Hiromitsu Kanehara Ryuki Ueyama Koichiro Kimura Hiroyuki Ito Yoshinori Nishi Foreigners RINGS' system was largely much inspired by organizations such as the National Wrestling Alliance and FIFA, and featured fighters from different countries organized into stables. These foreign fighters would then compete against RINGS' Japanese competitors and against each other. Stables Netherlands – Dick Vrij, Hans Nijman, Gilbert Yvel, Joop Kasteel, Bob Schrijber, Herman Renting, Valentijn Overeem, Alistair Overeem, Chris Dolman. Australia – Chris Haseman, Elvis Sinosic. Bulgaria – Todor Todorov, Dimitar Petkov, Georgi Tonkov, Borislav Jeliazkov. Georgia – Zaza Tkeshelashvili, Tariel Bitsadze, Amiran Bitsadze. Russia – Fedor Emelianenko, Andrei Kopylov, Bazigit Atajev, Nikolai Zuyev, Mikhail Illoukhine, Volk Han. Brazil – Antônio Rodrigo Nogueira, Ricardo Arona, Renato Sobral, Gustavo Machado, Renzo Gracie. United Kingdom – Lee Hasdell, Chris Watts, Dexter Casey and Paul Cahoon. United States – Randy Couture, Dan Henderson, Kerry Schall, Bobby Hoffman, Jeremy Horn. Decline Maeda retired from active duty in 1998, leaving Tamura as the top star, but the collapse of UWF International and the subsequent rise of PRIDE provided competition that proved to be too much for the promotion. On February 15, 2002, RINGS ceased activity. Many Japanese RINGS stars, including Masayuki Naruse, Wataru Sakata and Hiroyuki Ito, made the transition back into traditional puroresu (although Naruse continued to compete sporadically in MMA). Kiyoshi Tamura, Hiromitsu Kanehara, Yoshihisa Yamamoto and Tsuyoshi Kosaka continued competing in MMA, most notably for PRIDE. Mitsuya Nagai began a career in kickboxing before returning to traditional puroresu. The MMA promotion ZST was founded in November 2002 to accommodate former Japanese RINGS fighters who remained competitors in mixed martial arts. Revival Following the dissolution of Hero's and the conclusion of Maeda's involvement with FEG, Maeda revived the RINGS brand for a new series of MMA events named The Outsider. The first RINGS The Outsider event occurred on March 30, 2008. Over a dozen Outsider events have been held since. The brand was resurrected once more on January 22, 2012 with Battle Genesis: Vol. 9, Volume 8 took place on September 20, 2001. The event was sanctioned by fellow mixed martial arts promotion ZST. See also List of Fighting Network Rings events References External links Rings event results at Sherdog Japanese professional wrestling promotions Mixed martial arts organizations Sports organizations established in 1991 1991 establishments in Japan