Peter Aerts v. Mike Bernardo V Fight Video

Our week-long look at Peter Aerts v. Mike Bernardo continues today with fight 5.  Check out part 1 here, part 2 here and parts 3/4 here.

At the end of 1996, it looked like the year long rivalry between Peter Aerts and Mike Bernardo had been settled.  Over the course of 4 fights, Bernardo had definitively stopped Aerts twice (add scored a DQ win), while Aerts had only triumphed in one encounter. 

Coming out of their historic 4th match-up, the future looked bright for Bernardo, and full of question marks for Aerts.  Suffering 3 straight loses, the former K-1 champion was at an early career crossroads.  Were Aerts's best days already behind him, or would he be able to move past these bumps?  As for Bernardo, the only question now was could he harness those skills he used to defeat Aerts and Andy Hug and become a K-1 champion.

But as 1997 started, the careers of each man took decidedly opposite directions.  Aerts started the year with no less an opponent than Andy Hug, the reigning K-1 GP champion and clear #1 ranked fighter.  Aerts mauled him, scoring the TKO victory in under 2 minutes.  From there, the Dutch Lumberjack went on a rampage, winning his next 3 fights all via stoppage to gain an entry in the 1997 Grand Prix.  As the GP drew near the message from Aerts was clear - he was back, and back with a vengeance.

Bernardo's fortunes were decidedly worse.  Coming off the Aerts wins, Bernardo faced a step up in competition, and he didn't respond as well as his fans would have hoped.  After starting the year with a draw against Stan Longinidis (not bad, but not the strongest way to follow through on his momentum), Bernardo went 2-2 in his next 4, with the wins over a washed up Masaaki Satake and a washed up Branko Cikatic.  Of course, those loses came against Hoost and Hug, no slouches there, so it was still far too early to write off Bernardo.  But when he beat Cikatic to qualify for the GP, fans had to ask themselves if his moment was now, or if that moment had slipped away.

With Aerts coming in strong and Bernardo in some trouble, the 1997 Grand Prix looked to be a huge event for both men.  And as fate would have it, these opponents who knew each other so well would once again clash in the quarter-finals.  At the time K-1's most stacked Grand Prix ever, the 1997 event would provide chapter five in this epic series.

For Aerts, this had to be a particularly sweet victory, as he not only overcame the man who had defeated him all last year, but he did it on the grandest K-1 stage of all, gaining an appropriate sense of redemption.  Unfortunately for Aerts, that redemption would not carry him all the way back to the K-1 crown, as he would be eliminated in the semi-finals by Andy Hug. But with his win here Aerts showed that yes, he could defeat Bernardo.  And by bringing the series back to 2-2, he set the stage for one final match.