Former kickboxer and UFC 2 alumni Orlando Wiet has passed away at the age of sixty.
Wiet, who fought on the second UFC event in 1994, died from undisclosed reasons, according to Vechsport and coach Milton Felter.
He was born in October 1965 in Suriname and began his kickboxing career in the mid ‘80s, competing for K-1 and It’s Showtime. During his career, he became a multiple-time World Muay Thai champion, a WTC Super Middleweight Champion in 1997, and a European Muay Thai champion.
He also boxed professionally with a record of 8-6 between 1996 and 1998.
MMA fans would have become familiar with Weit when he was added to the UFC 2 tournament in March 1994 in the expanded 16-man format.
In the opening round, Wiet dominated Robert Lucarelli in 2:50 with elbow strikes for the finish as Lucarelli’s corner threw in the towel. It was also the first card on which Big John McCarthy worked as a referee, and he lacked the ability to stop a fight under the ruleset at the time.
From McCarthy’s book, Let’s Get it On:
My eyes darted nervously between Lucarelli’s corner and the beatdown, and I knew I had to do something. I started yelling for the cornermen to throw in the towel, but they just stared at me. With an elbow to the back of the head, Weit smacked Lucarelli’s mouthpiece out. Lucarelli crawled away like his life depended on it – no exaggeration – and his corner finally tossed in the towel as Weit landed another devastating elbow to the back of their injured fighter’s head.
It was a scary sequence that lasted no more than ten seconds, and it ripped the bloodthirsty crowd out of the seats. They were the most uncomfortable ten seconds I’ve ever squirmed through in the Octagon.
I didn’t want something like this to happen again, but there was nothing I could do. The next fight was underway before I could give it a second thought.
In the second round of the tournament, Weit was stopped by Remco Pardoel and advanced to fight Royce Gracie in the semi-finals.
Wiet had another fight in 1995 for the United Full Contact Federation and didn’t compete in MMA again until 2005, and fought as late as May 2011 when he was 45. He finished with a 1-5 record in MMA.
