JEROME LE BANNER - Paying Tribute to the Greatest

Hey guys, right now and again here you'll see the birth of a new category of postings here, a little bit away from such the musick side of things, now it's all about paying tribute to my great passion called Sports!!! The content of this rubric will be very well mixed, and I just start it all up with giving you some informations about and paying tribute to one of my all time favorite K-1 / MMA fighters, the french man JEROME LE BANNER, the BATTLE CYBORG, so here we'll go ahead and forth!!!

*** JEROME LE BANNER - The french Battle Cyborg ***

JEROME LE BANNER was born in Le Havre on the 26. December of the year 1972. His known as one the top martial artists of our time for something like over an decade right now. He was not only born in Le Havre, but he also gre up there. His father was a truck driver and also a semiprofessional pugilist, while his mother was working as a saleslady. Classical blue collar working class ethics as a background, not the worst for becoming a fighter, if you ask me!!!

With becoming just swix years old he started to training judo, and what shall I say, I done it by myself, so it brings some memories into m mind... but all an a lower level, haha;-). He was known to be very well-gifted, but as his father and the referees got into an heated argument one day JEROME LE BANNERs career in judo was all done history. He called it a day, but with 14 years of age he decided to start doing karate. The legend goes, that he was inspired by Bruce Lee movies, may it's true, why not, but I don't know it.

With growing up and becoming 18 years of age the martial arts career of JEROME LE BANNER was going completly over the top, he was suceeding to become the french martial arts champion, he won the so called ISKA championship versus his opponent Stéphane Réveillon, before beating Mike Bernardo in Kapstadt winning the intercontinental championship.

In 1995 JEROME LE BANNER received his first invitation of K-1 to go and battle at the grand championship final tournament over there in japan. His first victory in K-1 he got over respectively against Nokueed Devy at the 3. March of 1995. Also his next two fights he decided for himself by knocking his enemies out. Also Peter Aerts, the dutch lumberjack, beaten him in his next fight the year of 1995 was the start for his great career in K-1 and MMA sports.

Over the next years he was completly on fire, winning many tournaments and even more fights, suceeding and winning many trophies, and especially 2002 was a very strong year for JEROME LE BANNER, winning six strong and hard fights in a row, but sadly enough in the final battle of the K-1 tournament of 2002 he broke his arm in the fight against Ernesto Hoost. He returned in 2003, stepping back into the ring. He was making himself more and more a name for himself as the K.O. Machine in K-1, also known as the BATTLE CYBORG. Always marching forward into battle, all or nothing, with no remorse for himself or his opponents, like an battle icon.

Over the years of 2006 to 2008 he was fighting not that many fights anymore, injuries throw him back a little bit. But again he could decide a lot of them for him. Just against Semmy Schilt he got bad luck again and again, but Schilt is 22 centimeters taller than JEROME LE BANNER. In 2009 he just done three fights in K-1, nowadays 37 years old, but he's also establishing hinself and making himself a name as an actor in movies. He's father to his daughter Victoria. Hopefully he will be coming back in 2010 once again, it would just be great to see him one more time marauding through the ring and his opponents!!! It's sad that injuries caused him his changes to succeed in the K-1 final grand prix tournament in Japan, because as on the very bests of the bests he would really deserve to wear the crown of martial arts sports!!!

Here you'll get his official fight statistics:
K-1: 58 fights, 39 victories (30 by K.O. or T.K.O.), 17 losses (10 by K.O. or T.K.O.), one fight was a draw and one could not be counted anyway. MMA: 3 victories (all by K.O. or T.K.O.) and a drawMovies he already played in had been "Babylon A.D." (2008), "Scorpion" (2007), "Asterix & Obelix (at the olympic games)" (2008), and "Disco" (2008).