{"id":762707,"date":"2026-06-27T01:05:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-27T01:05:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/762707\/"},"modified":"2026-06-27T01:05:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-27T01:05:21","slug":"oleksandr-usyk-vacates-heavyweight-title-belts-but-insists-he-is-not-retiring-boxing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/762707\/","title":{"rendered":"Oleksandr Usyk vacates heavyweight title belts but insists he is not retiring | Boxing"},"content":{"rendered":"

The world heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk<\/a> has announced he will relinquish his title belts. The Ukrainian currently holds the WBC, WBA and IBF versions.<\/p>\n

The unbeaten 39-year-old insists he is not retiring but says the \u201cwell-considered\u201d decision will \u201copen new opportunities\u201d.<\/p>\n

Usyk said in a video posted on X: \u201cIt\u2019s a good day to say that I want to vacate all the belts I currently hold. I want to make them available so the guys who are next in line can fight for them. Friends, I am leaving the belts but I\u2019m not leaving the sport because I still have my last dance.\u201d<\/p>\n

He captioned the video with the message, \u201cThis is a well-considered decision that I am confident will open new opportunities for me. This is not the end of the story. The continuation lies ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Usyk last fought in May, when he stopped Dutch kickboxer Rico Verhoeven in the 11th round, although not all of his heavyweight titles were on the line.<\/p>\n

Usyk\u2019s sporting director, Sergey Lapin, told ESPN that \u200bthe Ukrainian had vacated the belts to give former champion Anthony Joshua, whom Usyk has beaten twice, a chance to reunify them.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs for Oleksandr, his goal has always been to finish his legendary career with his final fights in the United States, where he wants to leave the last chapter \u2060of his boxing legacy,\u201d Lapin said.<\/p>\n

Usyk became WBO cruiserweight champion in 2016 when he defeated Poland\u2019s Krzysztof Glowacki, beating Latvia\u2019s Mairis Briedis in 2018 to add the WBC title and then months later claiming the WBA and IBF belts from Murat Gassiev. The Russian, who has since also moved up to heavyweight, was Usyk\u2019s WBA mandatory challenger and has now been upgraded to champion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The world heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk has announced he will relinquish his title belts. The Ukrainian currently holds…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538385,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[571],"tags":[64,63,802,85],"class_list":["post-762707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-boxing","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-boxing","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=762707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/762707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=762707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=762707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=762707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}