Breaking: WBA creates new weight class

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The World Boxing Association (WBA) has added another weight class to their list of divisions.

According to a statement posted on their official site, the organization’s interest was to bridge a gap between the cruiserweight division and the heavyweight section.

Their full statement read as follows:

‘The World Boxing Association (WBA) Executive Committee approved the creation of the super cruiserweight division in a vote called by the president Gilberto Jesus Mendoza.

‘This new division will be between 200 and 224 pounds, while it will be located between the cruiserweight and heavyweight divisions.

‘The pioneer organization made several analyses during the last months before thinking about the request and in the end it was submitted to a vote, in which it was approved by the unanimous vote of the executive committee.

‘The creation of this new weight will mainly help to avoid bouts in which the fighters enter the ring with excessive weight differences, as tends to happen at heavyweight occasionally, where there can be differences of 20 pounds or more.

‘Fighters considered ” small heavyweights” will have the option to move down to super cruiserweight and seek opportunities against more balanced weight opponents, in the quest to make the sport increasingly fairer.

‘The WBA ranking committee has already begun working on the creation of the rankings for this weight and the first divisional match-ups will be announced soon. The WBA will continue to work on making boxing a fairer sport that provides opportunities and fairness to all involved, especially the boxers.’

Though another division called Bridgeweight was formed by one of the boxing organizations, many still think there should not be a bridge division between the cruiserweight and the heavyweight divisions since fighters have been proving themselves capable of dealing with the difference for years.

A popular example is Ukraine’s Oleksander Usyk who was an undisputed world cruiserweight champion before going up the ladder to beat Derek Chisora in a bout of heavy blows, later outperforming the past unified heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua to win a lineal throne.

The first champion of WBA’s new cruiserweight division is yet to be seen.