World Heavyweight Championship boxing: The past 30+ years of the male division

Abstract

Data from the past 30+ years of the male boxing World Heavyweight Championship (n = 182 bouts) was obtained. The USA were the most represented and produced more champions than any other nation, followed by the UK, Ukraine and Russia. Denmark (100%), Ukraine (85.4%) and the UK (67.3%) produced the greatest ‘success rates’ in World Heavyweight Championship contests. Where possible, comparisons between bout winners and losers were also made. Winners were significantly taller (p < 0.001, d = 0.35) and had a greater reach (p = 0.003, d = 0.23) when compared to losers. Championship bouts were settled by the following methods: a form of knockout (101), points decision (57), retirement (14), draw (3), disqualification (3), technical decision (1), whilst 3 no contests were omitted from the analysis. Total punches thrown and landed, and jabs and power punches thrown and landed were consistently significantly greater (p < 0.005, d = 0.27–0.73) in winners, compared to losers. Winners were more accurate compared to their losing counterparts by ~ 8 percentage points. The data presented in the present study clearly show some anthropometric advantages of championship bout winners, compared to their unsuccessful counterparts, and that winners are more active and accurate when compared to losers. The punch output data, albeit very basic, may be useful in informing tactical strategy and preparation of heavyweight prospects. Likewise, the data in the present study may be an interesting resource for professional boxing enthusiasts. Future research should seek to replicate the analysis in the present study across other weight divisions to explore any potential differences between weight classes. Additionally, extending the analysis to female boxing may provide interesting comparisons.

Professional male modern boxing: An analysis of activity profile by category

“…The boxers threw an average of 443.93 TPT and conceded a total of 26.34% PL during the fight, with PPT being the most-used punches (248.79) and more accurate to land in the valid scoring zone (34.95% PPL) compared to the jabs (195.12 JT and 15.96% JL). These values are somewhat heterogeneous (Finlay, 2022), with 320.1 TPT, 34.6% PL, who agrees with other studies on amateur boxing (Kruszewski et al, 2016) in which it is stated that the punches most used by boxers are the jabs, with a total of 53.8% of the punches thrown, but which is in agreement with our work that power punches are more accurate compared with jabs with averages of 42.4% PPL and 27.9% JL respectively. These differences might be caused by the fact that the cited study was carried out only with the heavyweight category, since these works were not homogeneous with respect to the categories analyzed (Thomson, 2015).…”

“…The boxers' characteristic records and anthropometric data were obtained from www.boxrec.com and those of the punching actions from beta.compuboxdata.com, both free access websites. Several studies have previously accessed these websites (Finlay, 2022;Pic, 2018;Pic & Jonsson, 2021).…”

“…Studies undertaken to identify boxing parameters and professional boxing profiles (Finlay, 2022;Pic, 2018;Pic & Jonsson, 2021) are scarce and only one of them aims to obtain records of the punching activity. An analysis was conducted to compare fights between winners and losers in the heavyweight category, stating that boxers throw an average of 320.1 punches per fight, 37.6 punches per round, and land 34.6% of punches thrown.…”

“…172.4 Jabs are thrown per fight and 27.29% land, and of the 147.8 punches thrown with power, 42.4% land. Winners have a higher average number of punches thrown and greater accuracy during these events (Finlay, 2022).…”

Has Covid-19 pandemic influenced the performance of top-class triathletes in the Sprint and Olympic dis-tance of the ITU World Triathlon Championship Series?

“…World Championships are attractive to the scientific community, and have been investigated in a wide range of sports (De La Rubia et al, 2020;Finlay, 2022;Hébert-Losier, Platt, & Hopkins, 2015), sometimes related somehow to triathlon (Haupt et al, 2013;Knechtle et al, 2020) but also very similar sports as duathlon (P. T. P. Nikolaidis, Villiger, Vancini, Rosemann, & Knechtle, 2018;.…”