The bright spot in what was an otherwise uneventful weekend for women’s boxing was Olympic gold medalist Katie Taylor, who spent the past three days picking up three victories on her way to the European Women’s Elite Championships later this month.
The three day winning streak started Friday night in Cork, when Taylor scored a decision over Croatia’s Marija Petric at Cork’s Rochestown Park Hotel. Saturday night, she swept all four rounds against Swiss boxer Anais Kisler, with Kisler taking a count in the final frame. TO cap off the weekend, the 27 year old lightweight defeated American boxer Kristin Karlson at Dungarvan Sports Centre in Waterford on Sunday. Karlson, a Chicago school teacher, was a bronze medalist at the 2014 USA Boxing Elite National Championships this past January.
The 2014 European Women’s Elite Championships, the ninth edition, kick off May 31st in Bucharest. Taylor will be aiming for her sixth successive title in this tournament.
On the professional side of the sport, it was a light and dismal week. Friday night in Thailand, WIBA minimum-weight champion Samson Tor Buamas (33-3, 15 KO’s) made the seventh defense of her world title against Sweden’s Ellenor Maria (0-1), who was making her professional debut. Buamas is a former WBC light flyweight champion as well as a former WIBA flyweight title holder who has also challenged for the WBC minimum-weight and WIBA flyweight belts. It’s hard to imagine that there was no one else available for her to fight…
There were two world title bouts on a card in Brandenburg, Germany. Former IBF light middleweight champion and current GBU welterweight title holder Jennifer Retzke (14-1-1, 9 KO’s) won the vacant GBU light welterweight title with a 10 round unanimous decision over Everline Odero (6-5-1, 1 KO). Odero has been a pro since 2005, but was inactive for all of 2009 and 2010, and had only fought once in the last two and a half years; a six round decision loss in 2012.
Also on the card Derya Saki (7-0, 4 KO’s) remained undefeated and became the new GBU lightweight champion when she stopped Flora Machela (5-2, 4 KO’s) in seven rounds. This was Saki’s first title contest, and her first match against an opponent with a win on her record. Machela came in off a four round win in March, but hadn’t fought for over three years prior.
Former super bantamweight champion Ana Julaton (13-4-1, 2 KO’s) made a successful MMA debut Friday night, scoring a third round stoppage of Aya Saeid Saber on the One FC: Rise of Heroes card at the Mall of Asia Arena. It was an impressive performance for Julaton, who saw some trouble in the second frame when it looked as if she was ready to tap out after being caught in a headlock. The two time boxing champ pushed through however, and in the following round gained a full mount and landed a series of shots to score the TKO. As a boxer, Julaton held the super bantamweight title for the IBA and had two runs as the WBO champion. In November she scored a 10 round decision over Perla Hernandez.
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