IT'S SHOWTIME Blows Minds With Heavyweight and 70kgs Tournaments

Simon Rutz has made quite an impact on the world of kickboxing in the past few years. The Netherlands promotion IT'S SHOWTIME has gone from somewhat obscure to a worldwide force, with many of the top kickboxing talents using it as their home base and the few cards they promote yearly turn into huge events with ripples from their shows felt the world over. If you look way back to our latest interview with Rutz, you'll remember that Rutz promised a big surprise around the time of the Amsterdam ArenA show, right?

So it comes as no surprise when today word leaked out that IT'S SHOWTIME plans to run two big tournaments of their own, treading into the territory of K-1's tournament empire. Much like K-1, IT'S SHOWTIME plans to run a Heavyweight tournament for fighters over 90kgs, and also like K-1 they plan to run a 70kgs "MAX" division tournament.

The Heavyweight tournament is set to kick off on March 5th in Amsterdam, it will include 16 of the world's top Heavyweight fighters and conclude in May in their annual ArenA show in Amsterdam. The question is, of course, who will be fighting in this tournament? Signed so far is the Golden Boy, Badr Hari, rising sensation Tyrone Spong, Alexey Ignashov, Errol Zimmerman and Gokhan Saki. The field so far is quite competitive, with the assumption that many of the other spots will go to other top fighters who participate in the K-1 World Grand Prix. Knowing the good relationship they have with Golden Glory, I think it is safe to say GG's impact on the tournament will be more than Zimmerman.

The 70kgs MAX tournament takes a whole different shape, as opposed to spanning multiple shows, this tournament is a one night 16-man tournament. To say that the format is grueling is an understatement, whomever comes out victorious in this tournament, dubbed "The Fast and the Furious" and is set to take place on December 10th can without a doubt be said to be one of the top 70kgs fighters in the world. So who is going to be in this tournament? Only the best, with the names so far being; Giorgio Petrosyan, Panjonsuk, Andy Souwer, Gago Drago, William Diender and Artur Kyshenko. Obviously this is a huge tournament, and takes place after the K-1 MAX tournament will conclude as to not interrupt any training for either event.