Kumate in Zilker Park!

Austin cops busted a Fight Club-style boxing match last Saturday in Zilker Park, near MoPac and Rollingwood Drive. It seems that Westlake High School kids (and adults) gathered there for years to watch these unsanctioned fisticuffs. From the Statesman:

Apparently one of many held during the past few years, Saturday's match was reminiscent of the 1999 movie "Fight Club," in which two men organize an underground fighting group ... In one video of a fight between two girls, Creasey said, officers saw evidence that one combatant had broken the other's nose ... According to some parents and students at Westlake, Fight Night has been an ongoing underground event for several years.

We're more than a little miffed that we never got an Evite, especially since we live so close to the venue and would gladly have offered our amateur referee services. Then again, we probably don't drive the right cars for the 8E set. Austin police responded to anonymous tips by bringing out the heavy hitters:

Ingram said that after one of the rounds was completed, an undercover officer in the crowd, "pulled his shirt up, flashed his gun, flashed his badge and said, 'Everybody down!' "

Ingram estimated that 15 to 20 officers, many emerging from the woods, "completely surrounded us with 3-foot batons in their hands. . . . (Several officers) had hands on their guns. I saw a lot of hands on holsters ready to pull them out. They made it like their big SWAT bust."

According to the news report, the WESTLAKE FIGHT CLUB website was almost immediately dismantled following the arrests. Sadly, we found no record of its existence.