Terry Gormley Wins Runner Up Prize in Mixed Martial Arts Ground Fighting Tournament

The Fire Training Academy’s M.D. Terry Gormley was narrally beaten in the final of the 2010 Mixed Martial Arts Ground Fighting Competition held at Castle Black Belt Academy in Sheffield.

Terry takes on the challenge

As many of you are aware our MD is not one to shirk a challenge having previously done a 13,000ft free fall parachute jump, climbed Mount Kinabalu in Borneo, ran the New York Marathon, Climbed to Mount Everest Base Camp, ran the London Marathon and the Great North Run all for charity.  So when Chief Instructor Dale Joel challenged Terry, who was a spectator on the day of the competition, to enter the competetion the answer to the challenge was of course yes!

Terry, Nicky and Jake (Terry’s wife and 8 year old son) had just trained for an hours session in the morning then stayed on to watch the days competition.   The first part of the groundfighting competition was taken up by the juniours and there was some fantastic achievements made by some of the youngsters.

Terry was as surprised as anyone else when, as the adult competition entrants took to the mat, Mr Joel asked Terry where his kit was, then told him to go and get it…but as ever Terry rose to the challenge.  Terry returned from the dressing room to find out that he was the lowest rank (in terms of colour of belt) in the competition and if that was not enough his first fight was against one of the Academy’s MMA Black Belts.  The first round was a round robin format so when Terry took to the mat he could afford to lose one of the three fights and could still get through!

To everyone’s surprise (includings Terry’s it must be said) Terry forced the black belt to tap out due to a rear naked choke.  Terry then progressed all the way to the final only to narrally lose on the referee’s decision.

The trophy was presented to Terry by Mr Joel at the Black Belt Academy and Mr Joel commented “Terry was challenged to step up and even though he had not prepared or trained for the fighting competition and, everyone else in the tournament was of a much higher standard, Terry still rose to the challenge.  Terry is a great example of someone who always tries his hardest, will accept a challenge and above all will never give up”.