Swiss Budo Open Root 20.-21.06.09
The first Swiss Open of the year took place in Root (Lucerne) on 21 June 2009. A total of 70 grapplers from 8 teams (i.e., Yogaka MMA Academy, Yogaka Team Croatia, BTT Genève, Fight Gym Aarau, MMA Zürich, Gladiatoria, Base Concept Lausanne, and Sambo Fribourg) took part in the competition that was organized in a very friendly atmosphere at the Yogaka MMA Academy. The tournament was placed under the supervision of Mr. Rafael Perlungher (Head of Grappling Europe), Mr. Peter Mettler (FILA Grappling Instructor), Mrs. Anne Pellaud (FILA Non-Olympic Styles Manager), and Mr. Jason Townsend (Head of Grappling Pan-America) who was visiting Switzerland and contributed to the smooth running of the competition.
The competition started with a kid tournament with grapplers weighing from 16kg to 110kg who demonstrated that grappling can be practised by children without any harm or danger. The FILA international grappling rules were easily applied by the young participants and no injury was reported. The tournament then proceeded with the seniors who were divided into beginners and advanced groups in both Gi and No-Gi styles. The 66kg advanced division was won by Oobaia (BTT Genève) who got the gold in both Gi and No-Gi. The 74kg beginners’ division was won by Jens Kundert (MMA Zürich) in No-Gi and by Christian Stinner (MMA Zürich) in Gi. In 74kg advanced, Pawel Nakonieczny (Yogaka MMA Academy) got the gold in No-Gi and Joël Breguet (Base Concept Lausanne) won the Gi tournament. The 84kg beginners’ division only took place in Gi and was won by Stefano di Liberto (BTT Genève). The 84kg advanced division was won by Okan Bulut (BTT Genève) in No-Gi and by Philipp Quesada (Yogaka MMA Academy) in Gi. Regarding the heavier categories, Aleksandr Korobov (MMA Zürich) won the beginners’ 96kg No-Gi division and Ivaylo Markov (Yogaka MMA Academy) won the Open No-Gi division. Only two women participated in the senior tournament and Sonja Räber (Yogaka MMA Academy) won the gold over Marija Sola (Yogaka Team Croatia) in the No-Gi Open category. The complete results can be downloaded at the following link.
The medals were fairly distributed among the teams and the organizers were very satisfied with the level of the tournament. The Swiss Grappling Committee is looking forward to developing the grappling activity in Switzerland and build a strong national team for the European Championship that will take place in Lithuania on 11-13 September 2009.
