Sports Illustrated: Fedor - The 8th Toughest Athlete

Sports Illustrated made a list of The 25 Toughest Athletes. Fedor Emelianenko was placed 8th, before the best boxer - Floyd Mayweather. This is

What makes him tough: Well, he's the toughest heavyweight in the world, and maybe the greatest heavyweight in mixed martial arts. Emelianenko, 31, is 27-1-1 in MMA and is a 10-time Sambo tournament champion, including four World Combat Sambo Championships. Ruthless Russian strongman Vladimir Putin shows up on occasion to watch him.


Defining moment: After a left hook tore a gash above his eye, the bloody Darth Fedor still needed only one round to beat Matt Lindland, the 2000 Olympic Greco-Roman wrestling silver medalist, in the much-hyped "Clash of the Nations" last year in St. Petersburg, Russia.

Old school match: Joe Frazier, who also scared the bejesus out of opponents with his appetite for destruction.

Interestingly, Fedor wasn't the best MMA fighter in that list - it was Anderson Silva, who was placed third. According to the journal, the toughest athlete is golf player Tiger Woods.