Press Release
STRIKEFORCE Heavyweight Champion Alistair “The Demolition Man” Overeem of The Netherlands made history on Saturday by winning the annual eight-man, single elimination K-1 World Grand Prix Championship in Japan, thus making him the first fighter in history to simultaneously hold a major MMA and K-1 Grand Prix title.
On Saturday, the 6-foot-5, 30-year-old Overeem won three fights at the annual one night, eight-man K-1 Grand Prix, the most prestigious tournament in kickboxing. He capped off a winning night by scoring a first-round (1:07) TKO in the finals over K-1 legend Peter Aerts, a four-time champion of the tournament.
In the semifinal round of the event, Overeem produced a similar result, registering a first round TKO over Gokhan Saki (2:33). In the opening tournament round, he scored a unanimous decision over Tyrone Sprong.
Overeem has been unstoppable in the sport of MMA, not suffering a loss in over three years. On Nov. 16, 2007, he became the first STRIKEFORCE MMA heavyweight champion in history, crushing Paul “The Headhunter” Buentello, with knee strikes to the body in the second round (3:42) of their matchup at HP Pavilion in San Jose, Calif. Overeem returned to STRIKEFORCE action last May 15, scoring a first round (3:40) TKO on Brett “The Grim” Rogers at Scottrade Center in St. Louis and bringing his career MMA record up to 33-11.
About STRIKEFORCE
STRIKEFORCE (www.strikeforce.com) is a world-class mixed martial arts cage fight promotion which, on Friday, March 10, 2006, made history with its “Shamrock vs. Gracie” event, the first sanctioned mixed martial arts fight card in California state history. The star-studded extravaganza, which pitted legendary champion Frank Shamrock against Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu black belt Cesar Gracie at San Jose’s HP Pavilion, played host to a sold-out, record crowd of 18,265. Since 1995, STRIKEFORCE, sanctioned by ISKA, has been the exclusive provider of martial arts programming for ESPN and, after 12 years of success as a leading, world championship kickboxing promotion, the company unveiled its mixed martial arts (MMA) series with “Shamrock vs. Gracie.” In May 2008, West Coast Productions, the parent company of STRIKEFORCE, partnered with Silicon Valley Sports & Entertainment (SVS&E), an entity created in 2000 to oversee all business operation aspects of the San Jose Sharks and HP Pavilion at San Jose. In March 2009, STRIKEFORCE signed a multi-year agreement with SHOWTIME® to stage live events on the premium cable television network. The promotion has since also produced two live, primetime events on the CBS Television Network.