in UFC / MMA Articles

Unless you've been living under a rock you'll have heard all the media hype about odds for UFC 66 so place your bets now for one of the most anticipated battles of the year.

BetUS.com profiles Andrei "The Pitbull" Arlovski:

Andrei Arlovski was born in Minsk, Belarus (a former Soviet country) on February 4, 1979. He became involved in martial arts when he was 18. Arlovski enrolled and was educated in the police academy in Minsk. As a part of the training, he learned Sambo. Sambo is a modern martial art, combat sport and self-defense system developed in the former Soviet Union. It is also one of the four main forms of amateur competitive wrestling practiced internationally.

It turned out that the young Arlovski was a natural. After finding his new talent in Sambo, Arlovski went on to win the youth European Sambo Championship, the World Youth Sambo Championships and later won a silver medal at the Sambo World Cup and World Championships.

The Pitbull began taking a greater interest in other martial arts, studying kickboxing and developing striking skills to complement his Sambo-based grappling abilities.

Arlovski began his professional MMA career at the Mix Fight M-1 in St Petersburg, Russia in April 1999. Arlovski lost the bout, and was KO'd by Viacheslav Datsik after 6 minutes, 5 seconds. Undeterred by the loss, Andrei came back in 2000 to take his first heavyweight title in the M-1 European Championships, with by TKO. Arlovski now lives, trains and fights from Chicago, USA.

Arlovski made his UFC debut at UFC 28: High Stakes In this fight he defeated Aaron Brink by submission. He was then matched against top opposition early on in his UFC career, with tough losses against Ricco Rodriguez and Pedro Rizzo. Despite those early defeats, big wins over Ian Freeman and Vladimir Matyushenko boosted Arlovski into the UFC elite and made him a crowd favorite.

On February 5, 2005 at UFC 51: Super Saturday, Arlovski faced the previous heavyweight champion, Tim Sylvia, for the UFC "interim heavyweight title" (UFC Heavyweight Champ Frank Mir was injured after a motorcycle crash). Sylvia came into the bout as a strong favorite having won 16 straight MMA fights prior to his loss against UFC Heavyweight Champion Frank Mir. Arlovski dominated the fight and connected with an overhand right that floored Sylvia; he followed that up with an ankle lock on the ground that forced Sylvia to tap out at 47 seconds of the first round.

Arlovski made a subsequent defense of the interim title in June, at UFC 53, against Justin Eilers. Then on August 12, 2005, the UFC announced that it now recognized Arlovski as the Heavyweight Champion outright (Frank Mir had not fully recovered from his motorcycle accident). Arlovski's first defense of the UFC Heavyweight title took place on October 7 of that same year at UFC 55. Arlovski took just 15 seconds of round one to knock out top contender Paul Buentello.

Then came UFC 59 in April 2006; a rematch with Tim Sylvia. Arlovski knocked Sylvia down with a right hand blow early in round one. Sylvia protected himself on the ground and immediately got back up on his feet. Arlovski tried to finish Sylvia, but Sylvia countered with a short right hook to the chin. Arlovski was knocked out. Sylvia followed up with strikes on the ground until the referee stopped the match at 2:43 of the first round. Tim "The Manie-iac" Sylvia had beaten Arlovski to become the new UFC Heavyweight Champion.

The long awaited rematch between Arlovski and Sylvia came in July 2006 at UFC 61, dubbed "Bitter Rivals". Instead of the previous one-round fights, this turned out to be a five round battle of attrition. Neither fighter was able to land any knock-out strikes and in the end Sylvia won the fight by unanimous decision.

Arlovski hasn't fought since UFC 61 and will be looking to redeem himself and prove that he can once again come back to the top of the UFC.

The Pitbull's opponent at UFC 66 is Arlovski is Marcio "Pe-de-Pano" Cruz, a Brazilian MMA and Brazilian Jiu Jitsu fighter. Arlovski is a huge -500 favorite going into the fight, while Cruz is listed as a +350 underdog.

John Edwards is a freelance writer for BetUS.com and features regularly on Fight News.