Wladimir Klitschko

The 21-year career of two times world heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko from Ukraine came to a shocking end after he recently announced his retirement from the boxing world ending all possibilities of a rematch against current world champion Anthony Joshua. Many people speculate that the Ukrainian’s defeat to Anthony Joshua in one of the best heavyweight fights, the 11 round match ended with Klitschko being knocked out.

A rematch was anticipated for November in Las Vegas if he was to agree to Joshua’s request. The 41-year-old announced his retirement via a video on his website which sparked a lot of reaction from boxing fans making his website crash for some time. Before becoming a professional boxer, in 1996 Olympic games in Atlanta he won gold in super heavyweight. Klitschko won the WBO heavyweight championship belt in 2000 against Chris Bryd from America and managed to successfully manage to defend his title five times and all by total knockouts. In 2003 his fight against Corrie Sanders in which Klitschko was knocked out twice was named The Ring Magazine Upset of the year.

Dr. Steelhammer as he was popularly referred to went unbeaten for 11 years until he lost his titles to Tyson Fury. His defeat to Fury marked the end of the Klitschko era in heavyweight division, a rematch against Fury was postponed severally until Fury exited the WBC and WBO titles. Vladimir has fought a total of 64 matches managed 64 wins of which 53 were knockouts, won 25 titles and only Joe Louis has won more titles than him. Wladimir Klitschko is the younger brother to Vitali Klitschko a former WBO and WBC champion and also the current mayor of Kiev. The Ukrainian speaks Russian, English, German and Ukrainian, he also holds a Ph.D. in sports. The Klitschko era in boxing is when the Klitschko brothers Wladimir and Vitali dominated the heavyweight division.