UFC Bantamweight contender and former WEC champ Miguel Torres is training in Montreal with Firas Zahabi (George St. Pierre's head coach). He's blogging at MMA Fighting as he prepares for his UFC 145 bout with Michael McDonald. Here's the part I found the most amusing:

I love Montreal. It's an awesome place. The only thing that gets me down from time to time is the cold. That's one thing I could do without while staying here. Still, I've traveled to a lot of countries during my 14-year mixed martial arts career, and I can safely say Montreal boasts some of the best women and the best food. The only thing it seems to lack is Mexican food - which is a great benefit to my diet, truth be told - and a bit more heat. If they could sort those two things out, it would be as close to a perfect city as you can get.
...
The reason for ending my camp in Montreal is simple really - it's far easier to make weight out here. I don't have the comfort of home foods in Montreal. It's tough to find tacos out here. The good thing about Florida, on the other hand, is that there is a heavy focus on wrestling, which used to be one of my main weaknesses a couple of years ago. Van Arsdale has me working on wrestling every day in Florida, and that kind of repetition and attention to detail has been a Godsend for me.

Torres is training with Ivan Menjivar, John Makdessi and Yves Jabouin as he prepares for McDonald.

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/3/25/2901677/ufc-145s-miguel-torres-its-tough-to-find-tacos-in-montreal

With UFC Commitment, Can Canada Maintain Its Designation As Mecca Of MMA?


“(Canada) has been the mecca for mixed martial arts ever since we set foot in this country,” UFC president Dana White recently stated when talking about his company’s commitment to Canada over the next few years.

With Brazil entering the picture with swiftly selling events, the first international edition of The Ultimate Fighter, and a rematch between UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva and Chael Sonnen apparently headed towards an attendance-record-setting event in Rio de Janeiro, the question now is whether or not Canada can maintain its grasp on mecca status.

The UFC has only operated eight events in Canada since its first show in Montreal in 2008, but they’ve amassed some rather impressive statistics during that span.

“Over 200,000 fans have attended in three host cities: Montreal, Vancouver, and Toronto. Over $40 million in gate. God knows what the economic impact of holding these events was,” said White at a press conference in Calgary, announcing UFC 149 and a three-year, three-events-per-year commitment to Canada.

“The first one in Montreal was huge. People flew in from all over the world. Broke records, the North American (MMA attendance) record in Toronto, where people came in from all over the world.”

UFC 129, the Toronto event that White mentioned, drew over 55,000 fans for more than $12 million in gate receipts, pushing the eight-event average to roughly 25,000 in attendance per event.

White, at the Calgary press conference, not only announced UFC 149 for Calgary, UFC 152 for Toronto, and UFC 154 for Montreal, in 2012, but added that the promotion will return at least three times per year annually through 2014.

Brazil may have leap-frogged Canada in the race to become the first international location for the UFC’s long-running reality series with The Ultimate Fighter: Brasil, but Canada will have ample opportunity to defend its designation as the mecca of MMA.

http://www.mmaweekly.com/even-with-ufc-commitment-can-canada-maintain-its-designation-as-mecca-of-mma

As UFC Commits To Canada, UFC 145's Mark Hominick Not Dwelling On Recent Loss


It should tell you how unassuming Mark Hominick is when he hopes to appear on at least one UFC card in Canada over the next three years.

The reality is, he'll probably be fighting on most of them as the promotion ramps up its presence in the country.

Georges St-Pierre might be the name that comes to mind when you think of MMA stars from the Great White North, but there Hominick was beside the welterweight champ when the promotion recently announced a trio of events scheduled for Calgary, Toronto and Montreal by year's end.

"I was just honored to be a part of the press conference to be announcing they're coming back to Toronto," Hominick told MMAjunkie.com Radio (http://www.mmajunkie.com/radio). "That's a huge honor."

So the announcement didn't go so well. Hominick's satellite feed was about five seconds behind real time, and comedy ensued when he wrestled with the delay.

"It was pretty embarrassing," he joked. "I could see everything, and once I could see everything, I started speaking, and then I started hearing (UFC president) Dana (White) in my ear, and then I started hearing what I was saying 10 seconds before that. So it was pretty much chaos."

But these are minor annoyances. The bigger issue for Hominick is getting back to where he was in his career just 12 months ago. After years of inconsistent performances, he put together the biggest win streak of his big-show career and earned a title shot with champ Jose Aldo at UFC 129. He was unsuccessful in taking the belt, but he won over countless fans with a gutsy performance at the record-breaking Toronto event. Then came a seven-second knockout at the hands of Chan Sung Jung seven months later at UFC 140 in Toronto, and all at once, his momentum came to a halt.

"It was one of those fights you didn't want to sit and dwell on it too much because it was what it was," Hominick said. "It was a seven-second knockout. It came out of character, so I came out aggressively and paid the price for it.

"I wanted to win so bad. There were so many things going on with the passing of (trainer) Shawn (Tompkins), and I really wanted to make a statement that I'm not going anywhere, my team's not going anywhere, and I just came looking to knock him out. Any time you go looking for the knockout, it doesn't happen."

Still, Hominick (20-10 MMA, 3-2 UFC) could certainly use an emphatic win when he takes on his next challenge, a fight with veteran Eddie Yagin (15-5-1 MMA, 0-1 UFC) at UFC 145, which takes place April 21 at Phillips Arena in Atlanta. The main card, including Hominick's fight, airs live on pay-per-view. (Preliminary-card fights air on FX and stream on Facebook.)

As Hominick correctly points out, the UFC's featherweight division is still the land of opportunity a little over a year after it became an integrated part of the UFC.

"The first title fight was in April of last year," he said. "So for the fighters, it gives them a lot of opportunities because you can have a huge performance, and all of the, sudden you're up there with the top contenders.

"These guys, even though we've been competing in the WEC and have established records ... the average UFC fan [doesn't] know who you are. So the biggest thing is going out there and making statement fights ... and you're already in contention."

Of course, trying to make a statement got Hominick in trouble the last time out. But this time he's surely going to be smarter about how he approaches the fight. Going in guns blazing is the last thing he's going to do this time around.

Like Hominick, Yagin has been around for a long time and had his share of ups and downs in MMA. After falling short to Junior Assuncao in his octagon debut, Yagin is looking to make a statement of his own and could take a big leap up with a win at UFC 145.

So Hominick is preparing for a tough fight.

"He's been around longer than I have," Hominick said of his opponent. "I remember fighting on a card with him when I was 18 years old in 2002. He's got a very powerful right hand, and he comes to fight. You couldn't ask for a better opponent."

Could Hominick ever rise to the level of a GSP as the ambassador of MMA in Canada? Unlikely, but even being on the country's Mount Rushmore of fighters isn't too bad. And with more shows than ever headed to home turf, he aims to make his countrymen happy.

"They're hungry for it," he said. "They always show up in numbers."

http://mmajunkie.com/news/27970/as-ufc-commits-to-canada-ufc-145s-mark-hominick-not-dwelling-on-recent-loss.mma

Jason MacDonald Wants To Hang Up His Gloves For Good At UFC 149


The Ultimate Fighting Championship this week took to Calgary for a press conference announcing not just UFC 149 for that city, but also two more events in 2012 in Canada. UFC 152 is slated for Sept. 22 in Toronto and UFC 154 on Nov. 17 in Montreal.

Canadian fighter Jason MacDonald, who currently resides just up the road from Calgary, was on hand to help announce UFC 149, the promotion’s first event in Calgary. But even more than announcing the event, he was lobbying to cap off his career there.

MacDonald has been competing professionally for more than a decade. He kicked off his career with a victory in Calgary in 1999. It’s a career that has made stops in many top promotions over the years, including a couple tours of duty in the Octagon.

Though he is currently 1-2 on his current run with the world’s leading promotion, MacDonald is hoping to finish his career in the UFC.

He currently has a bout slated against Tom Lawlor at UFC on Fuel TV 3 on May 15 in Virginia, but if he comes out of that unscathed, and hopefully on the winning side of things, it’s not out of the question that he could be ready two months later for Calgary. And that’s exactly what he’s hoping for.

“I’m excited on a personal level,” MacDonald said of UFC 149 at the press conference in Calgary, before adding, “I got a tough fight coming in May, but I really hope to be a part of the show (in Calgary).”

Though MacDonald has been much of a journeyman throughout his career, amassing a respectable 25-15 professional record, for him, hanging up his gloves less than two hours away from home would be the perfect way for the 36-year-old to go out.

“It’ll be a storybook ending for me. I’ll hopefully retire from the UFC in the Calgary show. For me the show is really special.”

http://www.mmaweekly.com/jason-macdonald-wants-to-hang-up-his-gloves-for-good-at-ufc-149

Menjivar In #1 Contender Match; Jabouin Gets New Opponent


There was quite the UFC Bantamweight shakeup today that involved two Canadians due to an injury to Mike Easton (12-1), as reported by Showdown Joe Ferraro,

Easton was to fight on the UFC on Fuel 3 against Yves Jabouin (17-7). Now, Jeff Hougland (10-4) will step in to fight The Tiger.

Hougland was to fight Renan Berao (28-1) but now Ivan Menjivar (24-8) replaces Houghland on the UFC 148 card. Menjivar vs Berao could be for the #1 contender to the Bantamweight title. Both fighters are 3-0 in their UFC careers and are in a division with few obvious contenders.

http://topmmanews.com/2012/03/23/menjivar-in-1-contender-match-jabouin-gets-new-opponent/

Alistair Overeem Beats Up Five Nightclub Bouncers, Nearly Loses Hand


(Just before the nightclub brawl, Overeem also reportedly negged eight women and kino escalated on six.)

When it was announced that Alistair Overeem turned down a Strikeforce heavyweight title fight against Brett Rogers due to an injured hand, we thought it was one of those phantom injuries that mysteriously arises when someone asks you to fight a comparatively unknown up-and-comer on a month’s notice. But it turns out Overeem’s injury is very real. And there’s a pretty interesting story behind it. Fighter’s Only has the tale…

In a recent blog posting, Boon told how Overeem (29-11-0-1) had suffered a hand infection following a nightclub brawl earlier this month. According to Boon, Alistair and his brother Valentine (26-22-0) – both heavyweights – had been involved in an altercation that left five security staff needing hospital treatment.

"Alistair attended some famous dance club with his brother Valentine. Went to the toilet and did not have coins to pay the toilet woman. Alistair told her he would pay a euro when he came back, because he did not have change. Then the security guard who was near by started to get involved," he wrote.

"Brother Valentine saw the incident and also started asking what the problem was. They offered to pay, but by then 6 security guards came over surrounding them. The Overeem brothers were asked to leave, Alistair was already outside when he saw his brother Valentine fighting.

"Valentine still was discussing the situation on his way outside with one of the security guards hit Valentine in the face with a flash light. Three security guards dived onto Valentine and brother Alistair wanted to go back inside to help his brother. This resulted in five security guards in the hospital."

Boon went on the reveal that one of the security guards involved in the incident was fired afterwards, while a second tried to lay the blame on the Overeem brothers.

In the meantime, Alistair Overeem was complaining of a painful cut on his hand and went to hospital at the urging of Golden Glory team mates.

"It was only because of the management pushing him to go to the hospital that he saved his hand. When he finally got his injury checked, he was advised to stay a few days in the hospital. They told him if he would have come any later he would have lost his hand," said Boon.

Neither Strikeforce nor Golden Glory have said when Overeem can now be expected to defend his title and a match is unlikely to take place before the end of the summer.

Well, at least it didn’t happen in one of those gay clubs. Now let this be a lesson to every American traveling abroad: When you’re partying in Holland, always keep an extra Euro in your shoe. You do not want to raise the ire of the Toilet Lady.

http://www.cagepotato.com/alistair-overeem-beats-five-nightclub-bouncers-nearly-loses-hand/

Bellator Continues To Assail 2012 As A Can't-Miss Fight Promotion


Bellator was absent from the MMA landscape from late November of 2011 until March 3rd of this year. The promotion has, however, more than compensated for their extended hiatus by flooding the market with riveting events every week.

Bellator's return was wisely synchronized with the debut of The Ultimate Fighter on FX and the corresponding six-week lull between major UFC shows. Thus far, in their three offerings of 2012, Bellator has produced two "Knockout of the Year" candidates and one "Fight of the Year" candidate.

It began with a featherweight extravaganza. Bellator 60 on March 9 featured the featherweight tournament quarterfinals and was headlined by immodest featherweight champ Joe Warren defending against surging tactician Pat Curran. The main event delivered all the ingredients to sate the appetite of ravenous fight-fans: two top-shelf mixed martial artists, heavy anticipation stemming from Warren's confident boasting, an absorbing ebb and flow, technical combat and an obscenely violent knockout.

Along with Strikeforce's Gilbert Melendez, Curran is the highest ranked non-UFC fighter and he justified that lofty status with the unruly shellacking of Warren to assume the featherweight mantle. Curran has also become one of my favorite fighters to watch in MMA -- he's an unshakably composed, three-dimensional juggernaut with some of the best technical defense in the business.

Next up was the middleweight quarterfinals at Bellator 61. The show kicked off with last year's finalist and this year's favorite, Vitor Vianna, a Wand Fight Team rep and two-time BJJ world champion, taking on the volatile Brian Rogers. Vianna quickly determined that the striking exchanges were not to his liking and pursued takedowns with the hope of impose his submission grappling advantage, but Rogers, whose stand up was unfailingly crisp, tight and on-balance, negated each attempt easily.

Rogers uncorked a stiff one-two late in the first that wobbled Vianna, then exploded with a picturesque flying knee that landed square on Vianna's chin. Knowing the airborne assault turned Vianna's lights out, Rogers was walking away with his arms raised in celebration before the referee had even waved the fight off.

Last Friday's Bellator 62 show staged the stacked lightweight tournament, replete with stellar new prospects and two reputable welterweights dropping to lightweight for the first time; one, Rick Hawn, an Olympic caliber Judoka. The event was captained by tournament favorite Patricky Freire colliding with the staunch Lloyd Woodard, both of whom were defeated by Bellator's newly minted lightweight champion Michael Chandler.

World champion kickboxer and #1 Scouting Report entry Thiago Michel cemented his potential by upsetting Rene Nazare in the opening bout, Brent Weedman latched on a Von Flue choke to tap J.J. Ambrose, Hawn notched a rousing, first-round knockout over Ricardo Tirloni and the main event was pure insanity. Freire and Woodard tore into each other from the get-go, swapping serious leather on the feet and engaging in lively transitions on the mat. Freire dazed Woodard with a punch halfway through and stole the round by fishing for a kimura as it ended.

The knockdown, drag-out brawl that started in the first roared back to life in the second. Both fighters hurled ill-intended haymakers and mutually found the mark, then Woodard clipped "Pitbull" with a knee from clinch and pounced with ground-and-pound. Freire repelled him with an armbar attempt, but Woodard countered and hopped into side control to threaten with an armlock of his own, eventually executing a rolling kimura to submit the Team Nogueira black belt. The bout was action-packed and mesmerizing from start to finish.

The three-years-young fight league has concocted a formula that just works. Match-maker Sam Caplan has lured relevant, name-fighters to their roster while simultaneously scouring the globe to attract legitimate prospects. The results-driven tournament format has long been adored by fans since the heyday of Pride Fighting Championships and, barring the recent flyweight tournament, something curiously amiss in the UFC.

The commentary duo of Jimmy Smith and Sean Wheelock is phenomenal. They have a straightforward, no-bullshit style with the right blend of technical observation and astute play-by-play that caters to new fans and hardcores alike. Referee Jason Herzog, who handles a great deal of Bellator's shows, is flat-out one of the best referees in the sport, if not the best.

Bellator CEO Bjorn Rebney has been adamant that fighters must prove themselves as top contenders by rising above in the tournament for a crack at the champ, propagating Bellator's signature catchphrase, "Where title shots are earned, not given." Without the convenience of the UFC's overflowing stable, Rebney's managed to avert the calamity of last-minute requirements by swapping match-ups sensibly (da Silva vs. Reardanz and Bezerra vs. Foster at Bellator 60) or nixing them entirely (Prindle vs. Santos at Bellator 63).

Amidst all of these subtle but critical accomplishments, the thing that stands out the most is that Bellator fighters are just downright hungry. Regardless of experience, popularity or position, the Bellator mixed martial artists all fight like they have something to prove. Which they do -- Bellator and its fighters will always be compared to the UFC, and having the undisputed alpha-promotion as an eternal benchmark can be quite grueling and tedious for an aspiring fight league.

All they can hope to do is put on entertaining fights between exciting and relevant fighters ... and that's exactly what Bellator has done so far.

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/3/25/2899871/bellator-knockout-fight-of-the-year-curran-warren-rogers-vianna-woodard-pitbull

Eric Prindle Wins $100K Bellator Tournament, Will Challenge Cole Konrad


Mauro Ranallo is reporting on Twitter that not only has Thiago Santos missed weight and forced the cancellation of his Bellator 62 heavyweight tournament final bout against Eric Prindle, but Prindle has been declared the tournament winner. If this report is correct, Prindle will win the $100,000 Bellator tournament prize and get a shot at champion Cole Konrad's title.

It's been a long and fairly crooked path to get to this point. Prindle initially met Santos at Bellator 59 in the heavyweight tournament final. That bout was a No Contest after Prindle ate a kick to the groin from Santos at 1:24 of the round 1 and wasn't able to continue. The pair were then scheduled to meet at Bellator 61 last Friday. Unfortunately, Bellator pushed the bout back a week because Prindle was having "flu-like symptoms."

http://www.bloodyelbow.com/2012/3/22/2896155/eric-prindle-wins-bellator-tournament-winner-cole-konrad

Top MMA News favourite Nathan Gunn has announced via Twitter that he has signed a two year deal with Bellator Fighting Championships and is expected to make his promotional début on May 4 in Rama, Ontario. Providing Gunn receives clearance from the Ontario Commission, he would be making his début alongside teammate Matt Veal who takes on 2 time Bellator veteran Will Romero. Also making their début for Bellator on May 4 will be fellow Canadians Ryan Ford and Cory MacDonald.

“Gunner” will enter this contest on a two fight win streak over Nabil Khatib and Lindsey Hawkes in 2011. In the victory over Khatib, Gunn captured the Wreck MMA Welterweight Title in a dominant unanimous decision. Prior to his current resurgence, Gunn suffered a pair of devastating knockout losses in the MFC after going undefeated in his first seven bouts. With a victory in Bellator, Gunn should be well on his way to climbing back into the top ten of the Canadian Welterweight rankings.

http://topmmanews.com/2012/03/22/gunner-signs-with-bellator-debuts-may-4/

Ronda Rousey Adds The Diaz Brothers To Her Training Routine


The next time Ronda Rousey defends her Strikeforce bantamweight title, she may have developed a new way to mean mug her opponent.

Following a brief vacation that she earned by submitting Miesha Tate in early March, Rousey is already getting back into the gym, and she’s adding some new training partners to her routine.

Rousey will be heading to Stockton, Calif., to work with Nick and Nate Diaz as well as the team at Cesar Gracie jiu-jitsu as she starts preparing for her next title defense.

“Yeah, I’m going up there from the 3rd to the 16th (of April) and it’s going to be the first time ever since I started doing MMA that I’m going to be training for an actual extended period of time away from my core camp, who I’ve always been with,” Rousey told MMAWeekly Radio recently.

Rousey got a chance to roll with Nick Diaz previously, and she says that traveling to different gyms during her judo career was a regular event, but she hasn’t done it since beginning her journey into MMA.

“When I did judo I used to go around all the time, like every month or so I would go away for a week or two weeks to go train somewhere else,” said Rousey. “For some reason it’s something I never did in MMA, so they invited me to come train up there, and they’re good at a bunch of things that I need to work on so I’m super excited. It’s going to be the first time I’m training away from home in a long time.”

While Rousey will definitely pick up some top notch training alongside Diaz and the other fighters in Stockton, she’s not leaving her home camp by any means.

Rousey has been working with her team and coaches in Los Angeles since she started, and she’s an L.A. girl for life.

She does however hope to keep the Diaz brothers and their team as regular training partners as she gets ready for her next title defense, presumably against Sarah Kaufman later this year.

“Oh yeah definitely, I hope it does,” Rousey said when asked if working with the Diaz brothers could become a regular part of her camp. “But I love L.A., I’ll never move away from here.”

http://www.mmaweekly.com/ronda-rousey-adds-the-diaz-brothers-to-her-training-routine