Over a quarter of million dollars will be on the line when the participants in the Glory World Series – First 16 climb between the ropes to face each other in Stockholm next month. The Swedish capital is playing host to the opening round of the most prestigious contest in kickboxing on May 26 and the best lightweight fighters in the world are assembling with their eyes on a grand prize of $300,000. The Glory – First16 follows the classic format, with the eight winners going forward to the next event. These will in turn be whittled down at the Final 8 event to four and then two fighters, who will compete to determine the overall winner.
The tournament is to 70 kilo kickboxing what the World Cup is to football, as a quick glance at some of the competitors backgrounds reveals. Among the entrants are Giorgio Petrosyan (Italy), Albert Kraus (Netherlands), Yoshihiro Sato (Japan), Fabio Pinca (France) and Dzhabar Askarov (Russia). Outside of the tournament fights there will also be a title contest between Semmy Schilt (Netherlands), the worlds most accomplished heavyweight, and Errol Zimmerman, one of the world’s hardest-hitting heavyweights. The inaugural title fight will crown a champion to stand atop a five-star heavyweight category. Three-time K-1 tournament winner Peter Aerts recently announced he was joining the GLORY heavyweight division, where he will line up alongside living legend Jerome Le Banner, super-talented Gokhan Saki and fearsome Russian bear Sergei Kharitonov among others.