HOUSTON, TX, August 5, 2012 – It was another monumental day for the Houston MMA and Grappling community this past Saturday as the city welcomed the Garcia-Pitre Grappling Association to existence with their inaugural event held at the Willowbrook Sports Complex.
The creation of this new tournament series was the next step for busy promoters / community members Eric Garcia and Jace Pitre. Previous to this Saturday the two just put their tenth successful Cage Combat amateur MMA event behind them and have both been busy on other fronts as well with Garcia training for his upcoming fight at the Legacy Amateur Series later this month and Pitre having just completed the build out on his Team Tooke / Jace Pitre MMA gym in North Houston.
“We want to be involved in every aspect of Houston MMA,” said Garcia in a pre-event interview with TXMMA. “We started with Garcia Promotions to try and give more amateur fighters a chance to showcase their skills and get cage experience in front of a crowd before hitting the pro circuit. “Now that we have a solid foundation in the MMA scene, Jace and I would like to build the same foundation within the Houston BJJ community. We believe more tournaments in Houston give grapplers and fighters both more opportunities to showcase their skills and compete.”
With the focus set on concurrently building the MMA and BJJ scene in the Houston community with this event, it was a sight to see many of the city’s MMA fighters involved in both the submission grappling and BJJ GI divisions this past weekend at GPGA 1.
Among them, Silverback Fight Club’s Eric Thompson and Gracie Barra Katy’s Christian Sutton went against each other once again after having just fought in MMA competition at Cage Combat 10 no more than a week ago.
Also competing were a plethora of other fighters as well, including Bushi Ban’s Gerzan Chaw and Alex Black along with Team Tooke’s Chris Lopez, Kingwood MMA’s Joe Whichard, Zion MMA’s Tim Buchanan, and 4OZ Fight Club coach Jeremy Mahon amongst several others.
Combine those with the sport BJJ players on hand and it was definitely a curious mix of talent on the mats with the competition being as fierce as ever.
Looking ahead, Houston can definitely expect these GPGA events to grow and add even more talent for both the adult and kids divisions alike as more grapplers and fighters become familiar with this event. With GPGA already talking about adding prize money for absolute division winners in the next one, this series should be one to watch.
GPGA 1 – Select Match Videos
We were on hand and caught 30+ of the days matches for the Texas Grappling Channel. Let the whole playlist go or go directly to the site to watch select matches. Either way, make sure to subscribe for more action from MMA & BJJ events all across Texas.
GPGA 1 – Photo Gallery and Slideshow
Here’s a gallery below courtesy of Mike Calimbas Photography. Feel free to browse the site for high-quality versions of all the shots also available for print or take a look at them on our TXMMA Facebook Page if you want to like, tag, and share.
