[24] On 11 August 2009 Ghiță broke Peter Aerts' record of fastest K-1 tournament win by defeating all three of his opponents in a total of 5 minutes and 15 seconds.

On 6 March 2011 Daniel Ghiță faced the Chakuriki fighter Hesdy Gerges and the current It's Showtime Heavyweight champion in Amsterdam.

Ghiță was a slight underdog as Gerges almost beat Semmy Schilt the previous year and gave Badr Hari trouble in their fight.

Ghiță was scheduled to face Polish-Australian fighter Paul Slowinski at the It's Showtime 2011 Lyon, but his opponent pulled out and was replaced by Fikri Ameziane.

After backing up Gerges to the neutral corner in the first round he knocked Hesdy out with a left hook and won his biggest world title to date in the process.

[26] On 10 March 2012, it was Sergei Lascenko's turn to be defeated by the Savage Samurai via third-round TKO (head kick) at Mirko Filipović's Final Fight in Zagreb, Croatia.

[27] On 12 May the Romanian beat Brian Douwes at It's Showtime 56 in the second round (2:16) by KO with a single counter left hook.

[28] At the It's Showtime 2012 Brussels, he scored his 7th straight win by KO with a 2nd round liver kick of his Bosnian opponent Dževad Poturak.

[29] In his previous fight at the K-1 World Grand Prix in Madrid, Ghiță fought Wendell Roche until his corner threw in the towel in round two.

[34] He defeated Diniz by unanimous decision after two, two-minute rounds due to the tournament's "best of three" format and advanced to the quarter-finals to face Mourad Bouzidi.

An anticipated rematch with Semmy Schilt awaited him in the final, and, after a slow start to the three-minute first round, the Dutchman sent Ghiță to the canvas with a left high kick.

Despite seemingly recovering from the blow, referee Joop Ubeda called a halt to the contest, giving Schilt the TKO win.

[43][44][45][46] In the semi-finals of Glory 11: Chicago - Heavyweight World Championship Tournament in Hoffman Estates, Illinois, United States in October 2013,[47][48][49] Ghiță stopped Anderson "Braddock" Silva with a first round body kick.

[64] In November 2015, Ghiță joined the United Romania Party (PRU), that being the kickboxing world champion's first involvement with Romanian politics.

[65] In October 2020, Ghiță joined the Social Democratic Party (PSD), to run for the Chamber of Deputies of Romania in the next legislative elections.