Kazuhiro Nakamura, the 29 year old Judo star is coming along after two disappointing spells in the UFC. Albeit against tough competition, he went 0-2 against Lyoto Machida and Rameau Thierry Sokoudjou. Prior to his UFC fights, his entire career was with, now defunct, Japanese promotion Pride FC. He held an 11-6 record within Pride, which includes battles with the biggest names of the sport like Antonio Rogerio Nogueira, Murilo Bustamante, Yuki Kondo, Dan Henderson, Wanderlei Silva, Igor Vovchanchyn, Josh Barnett and Mauricio "Shogun" Rua. He holds notable victories over Bustamante, Kevin Randleman, Evangelista Santos, Kondo, Nakao and Vovchanchyn. As you can tell from the whose who of fighters he has been in battle with, Nakamura is definitely up to the challenge to take on any and all competitors. He fits the bill of the true warrior spirit having fought bigger and stronger opponents. He'll also have a big opportunity to get his career back on track with a solid showing in Sengoku's inaugural Middleweight Grand Prix. He shall be a fan favorite being back in Japan and fighting alongside his training partner, Yoshida.
Valentijn Overeem, the 31 year old kickboxing and submissions fighter is looking to get active in mma again, having fought twice in the past 3 years. The Golden Glory fighter has an overall 25-22 record in mma and is a 12 year veteran of the sport, but hasn't fought in a major promotion since March of 2005, when he fought for K1's HERO'S promotion against Shungo Oyama. He's trying to turn his fate around, having lost 4 out of his last 5 bouts. He's fought for many promotions over his long career, including HERO's, Pride FC and Rings. He holds notable victories of Renato "Babalu" Sobral and Randy "The Natural" Couture. He'll look for a good showing in his Sengoku debut, when he meets up with relative unknown, Kazuo Takahashi.
Sengoku may not have started their promotion on full blast, but they are surely proving they are a viable contender to DREAM in the Japanese market with the recent signings (Trigg, Schults, Ribeiro, Nakamura, Nastula, etc.) and the announcements of the LW and MW Grand Prix tournaments. Here are the schedules, fight cards and participants for Sengoku 4 and 5...
Sengoku 4
Date:
August 24th, 2008
Place:
Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan
Fight:
Takanori Gomi vs Bang Seung Hwan
Makoto Takimoto vs Frank Trigg
Peter Graham vs Moise Rimbon
Pawel Nastula vs Yang Dong Yi
Pawel Nastula vs Yang Dong Yi
Kazuo Takahashi vs Valentijn Overeem
Satoru Kitaoka vs. Clay French
Eiji Mitsuoka vs. Rodrigo Damm
Kazunori Yokota vs. Bojan Kosednar
Mizuto Hirota vs. Ryan Schultz
Sengoku 5
Date:
September 28th, 2008
Place:
Yoyogi National Gymnasium in Tokyo, Japan
Kazuhiro Nakamura
Evangelista Cyborg
Siyar Bahadurzada
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