After 45-minutes, Felipe Pena verbally called an end to his match against Gordon Ryan at Who’s Number One on Sunday night.
The bizarre ending came after Felipe had already nearly walked off the mats around the 40-minute mark. The crowd and announcers were confused by what was happening, but after a brief chat with the referee, Pena went back to grappling.
Until this point, they seemed quite evenly matched and Pena was fully in the fight. However, Pena’s exhaustion now became apparent and Gordon Ryan was being fueled by the circumstances, even saying out loud that he was just getting started.
A well-timed foot sweep caught Felipe perfectly and sent him to the ground, and Ryan came on top into his passing, but Felipe had enough and verbally submitted at 44:40 into the match.
Gordon’s victory marks the end of a bitter chapter, as he has now redeemed himself against the only opponent who has been able to submit him at the black belt level. Thus, a new chapter of rivalry has begun, with Gordon already calling for another shot at Pena on social media, going as far as to say that Pena still owes him 2 more matches, which would give Gordon a winning record over Pena, should he win both of those.
It should be noted that Pena was understandably coming into the match with emotional baggage, having learned that his close friend Leandro Lo had been murdered earlier in the day.
The main event capped off a top-shelf night of match-ups with some of the biggest names in submission grappling.
The replay can be streamed on FloGrappling.com,
// FULL RESULTS //
Gordon Ryan def Felipe Pena via verbal submission
Nicholas Meregali def Rafael Lovato Jr via unanimous decision
Mica Galvao def Alan Sanchez via Submission (RNC) (7:26)
Bia Mesquita def Elisabeth Clay via unanimous decision
Jacob Couch def Jay Rodriguez via unanimous decision
Fabricio Andrey def Fabaian Ramirez via unanimous decision
Diogo Reis def Estevan Martinez via unanimous decision
