Cavalcante (holding flag)

Gesias Cavalcante was recently interviewed by Gracie Magazine. Here's what Cavalcante had to say:


Interviewer: What did you think of Antonio "Pezao" Silva's fight?

Cavalcante: Damn! Absurd. Ridiculous. They stopped it too early; they gave the little monster no chance to show how good he is on the ground.

Interviewer: Who was your toughest opponent in the HERO's GP?

Cavalcante: Every fight is a fight and they all have their difficulties. But in general, the (Kaoru) Uno fight was the most work. The guy is very experienced, and he was one of my idols when I started training MMA. All of that counts.

Interviewer: Which was the most difficult moment of the tournament?

Cavalcante: The hardest time was when I broke my hand - all I could think about was to continue fighting. I broke it at the end of the first round against Uno. At the time it was okay and I didn't feel a thing, but I had to come to Brazil for the surgery and get some time off. God does everything for a reason.

Interviewer: How is your contract right now, and when is your next bout?

Cavalcante: I've got a deal signed with K-1 for next year. I will probably fight in March or April. They had asked if I wanted to fight on December 31st, but I'm still recovering from the surgery so there's no way. Only next year.

Interviewer: Would Joachim Hansen have a chance against you nowadays?

Cavalcante: Every bout can go either way. Everybody's got a chance. Hansen has evolved a lot since we fought, as have I. So I can say that today it'd be a much more interesting fight.

Interviewer: Which fighter is the biggest challenge in your weight class?

Cavalcante: In my category in K-1 there's Kid Yamamoto, Genki Sudo... These are guys of great renown and it's possible that I may fight them.

Yoshihiro Akiyama (left) and Kazushi Sakuraba.

K-1 has so far announced the following matchups for their 'Dynamite' card on December 31st:


Kazushi Sakuraba vs. Yoshihiro Akiyama
Norifumi 'Kid' Yamamoto vs. Istvan Majoros
Akebono vs. 'Giant' Silva
Masato vs. Yong Soo Choi
Royler Gracie vs. Hideo Tokoro
Katsuhiko Nagata vs. Shuichiro Katsumura

Fedor Emelianenko

It was announced on the official website of Fedor Emelianenko that Fedor suffered a broken toe in training this week and may now have to pull out of his scheduled fight against Mark Hunt on the PRIDE card on December 31st.

Renzo Gracie

The IFL announced the following:


"Two of the International Fight League's legendary coaches, world Jiu-Jitsu champion and coach of the IFL's New York-based Pitbulls team Renzo Gracie, and Pat Miletich, coach of the IFL's Moline, Illinois-based Silverbacks team, were featured as part of Scott Pelley's report on the growth of Mixed Martial Arts on "60 Minutes" on Sunday, December 10. The piece, along with additional video and stories on Yahoo and CBS.com, drew massive attention to the IFL and the sport..

Pelley trained with both Gracie and Miletich, and the "60 Minutes" cameras were on site when their teams met at The MARK in Moline, Illinois, on September 23<, the same night Gracie took on Miletich in the main event Superfight. The piece will also look at UFC champion Hughes, his career and his relationship with Miletich."

FILA president Raph Martinetti announced that FILA, which is the world governing body for wrestling, now recognizes submission grappling as one of its officially recognized forms of wrestling.

According to Martinetti, a committee led by ADCC founder Sheikh Tahnoon, and composed of other big names, among them Renzo Gracie, will be in charge of organizing FILA-recognized submission grappling competitions and championships. They will work closely with the traditional submission grappling national affiliates that are already in place in many countries, such as in Brazil and the US.

According to experts in the submission grappling world, this is the first step in trying to build up submission grappling to the point it can one day become included in the Olympics as an official sport, such as wrestling and judo.

The IFL announced the following:


"IFL Featured On ESPN WebsiteNew York, NY - Following the announcement of the International Fight League's status as a publicly traded company, the IFL was featured on sports news site ESPN.com recently. The story also ran on Yahoo! Sports, and other articles ran in several regional newspapers, such as the Orange County Register, the Houston Chronicle, and the Quad City Times.

The IFL's 2007 schedule raised some eyebrows by promising to be the first major MMA promotion in cities like Houston, Chicago, and Atlanta, and news of the company's stock being traded has prompted many in the business world to take the sport seriously for the first time.

An excerpt of the ESPN.com story appears below.


NEW YORK - Whether you like trading punches or trading stocks, the International Fight League is for you.

Borrowing elements from boxing, wrestling and mixed martial arts, the IFL is a rapidly growing circuit with a couple of new quirks. The league has individuals competing for teams rather than themselves, and its fans can do more than follow the sport - they can own part of it.

On Wednesday, the IFL went public. While its logo is a fist, its trade symbol on the stock exchange is IFLI.

Co-founder and CEO Gareb Shamus believes the financial formula will further advance the popularity of all mixed martial arts, which has worked hard to erase the unfair "human cockfight" label it initially received from some overtly civilized folk, most notably Arizona Senator and potential presidential candidate John McCain.

But Shamus also was looking for something to differentiate the IFL from the Ultimate Fighting Championships and Pride Fighting Championships, which feature individuals such as Tito Ortiz testing their manhood."

David Loiseau

David Loiseau announced that he has signed a fight deal with 'Pro Elite' to fight for their MMA promotion on the 'Showtime' network.

According to Loiseau, his first fight will be on the Showtime MMA card on February 10th.

Nai vs. Kondo (right)

Pancrase 2006 Blow Tour
December 10th, 2006
Differ Ariake
Tokyo, Japan


Yuki Kondo defeats Ian Nai by rear naked choke at 1:30, RD 1.
Daizo Ishige defeats Kenji Arai by unanimous decision.
Nilson de Castro drew with Ryo Kawamura.
Takafumi Ito defeats Eriya Matsuda by majority decision.
Hikaru Sato defeats Sviatoslav Matanov by unanimous decision.
Koji Oishi defeats Hiroyuki Nozawa by KO at 4:53, RD 1.
Kanako Takeshita defeats Windy Tomomi by armbar at 2:08, RD 3.
Toryu Masahiro defeats Nobuhiro Tsurumaki by KO at 1:16, RD 1.
Miki Shida defeats Daichi Fujiwara by TKO at 0:36, RD 1.

Vitor 'Shaolin' Ribeiro (top)

Cage Rage 19: 'Fearless'
December 9th, 2006
Earls Court
London, England


Rob Broughton defeats Eric 'Butterbean' Esch by TKO, RD 2.
Zelg Galesic defeats Mark Weir by TKO at 0:50, RD 1.
Elvis Sinosic defeats Mark Epstein by armbar at 2:37, RD 1.
Vitor 'Shaolin' Ribeiro defeats Daisuke Nakamura by submission at 3:55, RD 1.
Luiz Azeredo defeats Paul Daley by unanimous decision.
Danilo Cherman defeats Jean Silva by unanimous decision.
Dave Legeno defeats Alan Murdock by rear naked choke at 4:10, RD 1.
Xavier Foupa-Pokam defeats Alex Reid by unanimous decision.
Jess Liaudin defeats Ross Mason by heel hook at 2:55, RD 1.
Matt Ewin defeats Alan McAuley by rear naked choke at 1:53, RD 1.
Suley Mahmoud defeats Francesco Ligato by rear naked choke at 0:37, RD 1.

Wes "Cabbage" Correira (left)

The European media reports that the reason Wes 'Cabbage' Correira was not able to participate on last night's Cage Rage 19 card in London, England, was because he was mugged by two men and sustained a concussion.

According to reports, Cabbage was not able to sleep due to the time difference with Hawaii and went looking for a drink at 6:00 A.M. in the morning. He was supposedly attacked, sustained a concussion, and woke up to find his wallet missing.