It was a busy week for the women: female fight action kicked off mid-week with a seven bout, all-female card in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico on Wednesday night. Headlining the card was Westbury, N.Y.’s Alicia Ashley (20-9-1, 2 KO’s) defending the WBC super-bantamweight championship against Zenny Sotomayor (10-6-2, 8 KO’s). The challenger didn’t have what it takes to hang with the 46 year old champ, and was stopped in the fifth round making it her second consecutive loss with both being title opportunities.
It was the third title defense for Ashley, who won the strap in July of 2011 and had been a prior holder of the WIBF super-bantamweight and IWBF featherweight titles. Closing out her 14th year as a professional, the victory put her on a six fight winning streak.
Also on the card was Bronx native Maureen Shea (22-2, 11 KO’s) who took a six round decision over Lesly Morales (3-4-1). Other results from the card: Kenia Enriquez (8-0, 4 KO’s) W6 Karoli Lopez (5-5-1, 1 KO), Brenda Flores (6-1, 2 KO’s) TKO2 Guadalupe Bernal (0-1), Sandra Robles (5-1, 2 KO’s) RTD2 Cristina Sarmiento (0-1), Tania Enriquez (1-0, 1 KO) KO1 Dulce Galaviz (0-2), Carol Madrid (4-3, 2 KO’s) W4 Diana Gonzalez (5-8, 1 KO).
WBO light welterweight title holder Fernanda Soledad Alegre (16-1-1, 7 KO’s) fought a non-title bout in Argentina, defeating Maria Ruiz (4-5-1) by eight round decision. Alegre won the title in 2010 and has successfully defended it seven times, but hasn’t made a defense in nearly a year. This was her first bout since stopping Diana Ayala in four rounds last November. For Ruiz, this was her third consecutive loss.
Two world title bouts took place State-side; in California, Sindy Amador (11-1, 1 KO) and Amaris Quintana (6-2-2, 1 KO) met for the second time to contest for the vacant IFBA light flyweight title. In their first meeting 18 months ago, Amador took a six round decision and would move on to fight three more times before the rematch, winning twice and losing a WIBA title bout to Jolene Blackshear. She would defeat Quintana again in the rematch by 10 round decision to win the vacant title. Quintana hadn’t fought between the two bouts.
Moving east to Albany, N.Y., Lindsay Garbatt (8-6-2, 3 KO’s) defeated Jackie Trivilino (9-6-3, 1 KO) to win the vacant WIBA featherweight title. The two fought to a draw in July, with Garbatt, a former WIBA super featherweight titlist, having lost three straight bouts prior. This was Trivilino’s first world title bout.
Gabriela Bouvier (11-4-1, 2 KO KO’s) won the vacant IBF flyweight title with a 10 round decision over Florencia Canteros (6-5-1) in Uruguay. Bouvier had lost prior world title attempts to Mariana Juarez (twice) and Debora Dionicius. Canteros is the current Argentina flyweight champion, but this was her first bid for a world strap.
Also in Uruguay, but in a different venue, Marcela Acuna (40-6-1, 17 KO’s) defeated Halanna Dos Santos (14-6, 9 KO’s) by 10 round decision to win the vacant WBO super bantamweight title. Acuna, a former champion for the WBA, WBC, and WIBA turned pro in 1997 and jumped right into the fire with her pro debut against Christy Martin, which she lost by 10 round decision. Nearly a year later she fought her second bout against Lucia Rijker and was stopped in five rounds. Dos Santos career got off to promising start; she turned pro in 2007 and went 10-0 in that year alone. Since then she’s become more of an “opponent”, running up a 4-6 tally and with this bout has now lost two straight.
The vacant GBU super bantamweight title was won by Elina Tissen (17-2, 6 KO’s) in Germany when she took a 10 round decision over Fleis Djendji (16-20-1, 10 KO’s). Tissen’s last defeat came in 2008; she’s won 11 in a row since then and is also the current holder of the GBU, WIBF, and GBC featherweight titles. Djendji has had a handful of title shots but has yet to win one. She keeps herself active though, fighting between five and eight times a year.
Natalia Smirnova (7-0, 4 KO’s) remained undefeated with a 10 round victory over Hana Horakova (3-10). Smirnova defeated Horakova in May by eight round decision and moved on to defeat Veronika Hornyak to win the WIBA lightweight and GBU super featherweight titles in her next bout. Neither title was on the line in this match up.
In Mexico, Ibeth Zamora Silva (19-5, 8 KO’s) retained the WBC light flyweight title with a 10 round decision over Ava Knight (12-2-3, 5 KO’s). It was the second title defense for the former WBA minimum-weight champ; she’s now 4-0 for the year after losing back to back fights in 2012. Knight hadn’t lost since 2009, and was 7-0-1 heading into this bout. She’s a former IBF flyweight world champion and the current WBC Silver flyweight title holder. A year ago she upset Mariana Juarez in Mexico, which left Juarez’z WBC flyweight title vacant, but earned Knight the vacant WBC Diamond flyweight title.
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