Finnfighters Gym - NHB as it should be

Report by Carl Fisher 29 July 2003

Situated in a basement underneath the local Ravintola (late licence bar) in Turku city centre, lies the Finnfighters Gym; no signs alert the average passer by to its presence and many walk on by in total ignorance to the fact that some of the world’s most fearsome NHB fighters are trading heavy leather under their feet; yet for those in the know, this unassuming location is fast churning out some of the top NHB fighters in the world today. The gym is one of the last true NHB outposts, a place where more or less anything goes, a place that lives up to the initials of NHB; with NHB competitions banned in Sweden and Norway, Finland is the last bastion of hardcore fight mayhem and every year Marko Leisten and Jari Ilka host the fearsome Finnfight event, a competition devoted to the spirit of real NHB fighting. Head butts and elbows to the head are still allowed and the event attracts some of the toughest warriors in Europe, it’s tentacles reaching as far as Belfast, where hardman Jonny Burrows took part in Finnfight 5 and proved he could walk the walk with a crushing KO victory over Esa Tyynismaa. Burrows went on to face Finnfighter Harry Niva and took Niva to the last second of the round, tapping out to excess punishment, but gaining the respect of Niva and the Scandinavian crowd, with his gutsy performance.

Famous Five

As well as attracting top Scandinavian fighters, Finnfight has been a stepping-stone to securing fights in Japan, namely in Shooto events. Finnfight 5 witnessed the epic battle between Olof Inger and Joachim Hansen in the Superfight match which saw Hansen winning the match after three rounds of hell and since this victory Hansen has now made his mark in Shooto, beating Takumi in December 2002 and more recently shocking the Japanese fight scene by beating Rumina Sato, raining down thirty six unanswered shots to the head of Sato before the referee stopped the fight. At the time of writing, Hansen is busy preparing for the fight of his life against Shooto number one Gomi and who knows where Hansen will end up if he beats this submission machine. Whilst visiting the gym in May this year, I had the pleasure of rolling with Hansen and after toying with me for most of the round, he switched it on for the last minute and the gulf between an amateur and a professional fighter became painfully apparent — this is one guy you’re glad to have on your side.

Carl piling pressure on Hansen

Jon Olav Einemo is another fighter who has dominated the Finnfight event in the heavyweight division and such is Einemo’s fearsome reputation in the ring, no one was willing to enter the ring at Finnfight 5, which left a very bemused Einemo the champion without ever throwing a punch. Einemo managed to shake off injuries long enough to compete in ADCC 2003 and as predicted, Einemo won his weight division, taking out big names such as Roger Gracie and Cacareco, a result more impressive when you learn that Einemo whipped himself into shape in only three months, after a long injury lay off. Rumours abound of the giant Norwegian making an appearance in Pride and of stepping into the UFC octagon in the future - let’s hope these rumours become fact.

Sauli Heilimo is one of the new breed of fighters at the gym; after winning the —70K division at Finnfight 5, Sauli’s fight career has been in overdrive, culminating in an appearance at the recent July 13^th Shooto edition in Japan. Hironaka was due to face Jutaro Nakao in the main fight of the night, but Hironaka - who owns a triangle win over Pat Miletich in 1999 -had to pull out through injury. Step forward Sauli Heilimo, who faced Nakao and succumbed to a round two triangle choke. Heilimo’s own training has taken a large step forward since the arrival of Joachim Hansen to the gym; both fighters are about the same weight and Heilimo now has a quality training partner and after watching him train with Hansen, one can see the immediate improvement, but there’s only one way to find out and that’s to roll with Heilimo yourself. Rolling with Heilimo in May this year I was given a ten minute lesson in precision submission wrestling from the young Finn; possessing natural athleticism and one of the hardest heads in the business, shots bounced off his skull and in return all I got was a smile and a barrage of body shots in return, some trade off - with youth on his side, Heilimo faces a bright future in the sport and is a name to follow in the Shooto organisation.

Finnfighters gym has been running for over 5 years and was set up by Marko Leisten and Jari Ilka and since its inception the gym has been a dominant force in the MMA scene in Scandinavia, with fighters regularly sweeping the boards at local NHB events; for fighters outside Finland who were competing in NHB, this is the place to train and the likes of Rickard Anderssen, Richard Bohlenius, Jani Lax, Bobby Sundell and many others have all travelled to Turku to sharpen up their games before major competitions. Other members of the gym include Arttu Nyman, Tomi Simonen, Erkka Sahlstrom, Yka Leino, all of who have a healthy haul of winner’s medals and have competed in Finnfight events and even crossed over to the UK and fought on Cage Wars 1 and 3.

Finnfighters Gym is hardcore NHB training and fighting, through and through; Marko and company are now working closely with the Shooto organisation and regularly hold Shooto events and are the stepping stone to securing an appearance in Japan; with Scandinavians such as Thomas Hytten, Hansen and Heilimo blazing a trail in Japan, these fighters have opened the doors for the rest of Europe and it’s only a matter of time before we start to see more European and UK fighters step into the ring in Finland and Japan. All the more reason to keep training - who knows where you may end up.

Carl Fisher is an honorary member of Team Scandinavia and a regular visitor to the gym — Marko and Jari welcome visits from MMA fighters from around Europe, where a warm welcome and hard training sessions await… anyone wishing to fight in the Shooto events can contact Marko at marko.leisten@pp.inet.fi for further details.

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