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UFC OFFICIALLY ANNOUNCES BROCK LESNAR'S NEXT FIGHT

UFC issued the following press release:

LESNAR FACES ‘BIGGEST’ TEST TO DATE AGAINST CARWIN AT UFC 106®
PLUS THE RETURN OF FORMER CHAMPION TITO ORTIZ
Live from Mandalay Bay Events Center, Saturday, November 21

Las Vegas, NV (USA) – Brock Lesnar has faced  some of the best heavyweight fighters in the world. The Ultimate Fighting Championship® heavyweight title holder dominated seasoned veteran Heath Herring and put away former UFC® champions Randy Couture and Frank Mir. On Saturday, Nov. 21, Lesnar will have to pick on someone his own size when he takes on the undefeated 6-foot-3, 262-pound top contender Shane Carwin at UFC 106: LESNAR vs. CARWIN, live from the Mandalay Bay Events Center in Las Vegas, Nev. Also on the card, one of the brightest stars in UFC history returns, as former light heavyweight champion Tito Ortiz battles UFC Hall of Famer Mark Coleman in what promises to be a ground war of epic proportions.

“Brock Lesnar has been tearing through everyone over the last year,” said UFC President Dana White. “But in Shane Carwin, he’s not only fighting someone as big as he is, he’s fighting someone who has ended all of his fights in less than three minutes. This is literally the biggest heavyweight title fight ever and may also be the most explosive.”

Tickets for UFC 106, priced at $1,000, $750, $500, $300, $200 and $100, not including applicable service charges, go on sale Saturday, Sept. 19 at noon PT at all Las Vegas Ticketmaster locations (select Smith’s Food and Drug Centers and Ritmo Latino). To charge by phone with a major credit card, call Ticketmaster at (800) 745-3000. Tickets also are available for purchase at www.UFC.com, www.mandalaybay.com, or www.ticketmaster.com.

UFC® Fight Club™ members will have the opportunity to purchase tickets to this event Thursday, Sept. 17 at 10 a.m. PT via the website www.ufc.com. A special Internet ticket pre-sale will be available to UFC newsletter subscribers Friday, Sept. 18 starting at 10 a.m. PT. To access this presale, users must register for the UFC newsletter through www.ufc.com.

UFC 106 will be available live on pay-per-view on iN DEMAND, DIRECTV, DISH Network, TVN, BellTV, Shaw Communications and Viewer’s Choice Canada for a suggested retail price of $44.95 for standard definition or high-definition broadcasts (where available).

A fighter that has dominated the competition in his last three bouts, Brock Lesnar (fighting out of Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minn.) is a four-time All-American, two-time Big Ten Champion, and 2000 NCAA Division I National Champion college wrestler who has parlayed his amateur successes into a UFC world championship. A gifted athlete with the size, speed and power to impose his will on any opponent, the 6-foot-3 ½, 265-pound champion with a 4-1 professional record earned the UFC heavyweight title with a second-round TKO victory over UFC Hall of Famer Couture, then successfully defended his title at UFC 100 in impressive fashion with another second-round TKO against former UFC champ Mir. Now the 32-year-old Webster, South Dakota native looks to put the first blemish on Carwin’s record.

“I'm excited to get back in the Octagon on November 21st to defend my title,” Lesnar said. “I’m looking forward to fighting Shane Carwin. “He’s undefeated and I’m the man who is going to put an end to that.”

Shane Carwin (fighting out of Denver, Colo.) has done nothing short of destroying his competition. The former NCAA Division II national wrestling champion and All-American college football player has put away all three of his UFC opponents in under two minutes. The 34-year-old from Greeley, Colo. handed TKO losses to Christian Wellisch and Neil Wain before turning heads in the mixed martial arts community with a devastating 69-second knockout victory against title contender Gabriel Gonzaga. The heavy-handed heavyweight remains a perfect 11-0 in his pro MMA career and faces his toughest challenge to date.

“I was extremely excited when I got the news that I was fighting Brock,” Carwin said. “I couldn’t even sleep that night. This fight is going to be different for both of us. We’re not used to facing someone who equals us in size. I can see this fight taking place everywhere. We both have wrestling backgrounds, but hopefully we’ll get into some exchanges on the feet too.”
With the world heavyweight title already on the line, the world’s MMA leader has bolstered the UFC 106 card with the addition of the longest reigning light heavyweight champion in its history, as former 205-pound boss Tito Ortiz (fighting out of Huntington Beach, Calif.) makes his return to the Octagon™ after a year and a half break. With wins over Forrest Griffin, Vitor Belfort, Ken Shamrock and Wanderlei Silva, Ortiz has mixed it up with the best in the world over the course of his career, and the 34-year-old with 14 wins in the UFC is now injury-free and planning to make another run at the light heavyweight title.

“It’s like a homecoming for me,” Ortiz said. “The back is 100 percent and it’s great to be returning to the UFC. Styles make fights and our styles are exactly the same. I expect a war and I expect more excitement from this match than anything else this year. There are a lot of people out there that expect me to succeed and there are a lot of people out there that expect me to fail. But I feel great and I’m expecting to win back my belt.”

Like Ortiz, Mark Coleman (fighting out of Columbus, Ohio) is a former UFC champion who wants to make a run in the light heavyweight division. At 44 years old, “The Godfather of Ground-and-pound” took it to the much younger Stephan Bonnar in July, earning a unanimous decision victory and proving that he has plenty left in the tank. The former NCAA Division I national champion wrestler from Ohio State parlayed that success into a UFC heavyweight championship and now this Hall of Famer looks for the 17th professional win of his storied career.

For more information, or current UFC fight news, visit www.UFC.com; www.UK.UFC.com; www.UFCESPANOL.com or www.GERMANY.UFC.com. All bouts are live and subject to change.

About The Ultimate Fighting Championship®

The Ultimate Fighting Championship® is the world’s leading professional mixed martial arts organization and offers the premier series of MMA sports events. Owned and operated by Zuffa, LLC, and headquartered in Las Vegas, Nev., UFC® produces over twelve live pay-per-view events annually that are distributed residentially through North American cable and satellite providers including iNDEMAND Networks, DIRECTV, DISH Network, TVN Entertainment, BellTV, SaskTel Max™, Shaw Pay-Per-View, Viewers Choice, and WOWOW in Japan, and via the Internet worldwide on Yahoo! Sports, and commercially through Joe Hand Promotions in the U.S. and Canadastar in Canada. In addition to its North American distribution, UFC programming is distributed in over 100 countries and territories throughout the world. For more information, or current UFC fight news, visit ufc.com or uk.ufc.com or ufcespanol.com.

Ultimate Fighting Championship®, Ultimate Fighting®, UFC®, The Ultimate Fighter®, Submission®, As Real As It Gets®, Zuffa™, The Octagon™ and the eight-sided competition mat and cage design are registered trademarks, trademarks, trade dress or service marks owned exclusively by Zuffa, LLC in the United States and other jurisdictions. All other marks referenced herein may be the property of Zuffa, LLC or other respective owners.

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