Profile of Mirko Cro Cop Filipovic on Famous Like Me

Mirko Filipovic
Statistics
Nickname	Cro Cop
Height	6 ft 2 in (188 cm)
Weight	213 lb (97 kg)
Born	September 10, 1974
Town of birth	Croatia
Fighting style	kickboxing
Mixed martial arts record
Wins	16
By knockout	12
By submission	2
Losses	3
Draws	2

Mirko "Cro Cop" Filipović (born on September 10, 1974) is a Croatian-born kickboxer turned mixed martial artist. He is among the few martial artists who have been highly successful in fighting in both K-1 and Pride Fighting Championships.

Filipović is perhaps best-known for his left high-kicks, the most dangerous weapon in his arsenal; upon impact with the head, numerous opponents have been knocked out instantly.

He currently lives in Zagreb with his wife and son.

Biography

Martial Arts career

Filipović started his professional career in 1996 as a kickboxer, following the footsteps of his compatriot Branko Cikatić. At the time, Filipović was working as a commando in the Croatian police anti-terrorist unit Alpha (stationed in Lučko near Zagreb), which earned him his nickname Cro Cop. He also fought several times early in his career under the nickname Tiger.

K-1

His biggest success in kickboxing was the 1999 K-1 Grand Prix. Filipović made it to the final, where he was stopped by Ernesto Hoost - major factor in that loss being a broken rib sustained in the semi-final match.

PRIDE FC

In 2001, Filipović began his switch to fighting in PRIDE, citing personal challenge, as well as dissatisfaction with K-1 salaries. A year later, he also left his job at the anti-terrorist unit in order to focus fully on his martial arts career. Since then, Filipović maintained a comparably low kickboxing profile, but nevertheless scored some impressive K-1 victories, most notably against Mark Hunt in March 2002 (unanimous decision), Remy Bonjasky in July 2002 (2nd round TKO), and Bob Sapp in April 2003 (1st round KO).

The Cro-cop's string of PRIDE wins secured him a chance to fight for the interm heavyweight champion title against Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira in November 2003. Filipović's stand-up fighting proved effective in the first round, controlling the fight from his feet. However, Nogueira prevailed in the second round after a successful takedown, forcing Filipović to submit to an armbar after being mounted. Filipović admitted to Bas Rutten in a later interview that he was overconfident against Nogueira.

In 2004, Filipović put his K-1 career on hold, and recruited Fabricio Werdum (a Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu expert and former world champion) as his coach, working on improving his ground fighting skills. At the PRIDE GP heavyweight tournament in 2004, he was knocked out in an upset defeat by Kevin Randleman. Filipović made up for this loss by submitting Randleman in a rematch at the end of 2004.

Filipović repeatedly requested PRIDE to let him challenge the heavyweight champion Fedor Emelianenko. After winning six straight matches since his defeat by Randleman, including a knock-out victory against Aleksander Emelianenko (the 6'6", 275 lb brother of the champion), Filipović received a chance to fight Emelianenko for the title on August 28, 2005 at Pride's Final Conflict 2005 event. After 3 rounds, Emelianenko won by unanimous decision and retained his title.

Political career

In November 2003, Filipović ran as a non-party candidate on the Social Democratic Party list in parliamentary elections and attained a seat in the Croatian Parliament.

This content from Wikipedia is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article Mirko Cro Cop Filipovic