Former UFC Heavyweight Champion Frank Mir returned from a two year USADA suspension to suffer a first round knockout loss to Fedor Emelianenko at Bellator 198.
Mir is ready to fight again, but the next bout will come under the Absolute Championship Berkut (ACB) banner instead of Bellator MMA.
“The next time we come down here to England, I believe it’s sometime in August we’re looking at. I hoped to headline one of the ACB cards going on at that time, we’re still working on an opponent, at that point when we have something more official, we will have more exact details. Hopefully we will be back here and I’ll be making my second appearance in the UK,” Mir said at the ACB 87 pre-fight press conference.
The heavyweight star hasn’t competed in the UK since a loss to Ian Freeman at UFC 38 in July of 2002.
Once Mir is done competing for ACB, fans can expect to see him back in the Bellator cage by October.
“Honestly, I don’t really have a perspective on that,” Mir said. “I took two years off and coming back and fighting Fedor Emelianenko probably wasn’t the easiest coming off that layoff for an opponent. Just anything to get more ring time. My goal is to fight 3 times this year and I’m 39 in a few weeks so I don’t have many competitions ahead of me. Between Bellator and ACB, I’ll fight over here (in England) in August and hopefully get a Bellator fight in October and just hope to keep it rolling, get back in form and then get back in title contention.”
There is no opponent set yet for Mir in his ACB debut, but that announcement should be coming within the next few weeks.
