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Lem’s latest: Road to Gennady Golovkin/Daniel Geale airs Saturday

Fighters Network
11
Jul

The HBO special entitled “Road to Golovkin/Geale” will air on Saturday at 12:05 a.m., ET/PT in advance of Gennady Golovkin’s defense of his WBA middleweight title against former IBF/WBA beltholder Daniel Geale on July 26 at Madison Square Garden in New York.

The special will also be available on the HBO On Demand service, HBO GO and at www.hbo.com/boxing as well as various other new media platforms that distribute the series.

An Olympic silver medalist who is promoted by Tom Loeffler of K2 Promotions, Golovkin (29-0, 26 knockouts) will be after his 17th straight stoppage win against against Geale (30-2, 16 KOs).

A Kazakhstan native, Golovkin fought four times in 2013, stopping Matthew Macklin, Gabriel Rosado, Nobuhiro Ishida and Curtis Stevens. In February, Golovkin scored a seventh-round stoppage of Osumanu Adama, who was knocked out for the first time in his career. Adama represented the 16th straight stoppage victory for Golovkin.



Ranked number two by THE RING at 160 pounds, Geale is coming off February’s sixth-round stoppage of Garth Wood, following a split decision loss to Darren Barker in August.

Geale unified the WBA and IBF titles with a victory over Felix Sturm in 2012 but elected to avenge his lone defeat at the time – against Anthony Mundine – and gave up the WBA belt rather than face Golovkin. Geale then lost the IBF title to Barker.

Also on the card is a co-feature between heavyweights Mike Perez and Bryant Jennings, who are handled by K2 Promotions and Gary Shaw, respectively. Jennings scored a 10th-round stoppage of Artur Szpilka in his last fight, one day after Perez battled once-beaten Carlos Takam to a draw.

Perez-Jennings represents the WBC’s second title elimination bout. In the first, Bermane Stiverne scored a sixth-round knockout over Chris Arreola in May for the title that was vacated by Vitali Klitschko.

Stiverne must make his first defense against Deontay Wilder and the victor between Stiverne and Wilder has been mandated to face the winner of Perez-Jennings.

 

YOAN HERNANDEZ TO FACE FIRAT ARSLAN

RING cruiserweight champion Yoan Pablo Hernandez has a great deal of respect for Firat Arslan, against whom he will defend his IBF belt on August 16 at Erfurt Exhibition Hall in Thuringen, Germany.

Arslan, 43, is coming off last month’s unanimous decision over Tamas Bajzath that helped him rebound from a sixth round stoppage loss to WBO beltholder Marco Huck, who dropped Arslan twice in a rematch of Huck’s unanimous decision victory in November 2012.

“Firat Arslan is a fighter my teammate Marco Huck had some trouble with,” said Hernandez. “I respect the way he performs, already being 43 years old. I will be well-prepared for Arslan as I do not want to go more than 12 rounds against him.

Arslan said he has a strategy to take down Hernandez.

“I will have a plan to beat him on August 16. The man who will help me to work this plan out will be Fritz Sdunek,” said Arslan of his trainer. “With him and my friend, Dieter Wittmann at my side, I am more than equal to Hernandez and his coach, Ulli Wegner.”

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