How is there both a heavyweight and an interim heavyweight champion
 

When Randy left the UFC, it wasnt clear that he would ever come back, and as long as he was contracted with the UFC, and they were still trying to get him back, he stayed the UFC Champion. However, that put the Heavyweight belt in limbo and they wanted to mark a true number one contender with a belt, and the way to do that is with an interim belt. The match with mir and nog for the interim belt was made before it was clear that randy would come back, so that is why randy didnt come back and fight Nog right away.


The same thing happened when Mir was the heavyweight champ and got hurt. Arlovski won the interim match and waited for Mir to return. When it was clear that Mir would not return, they stripped him of the title and andrei became the undisputed champion.

I don't follow MMA very much, but I can answer this question.

Randy Couture was Heavyweight champ, but disputes lead him to leave. So while they were trying to work it out with him, they didn't want to take the title away from him, but they wanted a title. So they made an interim champ.

Then Couture came back and lost the actual belt to Lesnar.

I assume some sort of unification bout will eventually happen.

Yeah the winner of Mir/Nog will face Lesnar to unify the titles.

Nog vs Lesnar baby!

Also, Couture vacated the title and the UFC refused to accept it as it would have given him legal grounds for a contract release.

The Interim Title was decided between Nogiera and Tim Sylvia (aka "The Troll."). Nog was rocked in the first round, like he always is. He comes back, pulls the Troll into guard in the third, and taps him out via Guillotine.

Perhaps the third most satisfying Troll loss ever, behind Mir breaking his arm and Fedor eating him for alive.

Fedor one was easily better.

So in short

The interim title is like a No 1 Contender for the belt whenever the title itself is not avialable

No, he has to beat Mir for the Interim title.

nog*

yeah, dunno where my brain was for that one.

UFC 92 is gonna be incredible

haha watch every fight find a way to suck

I hope not, because I'm actually considering getting a few peeps to come over and watch it (instead of streaming it)

lol :'(

Mir probably thinks he is such a super athlete that I wouldn't put it past him.

Maybe if Frank Mir could beat Ian Freeman he'll have a shot...

Well if that fight happened now, Mir would kill him. Having said that though, he still got humbled BAD in what was at the time the biggest shock in UFC history.

LOL ah memories