On Tuesday, August 6, Richie Cranny was confirmed via a member vote as the new president of national governing body and IMMAF – WMMAA member, the International Mixed Martial Arts Federation of Australia (IMMAFA).
Formerly the organisation’s vice-president, Cranny takes the reins from former president, Joe Minehan, alongside newly introduced board members who were also voted in last Tuesday night.
With over 20 years as a martial arts coach and gym owner, Cranny established the Wimp 2 Warrior (W2W) training program in 2012 and has overseen an expansion of this across eight countries and into 50 of the world’s most prominent combat sports gyms, including SBG Ireland in Dublin and American Kickboxing Academy in San Jose, homes to Conor McGregor and Khabib Nurmagomedov, respectively.
Last year, Richie formerly adopted the IMMAF grading system, introducing an extended pathway and opportunity to dedicated MMA practitioners of the W2W conveyor.
Since first coming on as vice-president in September of 2018, Cranny and IMMAFA created some exciting pathways to help build memberships and education opportunities through supporting and helping run the IMMAF coaching accreditation courses. Australia is the first country to launch the IMMAF app and already pioneers the level two coaching courses.
“I’m very honoured to be voted in a President, I’ve inherited some great people from Joe, our previous President, but I’m also building an even bigger team of passionate and driven men and women to help me build the vision and ultimately contribute to getting our amazing sport into the Olympic Games,” Cranny stated.
“My mission is to build our federation from the ground up,” Cranny explained, “by bringing on gyms, athletes and students into the federation as members by offering as much value as I can and as many pathways and opportunities for everyone involved. I have also launched talent scouting sessions,” Cranny explained, “in four states and we are close to launching our brand new website.”
At last year’s IMMAF – WMMAA Unified World Championships, the Australian national team earned a bronze medal via former number-one ranked senior middleweight, Jospeh Luciano, who has since completed a successful pro debut with victory on ONE Championship’s ONE Warrior Series.
Senior Flyweight competitor Alish Smith is currently Australia’s highest ranked athlete with the nation in 8th position in the senior national team rankings.
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