By Jim Dower: 2004 heavyweight Olympic Gold Medalist Odlanier Solis (16-0, 14 KO’s) is only one win away from getting a title shot against World Boxing Council (WBC) heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko (40-2, 38 KO’s). For the 30-year-old Solis to get a shot against Klitschko, he has to beat number #1 WBC ranked heavyweight contender Ray Austin (28-4-4, 18 KOs) in a WBC heavyweight title eliminator bout, which according to boxing news from Dan Rafael of ESPN, will likely occur in mid-November.

Solis’s promoter Ahmet Öner got Solis released from his contract with Top Rank in order to find another co-promoter to help Solis get more visibility on American television. Öner plans on having Don King be the co-promoter for Solis.

Solis has some of the fastest hands and the best boxing skills among the top heavyweights. His problem is his weight, which has recently ballooned up to 270 and his limited 6’1 ½” height. The weight is the more serious of the two that could hold Solis back, because that’s just too much flab to be carrying around on his small frame.

To his credit, Solis still looks very lethal due to his amazing hand speed. However, the weight is likely going to be a big problem for Solis if he gets a title fight against Vitali Klitschko. Solis needs to be as trim as possible to compete with the huge 6’7” Klitschko, and if he’s carrying around an extra 30 to 40 pounds of flab on his frame, Vitali is going to find a big target for his punches.

Solis is good enough to easily beat the 39-year-old Austin carrying around that kind of weight, but not either of the Klitschko brothers. Solis is going to have to try and trim off some of that flab for him to be competitive against Vitali.

Unfortunately, Solis’ weight appears to be going upwards instead of downwards recently, and it’s difficult to imagine that he’s going to be finally taking some of the weight off. Solis doesn’t look all that fat for someone weighing 270, but he does have a slightly rounded appearance now that he’s put on all that weight. In the Olympics, Solis was a lean 200 pounds, but since leaving Cuba and turning pro, Solis’s weight has shot up like a skyrocket. You have to wonder what he’s eating to put on weight like that in such a short period of time.