Background check: Fedor ‘The Last Emperor’ Emelianenko

Fedor was born on September 28th 1976 in Ukrainian SSR. He is 6ft and weighs in at 233lbs with a 74 inch reach. He holds a black belt in Judo and is an international Sambo and Judo master. Fedor has won gold and bronze in the men’s Russian Judo Championships, and has won 12 gold and 3 bronze medals in Sambo championships in Europe, Russia and the world championships. He made his debut in the Japanese fight banner RINGS in 200 where he submitted Martin Lazarov via guillotine choke. He has since built up a record of 32-1 1NC (9ko,16sub).

Fedor went on to fight ten more times under the RINGS banner, winning all of his fights and the tournament’s absolute class final, before he moved in to PRIDE FC. His PRIDE debut was against the giant Dutch kickboxer Semmy Schilt. Schilt, who had a huge height advantage over Fedor, was dominated and lost via unanimous decision. He then went on to win the PRIDE Heavyweight championship in an exciting fight against Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira which he defended 3 times against Big Nog agin, Mirko Cro Cop and Mark Hunt. He also won the PRIDE Grand Prix. In one exciting fight at Pride final conflict 2005 Fedor beat Zuluzinho, a man 7 inches taller and 174lbs heavier, with devastating ground and pound. Since the end of PRIDE Fedor has won the WAMMA Heavyweight title by beating Tim Sylvia via submission and has defended the title twice by knocking out Andrei Arlovski and Brett Rogers in Affliction and Strikeforce respectively.

Fedor’s next fight is rumored to be against former PRIDE fighter and current Strikeforce HW Champ Alistair Overeem who is yet to defend his Strikeforce title. Many feel that Fedor has already cemented his status as the best P4P fighter on the planet. With his only loss via stoppage due to cuts avenged with a TKO victory, and seeing that he has knocked out and submitted numerous ex UFC and PRIDE champions it seems hard to argue against his number one status. Although there are still critics who feel he is yet to prove himself. Whatever the case I feel he has provided some of the greatest moments in MMA history and he still has more to give.