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The Danish BJJ Championships
by Thomas Larsen
On Saturday October 25th 2003 martial arts history was written as the first ever Danish Championships in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu were held in the beautiful city of Elsinore. This excellent event was initiated and organised by Kasper Joergensen who runs the Jorgenson Jiu-jitsu Academy, Behring/Denmark. A lot of credit goes out to Kasper and his crew for organizing this event and pushing martial arts and especially BJJ further into the right direction in Denmark.
The event was a small one but it was run in a professional manner and the atmosphere was proper but relaxed with everybody in attendance mingling with each other. The champions were decided through a single-elimination style tournament refereed by brown belt in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu João Pedro Tinoco. Almost every academy practicing the BJJ style had entered the tournament, in Denmark there are les than ten BJJ schools with Jorguenson Jiu-jitsu Academy, Behring/Denmark being the school that has practiced the art the longest in Denmark. The schools represented were:
- Combat Sports Academy - http://www.csacph.dk
- MMA Alliance / Masters Team - http://www.mmaalliance.com
- Advanced Fighting Gym - http://www.shootersinternational.org/
- Mikenta / Modern Arnis Copenhagen - http://www.mikenta.dk
- Juku Ryu Ju-Jitsu
- Jorguenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia - http://www.b-jj.dk/
Nevertheless the big surprise of the day was the MMA Alliance/Masters Team from Copenhagen who entered their fighters les than a week prior to the tournament and basically won everything. The only division the team didn’t win was the -80 kilos division as the only MMA Alliance / Masters Team fighter in this category was in London for the London Open BJJ Championships together with team member Nic Osei; both fighters won gold and Nic Osei won the Absolute division as well.
The team was headed by 2003 Brown Belt Division Senior World Champion Peter Blackwell and Robert "Bobby" Sundel who is the 2003 Blue Belt Division Senior World Champion and 2003 Absolute Division Senior World Champion.
All the matches were fought at a very high pace. Each match consisted of a 6 minute round whereas the finals were 10 minutes. No fights were stalled and several sweet submissions were executed and this caused the spectators to scream and shout to show their approval and support. Even though there was a high competitive feeling about each fight no bad blood was drawn and everything basically went smoothly.
Being that BJJ is still young in Demark a lot of the participants have several years of submission wrestling and fighting experience and it was cool to see Tim Winther and Sune Bjerglund from Advance Fighting Gym (a Shooters International affiliate) sharing one gi as this is normally not their game. Both guys eventually took home a bronze medal: Tim Winther in the tough Absolute class and Sune Bjerglund in the -90 kilos division.
In the -70 kilos division Julian Kim Nguen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team) won all his fights by exhibiting strong ground control. Nguen had an extremely tough fight in the final against Sula Ampom (Jorgenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia) but at the end Nguens ground work was too solid for the Elsinorian and Julian Kim Nguen was awarded the first ever winner of the -70 kilos division in BJJ.
The -80 kilos division had several skilled fighters! Michael "Matsui" Pedersen (Jorgenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia) and Christian Graugart (Combat Sports Academy) were the best practitioners on this day and after a really exciting final round with 10 minutes of beautiful technical skills from both sides with loads of submission attempts and several sweeps Pedersen got the well-deserved decision.
Shimon Mochizuzi (MMA Alliance / Masters Team) won the -90 kilos-division after fighting a close war with Thomas LaCour (Combat Sports Academy). Mochizuzi showed superior ground-control and kept his calm through the whole fight with LaCour never giving up and constantly trying to pull off a finishing move but there was no mercy from the skilful and talented Mochizuzi who won a hard fought final on points.
In the +90 kilos division there was no denying the strong MMA Alliance / Masters Team as they took all the medals.
In the final Thomas Larsen had a huge weight disadvantage as his training buddy Trey Hooper out-weighed him by about 35 kilos! Hooper fought an intelligent fight using his weigh advantage and pure strength choking the relatively in-experienced (only 3 months of BJJ-training!) and much smaller Larsen causing the tap out courtesy of a gi-choke (Ezekiel-choke).
In the final of the absolute division Tray Hooper (MMA Alliance / Masters Team) faced another academy friend in Joachim Christensen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team). Now it was time to get even from the semi final in the +90 kilos division.
For most of this match the two tall, heavy and very strong fighters fought for takedowns. Christensen was not intimidated by the much larger Hooper and tried early on with a nice hip toss which Hooper defended nicely by quickly re-balancing. Later in the fight consisting of a 10 minute round Hooper was caught off balance by Christensen who quickly scored a takedown. Both fighters scrambled to their feet and the experienced Christensen got the takedown once again and swiftly secured an arm bar on Hooper leaving him no other option than to tap out.
The results of the first annual Danish Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Championships:
-70 kilos Division:
Danish Champion: Julian Kim Nguen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
2nd place: Kim Ampom (Jorguenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia)
3rd place: Ulrik Schilling (Jorguenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia)
-80 kilos Division:
Danish Champion: Michael Pedersen (Jorguenson Jiu-Jitsu Academia)
2nd place: Christian Graugart (Combat Sports Academy)
3rd place: Martin Skjoedt (Mikenta / Modern Arnis Copenhagen)
-90 kilos Division:
Danish Champion: Shimon Mochizuzi (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
2nd place: Thomas LaCour (Combat Sports Academy)
3rd place: Sune Bjerglund Nielsen (Advanced Fighting Gym)
+90 kilos Division:
Danish Champion: Tray Hooper (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
2nd place: Thomas Larsen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
3rd place: Joachim Christiansen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
Absolute-tournament:
1st place: Joachim Christensen (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
2nd place: Tray Hooper (MMA Alliance / Masters Team)
3rd place: Tim Winther (Advanced Fighting Gym)
* Article by Thomas Larsen.
* Back to Issue #4 Frontpage
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