My long weekend actually started sometime midweek last week as I made my way back from LA. I started wednesday by heading to traffic court in downtown. For anyone who has done this in Los Angeles, you know that it's already an unpleasant experience just going, and then paired with how the judge screwed me to prove a point (on a fixit ticket, nonetheless...), it's downright unbearable! Bad mood brewing, I headed to Miss Rara's house to wait out rush hour. I then got on the road back to Las Vegas; something that should have taken four hours but because of a semi engulfed in flames somewhere after barstow, ended up being a 7+ hour endeavor.
When I woke Thursday morning, I had no clue early on in the day how busy it was going to be. ESPN Friday Night Fights was having 5 MMA bouts on the card at Thomas and Mack and I was shooting guys cutting for it, the Weigh Ins, and the event itself where 18,000 tickets had been given away. I was out the door of my house by 12 noon, greeted by the blast of the blow dryer that is also known as the Las Vegas heat.
I met up with Pete Spratt over at Planet Hollywood to catch him cutting weight for his fight against John Alessio the following night. He was sitting at 174 all week so he didn't have much cutting to do; he had even stuffed his face at the buffett multiple times since he had gotten to Vegas. Jason House was there to corner him, and after Pete ran on the treadmill for about 20 minutes, he held pads to help shed the few remaining lbs. Ever conscious of the time and everything I had to do, I excused myself at 1pm.
I end up on a lot of crazy missions, but I have to admit that this next part was a new one. I walked into OTM and announced to everyone in there, "I need to buy a cup." I liken the experience to a guy going into the grocery store and picking up tampons for his girlfriend. I was slightly uncomfortable about it, but no one else seemed to think twice about it. I was quick and ready wih my excuse though, "Diego's manager called me and asked me to come pick one up and it's my first time doing this and I have to admit it's kinda weird and..." My run on sentence kept going and going like an energizer bunny on crack. Not sure what size to get, I bought two and continued on my journey.
Next stop, Xtreme Couture. John Alessio was cutting weight at 2pm and when I talked to him the night before, he still had 11 pounds to go. Such was not the case when I arrived and he said he weighed 174. He was not rushing to cut and was one of a number of people gathered around the boxing ring as Kim Couture was working on her clinch, coached by Randy. By 2:30 John and Kui were both cutting weight, and by 3:30 he saying a prayer (for this story it's to a non-denominational god) as he stepped on the scale and checked his weight successfully.
I went home and got ready for the weigh ins as fast as I could. They started at 5pm, and I was out the door by 4:45. A block outside of my gated community and I noticed a disturbing thing while I was driving; my car pulling slightly to one side, and louder than normal wheel noise from my back tire. As I slowed at the corner, I quickly popped open my door and confirmed what I already knew; I had a flat. Not sure if I should keep driving in the hopes to make it to the weigh ins on time, I did just that and drove on flat the whole way there. The parking lot was insanely busy so I made my own space in an area that was marked off at the end of a row and ran all the way to the mezzanine level of Planet Hollywood. I arrived by 5pm on the dot.
I soon learned that my efforts to be on time were in vain as we spent the next hour sitting around waiting for all the fighters and corners to get licensed. I wandered around shooting pics and conversing with friends and family until weigh ins finally commenced at 6pm. The MMA portion of the card weighed in first (thankfully) although I stayed and shot the entire weigh in. It was then I remembered that I still had to head out in the 106 degree heat and change my tire. Joey Varner offered to come and help me (I could have done it myself, I'm not a helpless girl), and I'm very thankful that he did.
We got out to my car and there was a boot on it, as well as a bright, neon yellow sticker on the window with a phone number to call. Joey began changing the tire as I got security out to remove the boot; an effort that they wanted $40 dollars to do. No sooner had I started talking to them and Joey was standing and smooth talking the guy. He was unable to make the call about removing it without charging us, so the supervisor was standing in his place less than five minutes later. I watched amazed as Joey convincingly pointed out the flat tire and the crowded parking structure, and that I'm a helpless girl (although I knew how to use the car jack better than he did) and a couple minutes later the boot was removed, they were shaking hands, and I was left with 40 bucks still in my pocket. I think this means I owe Joey a cheeseburger or something.
It was 7pm and I was supposed to be at Marc Laimon's Cobra Kai to shoot CB Dollaway and Matt Riddle cutting weight. I had never been there but knew generally where it was and arrived as though I had been taking the route every day for the previous year. The gym was located in a series of warehouses and the guys were in the back. Marc was training a couple guys in the ring as CB had started rolling with NFL's senior writer, Jay Glazer in the cage. After a couple rounds being cornered by Todd and Trevor Lally, the driving force behind AZ Combat Sports, Matt Riddle stepped in and the two went a couple more rounds. They finished off the session each hitting pads, Matt in the ring and CB in the cage. CB weighed himself with 7 more pounds to go; Matt was sitting pretty at 183.
And I was off running again; this time off to the traditional post weigh in dinner at Buca Di Beppo that I have come to enjoy with John Alessio's friends and family. This time though, Kim, Randy and her relatives were there as well as John McCarthy and his wife. I was 45 minutes late, but they had barely just started ordering. Although I rarely drink soda, I was craving a root beer and within minutes was happily downing one as I listened to conversations around the table. Plate after plate of food started arriving piled high with salad, garlic bread, spaghetti, chicken, lasagna and other italian favorites.
Although I hate to do it, I ate and then ran out the door and over to the Palms. I delivered the cups I had purchased earlier in the day to Diego's manager, Jeff Clark of North County fight Club. I also shot him cutting and watched him check his weight at 173. They were finished within minutes of me arriving so I said my goodbyes and then went to meet up with a tall, lanky hawaiian fighter.
I found him by the entrance to Moon and the Playboy Club and we (Me, Kendall, and his friend Timmy) walked outside the casino to the marquee billboard listing the odds for the fight. At 10pm, it was still over 100 degrees out! The billboard listed him as the underdog @ +180. He found this humorous as we posed a picture of him "holding up" his odds and flipping off the camera. Then we trekked a mile up Flamingo Rd to where another billboard and ran out onto the 12 inch median to attempt to grab a photo. On a busy street the night before weigh ins, we decided that this was a poor idea and took the photo from the side walk across the street. As we made our way back to the palms, some asshole chucked a half full, plastic 2qt juice bottle as hard as he could out the window at us. I was the lucky recipient of the blow as it hit me in the arm. Kendall was pissed and turned to go after them, but they were long gone. It hurt, and he couldn't stop talking about it the rest of the weekend, but I was already over it. Back at the Palms he checked his weight at 194 and then headed to bed. I ran into CB, Jay and Matt playing craps and Roulette. I hung out for a bit and then I drove the 2 miles from the Palms to my house and went to bed. See, I do sleep! Sometimes, lol..
I was supposed to shoot Kendall cutting Friday morning, but I had so much work to catch up on, I stayed home to do that before the weekend got TOO crazy. I left my house by 3pm, made a stop at sonic across the street from the Palms for a chicken wrap and an all too excellent Strawberry slush (again 106 out), and made my way to the second floor ballroom where the weigh ins were being held. Rampage was almost the first people I saw, and when I asked about the Round 5 figure of himself hanging out of his pocket, he responded, "That's Mini-me!" Weigh Ins got started a bit late, but went smoothly except for Jeremy Stephens trying to punk out Spencer Fisher after their noses touched in their face off.
Now at this point, I have to mention that I didn't watch TUF 7 other than a couple minutes here and there. So I don't know who most of the guys were on the show, other than Jesse who I met a few weeks prior to him leaving for it, and Mike Dolce who I had known because of the IFL. I had no clue who like each other and who didn't and what each guy looked like. Now, after 2 days of seeing them nonstop, I know a large amount of them. I mention this because of what happens next.
A number of the TUF 7 crew were standing around after the weigh ins, taking photos with fans and signing autographs. I choreographed them into a group picture and then tried to get Jeremy May over to join from across the room. In my attempts to do this, I managed to upset Matt Riddle who said,"I'm not in this picture if he is!" and started to storm off. This was quite a feat because usually Matt is grinning ear to ear. Jeremy didn't even hear me yelling and I pushed Matt back into the photo with the rest of the group. I think a few extra guys jumped in the pic, but again, like I said before, I didn't know most of the cast.
I joined Rampage's entourage (Juanito, Cheick, Dolce, May, and Harris) back to the room to change for the THQ Press conference. Rampage put on a TUF t shirt and a number of heavy pieces of jewelry that are upgrades from the chain he used to wear around his neck. Leaving the rest of the guys behind, he and Juanito dragged me with them to the event which was an unveiling of the UFC video game.
We arrived before the rest of the invitees and I got to watch him play his own character and knock out Forrest Griffin. As his character did the customary howl after the win, he simultaneously did one as well. Appetizers circled the room, and it was shortly filled with many members of the media. The press conference got underway with much of the game play, functions and features explained to us as we watched the trailer. The detail in the game was amazing as two asian programmers went head to head with Forrest and Rampage's characters, each being cornered by his namesake. For anyone who knows Rampage, you can imagine how funny he was cornering himself.
As soon as it was done, I devoured a plate of food from the spread they had waiting in the other room and took off to the Thomas and Mack center where the Friday Night Fights, ESPN's Free For All had already gotten underway. They were on the next to the last boxing match and I got my equipment together and started shooting. It was then that I remembered why I am an MMA fan, and dislike watching boxing. The rounds kept getting stopped over and over again, and the action wasn't anywhere near as fast paced. I also got hit with flying sweat a lot more. Eww! But I shot it to test the lighting for the upcoming MMA fights. During the intermission, they magically transformed the ring from a four rope boxing ring to a five rope MMA ring.
I shot along side Dave Mandel from Sherdog. He wasn't too thrilled about the card that was listed other than the Main event, but I assured him that some of the fights should be pretty good. At the end of the event he was 100 percent in agreeance with me.
First bout was super heavy weight event between Bryce Ritani-Coe and Rob Mitchell; both were making their Pro MMA debut. Halfway through the round, Bryce scored a knockdown that he thought was the end of the fight. As soon as he realized it wasn't, he was on his opponent ground and pounding his way to victory at 4:33. Kui Gonzalves-Kanoho stepped into the ring against Ricky Johnson and we watched as these 135'ers had an all out war. Kui almost finished Ryan early on in the fight, but it ended up going all the way to a three round decision in Kui's favor. Next fight was a 150 catch weight for Dennis Davis, formerly of Team Quest, against Dave Jansen, currently of Team Quest. Another three round battle to a decision, and the glove that was raised belonged to Dave Jansen.
Kim Couture was up next, making her MMA debut against Kim Rose, who was doing the same. The bell rang and Kim Rose rushed in. With a quick flurry of punches, an uppercut found its mark within 5 seconds and had Couture collapsing on the ground. Referee rushed in, ready to stop the bout, but Couture was able to find her bearings and fight back. For the entire 3 rounds, Dave Mandel and I watched as she fought the fight, but wasn't quite "all there". She took a beating, although didn't ever give up, and fought back and gave a beating of her own.
After all was said and done, we were told that the first uppercut split her jaw in two, and the left side was hanging about a quarter of an inch lower than the right. She fought the ENTIRE fight like that, not quitting or giving up. She took a NUMBER of punches to the face, as well as got caught in a few guillotines that for SURE stressed on her jaw. Even an elbow at the throat pushed against the bone had to be excruciating. Blood dripping and all, she joined Kim Rose in the center of the canvas as Josh raised her opponents hand from the judges' decision.
[6-20] ESPN Free For All: Kim Couture vs Kim Rose
The show must go on, and soon Pete Spratt and John Alessio were stepping into the ring. They went back and forth for a full round and in the next one, John's arm was broken blocking a kick from Pete. John managed to take his back and secure a win by sinking a rear naked choked (using the broken arm) on Pete two minutes into the second round.
[6-20] ESPN Free For All: John Alessio vs Pete Spratt
It was like lightning flashed, and all of a sudden the arena was empty. I was ringside putting away my equipment and trying to decide where to go next. I watched as Kim was taken to the hospital in an ambulance, and stopped to talk to some of the Xtreme Couture family before heading out to Kaizen Sushi right up the street from the arena. I met Jeff and Matt from North County Fight Club there, along with my room mate, Rebecca, the owner of the AFL, and female MMA fighter Tara La Rosa. Shawn Tompkins, his girl Emily, and Mike, one of his canadian fighters showed up soon after. Much of the talk was centered on the fights that evening as I pulled out my laptop and we inspected the damage that Kim sustained in the photos I had taken. We were all amazed that the fight wasn't called, that she kept fighting, and that her injuries were that severe. BJ, the owner of the AFL was completely impressed with Kim's performance and said he looked forward to working with her in the future.
I enjoyed a chicken bowl as I organized photos and joined in the conversation. Of course it was all shop talk, but I had a chance to hear Tara's side of the story when it came to the Gina Carano debaucle she was getting heat for. She said, "They took an hour long interview, and edited it into a 20 second clip that caused a ton of damage." She was bummed by the amount of heat that she got for it, but said that when she to spoke Gina backstage that night, they were cool and that Gina was extremely nice. After a couple hours relaxing and eating we parted ways and I gave Jeff a ride back to the Palms.
I was going to go home, but somehow ended up at the bar people watching with Jeff. Various friends came and went and tons of entertaining, drunk people came up to talk and then left, but we stayed put until close to 3am. He headed upstairs to bed, so I got in my car and went home to do the same.
I went to bed by 4am, but was up by 8:30 loading pictures. I fell back asleep until 11:30 am, worked a couple hours and then got up to start getting ready for the night. I didn't feel like getting dressed up after the fight so I threw a tube top into my purse to change into later that evening. Backpack packed, I found myself valeting my car at 2:45. Bouts started at 3:30 so I went up to the media room and showed off the pics from Kim's fight to other photographer peers. I was cageside and had my cameras out, ready to shoot, by 3:30.
The undercard was excellent. 2 guillotines in a row started off the evening, the first by Rob Kimmons, and the second by Dean Lister. Matt Brown won his fight by TKO due to strikes; In his post fight interview he credited Tito Ortiz with helping him win by cornering him from the crowd when he couldn't hear his own corner. Drew Mcfedries made quick work of Marvin Eastman with a TKO in just over a minute. Josh Burkman and Dustin Hazelett waged a war that earned them Fight of the Night; Dustin submitted Josh at the end of the second round with a slick arm bar that also earned him submission of the night.
The main card began with Matt Riddle vs Dante Rivera; a three round decision that went to Riddle. And folks, no, Dante is not going to retire despite all former comments. Spencer Fisher and Jeremy Stephens also went to war and the decision went to Spencer at the end of the fifteen minutes. Although I thought the Hazelett vs Burkman fight was good, I felt that the Sanchez Vs Fiorovante fight deserved FOTN. This fight went almost three entire rounds of nonstop action ending as Diego threw a kick that dazed Luigi, and then a knee that knocked him down. Diego was on top of Luigi like white on rice and then referee Rosenthal was using his body to seperate them.
And not it was time for the main event of the event. 3 rounds of nonstop action in the UFC. And Kendall came in like it was him game and Evan Tanner was just a pawn. They were the full 3 rounds trading blows and Kendall getting Tannner with his vicious knees. The fight was almost over in the second, but Evan managed to pull through and make it to the third. Then, it was time for the judges decision. One judge gave Kendall and 30-26. One gave Tanner a 29-28 (What??). The third gave Kendall a 30-26 and he won by split decision! Congratulations Kendall! But what the hell was up with the odd judge out giving a 29-28 to Tanner?
Again, I was one of the last ones out of the arena as I put all my equipment away and made my way up to the casino. I spent some time socializing and snapping photos before I went up to the press conference with Jeff and Tara. As soon as it was finished, a small group of us went to the cafe to have dinner. We ordered and then I ran upstairs to Kendall's suite to see him and his family celebrating and then ran back to the cafe. We were there till about 11:30 although Tara had taken off to catch her flight home sometime around 11. Jeff and I went to Diego's suite to check out the party going on there and snap some pics of Diego and his family. I went to my car to put my backpack away and change, and met Jeff to go into Rain for the Official UFC Fight Afterparty.
The afterparty was fun.. We made our way through the crowded club to the section where all the UFC people were. Hosted by UFC President, Dana White, others on hand to enjoy the evening included Lorenzo Fertitta, Rampage Jackson, the TUF 7 crew, Dean Lister, Joe Rogan, Eddie Bravo, Bruce Buffer, and more! The hour that I was there I spent taking photos, and bopping around dancing my little tushie off!
I got swept into the vortex that is Rampage's entourage for the second time that weekend. This time he and his buddies were on a mission to go drive their sports cars. His an Audi R8 (this car is friggin' bad ass!), and his buddies had a Lambo Diablo, and an Aston Martin of some kind. I wanted to go, but knew that I had other places to be and people to see! Dan Cramer with his broken collar bone was a part of this group and he said to me, "Never would I have thought that I would ever be in Las Vegas getting into a Lambourghini right now!" I waved good bye and got into my Honda Accord and drove towards the Wynn for Kendall's Afterparty.
I arrived there by 2am or so. I wasn't there very long as the party was winding down, but I did manage to catch Tito and Jenna right before they left. I also spotted Gray, Rude Boy, and Jay Hieron for pics, and took a bunch of Kendall, his pregnant girl, and their family and friends! Where's waldo on the passed out hawaiian!!
As I was leaving the club to head back to the Palms, I came across Kendall and company limping along. He had a bruised ankle so bad he could barely walk. I gave them a ride back and as we were walking through the Palms, we came upon a lone Amir headed to McDonald's. Kendall took that opportunity to lay his years of TUF wisdom on him, "Everyone will want something from you, and you have to learn to figure out who your true friends are!"
I headed to McDonalds with Amir to grab a bite. It was 3am by this time, and the line was pretty big. By the time we got to the front, Matt Brown had shown up out of no where and joined us. We grabbed a table to eat our late night delicacies and the talk of course turned to fighting. I joined into the conversation referencing different fights and Matt looked oddly at me and said, "You're like a fight encyclopedia!" Wikipedia, bitches!! The conversation soon turned to Cale and Tim's fight that got cancelled because of the aderol that Tim takes. Matt said, "That guy needs that stuff! Do you know how ADD he is?" Amir then mentioned that Cale was over at the tattoo shop in the Palms getting a tattoo so we motivated out of our seats to try and find him.
He found us as we were walking through the casino and told us that the tattoo place was closed. I made some calls to a couple other spots, but everything shut down by 2am. What kind of city is Las Vegas without all night tattoo shops?? Amir was still looking to go out so we went to Moon and saw that they had shut down the door. I dragged him over to the back door where the elevators to the club were and my friend let us go up. There were plenty of people up there still partying including Diego's whole crew. I found everyone of them except Diego and Ali and by that time the club was almost dead so we elbowed our way into the next elevator and left.
We found Diego and Ali at that point but they were heading up to go to bed. Amir and I parted ways at that point and I wandered through the casino towards the front door to leave, and found Dolce and May as well as a bunch of others and we spent then next hour in a large group socializing in the walk way. The life form that was our group grew and changed as some people approached and added themselves to it, and others left to go to bed. At some point I recall Jeremy staggering up to Matt to ask for a rematch. When all was said and done, we found ourselves at the 24 hour cafe with Matt Brown, Jesse Moreng, Hector Ramirez, Mike Dolce, Prince Mclean, and more. Lucky Matt ordered a bowl of berries with his meal and they gave it to him along with an amazing pile of french toast. Everyone sitting to my left ordered egg white omlettes and I got a chinese chicken salad. We shut everything down by 7am, and I went home to bed.
And then this is where the story ends, right? Wrong!! I woke up early to load pics from the night before and then made my way over to Green Valley Ranch hotel and Casino located about 20 minutes off the strip. There was a special afterparty thrown for Josh Burkman and John Alessio by their management, Denaro Sports and Marketing. So we spent the day by the pool enjoying drinks and food and the 111 degree weather. Out of 9 cabanas in the place, we had 7 of them. The sponsors that were there included Gamma O, Stagr, One More Round, and Cage Fighter. XTreme Couture came out to celebrate with John and when I looked to their table, I saw Kimi sitting there. I quickly made my way over to talk to her.
Her jaw was still broken, I could see that when I walked up. She said that her surgery was the following day. She seemed in little pain, but also didn't seem like she was drugged up; she said the pills make her sick. She was hungry more than anything she expressed to me. We got to talking about the fight and she explained at that point what was going on with her, and in her head when it was all going down.
"I went to touch gloves with Kim, and she didn't, just started throwing punches. I knew that something was seriously wrong from the beginning, but didn't realize what it was at the time. So I took her down. For some reason I kept seeing an arm triangle in my head. Then they would stand us up and she would get me with her punches again. After the first round, I said to Randy, I think I lost a tooth. He said, 'No honey, your jaw's broken.' They wanted me to stop fighting then, but she didn't feel that strong and I knew I could finish her. She tagged me with some more punches and I took her down again. I don't know why I just kept thinking, arm triangle. But everytime I tried to tighten it, it would push my jaw into my ear and cause me a ton of pain. One side of my jaw would push over the other so that the teeth were overlapping. I would have been so mad if Randy threw in the towel. I wanted to finish her. Looking back now, I can think of many other things that I should have done to her on the ground."
I was amazed. I couldn't believe how bad she wanted that win. Bad enough that she fought three rounds with her jaw broken like that; the pain had to be excruciating. Then I asked her the question on everyone's mind. "Are you going to continue to fight?"
"Oh hell yeah! I will have my jaw wired shut for the next five weeks. That sucks cause all I can think about is pizza or cheeseburgers. After that, they are going to look at it, but say it'll probably be another five weeks before I can spar. I already asked her for a rematch."
Whoa. Not only did this woman push through to finish the fight against all odds, she's already asking for a rematch? She hasn't even gotten out of surgery to fix the ramifications of this fight. She's a true fighter whose skills will some day match her heart. I have mad respect for her after that conversation.
Randy arrived to the pool around 6pm to join her. He had a seminar in Wisconson earlier that day and had just flown in. It was his birthday, and he spent it quietly enjoying the waning sun of the afternoon, and the cooling temperatures. It wasn't long before they were saying their goodbyes, and I was as well.
What an eventful weekend! I can't believe that so much had occured in four days. 2 nights of incredible fights, Kim's inspiring attitude, a ton of adventures, and Randy's Birthday. I wonder what the week has in store for me?
