Claressa Shields

Born March 17, 1995 an American professional boxer and mixed martial artist. She has held multiple world championships in three weight classes, including the undisputed female light middleweight title since March 2021; the undisputed female middleweight title from 2019 to 2020; and the unified WBC and IBF female super middleweight titles from 2017 to 2018. Shields currently holds the record for becoming a two and three-weight world champion in the fewest professional fights. As of November 2020, she is ranked as the world’s best active female light middleweight by The Ring and BoxRec, as well as the best active female boxer, pound for pound, by Lineal Boxing Champion ^[8] and ESPN, second by The Ring,  and fourth by BoxRec.

Shields is the only boxer in history, female or male, to hold all four major world titles in boxing—WBA, WBC, IBF and WBO—simultaneously, in two weight classes. She is the first woman to win lineal championships in two weight classes. 

In a decorated amateur career, Shields won gold medals in the women’s middleweight division at the 2012 and 2016 Olympics, making her the first American boxer—female or male—to win consecutive Olympic medals.^[12] Shields was the youngest boxer at the February 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials, winning the event in the 165 lb (75 kg) middleweight division.  In May, she qualified for the 2012 games, the first year in which women’s boxing was an Olympic event, and went on to become the first American woman to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing. Her only loss professional or amateur comes from British fighter Savannah Marshall.  In 2018, the Boxing Writers Association of America named her the Female Fighter of the Year.

Amateur career

Won two Junior Olympic championships, Shields competed in her first open-division tournament, the National Police Athletic League Championships 2011; she won the middleweight title and was named top overall fighter and also qualified for the U.S. Olympic Trials. At the 2012 Olympic Trials, she defeated the reigning national champion, Franchón Crews-Dezurn, the 2010 world champion, Andrecia Wasson, and Pittsburgh’s Tika Hemingway to win the middleweight class.  In April 2011, she won her weight class at the Women’s Elite Continental Championships in Cornwall, Ontario against three-time defending world champion Mary Spencer of Canada; she held an undefeated record of 25 wins and 0 losses at that point.

Shields is the only boxer in history, female or male, to hold all four major world titles in boxing—WBA, WBC, IBF and WBO—simultaneously, in two weight classes. She is the first woman to win lineal championships in two weight classes.

Boxing star, Flint native Claressa Shields signs MMA deal, will debut in 2021. Claressa Shields already reigns over boxing with two Olympic gold medals and professional titles in three weight classes. Her next world to conquer is mixed martial arts.

Aurora Colorado | Colorado Boxing

About The Author

delta

See author's posts