By Jim Dower: 39-year-old Wladimir Klitschko will be looking to successfully defend his heavyweight titles for the 18thth consecutive time on Saturday night against challenger Bryant Jennings (19-0, 10 KOs) at Madison Square Garden in New York.
If successful, Wladimir will bring himself to within seven defenses of former heavyweight boxing great Joe Louis’ record for title defenses at 25.
Wladimir has held one world title or another since 2006. It’s not quite 10 years, but it’s getting close for Wladimir. It’s going to be tougher for Wladimir to keep winning for much longer, as there are fights against the likes of Deontay Wilder and Tyson Fury that he’ll need to win for him to keep moving forward as the IBF/IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion.
Additionally, there is Britain’s Anthony Joshua who is moving up the ranks, and could be someone that Wladimir will need to face in a year or two if he wants to hold onto his world titles.
At 6’6”, 245 pounds, Joshua will be a tough fight for the 6’6” Wladimir.
Former heavyweight champion Larry Holmes is in 2nd place with the most successful title defenses at 19. Wladimir can bring himself to within one of tying that record if he defeats the 30-year-old Jennings on Saturday.
“As long as I have motivation and health, I’ll do it. I don’t feel old, or bad, or slow,” said Klitschko via skysports.com. “What could be cooler, or better, than to be the best man on the planet and beating up people for a living? I don’t want to compare myself with any of the great heavyweights. I’m still looking up to those guys. They are still icons to me.”
It’s going to be really difficult for Wladimir to be able to win his next seven fights in order to tie the record held by Louis. If Wladimir continues to fight twice a year like he’s been doing then he’ll tie the record in three years by 2018. By that time Wladimir will be 42-years-old. To break the record, he’ll need to continue fighting into 2019 and by that time he’ll be 43.
It is possible Wladimir can accomplish that goal, but he’ll need to be able to beat Fury, Wilder and Joshua. Those three appear to be the toughest obstacles that stand in the way of Wladimir breaking the record. If he can get past them, he should have no problems breaking Louis’ record. However, at this point I would have doubts whether Wladimir will be able to do that if that’s what he intends on doing. It’s hard to say.
One thing that Wladimir has in his favor besides his huge size, fast hands and incredible power is the fact that he wants to keep fighting. Unlike his brother Vitali Klitschko, Wladimir doesn’t have a desire to go into politics. Vitali gave up his own WBC heavyweight title at age 42 in order to go into politics in Ukraine. Had Vitali not given up his title, he’d like be still the champion.
“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,” said Jennings.
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