This is going to have to be one of the fastest blogs I've ever written.. Unfortunately my crazy schedule doesn't allow for a personal life so that when personal issues arise it can definitely derail my schedule. I think i'm back on track and heading down to California to cover a fight today. In the mean time I gotta wind this back to last Thursday.
Thursday, November 20th, 2008..
Somehow I messed up. I was supposed to judge a go go contest @ Tao Nightclub in Las Vegas thursday night, go to PFC Friday night, Strikeforce Saturday night, and then do a photoshoot for a group just signed by Timbaland on Sunday. I f*cked up though. I thought that friday was the 20th, saturday the 21st, and so on. It wasn't until Tuesday that I realized I screwed up royally. I had made a promise to a fighter to be there at PFC that was actually on Thursday. And because I messed up, the group thought we were shooting Saturday in Sacramento! I never said I was going to be in Sac. I had to back out of shooting the Gogo contest, missed out on the money from the shoot sunday, and shot PFC thursday and strikeforce Friday. Great, are you confused yet? I know I am.
I got on the road to Lemoore by 11am. I may have gotten a blog online that morning.. The details are quite blurry at this point. Not sure if the old age or the alheimers is setting in, but if it weren't for the photos I take I think I would be quite lost on the things that I do sometimes. Fast forward through the boring drive through the arm pit of california, and I pulled into the Tachi Palace at 4:30. I went straight to Jason Carpenter's room to use the bathroom to get ready for the night.
After I had succesfully applied my war paint, I went downstairs and grabbed a bite to eat in the Coyote Cafe with the guys from Legends Gym in Hollywood. I was waiting for Jason Carpenter's team to head backstage so I could get pics of him warming up. I was giving Conor Heun shit for all the drama he caused at the party the previous weekend. He's going to kill me for even bringing it up again. Urijah and Team Alpha Male walked by so I said hello and grabbed some photos before heading to the fights at 6:15. They were scheduled at 6:30 but when I walked in the room, Jason was already walking out.
I ran to the ring and pulled out my cameras as quick as I could. I have to go through and figure out the lighting at every single venue I shoot; it's almost never the same. Except for the UFC fights; The lighting there is as consistant as it gets. So Jason and his opponent had already walked out by the time I was set up and I started to shoot and check my settings as Jason waited to be announced. It was his first professional fight and I noticed that he had Mark Laimon in his corner. I knew that Jason already had a ton of amateur bouts under his belt so I had a feeling I knew which way the fight was going to go. And I was right. Jason secured a rear naked choke on Juan in :43 seconds. Thankful that I had made it in time to shoot such a short fight, I settled in for 13 more bouts.
I watched the action unfold and enjoyed many of the fights as I often do when I go to PFC. Unfortunately because this blog is being written as fast as I can, I'm not going to go into each fight individually. A bunch of the fights on the card went to decision. There were at least 4 low blows during the event. Rambaa Somdet impressed the shit out of everyone by defeating Ulysses Gomez who was previously undefeated. Jorge Olivera was one of the recipients of a low blow and his antics amused the crowd after it happened. He held onto his light heavyweight belt by an arm bar submission to his opponent, Isaiah Larson. Doug Marshall fought at 185. He defeated his opponent in just over a minute. He looked so skinny I almost didn't even recognize him! Here are all the photos from the fights that night:
After the fights were over, we (Miss Rara and I) headed over to the Coyote Cafe again. It's typically where you eat the entire time when you're at the Tachi Palace for PFC. If you get motivated, you can choose to drive about 5 miles away to the town of Hanford where you have a selection of restaurants to choose from. I sat with Ken Pavia and his cronies at a table with Erin Toughill. Or I should say my backpack sat there as I bounced around the restaurant to talk to everyone and take photos.
After I ate a bowl of minestrone soup, I adjourned to the bar area where I found a number of the fighters celebrating or drowning their sorrows. Tell you the truth, it's sometimes hard to decipher which ones are doing which. Danny Castillo and Scott Mcafee dragged me upstairs to the club (that was empty) so I dragged them back downstairs to the bar where we finished out the night.
Rara and I crashed out and she left early in the morning back to LA. I took my time to try and get some work done and then met up with Ken Pavia and his agents for breakfast before we made the 3 hour journey to San Jose for Strikeforce.
Friday, November 21st, 2008
We arrived in San Jose at 5pm and I went straight to the hotel to get ready. We were staying at the De Anza Hotel, which is fast becoming a favorite of mine. I was staying with Strikeforce's photographer, Daisy. She and I have shot side by side at many events now. She was ready and took off to the arena, and I rushed to throw myself together and join her. I got to the venue as the first fight was about to start and as usual was rushing to get my equipment in order.
This card had 13 fights on it. I still have no clue what time the televised portion started at, all I know is that there were 4 more fights after the main event. A quick run down of some highlights of the event: Joe Riggs defeated Luke Stewart halfway through the second round by referee stoppage. Kim Couture fought her second fight against Lina Kvokov. Lina must not have come to fight because she ran from Kim who was clearly on a warpath. Yves and Duane fought three full rounds with Duane taking the decision. Bobby Southworth was cut in the middle of the first round by a vicious elbow from Babalu causing the doctor to stop the fight after the first round. Babalu is the new light heavyweight champ for Strikeforce. Scott Smith KO'd Terry Martin in :24 seconds, much to even his own surprise as you can see from the look on his face in one of my photos. They did four more fights after the main event as well, and most of the crowd in the arena stayed to watch all of them. Here are the photos from the event:
After the fights we went back to the De Anza Hotel. I needed to drop off my backpack and Daisy and I wanted to raid the Pantry. Now I'm going to take a moment to explain the pantry to those of you who don't remember it from the last time I stayed at this hotel. They don't offer night time room service at the De Anza. Instead, they have a little "pantry" on the second floor of the hotel that you can visit any time between the hours of 10pm and 5am. It's filled with sandwich makings, cookies, fruit salad, fruit, coffee, tea, and milk. You can go in there at any time during those hours and take what you want. For free. Our room was just down the hall from it so we dropped off our stuff and went in and made some sandwiches.
We wasted no time though, and were on our way out the door to the first of many afterparties. Lucky for us, most of the clubs in downtown San Jose were walking distance. Our first stop was the hotel bar where we found Scott Smith and a whole group of his friends and coaches. We didn't stay long, and as we left we ran into Joe Riggs and his crew. We walked two blocks to the party that Mark Towe was throwing at The Vault; No one was there as of yet, so we kept on in our afterparty journey.
We showed up to Vivid where Babalu was having his party. Daisy's friend let us in the door and we made a beeline for the VIP to find the guys celebrating. The club was packed with people, but there was still room to move so it was the slowest I had ever seen that place be. We found Babalu, shot some photos of the group and then continued on to the next spot.
It was about 6-7 blocks to the next spot, and we walked it but it sucked because we she had heels on and I didn't have a jacket. When we got to WET, the location of the official Strikeforce Afterparty, it was absolutely insane outside. The place had just recently opened and was the hot spot that night. My friend who was supposed to be at the door was nowhere to be found. So we ended up waiting out front for about 30 minutes before they would let us in because the club was at capacity. I have to thank Ryan, one of Eric Lawson's corners for helping us out that night in getting in.
The place was huge and we went on a mission to try and find as many people as we could that we knew. I managed to find a large amount of the group on the stage near the DJ but not before finding Eric Lawson's crew near the front door. I caught Jose Palacios with his broken hand in the ice bucket next to a bottle of Belevdere before spotting Hitman Dan and his hotties (we had just seen him at Vivid) as we walked out the door.
Instead of walking, this time we grabbed a cab back to the Vault. There were a bunch of people there by that time including Jake Shields, Mark Towe, and Erik Apple (who I had also seen at Vivid). I stayed here until about 1am hanging out and dancing before exhaustion hit me and I walked by myself the two blocks back to the hotel.
I almost made it to the door before a group of people walking down the street yelled to me. It was Gina Carano, and a crew of friends from Vegas. They had just gotten back to the hotel from dinner with Randy and Kim and were looking for something to do. So they grabbed me and dragged me the two blocks back to the club (not before watched Ro Ro try to single leg Tasha) where we stayed until the place was closed. Gina was super low key, smiling and talking to any fans that approached her for pictures that night. Since I was standing next to her, quite a few pictures that were taken were from my camera.
Once back at the hotel it was chaos as everyone was arriving back from the clubs. Gina took her drunk friend to the room, we raided the pantry again, and as we walked through the halls we heard many an afterparty going on. We stopped at one for a little while but soon called it a night. Another successful fight night for Combatlifestyle.com!
