I participated in an anti-bullying event called BRAVE on 22nd March. Anthony was joined by fellow UFC fighters BJ Penn, Urijah Faber, James Tehuna and Dylan Andrews. The event was to raise awareness and tackle ways to stop bullying. The event was held at the UFC gym in Sydney.
SPMA won an impressive 10 gold, 7 silver and 2 bronze medals at the NSW BJJ Championships. SPMA had 35 students compete at the Sports and Aquatic Centre at Sydney Uni on 22nd March. Shaher Khan and Frances Bavaro deserve special mention for winning double gold!
SPMA went 2 wins 2 losses at the Brace for War MMA show at Luna Park in Sydney on 15th March. Gerhard Voigt won by KO 1st round, Steven Micallef won by decision, Luke Standing lost by TKO and Christoff Loff lost by decision. Usual ups and downs in the world of MMA. It was the first round of an 8 main tournament for each division. Gerhard and Steve now move to the semi finals to be held later in the year.
We moved our Liverpool MMA, BJJ and Muay Thai Kickboxing gym to Moorebank. We opened Monday 10th March at our new location. It is a much bigger and better place than our previous one. It has a much better training feel to it. All of the students are very happy with the move and new facilities. On top of that it is easy to get to and there is unlimited free parking. We will be having a Grand Reopening Day on Sunday 13th April.
I presented Bren Foster with his BJJ brown belt last Friday. Bren has been training with me for 10 years. Bren owns and runs Elite Martial Arts and Fitness in Minchinbury teaching Tae Kwon Do, Muay Thai and BJJ. He is a great coach to all of his students and he himself is a great student of martial arts. A very rare trait! On top of that you can see him show off his martial arts and acting skills in movies. Check out his latest movie Force of Execution.
The UFC Fit (Full body Intensity Training) trainer course was run at UFC Gym Sydney on 29th January by Rob “Razor” McCullough. Rob is a former WEC World Lightweight Champion. There were about 20 instructors including myself. We were shown and then practiced all the techniques and then practiced running a class. It is a great workout for the non fighter and a good introduction to MMA fitness training.
There is no link with MMA to coward punching and the violence on Sydney streets. That is my opinion and the opinion of the majority of people. Unfortunately there is a very small minority out there who cause trouble on the streets of Sydney. Here is an interview I recently did with Adam Ireland of MMA Kanvas talking about MMA, coward punchers and violence on Sydney streets.
I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas to you and your families. I started the day with midnight mass at my parish church and now I am off to my parent’s house for lunch. I hope you all have a great day :)
My school SPMA finished the year last weekend with our annual Christmas party. We had about 100 students, family and friends enjoy a BBQ in the park along with some sumo :) We also handed out our annual awards at our Christmas Party. Big congratulations to all of our winners.
Adult Competitor of the Year: Jean Mondaca
Adult Most Improved of the Year: Harichandra Rajiji
Kids Competitor of the Year: Zander Mucenski
Kids Most Improved of the Year: Jordan Catalovski
Kids Encouragement Award Concord: Oliver Silvestro
Kids Encouragement Award Liverpool: Tyga Téa Mucenski
Black, black and more black! Just finished a week of gradings at my two schools. Congrats to the new Thai Kickboxing Black T-Shirts at both my Liverpool and Concord schools and new BJJ black belt at my Concord school. It was the first time I graded students to Black T-Shirt and also awarded my ninth BJJ black belt. Check out the photos and names of my students :)
