{"id":643513,"date":"2026-05-02T18:20:15","date_gmt":"2026-05-02T18:20:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/643513\/"},"modified":"2026-05-02T18:20:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T18:20:15","slug":"paddy-pimblett-vs-benoit-saint-denis-set-for-ufc-329-robert-whittaker-to-make-lhw-debut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/643513\/","title":{"rendered":"Paddy Pimblett vs. Benoit Saint Denis set for UFC 329, Robert Whittaker to make LHW debut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A key lightweight bout between Paddy Pimblett and Benoit Saint Denis has been added to July\u2019s UFC 329 event in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n<p>The fight was originally reported by Alvaro Colmenero and later confirmed by the folks at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mmamania.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">MMA Mania<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Paddy Pimblett (23-4 MMA) will be returning to action for the first time since suffering a decision loss to Justin Gaethje in a fight for the promotion\u2019s interim lightweight title this past January at UFC 324. That setback snapped a nine-fight winning streak for \u2018The Baddy\u2019, a stretch which included stoppage victories over Michael Chandler and King Green.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Benoit Saint Denis (17-3 MMA) currently boasts a four-fight win streak, with his most recent victory coming by way of TKO against Dan Hooker this past February at UFC 325 (see that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/benoit-saint-denis\/ufc-325-results-benoit-saint-denis-stops-dan-hooker-video\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>). Prior to that triumph, \u2018God of War\u2019 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bjpenn.com\/mma-news\/benoit-saint-denis\/ufc-322-results-benoit-saint-denis-kos-beneil-dariush-video\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">knocked out<\/a> Beneil Dariush in just 16-seconds at UFC 322.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to \u2018Pimblett vs. Saint Denis\u2019, UFC 329 will also reportedly showcase the light heavyweight debut of former UFC middleweight champion Robert Whittaker.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-536446\" class=\"size-full wp-image-536446\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/Robert-Whittaker.jpg\" alt=\"Robert Whittaker\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\"   data-eio=\"p\"\/><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-536446\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">(via Zuffa LLC)<\/p>\n<p>Whittaker (26-9 MMA) will apparently be taking on Nikita Krylov this coming International Fight Week. \u2018The Reaper\u2019 will enter the bout on two-fight losing skid, this after suffering a split decision loss to Reinier de Ridder and submission defeat to Khamzat Chimaev.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, Nikita Krylov (31-11 MMA) most recently competed in the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.ufc.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">Octagon<\/a> this past January at UFC 324, where he scored a third-round knockout victory over Modestas Bukauskas. That triumph snapped a two-fight losing skid for \u2018The Miner\u2019, who had previously suffered back-to-back knockout losses to Dominick Reyes and Bogdan Guskov.<\/p>\n<p>If that wasn\u2019t enough to get you excited, UFC 329 is also set to feature the following contests:<\/p>\n<p>170lbs.: Leon Edwards vs. Daniel Rodriguez<br \/>135lbs.: Cory Sandhagen vs. Mario Bautista<br \/>125lbs.: Cody Durden vs. Ode Osbourne<\/p>\n<p>Also rumored for the fight card is the debut of highly touted heavyweight prospect Gable Steveson.<\/p>\n<p>Stay tuned to the site for further announcements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A key lightweight bout between Paddy Pimblett and Benoit Saint Denis has been added to July\u2019s UFC 329&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":643514,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[49,48,641,638,82],"class_list":["post-643513","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mma","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-fighting","tag-mma","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643513","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=643513"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643513\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/643514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=643513"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=643513"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=643513"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}