AFC bouts draw local fight fans

WASILLA — Less than a minute into the third fight Wednesday night, the young boxer from Wasilla was on the ground.

When he got up, Kyle Peters looked unsteady on his feet, but he cleared his head and started hopping in place, signaling he wasn’t done yet. But the referee had already made the call. Peters had lost.

His elated competitor, a young wrestler from Wasilla named Tyler Milner, took a victory lap around the octagon, jumping up on the walls, prompting the crowd to shower him with deserved cheers.

The fight, from the middle of the night’s lineup, was relatively typical for the second mixed-martial arts Alaska Fighting Championship event in the Valley this year. They all ended in the first round, either with one fighter tapping out or with the ref ending the bout.

“It was a fast night of fights. It was probably one of the fastest nights we’ve ever had,” said Sarah Johnston, who runs AFC. “There was at least four or five fights that I would have estimated going into the second or third round, but didn’t.”

She said that happens sometimes.

“Its’ a good thing and a bad thing,” she said.

Good because the fights moved along at a brisk pace. Nobody got bored. Bad because all eight fights were done in two hours.

Johnston said that talking with audience members she got the sense that most everyone enjoyed the show, even those who were new to the sport. She estimated 1,200 showed up this go-round, which is down from the 2,200 she saw last time she brought fights to the Valley.

“It was down a thousand, but honestly, summertimes are always drop-offs,” she said.

It’s hard to coax people inside when there is fishing to do and jet-skis to ride.

Johnston said she put together a Valley-centric lineup for the fights. Of 16 fighters on the card, only four were from Anchorage. The rest listed either Palmer or Wasilla as their hometowns.

Johnston, who calls the Valley home, said she’s been working with the community, talking to martial arts gyms trying to build up a base of talent and a network of gyms where they can train.

“We have three new gyms out here that are training guys. Up until six months ago we didn’t have any,” Johnston said. “A lot of them were training out of their garages (and going to Anchorage and) getting beat up really bad.”

The fights at the Curtis D. Menard Memorial Sports Center are a piece of that puzzle. Johnston said it gives up-and-coming Valley fighters a place to get their feet wet. She said she’s signed up for six fight nights per year at the venue, one every other month.

But that doesn’t mean the Valley should expect a lot of greenhorns in the ring. As she builds a fan base, she plans to bring more experienced fighters out here to battle.

“Some of the championship fights that happen in Anchorage, we’re going to bring them out here,” she said.

Johnston said she’s heard stories about past attempts to bring this type of mix-martial-arts fighting to the Valley that ended poorly. She said a lot of fight promoting depends on paying attention to the ancillary things, like venue and security. It’s important to keep a lid on the crowd but not make the events uninviting. T

he sports complex, she said, is the perfect place to build that kind of atmosphere.

Johnston said the Valley is also a great place to stage these kinds of events. When people in the Valley want to see something grow, they get behind it 100 percent. It’s refreshing, she said, having spent so much time working in Anchorage.

“Anchorage is completely different,” she said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.