Troubled Jones finds a taker: Jackson’s Acoma
Jackson-Wink cut ties after ongoing troubles
Jon Jones has come home. Sort of.
Jones, an Albuquerque resident and the former UFC light heavyweight champion, announced Thursday on social media that he has found a new training base after being booted from his longtime home at Jackson-Wink MMA.
The new training base is also his old training base: Jackson’s Acoma, two blocks south of Central and just east of San Mateo, the building in which Jones trained for six years after coming to the Duke City in 2009.
Jackson’s Acoma, established by former Jackson-Wink fighters Nick Urso and Clint Roberts in 2018, occupies the building that housed JacksonWink from the time coaches Greg Jackson and Mike Winkeljohn joined forces until Winkeljohn moved the enterprise in 2015 to its current location at Broadway and Martin Luther King SE.
Despite the name, Urso said last year, Jackson’s Acoma is totally independent of Jackson-Wink.
Jones’ move comes a month after he was banned from Jackson-Wink, his longtime competitive home. Winkeljohn said Jones was no longer welcome after his Sept. 24 arrest in Las Vegas, Nevada, on domestic-violence charges.
At the time, Winkeljohn said the suspension was for an indefinite period and that Jones would be welcomed back once Winkeljohn was satisfied there would be no further out-of-the-cage eruptions from the troubled MMA superstar.
But Jones, making it clear he was hurt by the move, said he would not return — training instead at his home with the help of Jackson, Brandon Gibson and some of his other JacksonWink coaches.
Jones, though, realized he couldn’t train effectively in his garage forever.
“... Eventually I’m going to need
more training partners,” he tweeted early this week. “Mainly wrestling partners and kickboxers. I’m on the lookout for teams that I’ll be able to visit and come train with, maybe get some sparring sessions in.”
Thursday, he posted video of himself entering the old Jackson’s facility and beginning a workout.
“... The energy felt amazing exactly the way it was before,” he wrote on Instagram. “... I won my first world title out of this gym. I am grateful to have this comfortable place for both my local and visiting training partners to come enjoy.”
It’s unclear at this point whether Jackson, Gibson, et al would continue to work with Jones at Jackson’s Acoma as they had at Jones’ home since his ban from Jackson-Wink.
Jones (26-1) has not fought since Feb. 8, 2020, when he defended his UFC light heavyweight title with a victory by unanimous decision over Dominick Reyes. He since has renounced the light heavyweight title with a stated intention to compete as a heavyweight. He has no fight scheduled.
THE COURT CASE: In Las Vegas, Jones was arrested on misdemeanor domestic battery charges after a police report depicted his fiancée as having dried blood on a swollen lip and blood on her clothing. When apprehended by police on the Vegas Strip, according to the report, he head-butted a patrol car and was charged with a felony for “injury to/tampering with a vehicle.”
According to court documents, a scheduled Oct. 26 court date was continued after the state of Nevada requested more time to file charges.
A status check on the filing of the complaint is scheduled for Nov. 30.
In the police report, Jones’ fiancée told police Jones had gotten physical with her “a little bit” during an altercation but that he had not hit her.
Since, Jones has denied striking her but admitted his drinking the previous night had led to an incident. He vowed to stay away from alcohol in the future.
BELLATOR: Aaron Pico and Arlene Blencowe, MMA fighters who train in Albuquerque at Jackson-Wink, each made weight for their fights Friday on a Bellator card in Hollywood, Florida.
Pico (8-3) weighed in at 145.4 pounds for his featherweight fight against Justin Gonzales (120). Gonzales weighed in at 145.6. The featherweight limit is 145 pounds with an additional pound allowed for non-title fights.
Blencowe (14-8), also a featherweight, weighed in at 145.8 pounds for her fight against Pam Sorenson (9-3). Sorenson weighed in at 146.
Both fights are scheduled for Friday’s Bellator 271 main card, scheduled to be telecast on Showtime, starting at 8 p.m.