Ruslan Chagaev

Ruslan Shamilevich Chagaev (Tatar: Руслан Шамил улы Чагаев; Russian: Руслан Шамилович Чагаев); born 19 October 1978) is an Uzbekistani former professional boxer who competed from 1997 to 2016. He is a two-time WBA heavyweight champion, having held the full world title from 2007 to 2009, and the Regular title from 2014 to 2016. To date, Chagaev remains the only Asian boxer in the history of the sport to hold a heavyweight world title by any of the four major sanctioning bodies.
In 2007 he defeated then-unbeaten Nikolai Valuev to win the WBA heavyweight title for the first time, and would make two successful defences. Due to injuries and being unable to grant Valuev a rematch in 2009, the WBA stripped Chagaev of the title. He went on to suffer his first professional loss in the same year to Wladimir Klitschko, who held the IBF, WBO, and IBO heavyweight titles; the vacant Ring magazine and lineal titles were also at stake.
Chagaev won the WBA heavyweight title for a second time—this time the Regular version—by defeating Fres Oquendo in 2014. He made one successful defence, but lost the title to Lucas Browne in 2016. However, after Browne failed a drug test, the WBA reinstated Chagaev as champion, but he was once again stripped of the title in July after failing to pay sanctioning fees. On 28 July 2016 he announced his retirement from boxing due to ongoing eye injuries.
As an amateur, Chagaev won gold medals at the 2001 World Championships and 1999 Asian Championships, in the heavyweight and super-heavyweight divisions respectively.

Professional career

1997-2005: Early career

Having fought twice in 1997, Chagaev returned to amateur boxing. He turned pro fully in 2001, with the only flaw on his early record coming 5 October 2002 bout against Rob Calloway in Detroit, Michigan, United States. At the end of third round, the fight was stopped due to Calloway having a wound caused by a headbutt. Michigan boxing rule mandated that the fight be called a Technical Draw (TD) since the bout ended by an accidental foul. Usually four rounds are needed to go to the score cards for decision.

Chagaev slowly but steadily climbed up the heavyweight ranks, first avenging the no-contest with a brutal second round knockout of Calloway.

2006: Title contender

In 2006 he beat undefeated Ukrainian prospect Vladimir Virchis in a close and intense punchfest, and slowly took apart prominent British boxer Michael Sprott. On 18 November 2006, he fought the former WBA champion John Ruiz, and prevailed in a close contest. He took a split decision with scores of 117–111 and 116–112 for Chagaev, and 115–114 for Ruiz. Chagaev became the mandatory challenger for a shot at Nikolai Valuev, the WBA heavyweight champion at the time.

2007-2009

WBA Heavyweight Champion and title defense

Chagaev defeated Valuev on 14 April 2007 by a majority decision (117–111, 115–113 and 114–114) to win the title.

On 26 June 2007, it was announced that Ruslan Chagaev would partake in a heavyweight unification bout with WBO heavyweight champion Sultan Ibragimov. The fight was due to take place in Moscow on 13 October 2007 and would have been the first heavyweight unification bout since 1999; however, Chagaev had to drop out of the fight after contracting hepatitis B. At that point, it was not clear whether he would have been able to compete at all, with WBA considering a championship tournament for Chagaev's crown. After Ibragimov defended his crown against Evander Holyfield, however, it was announced that Chagaev was able to recover.

Chagaev defended his WBA heavyweight title against Matt Skelton on 19 January 2008 by unanimous decision.

His next mandatory defense was to be a rematch on 5 July 2008 with Nikolai Valuev, who defeated former WBO champion Sergei Liakhovich by unanimous decision to earn the right. However, the fight had to be cancelled after Chagaev suffered a complete tear of an Achilles tendon during his final sparring session in preparation for the defense, causing Chagaev's second postponement of the match. The WBA elected to make Chagaev "Champion in Recess" due to the injury that Chagaev sustained and necessary recovery time and mandated that top-contenders Valuev and John Ruiz meet for the vacated title. By beating Ruiz, Valuev also became champion on 30 August 2008.

Second title defense

Chagaev returned from injury on 7 February 2009 with a victory over the then-unbeaten Costa Rican, Carl Davis Drumond to retain his title. The bout was decided by a controversial technical decision after Chagaev sustained a cut from an unintentional clash of heads. Chagaev and Nikolai Valuev were supposed to fight no later than 26 June 2009 to determine who the WBA regarded as their champion. They were scheduled to fight on 30 May 2009 in Helsinki, Finland at the Hartwall Arena, but Chagaev failed a Finnish medical test, allegedly due to hepatitis. On 24 July 2009, when the WBA published their Official Ratings as of June 2009, Chagaev was no longer the "Champion in Recess" but the No. 1 challenger instead.

Chagaev vs. Klitschko

Chagaev was defeated for the first time in his professional career in a bout with Wladimir Klitschko on 20 June 2009 with a 9th round ref stoppage. Klitschko retained his WBO, IBO & IBF crowns and won the vacant Ring magazine title. The fight was held at the Veltins Arena in Gelsenkirchen, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany, and Klitschko's WBO, IBO & IBF heavyweight titles were at stake.

The WBA title that he shared with Nikolai Valuev was not at stake, as the WBA confirmed Valuev was to be the WBA Champion.

2010-11: WBA elimination bout and vacant WBA title shot

Chagaev fought Kali Meehan (35–3; 29 KO) on 22 May 2010, in a WBA Heavyweight Title Eliminator at the Stadthalle in Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. The former WBA champion won the bout by unanimous decision with the scores of 117–111, 117–112 and 118–110. Six months later in a stay busy fight, he defeated Travis Walker on points in an eight round fight. On 27 August 2011 Chagaev lost a competitive bout against Alexander Povetkin by unanimous decision after 12 rounds.

2012-16: Return victories and recapturing WBA title

After the Povetkin bout, Chagaev went 5-0 (3 KO), defeating world ranked Jovo Pudar & four journeymen with respectable records. Next he took on Fres Oquendo for the vacant WBA regular Heavyweight title & won the fight by majority decision. The current WBA (Super) World Heavyweight Champion is Tyson Fury, who is also the IBF, WBO, IBO and Ring Magazine Heavyweight Champion.

Chagaev vs. Pianeta

In his first title defense, he stopped long time contender Francesco Pianeta in the first round.

Chagaev vs. Browne

On 5 March 2016, Lucas Browne made history by becoming the first Australian to win a version of the world heavyweight championship, by stopping Chagaev in ten rounds to become WBA (Regular) heavyweight champion in Russia. Browne landed nearly 20 unanswered punches, mostly right hands, before referee Stanley Christodoulou stopped the fight at 2 minutes, 27 seconds.[1] Browne was knocked down in the sixth round and at the time of the knockout, behind on all judges scorecards (81-88, 82-88 twice).[2]

It was reported on March 22 that Browne failed his post-fight drug test and was then stripped of the belt and will likely have the result changed to a no-decision.

On July 28, it was reported that Chagaev had been stripped of his WBA 'Regular' title for failure to pay outstanding sanctioning fees. According to WBA, Chagaev and promoter Timur Dugazaev have repeatedly failed to pay $40,750 in sanctioning fees related to Chagaev's majority decision victory against Fres Oquendo. The WBA said it sought payment multiple times and had no choice but to vacate the title when there was no response.

Retirement

It was announced on July 28, 2016 by manager Timur Dugashev that Chagaev announced his retirement from boxing at the age of 37 due to problems with the eyes. Dugashev stated: "Ruslan informed us that he would no longer fight. The reason is the state of his eyes. Health is the most important thing."

There was reports in October 2016 that Chagaev was offered a farewell fight to close his career, potentially a rematch with Lucas Browne. Chagaev chose to stay retired due to health issues.

Professional boxing record

Personal life

Chagaev is of Volga Tatar ethnicity and an adherent of Islam. His parents, Shamil and Zamira Chagaev, are Mishar Tatars from the village of Kalda (located in today's Baryshsky District of Ulyanovsk Oblast, Russia), who moved to the Uzbek SSR in the 1950s. Chagaev has a sister, Luiza. He is married to Viktoria, an ethnic Armenian, who is also from Andijan. They have two children together. Their first son, Artur, was born on 24 March 2004. Ruslan resides in Hamburg, Germany with his family.