NITERÓI, Brazil -- Gustavo "Ximu" Machado prevailed Saturday in the main event of MMA show "The Glory."
He was better than Argentinean Alfonso Garate from the start. The Brazilian was the superior striker and used strong kicks to hurt Garate early. Garate tried for a takedown but ended up mounted, and the fight almost came to an end.
In the second round, "Ximu" continued landing good low kicks. He also continued his dominance on the ground, attacking with an armbar and then an ankle lock. Wearing wrestling shoes, Garate could not escape and was submitted at 3:45.
"This is one of my favorite positions," Machado said afterward. "When I fit the [lock], I knew he would not escape."
Julian Soares had a tough fight against André Minhoca with good exchanges standing and on the ground. More experienced, Soares took a slight advantage before applying a guillotine choke to finish his opponent at 4:43 of the second round.
"It was the first victory by finish in my career," Soares commented.
Former teammates
Amilcar Alves and
Diego Braga (Pictures) were the stars in one of the best fights of the night. Better on the feet, Alves defended himself well from Braga's attacks and almost knocked him out twice en route to a unanimous decision.
Another standout was
Felipe Arinelli. The pupil of
Alexandre Franca Nogueira (Pictures) was the aggressor against
Fabio Issa and connected with good strikes. Eventually, during a clinch, Arinelli got an arm-triangle choke and took his opponent to the ground, where he held the submission for the win at 3:15 of the first.
Aloisio Barros used his best muay Thai to open an advantage against
Bruno Machado. Barros was in control with good low kicks, though he was taken by surprise in the second round when Machado got his back and tried to finish him. Barros escaped, however, and eventually won the decision.
An experienced
Johnny Eduardo proved to be not only good in muay Thai. The fighter, who was coming off an amazing knockout at Jungle Fight, was taken down by
Cristiano Bananada but finished him with a beautiful armbar at 1:29.
Marcelo Nigue's sharp ground game was decisive against Leandro Reis. Nigue scored a takedown early, passed the guard and mounted Reis on his way to a win on points.
Maicon Alarcão took the initiative against
Eliene Pit. However, still in the first round, Alarcão seemed to be tired. The fight seemed to balance out until Pit illegally kneed Alarcão to the head while he was on all fours. After taking time to recover, Alarcão was booed by the fans and didn't fight well anymore. Pit came back more aggressive, bombing his opponent in the guard until the ref stopped the fight at 3:23 of the third round.
Flavio Serafim (Pictures) opened the event against Danilo Noronha and seemed to be ready to end the fight quickly. He took the match to the ground and was controlling the positioning, but Noronha caught him with a guillotine at 2:53 of the first.
In preliminaries, Ralf Lauren defeated
Vitor Santos by decision, and Eduardo Rodrigues stopped João Machado in the first round.
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