Medieval Armored Fight Club is Freakin’ Hardcore and Here’s a Short Doc on It
I had no idea that the Armored Combat League existed until I came across this short documentary Harlem Knight Fight. It centers around a man named Damion DiGrazia, the captain of the New York chapter of the league.
It’s basically a medieval-inspired fight club in which people dress up in their real metal suits armor and beat the living shit out of each other! This is no joke. These guys are serious and it’s MMA fighting with the contestants wearing heavy-ass armor.
The doc shows off footage of what these fights look like and they are freakin’ intense! A lot of these contestants get seriously injured and I’m surprised no one has died in combat yet. These guys aren’t wielding foam weapons, they are metal axes, swords, and various other things and they are hitting each other freakin' hard!
The doc also tells the story of how DiGrazia, who is a Harvard and Columbia graduate, got into the sport. This is incredibly fascinating and it’s a doc you’ve gotta watch! Here’s the synopsis:
For Damion DiGrazia, joining the Air Force, graduating from Harvard and Columbia and putting together a lucrative career as a management consultant at a top investment bank in Manhattan wasn’t enough. He had one more, slightly less conventional item for the bucket list. When this Sunday school teacher isn’t spreading the Good Word, he prefers a metal fist to the teeth. DiGrazia is the captain of the New York chapter of the Armored Combat League — a sort of medieval fight club whose members smash the hell out of each other while dressed like attendees of the Red Wedding in Game of Thrones. “This is a sport that requires passion,” he explains. “Because there’s no responsible way to do it.” We met with Damion at his East Harlem training studio and followed his team to their regional matchup with New England.