Garry Tonon returns to Polaris after more than nine years away. He headlines Polaris 40 against Ireland's Sam McNally for the Polaris Lightweight Championship. The event takes place at Southampton Central Hall on 21 November and will be shown live on FloGrappling.
Tonon was never beaten in five Polaris appearances. He heel hooked Marcin Held at Polaris 1 in January 2015, Masakazu Imanari at Polaris 2 in September 2015 and Gilbert Burns at Polaris 4 in October 2016. Between those he drew with Rousimar Palhares at Polaris 3, and he last competed for the promotion at Polaris 5 on 19 August 2017, when he beat Dillon Danis by unanimous decision. He has spent most of the years since in MMA with ONE Championship.
The match is a rematch. At ADCC 2022 in Las Vegas, McNally beat Tonon 3-0 on points in the opening round of the 66 kg division, where Tonon was the top seed.
Moody drops to light heavyweight
The second main card match pits two ADCC European champions against each other. Declan Moody, the reigning WNO GP champion, drops to light heavyweight to face Polaris Squads champion Santeri Lilius. Moody was born in Worksop, England, and grew up in Australia, and he now competes for M16. Lilius, who is originally from Finland, runs the LiliusBarnatt Martial Arts academy on the Costa del Sol in Spain.
Norway's Espen Mathiesen of Mavericks Jiu Jitsu also returns. After switching his focus to no-gi, he is working towards a shot at the Polaris middleweight title, and his first test is black belt and academy coach Sam Gibson. Carson Coles is back at Polaris against Dinu Bucalet, who has not competed for the promotion since a submission win at Polaris 30 in 2024.
Prelims
The prelim card keeps growing. Confirmed matches so far include Greg Doulton against George Belcher, Will Nichols against Franck Takoudjou and Callie Nelson against Destiny Beer. Melissa Hill, Connor Tymon, Dylan Carreira Miguel, Harry Fall, Justin Moore and Rodrigo Mariani also have prelim matches.
