Heavyweight champion Wladimir
Klitschko says he enjoys beating up
people for a living and has no plans to
retire from boxing soon.
According to Reuters, the 39-year-old
Ukrainian,
who will defend his collection
of titles against Bryant Jennings in New
York on Saturday night, said during the
week, “What could be cooler, or better,
than to be the best man on the planet
and beating up people for a living?
“As long as I have motivation and health,
I’ll do it. I don’t feel old, or bad, or slow.”
Klitschko, who holds the WBA “super”
title as well as the WBO, IBF and IBO
titles, has lost only three of his 66
professional fights.
He will equal Joe Louis’ record when he
appears in his 27th heavyweight title
fight on Saturday.
The champion will make his 18th title
defence when he takes on Jennings, an
American, at Madison Square Garden. He
has dominated the heavyweight division
for nearly a decade and has shown no
signs of slowing down.
The two-metre tall Klitschko, who has
won 53 of his fights inside the distance,
faces an opponent whose record stands
at 19-0 and who has stopped ten of his
opponents.
Jennings has been boxing for only six
years but the 30-year-old challenger from
Philadelphia is not impressed by
Klitschko’s accomplishments.
“My first edge is youth. Youth is always
an edge that you can’t deny. Speed.
Speed is an edge. These are things that
are obvious,” he said during the week.
Despite Klitschko’s 7.6cm height
advantage, Jennings has the same reach
as the champion.
Klitschko, who will be within one of Larry
Holmes’s 19 consecutive title defences if
he wins this weekend – second to the
mark of 25 held by Louis – said he was
“allergic” to comparisons with other
greats.
“How long I’ve been champion, how
many title defences I’ve made … I don’t
want to compare myself with any of the
great heavyweights,” the 1996 Olympic
champion, said. “I’m still looking up to
those guys. They are still icons to me.”
If he beats Jennings, he could be
matches with Britain’s Tyson Fury and
Deontay Wilder, who holds the WBC belt.
“I see the change of the generations is
slowly coming, because I had all of those
guys in my training camp coming up,”
Klitschko said.
“They are very competitive, very young,
very ambitious, very strong fighters that
definitely are going to bring a lot of
excitement in the ring.”
