At the EWS Arena in Goeppingen, Germany, IBO cruiserweight champion Kevin Lerena (25-1, 12 KOs) secured one of the biggest wins of his career when he battered and stopped former WBA champion Firat Arslan (47-9-3, 32 KOs) in the sixth round.
At 49-years-old, Arslan was attempting to become the oldest champion in history, but Lerena, who is 22-years younger, was too good and too strong for the veteran.
Lerena has now won 14 bouts in a row since suffering his only career defeat, back in 2014 at the hands of Johnny Muller. In 2016, Lerena avenged that loss with a TKO victory in ten.
Lerena is hoping to get a unification with one of the other world champions in the weight class.
For Arslan, it was his first defeat since 2014 when he was defeated by Yoan Pablo Hernandez. After that Arslan went undefeated in 14 bouts.
Former middleweight champion Christina Hammer (25-1, 11 KOs) returned for the first time since her unification decision loss to Claressa Shields back in April of 2019, and she won an eight-round decision over Florence Muthoni (12-9-2, 6 KOs).
The bout with Shields was the first loss of Hammer’s career. Shields, who has the WBC, WBO world titles at junior middleweight, still holds all of the major belts at middleweight.
Heavyweight contender Erkan Teper (21-3, 13 KOs) stayed busy with a four round decision over inexperienced Mykyta Nesterenko (1-3, 0 KOs).
–boxingscene.com
