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Topics: Tom Hardy, MMA, Sport, UK News, TV and Film
Daisy Phillipson
Tom Hardy once again proved he's hardy by name, hardy by nature by winning yet another jiu-jitsu championship over the weekend.
The Peaky Blinders star shocked onlookers last month when he took to the mat at a leisure centre in Wolverhampton and brought home the gold for the REORG Open Jiu-Jitsu Championship.
He was so good, in fact, that one of the other competitors said he had to tap out of his match with Hardy before his arm was broken.
And again the 45-year-old actor secretly arranged to fight - this time at a local school sports hall in Milton Keynes - where he then floored all his opponents.
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The fight took place on Saturday (17 September) at Oakgrove School, where the Hollywood heavyweight entered the Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Open Championship.
As someone whose known to play hard men on the big screen, it might come as no surprise that he's a high-level blue belt in the ground-fighting combat sport.
Utilising his skills on the weekend, Hardy emerged as the winner of his section after beating everyone he competed against.
Sean Rosborough, who sponsored the event, said the organisers found out the Mad Max star would be coming to the school a few weeks before the event.
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But he said they kept the actor's appearance 'to themselves' to stop masses of people 'distracting' him from taking part in the competition.
Despite it being a surprise for attendants, Hardy was said to be 'brilliant' with the fans who approached him for photographs.
Rosborough said: "We found out he was coming probably a couple of weeks before.
"But the organisers kept it to themselves - and didn’t want masses of people turning up distracting him from what he was doing.
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"He was brilliant. A lot of people were asking for photos, and coming up to him, and he had no problem with that all.
"The mums were all over him. It didn’t bother him.
"We tried not to bother him too much. We didn’t pap him to bits. We just tried to keep it as normal as possible for him. I think he had a good time."
He continued: "When he was fighting, he was focused on what he was doing. He’s amazing at Jiu-Jitsu."
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Hardy reportedly got into Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu while training to play a former boxer turned MMA fighter in the 2011 film Warrior.
Speaking about his recent victory, Rosborough added: "I saw his matches, and he had submissions in them all - and they were really quick.
"He did really, really well. He’s not the highest grade, but you could see he had turned up to win, and he was impressive in every fight."