Once again this year, I had the opportunity to visit Montreal.  This is the third time in the last three years that I have been to Montreal, and once again the city did not disappoint.  Montreal is a fabulous city, and one that I would have no problems living in.  The culture is diverse, and the majority of its inhabitants are bilingual.  This – to me – is important because my French is very rusty.  This is not to say that I would not grasp the language fairly quickly if I was living there…but you know, feeling lost due to a language barrier bothers me.

This time, I took my camera and I took a ton of photos.  The last couple of years, I did not take a camera and after the trip ended, I was kicking myself for not doing so.  Hindsight always being 20/20, of course.  This year, I made up for it in droves by taking over 1,000 pictures.

In any event, we (me and a couple of guys from work) booked a trip up to Montreal to witness UFC 113 live in person.  I was previously in Montreal for UFC 97 and UFC 83.  Each of these events are awesome to attend live in person and I urge anyone with an interest in Mixed Martial Arts to make an effort to attend at least one live event in person.  The atmosphere is electric and the UFC puts on a great show.

The main event was a rematch between Lyoto “The Dragon” Machida and Mauricio “Shogun” Rua for the UFC Light Heavyweight Title.  In their first encounter at UFC 104, the champion Machida retained his title in a very controversial decision.  Many people thought that Rua had defeated Machida – ergo the immediate rematch.  The second fight did not disappoint, as Shogun became the new UFC Light Heavyweight Champion with a devasting first round knockout.

Many people believed that beating Machida was impossible.  His style – Karate – is unique to Mixed Martial Arts and up until his first fight with Shogun, he was considered virtually impossible to hit.  If you can’t hit your opponent, you certainly have no way of winning the fight.  In the first fight, Shogun solved the Machida puzzle by using low leg kicks and aggressively punching.  This threw Machida off of his game and forced him into counterpunching randomly.

The strategy was similar for the second fight.  However, this time it did not take Shogun that long to solve Machida.  He used the same strategy to pummel Machida and knocked him out at 3:35 of round one.  He caught Machida with a hard right that knocked him down and then followed with a shot to the eye to finish the fight.  It was a quick fight with a brutal knockout, which made many fans happy.  It was a decent fight in my eye, and while some people wanted to see a longer fight, I was just happy that it ended decisively. 

Personally, I have never been a big fan of the judges.  The judging in Mixed Martial Arts is more often than not very suspect.  The judges – however admittedly – have a very difficult job to do.  They sit at ringside (on three different sides of the cage) and watch the fight from a singular angle.  They do not have the benefit of commentary, television, or instant replay.  As a result, it is entirely possible that they may not see something that is pivotal to the fight.  Thankfully the judges did not play a factor in the outcome of this fight.

In the co-main event, Josh Koscheck defeated Paul “Semtex” Daley via unanimous decision.  Koscheck used his wrestling and neutralized Daley throughout the bout.  The match was not without controversy, however, as Koscheck “pretended” to get hit with an illegal knee in the first round (which cost Daley a point).  It was not honorable in any way.  After the bout, Daley punched Koscheck in frustration.  That is a definite no-no and earned Daley a one-way ticket out of the UFC.  Many people thought that firing Daley and banning him from the UFC forever was far too harsh, but in my opinion an example had to be set.  It is no different than Renato “Babalu” Sobral not releasing the choke on David Heath at UFC 74 following the bell.  I don’t care if the fighters don’t want to be friends, or shake hands following a fight, but there can be zero tolerance of aggressive actions outside of the cage (or in this case, the fight itself).

The fight of the night was Jeremy “Lil’ Heathen” Stephens vs. Sam “Hands of Stone” Stout.  This was a back and forth affair that saw Stephens take the split decision.  I have to admit that even though the fight was close and the crowd did not like the result, the judges scored the fight accurately.  Stephens won the first round, and I think eeked out the second, but Stout clearly won the third round as Stephens tired.  I was hoping that Stout would have been able to finish the fight, but ultimately Lil’ Heathen’s chin held out against the barrage of rocks thrown by “Hands of Stone.”

The comedian of the night award had to go to “Filthy” Tom Lawlor.  At the weigh-ins, he did the funniest Dan Severn impersonation that I have ever seen.  I was in tears, laughing so hard.  Then, on the way to the cage, he was doing his best Apollo Creed impersonation.  It takes balls to come out to “Living In America” in Montreal.  He lost a very competitive fight to Joe “El Dirte” Doerkson.

The “OMFGWTF” award of the night went to Jason MacDonald, who, two minutes into his return to the Octagon, landed awkwardly on a takedown and broke his shin in two places.  This was the first fight of the night and it was a very sickening injury.  I’m sure his opponent, John Salter, did not want to win in that manner, and I would like to see these two fighters rematched because I think that their styles could make for a very competitive fight.

The “Disappointing Fighter of the Night” easily went to Kimbo Slice.  Kimbo – via his reputation – has (had) a lot of hype behind him.  He faced Matt Mitrione at UFC 113 – and was stopped via strikes in the second round.  Mitrione is a very large man in need of a tan, and much like his unofficial nickname on the tenth season of The Ultimate Fighter, he reminds me of the meathead from Archie Bunker fame.  I even made up the name before I knew that he was coined with it by Rashad Evans.

Regardless…Kimbo did nothing in this fight other than throw a few wild punches.  Mitrione took him down at will, attempted submissions, and generally used his reach to out-box Kimbo at his own game.  I was hoping that Kimbo – after four years of training – would be able to show some kind of takedown defense, but alas I was disappointed.  Kimbo was cut from the UFC following this fight (a move I did not agree with as the man only has one UFC loss on his record), and hopefully he lands on his feet in another organization.  Normally I wouldn’t care where I fighter goes, but Kimbo seems like a decent guy who is doing everything that he can to earn a living to support his wife and kids.  Inside the cage he is menacing, outside of it he seems like a big quiet teddy bear.  His fortunes are likely best served in Japan, where they will pay top dollar for fighters who have that type of aura and charisma about them (…in Japan, the actual ability to fight is almost secondary…).

Patrick Cote made his return to the Octagon after an eighteen month layoff due to injury.  His opponent was Alan Belcher, a rising condender in the 185 lb. division.  The ring rust was evident in Cote less than a minute into the bout, as he was unable to find his range against Belcher.  He submitted to a rear-naked choke in the second round, after Belcher dropped him on his face (obviously, stunning him).  I was surprised that Belcher won, I had picked Cote in this bout despite the layoff.  Moreso, I was suprised that Belcher won via submission – it is not something that he is known for.  I had predicted that these two guys would stand and slug with one another, but given the fact that both of these guys have dynamite in their hands, I guess they were leery of each other’s power and decided to turn it into a mat war instead.

In other fights, Mike “The Joker” Guymon defeated Yoshiyuki Yoshida (by decision, for which he was very emotional and very happy), Johnny Hendricks (who reminds me of an Ewok-in-training) defeated T.J. Grant by decision, Joey “The Mexicutioner” Beltran defeated Tim Hague (by decision), and Marcus “The Irish Hand Grenade” Davis defeated Jonathan Goulet by strikes in the second round.

All in all, it was a fantastic event, and of course I will attend the next one in Montreal if I have the means to go.  It was better than last years event (UFC 97, which was marred by the snooze-fest between Thales Leites and Anderson Silva), but not as good as UFC 83 (which featured Georges St. Pierre rematching Matt Serra).  It goes to show you how much the main event plays a part in the overall quality of the show.  If the main event is good, then people will remember that the show was great.  If it is not, then they have the notion that they got ripped off.

While in Montreal, we did a few other things.  On Friday, we ventured up to the Bio Dome and the Olympic Stadium.  We just saw the outside of the Stadium, because to be honest none of us had the desire to go inside.  The monstrosity that is the hotel that looms over La Stade Olympique should, in all honestly, be torn down.  Actually…just tear the entire thing down and rebuild it.  I think that Montreal would benefit from a classic stadium, using architecture from the 1800′s (much like Camden Yards in Baltimore…I’ve always loved that stadium).

The Bio Dome is a unique place.  I have never seen anything like it.  It looks (and is) huge on the outside, but because it houses so many various environments it does not take long to walk through.  It is basically an indoor zoo.  You start in the Tropical section, which will take you about twenty minutes to walk through.  In the twenty minutes though, you’ll drop about ten pounds.  I have to remember that this is not the environment for me – I don’t like it when my breasts sweat.

I did enjoy the wildlife though.  Birds, a crocodile, something that looked like a flamingo…they were all there.  As well, a myriad of various tropical fish.  There is no way that I could identify them all, but I have the pictures with the names on them.  What I liked was how the environment completely changed as you went through the different areas.  Thankfully, the sub-arctic envirionment was behind glass, or it would have been mighty cold (though I would have loved to have interacted with the penguins).

After we finished up at the Bio Dome, we took the Metro (which runs on tires and railroad tracks…tires!) to get to the Bell Centre for the UFC 113 Weigh-Ins.  We were early so we stopped by La Belle Province for a quick bite to eat.  La Belle Province is a burger joint, with their claim to fame being $1.00 hot dogs.  The food was palateable, but I would have preferred something a little more decent.

The weigh-ins were a very good tease to the main show – Tom Lawlor’s impersonation of Dan Severn standing out – and the history of Lyoto Machida and Maurico Rua for those who were not in the know.  Say what you will, but the UFC does a great job building up their shows.  The weigh-ins were covered live by ESPN, another sign that the sport is gaining more mainstream popularity.  There were approximately 6,000 people there for the weigh-ins and pre-fight buildup.

We went up and down Rue Saint Catherine a few times, and we stopped at Reubens for a nice large smoked meat sandwich.  We did a fair amount of shopping, because Saturday was a really shitty day.  It rained and the wind blew like crazy.  That was o.k. though – in my previous two stops I had never been through the Montreal underground (where all the good stores are).  The Bay is eight floors high!  And of course, we went through all eight floors, just to see how they laid out the store.  Then, we went into the main mall and wandered around where I found a few MMA t-shirts.  The other guys found some shirts that they were looking for as well, merchandise that they couldn’t find in Toronto.

The goods in Montreal tend to be a tad higher priced than in Toronto, but they offer a much better selection and quality of product.  I don’t mind paying good money for quality, though i do mind paying $75.00 for a t-shirt.  The MMA t-shirt business is a gold mine, in that you could manufacture these shirts for less than $20.00 – and sell them for at least 100% profit.  If I had any chops with respect to designing and marketing, I would probably get into the business.

We filled up our remaining time by eating in various restaurants around the city (St. Hubert, of course!!!!!) and watching the playoff series between Montreal and Pittsburgh.  Montreal was the underdog in this series, and we were fortunate enough to catch Games Five and Six while in the city.  The fans in Montreal are extremely passionate about their hockey club, and as they were (unexpectedly) climbing deep into the playoff picture, people were out in droves to support their club.  Even in McDonalds – they had big screen televisions and people were glued to them.  You don’t see that in Toronto – because you actually have to qualify for the playoffs first! 

As in previous years, I would have liked to have gotten down into old Montreal a bit more.  It’s funny, even though you plan the time to do things, you invariably never get to see everything that you want to see.  It’s a good thing that I keep going back.  Eventually I’ll see it all!  Montreal is a fantastic city and I wouldn’t have much problem living there full time.  As it stands though, I’ll settle for visiting regularly.  Even when Mixed Martial Arts is eventually licensed in Ontario, and the UFC puts on a show here, I’ll still make the trek up.