Bellator middleweight champion Hector Lombard will return to action for the first time since June to take on former UFC fighter Kalib Starnes at a Cage Fighting Championship event on Oct. 9 in Queensland, Australia. News of the bout was first reported by MMAWeekly.com.

Bellator Fighting Championships cleared Lombard to compete in the bout against Starnes. Lombard is the second Bellator FC champion to land a fight outside the promotion as featherweight champion Joe Soto will fight Mike Christensen on Oct. 8. Bellator has been allowing its champions to take fights outside of the organization as the promotion isn't expected to begin its next season until March 2010.

Lombard is no stranger to the Cage Fighting Championship organization as he won the promotion's middleweight title and is unbeaten in six bouts with the organization. He put together a 5-0-1 record with the CFC prior to joining with Bellator, gaining wins in the promotion over the likes of Tristan Yunker and Brian Ebersole.

Lombard (21-2-1) has put together an amazing 15-fight unbeaten streak and is coming off an impressive performance in Bellator FC's inaugural middleweight tournament, earning wins over Virgil Lozano, Damien Stelly, and most recently Jared Hess in June en route to earning a $100,000 paycheck.

The Pride and Deep veteran, Lombard, has not lost a fight since being defeated by current Strikeforce light-heavyweight champion Gegard Mousasi in November 2006. Also of note, he has finished 16 of his 21 career wins including 11 by TKO or KO.

Starnes (9-3-1) is coming off a win over Chris Cisneros at last November's Destiny MMA debut event in Hawaii. Prior to the win, he was released from the UFC after losing two straight bouts against Nate Quarry and Alan Belcher.

However, its the loss to Quarry at UFC 83 that fans most remember Starnes for. The Canadian put forth an embarrassing and highly controversial performance by running and back pedaling from his opponent nearly the whole fight due to a broken foot he suffered in the first round of the bout.

Despite the poor performance at UFC 83, Starnes showed promise in previous fights by finishing all but one of his nine career wins. He holds notable wins over Jason MacDonald and Chris Leben.