March 5, 2025
Shields opted to maintain the heavyweight title that she earned final month.
Claressa Shields will stay the World Boxing Group’s Feminine Heavyweight champion after vacating her gentle heavyweight title.
Shields was prompted to decide on which of her two titles to maintain as a WBO rule forbids boxers from holding a number of directly. WBO President Gustavo Olivieri shared the replace on X on March 3.
Re: WBO Feminine Mild Heavyweight Division
Be suggested Claressa Shields has relinquished her WBO Lt.
Heavyweight title. Per our guidelines, NO WBO Champion could maintain titles in two totally different weight divisions concurrently. Subsequently, Shields stays Champion in Heavyweight division.— Gustavo Olivieri, Esq. (@OlivieriLaw) March 3, 2025
“Be suggested Claressa Shields has relinquished her WBO Lt. Heavyweight title,” Olivieri wrote. “Per our guidelines, NO WBO Champion could maintain titles in two totally different weight divisions concurrently. Subsequently, Shields stays Champion in Heavyweight division.”
Shields opted to earn the vacant heavyweight title throughout a match in opposition to Danielle Perkins on Feb. 2. After an unanimous win over Perkins, the 29-year-old turned the undisputed heavyweight champion.
Shields’ rise in boxing was the current topic of the biopic The Fireplace Inside,. Ryan Future starred because the acclaimed boxer alongside Brian Tyree Henry. The movie depicted her rise to successful an Olympic gold medal.
The Flint, Michigan, native at the moment has a 16-0 document with three knockouts.
Nonetheless, Shields confronted controversy after Michigan’s athletic fee said that she examined constructive for marijuana after her current match. Regardless of the result, Shields stated that she doesn’t use the drug, which additionally will not be performance-enhancing.
As an alternative, she believes the constructive outcome could stem from second-hand smoke or close-contact with others on battle evening. She mentioned the incident on the Tamron Corridor Present.
“The place reeked of marijuana,” Shields stated of the battle’s website, the Dort Monetary Heart. “After which, earlier than I acquired to do the mouth swab, all people was hugging and kissing me in Flint. All people there—my cousins, sister, brother, mates—all people was hugging and kissing me. And I do know some boxers don’t cease and greet the followers, however I’m not considered one of them. I hugged and kissed all people again.”
At the moment, Shields stays prohibited from combating in Michigan. With the specter of dropping her newly-acquired belt looming, she has since appealed the suspension. In response to a WBO discover, she has 30 days to clear her title.