Late Monday night, Ultimate Fighting Championship officials made the upcoming middleweight title bout between champion Anderson “The Spider” Silva (28-4) and challenger Yushin “Thunder” Okami (26-5) official for the UFC 134: Rio card in August.
It’s official. UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva will look to successfully defend his title for the ninth time when he faces the last man to beat him, number one contender Yushin Okami, at UFC 134 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on August 27th.
UFC 134: Silva vs. Okami will take place at the HSBC Arena in Rio de Janeiro and will mark the promotions second ever visit to Brazil. The promotion held their first event back in October of 1998, featuring a middleweight bout between two current well known UFC fighters, Vitor Belfort and Wanderlei Silva.
This will be the second meeting between Silva and Okami, who squared off back in January 2006 at a Rumble on the Rock 8 event in Honolulu, Hawaii. The fight ended in a disqualification loss to Silva after delivering an illegal upkick that left Okami unconscious in the first round.
Since that DQ loss, Silva has won fourteen straight fights, including a record eight straight title defenses. He is coming off a first round knockout of Belfort in the main event of UFC 126 last February.
Okami, meanwhile, is 12-3 since his meeting with Silva and is currently on a three fight win streak. He earned the title shot by defeating Nate Marquardt at UFC 122 in a title eliminator match.
The current, announced and rumored, UFC 134: Silva vs. Okami card appears as follows:
Official Bouts
Middleweight Championship bout: Anderson Silva (c) vs. Yushin Okami
Light Heavyweight bout: Forrest Griffin vs. Mauricio “Shogun” Rua
Lightweight bout: Edson Barboza vs. Ross Pearson
Light Heavyweight bout: Luiz Cane vs. Stanislav Nedkov
Middleweight bout: Maiquel Falcao vs. Tom Lawlor
Lightweight bout: Spencer Fisher vs. Thiago Tavares
Unofficial bouts:
Middleweight bout: Alexandre “Cacareco” Ferreira vs. Rousimar Palhares
Welterweight bout: David Mitchell vs. Paulo Thiago