WINNIPEG — It was a good night for Canadian fighters early on at UFC 161.
Fighters from this country won four straight preliminary fights Saturday before a bleeding Sam (Hands of Stone) Stout from London, Ont., tapped out in the third round of his lightweight bout with James Krause.
Stout submitted to a guillotine choke, still bleeding profusely from a gash above his right eye off a kick delivered by Krause in the first.
The MTS Centre was packed with a sellout crowd of around 15,000 fans who paid anywhere from $50 to $500 to watch the first UFC event to visit Winnipeg.
They were loud from the get-go and the seats were filled for the early preliminary bouts, which started a little late.
Fans still managed to boost the volume a little for the first of the televised prelims that featured local batamweight Roland Delorme, who fought Edwin (El Freoz) Figueroa.
Figueroa threw sharper punches and Delorme went for takedowns to avoid them and try for a submission.
He didn’t get one and Figueroa almost turned the tables but Delorme still secured a unanimous decision that pleased the hometown crowd.
"That was gruelling," Delorme said later as his MMA record improved to 9-1-0 and his UFC record to 3-0-0. "I’m happy with the performance. I’ve worked my on my submission defence and I needed that tonight."
Sean (The Punisher) Pierson from Toronto looked in charge for two of his three rounds against fellow welterweight Kenny Robertson, but Robertson caught him with a flurry of punches that left him dazed in the third.
Pierson held on and took the fight with a majority decision, raising his MMA record to 14-6 and his UFC record to 4-2.
In early prelim action, it was batamweight Yves (Tiger) Jabouin from Montreal over Dustin (The Disciple) Pague in a split decision and Saskatoon’s Mitch Clarke over John Maguire in a lightweight contest that went to Clarke on all scorecards.
"The difference was the damage I did when I was on top," said Jabouin after spending most of the three rounds grappling on the canvas with Pague.
His MMA record is now 19-8 and his UFC record is 4-2.
"I landed a ton of hard elbows and I thought I was a shot or two away from finishing it," said Jabouin. "It was a war, I can’t wait to go back home and sleep after that."
Clarke’s family drove in from Saskatoon and friends from Edmonton, the city he fights out of, and he was happy he gave them a win, his first in three UFC fights, although his MMA record is 10-2.
"My family’s here and that makes it so much better."
