By Jason Kim: Former heavyweight world title challenger Odlanier Solis (17-1, 12 KO’s) will be facing 33-year-old German based fighter Konstantin Airich (23-5-2, 17 KO’s) on May 19th at the Concention Center, in Pharr, Texas. This will be 31-year-old Solis’ first fight since he blew out his right knee in his 1st round knockout loss to WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko last year in March.

It’s taken this long for Solis to get back in the ring because he had a couple of setbacks after his initial surgery to repair torn cartilage in his right knee. All total, Solis went through three separate surgeries to finally repair his badly injured right knee. With a knee that’s had this many surgeries in such a short period of time it’s likely weak and Solis could have problems driving off it when throwing power shots.

He needs to lose some weight if he wants to lessen the possibilities of future knee problems, because Solis has gained a ton a massive amount of weight since he won a gold medal in the 2004 Olympic, going from a muscular 200 pounds to a flabby, slow looking 250. Some of the weight he’s put on is muscle but in looking at all the flab on his physique, Solis looks to be at least 30 to 40 pounds overweight. If he could take off all that fat, he’d probably be a fast 210 pound heavyweight, and his knees would be thankful for him having done so. However, he’ll probably stay heavy for whatever reason and continue to have knee problems in the future.

Airich is a nice soft touch for Solis to beat without too much risk. Airich can punch a little, so it’s not as if he’s someone you can just go out and destroy. If Airich connects with one of his best fight hands on the top of the head like Vitali did, we could see Solis coming up with another knee injury. I’m not counting on it, though, because Solis will likely be too skilled for this guy to land much.