Charles Martin IBF Heavyweight Champion
Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images
Enter Boxing’s newest champion.
Charles Martin, a gigantic southpaw, lifted the IBF heavyweight strap last weekend after beating (if you want to call it that) Vyacheslav Glazkov. Glazkov suffered a tear in his anterior cruciate ligament (ouch!) in the third round and was unable to continue.
The IBF trifle was left vacant after the sanctioning body stripped Tyson Fury for agreeing to a rematch with Wladimir Klitschko instead of a squash match with Glazkov.
Martin, 29, has never lost but has never beaten a credible opponent either. His matchup with Glazkov was the first 12-rounder of his career.
The new champion is saying all the right things, ad interim.
“I want to unify the titles,” Martin said via World Boxing News. “I want Tyson Fury.”
Martin utilizes his scary 80-inch reach well against tomato cans. But how will that translate into a fight with a man in possession of the skill and size of Fury?
Fury is set to rematch Klitschko sometime in the spring. Martin will be 30 years old by the time he can get his earliest crack at the Englishman.
For now, he remains completely unproven.