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Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino- Hollywood, Florida April 8th 2010


Georgi vs Bao April 8th

Bellator Fighting Championships announces matchups for Season 2 featherweight tournament

HICAGO, Ill. (February 23, 2010) – With its first Season 2 event now less than eight weeks away, Bellator Fighting Championships today revealed the Round 1 matchups for its much-anticipated, nationally-televised featherweight tournament.

The four fights will take place during Bellator’s first two Season 2 events on April 8th at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Fla., and on April 15th at the historic Chicago Theatre. Bellator will also conduct tournaments at 155, 170 and 185 lbs. during Season 2 with the winners in each division being declared No. 1 contenders to the current roster of Bellator champions. Fighter pairings for those tournaments will be announced within the coming weeks.

The featherweight (145 lbs.) matchups are as follows:

April 8th

April 15th

Each of the fights will be broadcast live in prime time on FOX Sports Net. Highlights will be shown the following Saturday night in special action-packed shows on NBC and Telemundo.

“As an MMA fan, I can’t wait to see these fights,” said Bellator founder and CEO Bjorn Rebney. “Having watched all of these guys in the cage, I can’t tell you who the favorite will be. There’s been great buzz about our 145 division and it’s definitely warranted. This tournament is a mine field for each of these fighters.”

Ultimate MMA

Article from Ultimate MMA Magazine


MMA Recap With Georgi

Recapping With Georgi Karakhanyan – I Like To Fight A Lot

by Matt Clarmont – 02-04-2010

When Bellator Fighting Championships began releasing the names of those who would populate their 2010 roster, eyebrows began to progressively raise with each passing day’s announced signing. They raised considerably more when the featherweight tournament was confirmed to include one Georgi Karakhanyan.

“Georgi K.” is how he is endearingly referred to by most. “Insane” is how he fights and so it serves as a fitting nickname for someone who has progressed so much in such a compressed period of time. In just over 3 years of professional fighting, he has compiled an otherworldly 12-1 record and has quickly become the subject of future top 10, 145 pound discussions. He hasn’t trained for much longer than that either and he didn’t originally intend on dedicating his future to the sport of MMA.

“I started getting into Brazilian jiu jitsu in April of 2006. It was nothing serious, nothing like ‘oh I was going to become a professional fighter’ or ‘I was going to be in MMA.’ It was basically just to see what Brazilian jiu jitsu was all about,” said Georgi when asked about his trek into MMA. 3 short years may indicate that he was a natural at the Brazilian martial art, but it was hard work and determination that yielded the success story we see today.

“I started a [Brazilian jiu jitsu] class, I was getting tapped too many times. I was getting frustrated so I decided to get better and just train more,” and then came the call from King of thae Cage, “After about 6 months of training, I got offered a fight at King of the Cage and I just took it. I won that fight by guillotine choke which was the only submission I knew and I was good at. After that fight I just made up my mind. I kind of liked that feeling of walking out, the adrenaline and all that, the crowd, so I just decided to see how far I could take it and now I’m here, fighting for Bellator.”

Though Bellator seems to be a leap up in exposure, it isn’t quite a leap in competition. Georgi’s last victory was over an established prospect himself in Albert Rios, who a few short weeks ago took out UFC veteran and Brazilian jiu jitsu specialist, Alberto Crane. That fight was a giant notch in his hopeful future Bellator featherweight belt. His reaction was simple: he showed his growth as a fighter.

“When I fought that fight, I didn’t show lots of my standup ’cause a lot of people were telling me he’s stronger than me, he’s going to outwrestle me, so I was just trying to prove a point, that I could take him down. Actually, when the fight started I was just working on my takedown defense and he couldn’t take me down and I was just trying to prove people wrong, from that fight. That I could defend and I could take Albert Rios down.”

He understands what that accomplishment denotes and recognizes the talent level of his former opponent, “He had a lot of hype behind him because he fought in Affliction. But now, me and Albert are friends. I was actually at the fight last weekend, rooting for him when he was fighting Alberto Crane and he looked really good. That makes me look good!” he reflected with a chuckle.

That inherent humility is further apparent in his recollection of the one loss he has sustained thus far in competition. The Albert Rios fight was the culmination of the after-effects from that loss at the hands of Chris David.

“I’m really happy I lost ’cause I learned a lot. I’m a really humble person, I like to learn. I mean, I still have so much left to learn, I’m going to learn throughout my career so it was a good experience…something that could not get out of my head told me ‘okay you need to work on your wrestling’ so now I’ve been working a lot with Olympic caliber wrestlers and division I wrestlers so it’s good.”

What better way to shore up your weakness than learning from someone who is among the world’s best? So he became a mainstay with a southern California wrestling gym, “I train with SK Golden Boys out of North Hollywood, that’s where I train my wrestling with Martin Barberyan, that’s the Olympic wrestler, Andy Darmenjyan.”

In order to be well-rounded, the modern mixed martial artist needs to focus on every aspect, a fact well known to rising stars. Georgi gets that multiple pronged approach from Rancho Cucamonga’s Millennia MMA gym. And he couldn’t be happier with the tutelage he receives there.

“Training is good there. We have Romie Aram, our MMA instructor and Brazilian jiu jitsu instructor so we have lots of experience, he really helps us a lot. And we have lots of good quality guys, Manny Tapia, Charlie Valencia and the current King of the Cage champion Rick Legere so just training with those guys is really good. It keeps you really sharp and gets your game up there,” but for that extra bit of assistance to improve that game, “I also go to Glendale Fight Club and GOKORS in Burbank.”

Even when he’s not fighting or training, he has become obsessed with his chosen profession. Said Georgi of those brief periods when he is not training for a specific opponent, “I teach a lot. I work with the kids and I teach a lot of cardio kickboxing classes. Other than that, I just watch lots of fights. I like to learn from professional fighters and professional boxers, muay thai fighters. I just watch lots of fights and just learn.”

When Bellator came calling, Georgi was already committed to fight on January 24th at Called Out MMA 2. Though that organization seems to also be supplanting itself into the big time, a television deal was reached by Bellator and they weren’t thrilled with the idea of him risking his record against another unknown prospect. “You know I had like six fights not happen and I was supposed to fight January 24th at the Called Out against Vince Ortiz but I didn’t get the approval from Bellator ’cause they though he was going to be tough.”

If Georgi had it his way, he would’ve fought that fight anyways. Vince Ortiz was on a 7 fight winning streak at the time and he viewed him as a solid test. He didn’t like being denied such a chance, “It was frustrating because I’m a person that likes to fight a lot…”

For someone who loves to fight, it is not an easy pill to swallow when cancellations occur. It will have been almost a year since he last tasted competition, all through no fault of his own. According to Georgi, Ortiz was not the only opponent who lucked out, “Basically, lots of fights didn’t come through [last year]. I had so many fights lined up. Like Bao Quach broke his hand and there’s lots of them just, I don’t know. It’s frustrating.”

Bao Quach was also recently announced as a competitor in the Bellator tournament and he has his sights on eventually getting that bout with Georgi, “I heard he said he’s got unfinished business so it’s all good.” Not one to mince words, Georgi opted not to comment on the public call out, “I don’t do lots of talking about my opponent. I’m gonna train more then I talk and so we’ll see what happens when we fight.”

This sort of banter between fighters and hype-building exposure is new to the Armenian-American. More exposure is on the way and he isn’t oblivious to what that means. He seemed excited at the prospect of the forthcoming national attention he will get through the burgeoning promotion, “Bellator is a really good organization to fight for and they have a really good deal with NBC, Telemundo, and it’s going to be live on Fox Sports. It’s good exposure for me, to show myself and it’s a great feeling to fight for a good organization right now.”

He truly believes he is ready for whatever lies ahead, including all of the prospective opponents, “The Bellator tournament is stacked with a lot of good and tough fighters so it doesn’t matter to me who the opponent is and I’m not going to call out anyone. I’m just ready for any of those guys.”

The winner of this tournament gets a crack at the current Bellator champ, Joe Soto. Georgi likes his chances. Said he of that possible bout with Soto, “I think I match up really good. I’m an unknown fighter, nobody actually knows about me except my training partners. He might underestimate me or whatever but I think I match up really good. My wrestling’s really good, I think my wrestling is a bit underestimated,” and almost as if he expects to be the man with that shot, he added, “Should be a good fight.”

Although he may not realize it, a lot of people are picking him to win that tournament. When asked what he thought about being the favorite, his combination of humility and confidence shined yet again, “You know…I’m going to keep my head clear. I’m not going to go thinking ‘oh I’m going to win it’ and start listening to all that hype. Basically, to beat those guys, I just need to focus, keep training hard, take it one fight at a time and see how it goes. But I can see myself doing pretty well.”

The advantage of being a relative unknown is that underestimation comes with the territory. Rios may have been surprised by Georgi’s amazing growth as a wrestler and others may be surprised to learn that he has come a long way in his striking. Boasting 8 wins by submission, he expects people to overlook his striking ability, “Hopefully they know what to expect in my submission game but nobody knows my stand up game so that’s really good. Cuz I’m going to do lots of standup in my Bellator fight.”

One of the brightest young stars in MMA is also an obscure talent. That is a dangerous foundation for a career and one that usually results in a burst onto the scene of public visibility. There is little doubt that this kid shows an immeasurable amount of potential and the perfect attitude to become a champion one day. It is really only a matter of time until he realizes the results of what all his hard work in the last 4 years will bring him.

This introduction is but a speck on the glass of what is to come. On April 8th, the world will begin to know the name Georgi Karakhanyan. A glimpse: his favorite cereal is Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

Georgi would like to thank Original Grappler, Nutri Shop out of Riverside, California, and Clinch Gear.

LINK TO ARTICLE MMARECAP.COM

The Humble And The Insane

Georgi Karakhanyan  The Humble And The Insane

Article author: C. M. Holden Posted on 01/17 at 04:10 PM

One of the four recently announced featherweight signings by the Chicago-based Bellator Fighting Championships, Russian-born Armenian fighter Georgi “Insane” Karakhanyan aims to put his stamp on the division as he competes in the promotion’s promising second season. The 12-week tournament, debuting April 8, is set up to determine the number one contender for each of Bellator’s four weight classes (featherweight, lightweight, welterweight, and middleweight) and will conclude with four respective championship bouts.

Karakhanyan (kah-ra-kahn-jan) is intently focused on a title contest with the current featherweight champion, Joe “The Hammer” Soto, and the three elimination fights that will get him there. MMA Spot’s C.M. Holden recently sat down with Karakhanyan (12-1-1) to discuss a variety of topics, including his recent signing with Bellator, his thoughts on the featherweight division, and his career as a mixed martial artist.

Born in Moscow, Russia, not much about his location or upbringing pointed to a career in combat sports as a likely destination for Karakhanyan. In fact, his childhood and adolescence were fairly pedestrian. According to him, “I’m just a normal person, a humble guy.” So what set the stage for the young fighter to become such a successful mixed martial artist on the threshold of becoming a star?

Two converging circumstances got the ball rolling for Karakhanyan: his father, a karate black belt, and an already apparent competitive drive as a child. Following in his father’s footsteps, he began studying karate at an early age. “I did it when I was around 5 or 6, I did it for around two years and then I stopped. It was good, my dad wasn’t my teacher. I learned a lot of discipline.” But, the effort was short-lived. “I just lost interest in Karate. I wasn’t taking it that seriously and I started playing soccer.”

Karakhanyan proved more earnest in his approach to soccer. His competitiveness lead to great success as a youth; he reached as far as the professional level, and nearly to the Olympics. Nearly, however, wasn’t satisfying enough for the fighter-to-be. “If I was extremely good at soccer I would be playing somewhere in Europe, for Barcelona, Real Madrid, or the top teams. I was doing good to the point where I played for the San Diego Sockers and ODP, the Olympic Development Program. So, it was okay, you know.” Lacking the possibility of being the very best, he began to shift his interests.

With relatively few professional soccer players making a similar transition, Karakhanyan perhaps gives his former peers too much credit, and himself too little, in making the leap to MMA. On whether other soccer pros could compete in the cage, he stated, “Yeah, it depends on the person. You kick the ball a lot, in fighting you kick your opponent a lot. They would just have to work on their hands and wrestling and jiu-jitsu.”

Not mentioning the fact that “just” learning striking, wrestling, and jiu-jitsu are formidable tasks in themselves, especially at a competitive level, Karakhanyan did admit that the added element of pain could be an impediment. “Soccer players sometimes fake to get a yellow card. I’m guessing no [most would not like to deal with the pain]. There might be some soccer players that don’t care about pain like I do.”

Like most professional athletes, what brought Karakhanyan to karate, soccer, jiu-jitsu, and finally MMA was the competitiveness, and the thrill of victory. Winning a fight, however, does not have a parallel in terms of the intensity of the feeling experienced. “It’s kinda similar. When you score a goal, you get the butterfly feelings. But winning a fight is a different story, you put so much time and effort into training and when you win that fight it’s a great feeling.”

Making the transition out of professional soccer, Karakhanyan found Brazilian jiu-jitsu, and quickly moved to professional fighting just six months later. Like many fighters just beginning their careers, he worked full-time while training for his early fights. “When I started I was working. I used to do construction, digging trenches, and stuff like that. I think it was after my fifth fight, I did it full-time.”

The work hasn’t exactly stopped, Karakhanyan added, “Right now I still work, my work is teaching kids and law enforcement agency guys. I’m still working, but it’s involved with my fighting.”

This is an important distinction. Being able to focus entirely on training and competing is an uncommon luxury that allows athletes the gains necessary to perform at an elite level. “It’s really important. There is so much you need to learn in this game, so you need to put in a lot of time. It’s really important.”

With a record of 12-1-1, Karakhanyan has put in that time, and a lot of it has been spent shuffling between multiple MMA organizations on the regional level. Joining the growing ranks at Bellator provides the 24-year-old with the security, stability, and national exposure he has yet to experience in his young career.

“I’m really excited. Last year Bellator did a really good job with all the fights. I was really shocked watching the featherweights and even the lightweights, and with that submission of Toby Imada against Jorge Masvidal, it was really exciting. I personally think Bjorn [Rebney, Bellator's CEO] is a really smart man. With the three channel TV deal he has with Fox Sports, NBC, and Telemundo, it’s really good exposure; not just for me but for other fighters to show our skills. It’s not on pay-per-view, you know,” Karakhanyan exclaimed.

Without some form of national television coverage, it is nearly impossible for any fighter to advance and improve their career. With this in mind, Karakhanyan jumped at the chance to perform in front of a live TV audience. “As soon as I listened, I was like ‘yeah, I need to go there.’ It’s important to have a good place, organization to fight for. Because right now, the top ones are just UFC, WEC, and Strikeforce. I think Bellator is going to take over this year, they are really strong.”

That being said, the tournament format implemented by Bellator is no walk in the park. Aside from the possibility of losing one of the three scheduled bouts on the way to the title shot, fighting once a month presents the very real possibility of suffering an injury severe enough that it would force a fighter out of the competition.

Karakhanyan relishes the opportunity. “I feel really excited. I think it’s good, you fight every month. If I had the opportunity to fight every month, 12 fights a year, I would have done it. I like to fight a lot. I like to stay busy.” And as for injuries, “That might happen, you never know. I don’t know until I fight. If it happens, things happen for a reason.”

If he does make it through the season victorious and relatively unscathed, the newly crowned champion, Joe Soto, awaits with the belt. Karakhanyan is ready for the shot. “He’s a good wrestler. He’s well rounded. I match up really good. I’ll be a tough opponent for him. We’ll see, I can’t wait until I beat those three guys and fight him.”

With 14 professional fights under his belt, Karakhanyan has just a single loss blemishing his record. In his sixth fight, Karakhanyan lost by split decision to Chris “Dark Lotus” David. However, it was that February 2008 loss that he credits with helping him develop into the fighter he is today.

“I lost that fight because I had no wrestling. It really changed me into a different person. I looked at it in a good way because I started wrestling a lot. I realized there were other things to work on. Because all I was working on was Muay Thai and jiu-jitsu, and no wrestling. After the loss I started working a lot on my wrestling.”

Needless to say, wrestling is no longer Georgi Karakhanyan’s weakness. He has been working on his wrestling at S.K. Golden Boys in North Hollywood. The man he is working with is fellow Armenian, and three-time Olympic freestyle wrestler, Martin Berberyan.

Of his 12 wins, eight have been by submission. Despite that success, or maybe because of it, Karakhanyan prefers to finish by knockout. “The feeling is that much better. Some knockouts are lucky. You get lucky and knock a guy out. But submissions you need to work for it. If I can get lucky three times in this tournament, that would be perfect.”

Outside of “luck,” Karakhanyan suggests his strategy for a fight can be somewhat less than predictable, which is in part where his nickname, “Insane,” is derived from. He prefers a more improvisational approach.

“I don’t think it is good to come up with a [strict] game plan, because if it doesn’t happen then you mentally get broken down. I just take it how it is. When I’m fighting, if I feel comfortable talking to my opponent, I’ll talk to him. If I feel like doing anything else–I just feel really comfortable in the cage. When I step into the cage it’s a different feeling, it’s like I could do whatever I want to do.”

Importantly, Karakhanyan recognizes how Bellator’s success is directly tied to not just his current good fortune, but also to the opportunities afforded to the many undervalued and lesser known fighters not fighting in the larger promotions–as well as the promotion’s contribution to the continued growth of the sport.

Regarding the significance of having multiple organizations succeed, Karakhanyan commented, “It’s important for a variety. We can’t let just the UFC, WEC, and Strikeforce dominate. So for all the other fighters that think of going there just because of the money, Bellator is doing really good things. Fighters like me have chance, and other fighters. I didn’t even know who Joe Soto was, and they give opportunities for guys like that to fight and show their skills, unlike Strikeforce or the UFC. When they sign all these known guys, from Dream and Japan, and bring them over here… but they don’t care about the tough guys that have no name.”

As far as his long-term goals in the sport, aside from capturing the featherweight belt in the coming months, Karakhanyan remains the humble guy he introduced himself as. “I want to be a well-rounded fighter, and make my name out in Riverside, the current city I am living in. Just hopefully, have my own gym, work with kids teaching them jiu-jitsu and how to defend themselves.”

In closing, Karakhanyan would like to thank the following:

“Thanks to all my Millennia training partners; that’s my gym. And then out in LA, all my training partners. The Hye Fighters, it’s a website based on Armenian fighters. USKO, that’s the karate school where I teach all my jiu-jitsu classes–it’s in Riverside. Clinch Gear, Nutrishop of Riverside, Original Grappler, and O.N.E, the coconut water drink.”

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