Since taking up the Chief Officer role for the UMA at the start of the year, I had my fair share of ideas and ways to take the UMA on to bigger and better things; naturally coming from a grappling background, it is my desire to bring to the UMA my many years’ experience in and around the BJJ and MMA scene, which has taken me all over the world from LA to Abu Dhabi.

Making friends along the way and many useful contacts, I came up with an idea to bring two grappling associations together and host two separate grappling competitions under one roof and after many hours behind the scenes work with Jim Mc Sherry and Ebe Ghansah, we were delighted to host the UMA’s second national Groundfighting event (with gi) alongside Ebe Ghansah and the FILA UK National Grappling Trials; the idea behind this was to give the UMA guys a chance to see what is needed to take their grappling to the next level and to see some brilliant matches along the way and for the FILA/MMA crowd to see the standard of competition in the UMA event and to give their younger students the chance to compete in a national level competition and the juniors sure enough did not disappoint.

The day for yours truly was, as always, a busy affair, this time the busy factor doubling with a host of old friends to say hello to on the FILA mats and try and sneak in a few matches before my refereeing duties came along; on the FILA mats I watched Theo Blackledge calmly take an impressive victory in one of his early fights, a carbon copy of his much uglier brother Tom (I love you really mate!). Dublin’s John Kavanagh was on hand to wow the crowd with some outstanding grappling as was GB Brum’s Kevin Webb and no top level grappling event would be the same without the presence of London Shoot, with Paul and Alexis fielding an imposing team of top level grapplers.

Now it was time to do some work and referee; starting with the juniors I was very impressed at the skill level displayed by all fighters, a credit to their coaches and teams and of course sportsmanship, taking decisions against them with honour and no malice. Gracie Barra and Team Brasa lent support to the event by fielding large squad numbers for the juniors, further boosting the events reputation as one of the best in the UK for junior competition, lets hope we see a continuation of this great support in future events.

I had the privilege of reffing the -75, -85 and -95K brackets and all matches were hotly contested, with the majority of the matches ending in submissions, making the ref’s job that much easier and once again, when a decision went against a fighter, they took it on the chin and accepted the decision. Pivotal to all this in the decision making process is the fact that all the table judges on the day on both mats are all qualified UMA gi and no gi referees, which certainly takes a lot of pressure off the referee in the middle.

The UMA is dedicated to running smooth, efficient competitions, officiated by competent and qualified referees and the UMA takes on board all feedback, both positive and negative and I found that many issues had been acted upon since the no gi comp in May early this year. Coaches and competitors from the FILA mats were impressed at the event and level of players in the brackets and had a lot to say about the whole day itself and were able to kill tow birds with one stone by having their seniors fight in the FILA event and the juniors compete in the UMA event.

From myself, Jim and Ebe, thanks to all involved on the day, the UMA credits are at the bottom of the results section and am sure Ebe will have his thank you list out ready on the relevant forums (www.cagewarriors.com/forums and www.bjj.eu.com/forum).

Until the SW comp in December!!


CHAMPIONSHIPS RESULTS


JUNIOR BOYS U30KG

1st PLACE GOLD MEDALLIST and UMA OPEN CHAMPION: GARETH HARRIS - AIKINS ACADEMY

2nd PLACE SILVER MEDALLIST AND RUNNER UP: SAM FRANC - MILTON KEYNES GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: SAM LANE - MILTON KEYNES GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: DANIEL BALL - CREWE JUDO


JUNIOR BOYS U40KG

1st PLACE GOLD MEDALLIST and UMA OPEN CHAMPION: JACOB NEAL - SHINGITAI JUJITSU

2nd PLACE SILVER MEDALLIST AND RUNNER UP: JACOB PARKS - DERBY GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: LEWIS READ - DERBY GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: LIAM MARTIN - DERBY GRACIE BARRA


JUNIOR BOYS U50KG

1st PLACE GOLD MEDALLIST and UMA OPEN CHAMPION: SEAN BARBER - CREWE JUDO

2nd PLACE SILVER MEDALLIST AND RUNNER UP: LOREN BISHOP - CREWE JUDO

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: ALEX CARTER - CREWE JUDO

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: JONAH OSBOURNE - DERBY GRACIE BARRA










JUNIOR BOYS U60KG

1st PLACE GOLD MEDALLIST and UMA OPEN CHAMPION: SHAUN MCDONAGH - DERBY GRACIE BARRA

2nd PLACE SILVER MEDALLIST AND RUNNER UP: BEN DOHERTY - DERBY GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: KURT JONES - P.M. B.J.J.

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: JORDAN CAPPER - SILVER TIGERS JUDO



JUNIOR BOYS O60KG

1st PLACE GOLD MEDALLIST and UMA OPEN CHAMPION: DALE JONES - R.G.A. B.J.J. MILL HILL

2nd PLACE SILVER MEDALLIST AND RUNNER UP: CHRIS FRANCIS - DERBY GRACIE BARRA

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: MALLICK HENSHALL - SILVER TIGERS JUDO

3rd PLACE BRONZE MEDALLIST: KANE DAVIES - DERBY GRACIE BARRA


JUNIOR