Few care more about their legacy than Claressa Shields.
The pound-for-pound great has been the unified champion at junior middleweight and has also cleared out the middleweight and super-middleweight divisions.
After successfully defending her 160lbs title against Maricela Cornejo in June 2023, Shields, 14-0 (2 KOs), began to think about what to do next.
Lapping the field didn’t appeal to anyone. Talks about a 154lbs fight with Britain’s IBF welterweight champion Natasha Jonas quietened quickly, and her only other marketable opponent, Savannah Marshall, was finalising preparations for an undisputed super-middleweight title fight with Franchon Crews Dezurn.
A return to mixed martial arts and the Professional Fight League’s smart cage earned her a split-decision victory over Kelsey De Santis and temporarily satisfied her competitive urges but Shields is intent on building her legacy in the boxing ring.
When the 29 year-old returned to boxing, the landscape was as featureless as it was when she left it. Rather than waiting even longer for a suitable opponent to emerge, the double Olympic champion decided to go looking for a fight herself.
On Saturday night at Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena the three-weight world champion steps up to heavyweight and will fight the WBC champion Vanessa Lepage-Joanisse.
Their fight will take place at 175lbs, which means that not only will Lepage-Joanisse’s WBC heavyweight title be on the line, so too will be the vacant WBO light-heavyweight title.
Shields’ talent is such that she is a massive favourite over whoever she faces, but Saturday’s fight is an imaginative move and the weight does add an element of intrigue this weekend.
“When we were thinking about what would be the best challenge for ‘The GWOAT’, I wanted to fight Natasha Jonas at 154lbs,” she told BoxingScene. “The fight wasn’t able to be made because she didn’t want to fight me. I’ve beaten all the girls at 160lbs. [At] 168lbs was Savannah and Franchon Crews Dezurn but they wanted to fight each other. There was no other place to go but up.”
Shields initially targeted the long-reigning IBF champion Lani Daniels, but when an injury ruled out the New Zealander she pivoted to Lepage-Joanisse, also 29 and who won the WBC title in March via a split-decision victory over Argentina’s Abril Vidal.
It was a career best victory for the Canadian who only returned from a six-year break early in 2023. Shields may be facing the biggest physical challenge of her career, but Lepage-Joanisse is facing the fastest, smartest, most well-rounded test of hers. She will also be fighting a motivated Shields, who never envisioned herself fighting at heavyweight but who has thrown herself into the challenge.
“To go to heavyweight, I felt like it was a big ask of me but that I’m the woman for the job,” she said. “I was going to fight [Lani] Daniels but she came up injured. The next best was Vanessa. She’s tough, rugged, big and strong and very sturdy. She accepted the fight so that’s what we’re doing. After this fight I’ll be a four-division champion but I’ll be ‘Claressa Shields, heavyweight champion’ and I never thought I’d have that to my name because, to me, it makes me sound fat. It just shows that I’m the biggest and baddest.
“It makes me want to show just how strong I am. I’ve been lifting my weights and doing my squats. I’ve been doing some strength training just for this fight because afterwards we’ll have to decide if we’re going to go back down to 160lbs to defend my undisputed title or whether I’m going to fight the other girls at heavyweight.
“We have Danielle Perkins who’s about 6ft 2in tall; 210lbs; sturdy big girl. We’ll have to make those type of decisions but for me, it just feels like I wouldn’t pick anybody else for the job but me to do something like this.”
Read the full article here
