This Friday’s Strikeforce 135-pound women’s tournament has undergone last-minute format changes. The promotion announced last week that all bouts in the four-woman tournament would be contested under a three, three-minute round format. However, opening round bouts have now been shortened and will be contested over just two rounds of three minutes.
In addition, original plans that called for a sudden death round in the event of a tie have been scrapped. It is expected that judges will be tasked with determining an outright winner and that Draws will not be permitted.
Participants in the main bracket of the tournament are Miesha “Takedown” Tate (9-2-0), Carina “Beauty But The Beast” Damm (15-3-0), Hitomi “Girlfight Monster” Akano (15-7-0) and Maiju Kujala (4-1-0). A tournament reserve bout, which will determine a replacement finalist in the event of an injury, features Colleen Schneider (0-1-0) taking on fellow Californian Liz Carmouche (2-0-0). The tournament winner will become the number two contender for the Strikeforce Women’s Welterweight Championship.
The August 13th tournament has undergone a number of changes since it was first tentatively set for this Summer. Original plans called for an eight-woman bracket, with the tournament to be contested across multiple events. The tournament was then scaled down to just four participants and will now be contested all in one night. The tournament final will still use the previously announced three-round format of three minutes per round. Strikeforce Director of Communications Mike Afromowitz confirmed the changes with MMARising.com this evening.
Strikeforce’s inaugural 135-pound women’s tournament takes place this Friday, August 13th, at Strikeforce Challengers 10. The event emanates from the Dodge Theatre in Phoenix, Arizona and airs live on Showtime in the United States and Super Channel in Canada.
2 3 minute rounds?holy hell;they wont have broken a sweat and the fight will be over…this strikeforce thing is looking shakier all the time