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Ultimate Challenge: Dynamite Review
25 Oct 2009
By Jim Page
On Saturday 24th October, the Ultimate Challenge promotion returned to the Troxy theatre and delivered one of the most entertaining events London has seen in recent years.
In the main event, Neil ‘Goliath’ Grove lived up to his nickname as he dwarfed heavyweight challenger Martin Thompson and immediately appeared to seize the psychological advantage.
‘The Ox’ swung wildly as he tried to bomb his way into the contest, but quickly over-committed and walked onto a powerful right hand from Grove which sent him crashing to the floor.
Grove chased in for the kill and landed several hard punches before referee, Grant Waterman, jumped in to call a halt to the fight after only 53 seconds. After the bout, Goliath was delighted with this first defence of his title and eagerly accepted the challenge of the fearsome CFC champion Karlos Vermola.
In a well-matched encounter, Ultimate Challenge middleweight champion Tom ‘Kong’ Watson ground out a whisker thin decision victory over the determined, but unspectacular middleweight challenger, Denniston Sutherland.
Watson vaguely threatened with an ill-fated triangle attempt in the first round and scored with some hard punches on the floor in the second, arguably stealing both rounds.
In the third, Sutherland consistently defended a string of takedown attempts from Watson, making the champion work for everything. After 3 close and gruelling rounds, two of the judges felt Watson had done enough and handed him the split decision.
Jason ‘Shotgun’ Young claimed a memorable victory over perennial top-ten fighter, Abdul Mohammed in this changing of the guard encounter. On more than one occasion, the wily veteran was able to slam Young to the floor; however, the Londoner showed vast improvements in his ground game as he continually scrambled his way out of danger.
The striking encounters were a different matter. Whilst Mohammed scored with a few hard right hands, ‘Shotgun’ bossed the action to the most part, even pausing to smile genuinely when his opponent was able to land a rare low kick.
With the end of the third round in sight, Mohammed unleashed his trademark spinning backfist to great effect; however, Young was able to brush off the cobwebs, seeing out the round to claim a well-deserved majority decision.
TUF graduate, Dean Amasinger tore through the challenge of Scott Jansen to cement his position at the top of the domestic welterweight scene. Amasinger demonstrated a perfected double-leg takedown by effortlessly scooping his opponent, driving forward and spiking him into the floor. Seconds later, the Nottingham fighter tightened up a crushing arm-triangle to force the tap 44 seconds into the fight.
In an untidy slugfest, Dave Nobel dominated much of the fight with Wayne Weaver; however, a nasty eye injury late in the first round forced the 42-year old debut fighter to call it a day.
Edgelson Lua showed some refined sprawl and brawl technique as he held off the first takedown attempts from London Shootfighter, Alberto Mina. However, Mina chased after his opponent like a wild dog, taking him down and clamping on a kimura before transitioning to a merciless straight armbar which forced the tap.
Ian Hawkins and Ashley Pollard set the place on fire with an incredible display of guts and determination in their UK-1 Heavyweight title fight. Pollard started fast but was forced to eat a horrific number of clubbing punches in the second and looked on the verge of collapse. To his infinite credit, Pollard stormed back to win a back-and-forth final round to claim the championship belt.
Brad Wheeler claimed the UK-1 Lightweight title as he won a split decision victory over game opponent, John Joe Ellis. Ellis enjoyed a significant strength advantage, but Wheeler deftly employed a wide range of striking skills, landing spinning punches, kicks and knees en route to the win.
Jermaine Facey exploded out of the blocks with a breath-taking series of knees and punches on Tsunami gym fighter, Lee Doski. Drawing on his vast experience, Doski was able to weather the storm and took full advantage of his clear edge in the grappling by choking Facey out with minimum fuss in the second round.
Abdullah Hamden is not the most technical striker in the world, but he demonstrated a sharpened sense of timing as he picked off Shah Hussein for the majority of the first round. Unfortunately, Hussein suffered an eye injury in the second round and the fight was judged on the only round completed: Hamden walked away with the win.
Sure Grip grappling specialist, Tam Khan looked a weight class bigger than Ben Craggy and soon made him pay as he overpowered his helpless opponent, catching hold of a guillotine choke after only 80 seconds of action.
Michael Brown flew across the cage to land a vicious jump knee to begin his bout with Scott Rogan, setting the tone for an explosive striking encounter. Both fighters landed heavy bombs during the 3-round war, but Michael consistently crept ahead on the scorecards and was awarded the decision.
Joe Holder took a leap into the unknown as he quickly jumped guard with a guillotine attempt at the start of his match with Ryan Campbell. Though his opponent was able to break free, Holder made up for it by catching a tight triangle choke to seal the win.
Pablo Ben used some questionable tactics on his way to a second round submission over Tommy Kelly. Ben was warned for repeated use of the elbow in the first round and faced accusations of eye gouging from Kelly who wanted no further part of the contest.
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