Richie Woodhall

Richie Woodhall
Data
Birth Name	Richard James Woodhall
Weight class	Super middleweight
nationality	British
birthday	April 17, 1968
place of birth	Tamworth
style	Left-hand boom
size	1.87 m
Combat Statistics
Struggles	29
Victories	26th
Knockout victories	16
Defeats	3

Richard James "Richie" Woodhall (born April 17, 1968 in Tamworth ) is a former British professional boxer and former world champion of the WBC in the super middleweight division.

Amateur career

Richie Woodhall was born in Tamworth near Birmingham and trained at the Telford Amateur Boxing Club in the West Midlands . He made his amateur light middleweight career and qualified for the 24th Summer Olympics in Seoul . He had beaten Marcel Yman from Sweden 5-0, National Golden Gloves Champion Ray McElroy from the USA 5-0 and Raymond Downey from Canada 4-1 in test tournaments . In the games themselves, he won in the preliminary round against Desmond Williams from Sierra Leone 5-0, in the round of 16 against Apolinário de Silveira from Angola 5-0 and in the quarter-finals against Rey Rivera from Puerto Rico 5-0. Only in the semifinals he was defeated by Roy Jones junior from the USA 0: 5 and was eliminated from the games with a bronze medal.

In 1989 he took part in the 5th World Championships in Moscow , where he defeated the Cuban José Luis Hernández 24:17 in the second round, but was defeated in the quarterfinals against Rudel Obreja from Romania 8:21. In 1990 he won the gold medal at the 14th Commonwealth Games in Auckland . He beat the two-time Olympian Rival Cadeau from Seychelles 4-1, the Olympian Sililo Figota from Samoa 5-0 and again Raymond Downey from Canada 4-1.

Professional career

Woodhall moved to the professional camp in 1990 and won 21 fights in a row, 13 of them prematurely. On March 26, 1992 he won by knockout in the first round against the Australian champion Vito Gaudiosi (balance: 12-3), the Commonwealth title in the middleweight division. In addition to four successful title defenses, he also beat the American Heath Todd (23-3) on March 1, 1994 by tKo in the seventh round.

On February 22, 1995 he was European Middleweight Champion of the EBU ; he defeated the later WBU and WBA world champion Silvio Branco (24-1) by tKo in the ninth round. On October 25, 1995 he defended the title unanimously on points against the undefeated Zdravko Kostić (19-0) from Montenegro and on January 31, 1996 by tKo in the tenth round against Derek Wormald (20-1).

In the fight for the WBC World Championship on October 19, 1996 in Maryland , USA, he lost prematurely in the twelfth round to the title holder Keith Holmes (29-1). For this he won on March 27, 1998 the WBC world title in the next higher weight class, the super middleweight, by a unanimous victory on points against Thulani Malinga (42-10). In September 1998 he won on points against the later WBC world champion Glenn Catley (22-2) and in February 1999 by tKo in the sixth round against ex-WBC world champion Vincenzo Nardiello (33-6).

In his third title defense on October 23, 1999 against Markus Beyer (16-0), Woodhall lost unanimously on points. In addition, he had to hit the ground three times against his German opponent. After an early win against Errol McDonald (29-9), he boxed on December 16, 2000 against Joe Calzaghe (29-0) for the WBO World Super Middleweight Championship, but lost to tKo in the tenth round.

predecessor	Office	successor
Thulani Malinga	Super Middleweight Boxing Champion ( WBC ) March 27, 1998 - October 23, 1999	Markus Beyer

Others

After his boxing career, he worked as a sports commentator for BBC and Setanta Sports, among others . As a double for Brad Pitt , he took on a fight scene in the movie Snatch - Pigs and Diamonds . He also had several appearances in English TV productions.

He owns the Box-A Circuit Gym in Amblecote .

Web links

• Richie Woodhall in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )
• Richie Woodhall in the BoxRec database