The first international season of The Ultimate Fighter has been off and running for three weeks now, we’ve seen a hungry group of Brazilian fighters join the competition that will crown a featherweight and middleweight series champion.
This week opens with a recap of the past two weeks including Vitor Belfort collecting his first win of the series in a controversial fight with questionable refereeing that frustrated blue team’s coach Wanderlei Silva.
Godofredo “Pepey” de Oliveira is happy that he got the win and is happy to boost the morale amongst the green team while Wanderlei stresses that his team will be ready to fight anyone at anytime and Vitor is happy to retain control of the matchmaking.
We cut to a Vitor Belfort training session as he weighs up which fights he wants to arrange and stresses the importance of retaining control before Daniel Sarafarian raises his hand to fight.
Belfort makes the choice to pair up Sarafarian against Renee Forte, before he made the decision he had a long discussion with the teams which Wanderlei criticized calling him boring.
We meet Sarafarian who reveals that he an overweight child who was a bit of a trouble maker getting into his fair share of fights and that he’s taken that and controlled it on his quest to be the best fighter in the world.
We cut to a video package on Forte who discusses losing his mother when he was 18 and growing up with his brothers by his side and a father that has struggled with alcoholism and that he’s considered calling it quits fighting as his friends have been more successful than him.
Back at the house Delson “Pe de Chumbo” Heleno chats with his Team Wanderlei members about the huge opportunity they have and not squandering it by lazing around and advises the squad to separate themselves from the opposing team.
Hugo “Wolverine” Viana of Team Belfort doesn’t agree with this split and believes that it will just create a rivalry between both teams if it goes ahead.
Following a commercial break the house are singing and dancing to kill their free time but both the fighters about to step in the cage appear motivated heading into their fight.
We show a brief video of both teams prepping for the fight as we are interrupted by a weird moment which was essentially a blatant product placement for what appeared to be an energy drink.
Both men weigh-in on point before Belforts team discuss messing with the sleep time of the opposing team and chant “lets beat up, beat up blues” that doesn’t impress fellow teammate Rodrigo Damm.
UFC heavyweight kingpin Junior dos Santos comes to visit the crew and gives them final words of encouragement before the fight begins and sticks around to watch the action.
Daniel Sarafarian vs. Renee Forte
Mario Yamasaki is in charge of the action as we begin with an extended feeling out period as neither man engages early before Forte presses forward and ties him up against the cage as both men try to trip the other. Both scramble for a takedown as Sarafarian lands on top but we wind up in a stale mate on the floor before returning to the feet, Sarafarian is throwing some good shots but again Forte gets in close looking for the takedown but we scramble and reset on the feet with under a minute to go, Forte takes the center of the cage and lands the better shots but Sarafarian fires back with a good leg kick and a late takedown to close us out, 10-9 Sarafarian.
We begin with Sarafarian the aggressor successfully using his leg kick and throwing some crisp shots before stunning him with a body shot that gets him a takedown, as he scrambles to his feet he throws a leg before forcing him back to the mat but Sarafarian craftily used his aggression and eagerness against him being able to step over him and take the hooks to secure the rear-naked-choke.
Wanderlei is upset with his student’s performance citing that he didn’t fight the way they had planned to and that he was disappointed while Team Vitor celebrates their continued success.
Back in Team Wanderlei’s locker room the whole team is down as Forte points to them adding pressure to his downfall while Rafael Cordeiro pulls no punches calling it a terrible fight and saying he fought at 10% of his ability.
Silva is upset saying he fought for crumbs coming up and these guys are given everything and they don’t put in the effort that he did.
Back at the house the heavyweight champ drops by to give them some advice about fighting and he talks about dengue fever.
That’s all for this week, check back next week as I’ll have a full report on the happenings in the TUF Brazil house.
