July 30, 2011 - Thomas Fan's celebration for Black Belt!

TRIQUEST members had a great rooftop BBQ in Mongkok at BeBeStore to celebrate Thomas' recent promotion to black belt.

thanks to Lung, Hippo, Victor and Henry for being our chefs for the evening! it was HOT and you guys did a great job!

championship cage cooking???


and while the food was great, the company was even better! thanks to Makoto-san, Quinton and Oswaldo for joining in the celebrations!

we even played a few fun games...

but the whole point was to get Thomas as drunk as possible!

of course new purple belts Ken and Andy didn't escape the forced drinking either!

and when the BBQ was over, we went into the BeBeStore karaoke room for some late night howling. more beers. hey, who the hell is drinking soda?!?

July 5, 2011 - Triquest in Timeout

Timeout Magazine that is!

"This smaller gym specialises in ensuring personalised workouts, even for the meek. In addition to Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, MMA and Muay Thai, Triquest is one of the only gyms in Hong Kong to offer training in Krav Maga, the official self-defence and fighting system used by the Israel Defense Forces."

TIMEOUT JULY ISSUE

July 25, 2011 - BJJ training with a packed gym!

Monday night BJJ class and there were 20 people in class today! good job, everybody! gear up for all of the competitions coming our way.


a special moment as Ken shows off his purple belt certificate from Professor Ze Marcello.

Andy's too tired from sparring to give us a smile, but we know he's happy on the inside.


here's a review of the armbar and triangle from guard techniques learned in tonight's class:

July 16, 2011 - Legend Welterweight belt: Bae vs MacSwain

here's MMAcore's upload of the first Legend FC Welterweight title defense, Rod MacSwain versus Bae Myoung Ho. Thomas Fan was the referee for the fight.

Bae vs MacSwain, Part 1

Bae vs MacSwain, Part 2

spoiler, in case you didn't already know:

July 16, 2011 - Legend FC 5 at City of Dreams

Legend Fighting Championship based out of Hong Kong just held their fifth show at the City of dreams in Macau. this event showcased the first round of a four-man featherweight tournamaent, the inaugural bantamweight championship belt and and the first defense of the welterweight belt. you can see a full write-up of the event here. TRIQUEST members Henry, Victor and Andy were on hand as ring staff. once again, Thomas Fan was head referee and Roger Chau stepped on the canvas to ref as well. but... why isn't Andy in this picture?

because he was backstage for the entire afternoon and throughout the event as the glove manager. eighteen fighters to supervise tape and glove... that's a big job!

joining Thomas and Roger in the ring as refs were our friend Warren Wang from Taiwan and Khomkrit "Killer Bee" Niimi, a black belt and amateur MMA ref from California.

Roger in action! this was between Fransino Tirta of Indonesia and Wu Chenjie of China for the first round of the four-man featherweight tournament. Fransino is a remarkable bjj player and Wu is known as a ground-and-pounder, so Roger had his hands full with action both on the mat and striking. the fight went the distance and Tirta won the decision.

Thomas refereed the main event, the first defense of the welterweight belt by Rod MacSwain against the now-famous gregarious Korean Bae Myoung Ho. Rod made a go of striking and ring control through the first round, but in the second Bae came on strong with his first takedown and then repeatedly ground-and-pounded the Kiwi until the end of the third.

Bae was the winner by unanimous decision and claimed the welterweight title belt as his own.

he happens to be my favorite fighter in all of Legend, so i was very eager to congratulate him! i am even more eager to see who will be his first opponent in defense of the belt.

after a busy night, Roger, Thomas and Warren took a rest with the Legend ring girls.

and then we all headed to the Hard Rock's Flame Bar for a much-needed beer before the epic afterparty.

July 8, 2011 - Versus Performance is 1!

a big congratulations to our friend Quinton Arendse on the one year anniversary of his gym in Hong Kong, Versus Performance! they hosted a great party on a rooftop patio that lasted well into the night.

July 2, 2011 - MMA in Shenzhen

Ken, Victor and Terence were recently invited to the Shenzhen MMA Club for a mini seminar.


There they demonstrated no gi techniques for MMA to the members. Looks like everyone learned a lot!

July 10, 2011 - Henry Tong wins HK Sanda Open!

On Sunday July 10^th, TRIQUEST members went to support our MMA teammate Henry Tong WIN his fight at the Hong Kong Sanda Championships in Lei Yue Mun. Henry fought in the Open 56kg division.

He went right in against an opponent who had a distinct reach advantage but proceeded to get take down after take down in the first round, with quite a lot of nice combinations in between. His opponent was bewildered.

In the second round, Henry got a massive KO, but his opponent survived the 8 count and got up, after which the poor guy’s corner threw in the towel. Ouch, that’s gotta hurt.

Henry Tong, winner by TKO!

A nice trophy and an even nicer $1,000 check were his prizes.

His daughter was elated! She's only 12, but she has 3 years in Taekwondo, and she spent the afternoon commentating all the fights for me. Look for her in BJJ class during the school summer break! She definitely takes after her father.

Sanda is like extremely handicapped MMA: there is punching (mostly wild roundhouse stuff from what I saw), and kicking (Wunique’s gym – famous for Thai boxing - was in the house), however the most points are awarded for take downs… but in the clinch you can’t do anything but defend or escape. Once a takedown is executed, the fight is stopped and restarted on the feet. I did see one nice takedown where a guy transitioned to a sitting position on his opponent’s chest to crush him. That was a creative move. However, I think they frown on that sort of thing. It was all so very “official”. And the rounds are only 2 minutes so if you decide to go for a beer, you miss half the fights.

Congratulations Henry!!! Now, on to MMA!!!

June 26, 2011 - Kalis Ilustrisimo seminar with Guro John Chow

On the 25^th and 26^th of June, the Kali Brotherhood of Hong Kong hosted a seminar by Guro John Chow of Kalis Ilustrisimo Australia. There was such a huge demand for it, that we had to rent a sports hall in order to accommodate all of the flying sticks and swords with minimal damage to the participants.

Guro John is a student of Tony Diego, the heir apparent of Grandmaster Antonio “Tatang” Ilustrisimo, and was himself able to spend quite a lot of time with the Grandmaster before he passed in 1997.

The Ilustrisimo family style of stick, dagger and sword fighting goes back at least five generations before Tatang. However, it is because of Tatang that the art was named as such and became infamous, as he was a consummate fighter. Among his exploits were gang fights, defending the Philippines against the Japanese army invasion and a government job as an ‘ambassador’ between warring clans. He does have kills to his claim and they are verified.

Grandmaster Ilustrisimo taught very few people in his life, but fortunately those well-chosen students were able to decipher and systematize his fighting style. Guro John presented the basics on the first day of the seminar, to concrete the foundation of ‘what is Kalis Ilustrisimo?’ On the second day, he presented the male/female triangle patterns of footwork. Combinations were added to make different attack angles and openings. Throughout the seminar Guro John emphasized that the core of Kalis Ilustrisimo is rooted in economy of movement, negating your opponent’s attack or superceding it, and finishing a fight in a very small number of moves.

After the last seminar, we all joined Guro John for yumcha, during which he talked about the history of the style, the progression of it all over the world, and some of his own experiences. His knowledge of Kalis Ilustrisimo is very deep, and we are proud to have his instruction. The Kali Brotherhood of Hong Kong looks forward to hosting another seminar with Guro John Chow later this year.

June 16, 2011 - THE BIG ONE - Thomas Fan is awarded his BLACK BELT!

Kylin BJJ Founder and Coach Thomas Fan began Brazilian Jiujitsu in the UK in 1996 under Professor Ze Marcello, after many years fighting full contact in kung fu tournaments. As a purple belt, he relocated to Hong Kong in 2002, and became the premiere force for establishing BJJ in Hong Kong with the founding of the Hong Kong Brazilian Jiu Jitsu Association. Thomas and his students competed around Asia in a newly-developing BJJ community.

Kylin BJJ and Combat Club first officially opened in 2006 in Sheung Wan. There Professor Ze Marcelo made his first seminar in Hong Kong. In late 2007 Thomas traveled to Brazil to train with Professor Ze again. It was then that he was awarded his brown belt.

Thomas continued to teach and promote BJJ in Hong Kong with the opening of Kylin BJJ in it’s own gym - TRIQUEST MMA + Fitness - in 2009 with the addition of the Kali Brotherhood of Hong Kong, Muay Thai, Kettlebells and Krav Maga. Thomas also runs the BJJ and MMA program at Impakt. And a rounding off to this chapter of Thomas’ career would be the return of Professor Ze to Hong Kong for his second seminar.

On June 16, during the final gi day of the seminar, Professor Ze Marcello awarded Thomas Fan with his black belt. He began by noting that he does not give them easily!

Professor Ze said that he is proud to have Thomas as his first black belt in Asia.

This also makes Thomas the first Chinese black belt in China.

So begins another chapter in Professor Thomas Fan’s BJJ life.

On behalf of all of your students, OSSS Sifu!!!

A very special THANK YOU to Boyee Siu for again capturing such emotion with her amazing photography!

June 16, 2011 - NEW PURPLE BELTS ANDY AND KEN!

On the final gi day of Professor Ze Marcello’s week-long seminar, we were treated to a real surprise. Two of Thomas Fan’s oldest students were awarded their purple belts from Professor Ze. Andy Chan and Siu Kei ‘Ken’ Man have been observed closely by Professor Ze since his first seminar in Hong Kong four years ago, and during this seminar he tested them greatly.

Spiderman Ken grinned from ear to ear and couldn’t speak as the Professor wrapped knotted the purple belt around his waist.

Blue Monkey Andy was caught by surprise when Professor Ze announced his name, and fought back tears as his was awarded.

Boyee got some wonderful photographs of the event, which i have to share, because they convey so much feeling behind this milestone event for Ken and Andy.