Logan Hulstine, left, celebrates post-fight with Dustin “The Disciple” Pague.
UPDATE: According to Hulstine, the date of CPWC 13 has been changed to Sept. 16. The venue has also changed to Wisehaven in York, Pa. Wisehaven was the first venue to hold a sanctioned MMA event in the state on April 19, 2009. The event was, coincidentally, CPWC 1, promoted by Mark Jovich.
Logan Hulstine hopes to break “first pro fight curse” at CPWC 13:
MMA trainer-manager Logan Hulstine has had a great deal of success training a core group of serious and skilled fighters at his Middletown, Pa. academy, Hulstine Athletics. But there is an inside joke he kind of laughs about — a curse that nearly all of his fighters, and that includes guys like Dustin Pague and Jeff Smith — have lost their first pro fights.
Hulstine doesn’t know whether it’s jitters from transitioning from amateur to pro rules, or just pure coincidence. Whatever the case, he hopes to break the curse at Central Pennsylvania Warrior Challenge 13 at Millersville University on Sept. 17, when one of his fighters, Vinnie Courts, takes on John Flock in the main event. It will be Courts’ pro debut, Hulstine said.
Courts, 3-0 as an amateur, was scheduled to fight Shane Chojnacki (7-5 amateur, 1-0 pro)in the main event at CPWC 13, but for some reason, Chojnacki has now been replaced by Flock, who fights out of Team Vicious in Williamsport, Pa., has a 6-6 amateur career and is also making his pro debut.
Hulstine said he has two other fighters on the card as well. Travis Creamer will be fighting William Leibensberger for the vacant 155-lb. amateur title, and Nate Vantassel will be taking on Craig Odeair in what will be each fighters’ first pro fight too. Both Vantassel and Odeair went 3-1 as amateurs.
In addition, Harrisburg’s Phil Davis, who is now one of the top UFC LHWs, will be coming by Hulstine Athlectics next week to train. “It’s going to be awesome,” Hulstine said. Later this month, Courts will journey to AKA in California (home to Josh Koscheck, Jon Fitch and Cain Velasquez) to train for about 10 days, Hulstine said.
