Skye Nicolson: Lucy Wildheart & Beyond

Skye Nicolson: Lucy Wildheart & Beyond

If Amanda Serrano is to be believed and the WBC refuses to play ball, there is a very good chance that the WBC featherweight title will sooner rather than later become vacant.

Serrano recently beat Danila Ramos over 12 x 3-minute rounds, and she has insisted that any future opponents must agree to fight her at the exact same duration. Mauricio Sulaiman, the president of the WBC, has again reiterated their stance that all female fights will remain as they are at present.

You can justifiably criticise plenty of the decisions reached by Sulaiman and the WBC. Or, in many cases, the lack of a decision. But there is at least some basis to their argument as to why the WBC steadfastly sticks with 10 x 2-minute rounds for female fights that fall into their jurisdiction. Based on the following comments by the WBC president, that position is unlikely to change anytime soon:

“Women physiologically are different than men. So there’s 85 per cent more concussions in women than men, and this is researched on soccer, football, baseball, and basketball, and this is medical data. It is also reported that fatigue and dehydration are major factors for sustaining an injury.

“With all this information, we just simply rectify that female boxing will never be more than 10 rounds in the WBC and will never be for 3 minutes. It will be for two minutes only to avoid dehydration and fatigue, which are higher risks for female fighters.”

I am all in for equality, and you can’t dismiss the idea that one-day women’s boxing will fall into total harmony with the men’s side of the game. But that push for total equality shouldn’t be rushed in my opinion and certainly not at the risk of safety for the fighters. Only a quick Google search will find the words of Sulaiman hold at least some semblance of truth and balance. Studies, especially in horse racing, do seem to indicate that women are at more risk of concussion-related injuries. And if that is indeed proven beyond a reasonable doubt, equality shouldn’t even be in the conversation. And it shouldn’t be until we have a definitive answer.

Boxing with its history of brain trauma-related injuries and the very nature of the sport should tell all concerned that it needs to move ahead with extreme caution and not with reckless abandon. To rush into extending ring time in all-female bouts on a wider scale, without further studies and intensive research, is incredibly risky and could do more damage than good in the long term.

We have gone from 20 minutes to 36 minutes, almost double the amount of ring time, in one stroke of a pen. In this observer’s view, 12 x 2-minute rounds would have been an initially safer route to take. In MMA, a much-documented comparison, the women admittedly follow the same rules as their male counterparts. But they would only fight a maximum of 25 minutes with their 5 x 5-minute main events. Eleven minutes less than what Serrano and Ramos fought not so long ago in that ‘historic’ fight in Florida.

What did that Serrano Ramos fight really tell us? It was pretty obviously a one-sided fight. There was little expectation that the fight would be anywhere near competitive and I just saw it as Ramos taking another sixteen minutes of unnecessary punishment. It wasn’t the fight to start to start a revolution with. And while everything has to start somewhere, I don’t think it does the female side of the sport any favours by Serrano doing her thing and everyone else doing something completely different. In many ways, we all need to be on the same page. Don’t be fooled into thinking that every female fighter is in favour of fighting 3-minute rounds. Because they most definitely are not.

But above anything else, safety should be paramount, and the sport needs some immediate and extensive studies to be conducted before the sport moves in a direction it is simply not ready for. Sometimes, progress can be achieved by caution and not haste.

Unless Amanda Serrano softens her stance, there is every chance her WBC featherweight bauble will be removed from her clutches, and that will likely mean that the unbeaten and WBC Interim champion Skye Nicolson will get the chance to crown herself a world champion, but not against the current undisputed featherweight champion of the world.

Nicolson is already the WBC mandatory challenger to Serrano, and her sights are firmly fixed on going the WBC route, preferably with Serrano in the opposite corner. But if Serrano won’t move on her 3-minute stance, Nicolson will fight for the vacant WBC title, Serrano or not, if she comes through her fight with Lucy Wildheart later this month in Dublin on the undercard of the rematch between Chantelle Cameron and Katie Taylor.

Wildheart has only lost to Estelle Mossely and Mikaela Mayer in her twelve-fight career. Both of those defeats were at lightweight. Featherweight is much closer to her natural home. Wildheart is a good fighter and is undeniably the toughest challenge to date for the extremely talented former Olympian. But Nicolson is a strong betting favourite. Skybet has her at 1/12 to beat Wildheart, odds which may be a little wide of the mark, but do indicate the expected way the fight will go. But Wildheart should not be overlooked. I was ringside in April when she took a fight with the former world champion Mikaela Mayer up at lightweight with just 24 hours’ notice and she gave the American a more than decent fight. With a full camp and a fight at her natural weight, Wildheart will provide stern opposition and will give Nicolson everything she needs as she looks to what lies ahead in 2024.

Nicolson has done little wrong in her eight professional fights so far, and the elusive southpaw says we have only seen little glimpses of her ability. Last time out in Mexico, we saw a little bit more of her progress when she beat Sabrina Maribel Perez on points to claim the WBC Interim featherweight title. It was, in many ways, her best performance to date. Nicolson will only get better.

If Nicolson does extend her resume to 9-0, a world title will almost certainly be on the line in her tenth fight. The only question will be if it is Serrano or someone else in the opposite corner. Nicolson hopes that person will be Amanda Serrano.

Photo Credit: Mark Robinson/Matchroom Boxing