Andy Hug

Andreas "Andy" Hug (September 7, 1964 – August 24, 2000) was a Swiss karateka and kickboxer who competed in the heavyweight division. Considered to be one of the greatest heavyweight kickboxers of all time, along with Mirko Filipović, Peter Aerts, Remy Bonjasky, Ernesto Hoost and Semmy Schilt, Hug was renowned for his ability to execute numerous kicking techniques rarely seen in high level competition and although he was usually smaller than his opponents, standing at 1.80 m (5 ft 11 in) and being barely a heavyweight, weighing around 98.0 kg (216.1 lb; 15.43 st) in his prime, he made up for his lack of size with his tremendous athleticism and speed. A southpaw, his trademark kicks included the axe kick and the "Hug Tornado", a low spinning heel kick targeting his opponents' thighs.

Raised in Wohlen, Aargau, Hug was a keen footballer in his youth but gave up the sport to pursue Kyokushin karate which he began practicing at ten years old. Beginning his full contact karate career in the 80 kg/176 lb middleweight division, he rose to prominence in the late 1970s and early 1980s by winning numerous regional tournaments around Europe and made the transition to heavyweight in 1984. That same year, he competed in the Kyokushin World Open, knockdown karate's most prestigious competition, for the first time and made it to the fourth round where he was eliminated by Shokei Matsui. Returning to Europe, he won his first major title in the form of the 3rd European Championships in 1985 before entering World Open again in 1987. He became the first non-Japanese fighter to make it to the final of the competition but again lost to Shokei Matsui. Another European Championships win would follow in 1989 and he fought in his third and final World Open in 1991, losing a controversial bout to Francisco Filho in the third round.

Andy

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Grand Prix

Grand Prix (French pronunciation: ​[ɡʁɑ̃pʁi], meaning Grand Prize; plural Grands Prix) may refer to:

Sports competitions

K-1 World Grand Prix

K-1 World Grand Prix, also known as the K-1 World GP, is an elimination kickboxing tournament that has been held annually since 1993 by the K-1 organization. Each year, K-1 holds various 16-men, 8-match grand prix style tournaments throughout the world to determine which 16 fighters will compete in the K-1 World GP. This tournament has had nine different winners with Ernesto Hoost and Semmy Schilt each winning four times.

Match-Ups

Usually combatants of the quarter-finals of a 16-man 8-match tournament are paired by drawing. In the case of the Final in the Tokyo Dome it is widely different. The whole event is combined with a ceremony and a press conference. The process looks like a lottery show in the beginning with all the fighters pulling a ball from a glass bowl. The balls represent numbers 1 to 8, which determines the fighters' order in choosing a position from a giant tournament tree figure by standing in front a drawn bracket (from A to H) on the poster, which represents the fighter's corner-color and the line-number of the match. The next fighter does the same, but he can now choose between challenging the one on the stage or an "empty" section. This procedure goes on until one fighter remains who has no choice just to fill to one slot left next to the one lone fighter. This system gives a freedom of choice and tactics to the fighters with the help of a little luck.