Onra:March15th,2012

Hafa adai.

First of all, the column has been a few weeks overdue and a sincere apology to the handful of you who spare a piece of your valuable time to share in the good intention that is rooted in between the lines of these words of babble. The Pacific Daily News has been kind enough to give Guam’s competitive and non-competitive martial arts a voice and truthfully — in particular these past few weeks — the island’s achievements really have a lot to speak of.

Among other things:

Our neighbors in Saipan are rising from the ashes of misfortune as the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands’ major headquarters for mixed martial arts development was set afire by a-yet-to-be-identified arsonist on Feb. 8. Saipan’s premiere fight training center was down but not out as Trench Tech’s Purebred Saipan is already back up and running in its new location on the seventh floor of the Marianas Business Plaza. Contact Cuki Alvarez on Facebook for further details if you want to help with the resurrection of Saipan’s ongoing campaign for positive mixed martial arts representation.

A standing ovation for PXC 30 and the Rise for Japan. What a great example of Guam’s embrace of mixed martial arts in conscious effect for the greater good.

Guam continues to succeed in U.S. jiu-jitsu competition. Great job for Guam’s Gerson Atoigue for taking gold in the adult brown-belt division at the Seventh Arizona Open & Arnold Classic 2012 and good work again for Mike Carbullido, taking first place in the Abu Dhabi Pro Trials for the adult purple-belt 202-pound division.

Props for Universal Alliance’s Jon Tuck, who fought well in his chance at one of the 16 slots of The Ultimate Fighter’s Season 15. Despite breaking a toe in the middle of the fight, great job fighting forward valiantly, letting the watching world know that Guam will fight strong to make its way forward into the upper tiers of world MMA.

Good luck to Joey Lopez and Maria Dunn, who are in Morocco to compete in the continental qualifier for the London 2012 Olympic Games March 16-18. We are endlessly looking forward to seeing our island’s grapplers in the world’s greatest sporting event.

Magnificent 17

Ava and Alexandria Aflague, Laralei and Jayronne Gandaoli, Stevie, David and Ambrosio Shimizu, William and Thomas Ludwig, Ralph Gutierrez, Johanna and Ayden Duenas, Brian Roberto, Justin Untalan, Gi’anne Mantanane, Rayjon Umadhay and Adriano Cruz are 17 names worth remembering from the Purebred/Lloyd Irvin Jiu-Jitsu Academy for the countless hours of training, the priceless accounts of sacrifice and the thousands of miles of traveling to California for Feb. 19′s Pan Kids Jiu-Jitsu Championships.

In an effort to cement their victory from last year’s tournament that turned eyes of attention from all around the jiu-jitsu world toward this tiny dot in the Pacific, they finished in a close second place to team CheckMat (who was accompanied by Universal Alliance’s Ethan Flores of Guam). Just a hair’s margin away from becoming the event’s defending champions, Team Lloyd Irvin walked away from its 2012 venture to and through the Pan Kids Jiu-Jitsu Championships with more virtue than they had asked for.

Just a day before the Pan Kids tournament the representatives from Guam decided to pay a visit to the Gracie Museum in the newly located Gracie Academy in Torrance, Calif. There, to everyone’s surprise and thanks to super-perfect timing, they were happily greeted by the legendary Rorion Gracie, who was kind enough to spontaneously offer a personal and very elaborate tour of Gracie jiu-jitsu’s history, personally dialogue different details that shared true and memorable stories of the days-of-old Gracie Challenge and outline the steps that led to the inevitable creation of the UFC.

After hearing of the hurdles that his father Helio endured to create Gracie jiu-jitsu, the hosted tour was a priceless experience and a lifetime highlight that in itself made the trip vastly more than worthwhile.

The past couple weeks we’ve been in touch with all kinds of Mariana Island martial arts headline stories. Off-island jiu-jitsu success, MMA for benefits, our fighters on national TV, etc. It’s amazing the stories we are able to tell truthfully through these many ventures of self-improvement.

Recognizing that a martial arts headline or cover story in the past seemed more exotic, and few and far between, now it seems that virtually every week we are given a highlight-worthy public feature and broadcast. It’s success story after success story, competition after competition, ambition after ambition. Guam’s occasional MMA or jiu-jitsu headline that used to make a sound on this mere 32-mile-long island has now become a frequency that is resounding positively all over the planet.

Pushing for success

Our guys and gals are putting in real work. Our athletes are competing in the greatest events, they are training with the world’s best and even outside of competing, they are going above and beyond to join in the push for the success of fighting sports and competitive martial arts. We have been supported with hard work and sacrifice; we are blessed with ambition and direction. As a result, we are increasingly inspired with the panoramic view of massive opportunity. Guam is leading the way to put the Mariana Islands in good light throughout the extending landscape of combat sport. It’s really inspiring to see our island, our people and our neighbors in the Marianas reaping its benefits. Byproducts of our love for the game have escorted our island recognizably and honorably throughout the many corners of its increasingly complex and diverse industry.

Martial arts has done, is doing and will be doing a great service for the islands even if for any reason we should become the most unaccomplished competitors in the world.

Watching Dana White, Dominic Cruz and Urijah Faber give Jon Tuck props on national TV, seeing our Pan Kids competitors hosted by Rorion Gracie, hosting celebrities and legends at 13 degrees North 144 degrees East firmly illustrates that our efforts through competitive martial arts have blazed the way for a path toward greatness for the Mariana Islands.

In this ridiculously competitive sport we’re definitely not the best in the world nor are we pretending to be, and we are light years away from perfect, but you can’t argue that martial arts and competitive martial arts on Guam in many ways is something done properly.

After reading comments on Facebook to see our athletes and martial artists rise above discipline and/or gym affiliation to show their support for our brothers in battle around the world, it’s obvious that in a venture of (among other things) learning how to defend ourselves, we, at least and in large, have learned to fight for the honor of our islands, something far greater than any single person, discipline or gym. And in this small part of an even bigger picture, the growing numbers of fighters and fans around the world will agree that our islands are definitely something worth fighting for.

For her honor always.

Thanks for dropping by.