by a unanimous decision, and then dropped a split decision loss to hard hitting K-1 veteran Mark Hunt at PRIDE Shockwave 2005. Coming into the 2006 Openweight Grand Prix, Cro Cop TKO'd two Japanese legends, Pancrase veteran Ikuhisa Minowa in the opening round, and 1992 Olympic Judo Gold Medalist Hidehiko Yoshida in the quarterfinal. On his 32nd birthday, he met Wanderlei Silva at Pride Final Conflict Absolute in the semi-finals, where he put on one of his best performances, defeating the Middleweight champion with his trademark head kick knockout. This put him in the final against Josh Barnett, a fighter whom he would face for the third time in his career. After exchanging in the stand up, Cro Cop was able to posture in Barnett's guard - landing many punches. At 7:32 of the first round, Barnett tapped to strikes, earning Cro Cop his first belt in his MMA career - the PRIDE 2006 Openweight Grand Prix championship. When PRIDE president Nobuyuki Sakakibara placed the belt around Cro Cop's waist, Cro Cop broke down in tears and addressed the crowd in attendance, saying "This is the happiest day in my life. It's my 32nd birthday, and I want to thank all my fans in the arena, and all around the world for supporting me during my career. I love you, thank you." Many have cited the performances that night as Cro Cop's finest - leading Wanderlei Silva's trainer, Rudimar Federigo to say, "That was Mirko's day. He fought two perfect fights and I believe even Fedor could lose to him on that night." Josh Barnett would later say - despite facing top fighters like Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira, Randy Couture, Frank Mir and Andrei Arlovski - that Cro Cop was the best fighter he ever faced in his career. After winning the belt, Cro Cop revealed some more of his emotions behind the victory in the backstage interview with Frank Trigg, All I can say is this is the happiest day of my life. Definitely. I was waiting for this for 10 long years and finally - I knew that I'm the best, but some circumstances just didn't let me do that. To go to the end, and I proved to all the people who were talking that I'm finished, that I'm done after Fedor's fight, that I am number one. Believe it or not, and I swear with everything I