DanielDubois

"Dynamite"

IBF Heavyweight World Champion

DANIEL DUBOIS IS now the IBF heavyweight champion of the world fresh from a resounding stoppage victory over former two-time unified champion Anthony Joshua at Wembley Stadium.

The strapping Londoner confirmed his status as an elite heavyweight by flooring the 2012 Olympic champion four times on his way to the emphatic fifth round conclusion.

Dubois put himself in position for his Wembley glory by defeating the previously unbeaten No.1 contender Filip Hrgoviv in June over in Riyadh via an eighth round finish, having earlier ended the unbeaten heavyweight reign of giant American Jarrell Miller in December of last year.

It represents a sequence of victories, following on from his unsuccessful unified challenge against Oleksandr Usyk last August, that is right up there with the best in world boxing.

Right from the beginning of his professional journey, Dubois had been widely considered to be a world champion in waiting. This prediction first came true with a thumping victory over the previously unbeaten Trevor Bryan to win the WBA world heavyweight title in June of 2022.

At the beginning of the December he made a first defence of his prized WBA belt against the dangerous South African Kevin Lerena and ultimately prevailed via a third round stoppage. 

His performance at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium booked his shot at unified champion Usyk and this encounter took place on August 26 of 2023 in Wroclaw, Poland.

In the fifth round, Dubois could and probably should have been able to celebrate the prospect of taking four belts home with him. He bludgeoned the champion to the canvas and out for the count, only for the blow to be ruled low and Usyk was given nearly four minutes to recover.

Dubois lost momentum and was ultimately overwhelmed by Usyk in the ninth round. An appeal over the low blow controversy was duly lodged.

At just 19, with limited senior amateur experience under his belt, Dubois took the plunge into the professional ranks when it was thought by many that he would carry the nation's heavyweight hopes into the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and follow in the medal-winning footsteps of Anthony Joshua and Joe Joyce.

Now, Dubois, with just 22 fights on his professional clock and training under the guidance of coach Don Charles, has already recorded 13 title successes in his fledgling career to date.

In December 2016 Dubois won his first senior domestic title at the GB Boxing Championships at the English Institute of Sport in Sheffield before making his decision to join forces with Hall of Fame promoter Frank Warren in the professional ranks.

Dubois claimed the Youth World Heavyweight title after easing past the challenge of Mauricio Barragan in London. He maintained his perfect record of four wins and four knock- outs after dropping his opponent twice inside two rounds.

The Southern Area title was next for Dubois and he sealed his first domestic belt with a brutal first round KO of fellow Londoner AJ Carter, moving on to record KO wins over Dorian Darch and DL Jones.

The next title was won via defeat of Tom Little in the 5th round to win the vacant English heavyweight title, before he was moved up a level to take on American veteran and former world title challenger Kevin Johnson. It was the first time Dubois was taken the distance as a professional, comfortably beating him 100-91 on the scorecard.

The still unbeaten Dubois demonstrated that he belongs amongst the world's elite fighters when he faced California-based Romanian Razvan Cojanu at the Royal Albert Hall, flooring the former world title challenger in the second round before applying the finish and another memorable KO.

Dubois' next test was against a dangerous foe in Richard Lartey in April 2019 in what was a thrilling exhibition of power-punching. The Ghanaian came to win and there were several brutal exchanges before he suffered defeat by TKO in the fourth round.

This huge talent cemented his place among the stars of British boxing when he headlined at the O2 Arena in the July against stablemate Nathan Gorman for the British Heavyweight Championship.

Dubois was the one who protected his unbeaten record with a pulsating performance that resulted in a fifth round finish and the title of new British heavyweight champion. The vacant Commonwealth title was added to Dubois’ ever-increasing collection of belts in September 2019 when he returned to the Royal Albert Hall and destroyed the previously unbeaten Ebeneezer Tetteh in the opening round.

In December of 2019, Dubois extended his workload to the second round at the Copper Box, but his Japanese opponent, Kyotaro Fujimoto, was brutally dispatched and Dubois became the proud holder of the WBC Silver title, to go along with his WBO International belt.

To keep busy after the lockdown period, Dubois took on Ricardo Snijders, with the 18-1 Dutchman having been drafted in as a late replacement. Dubois targeted the body and Snijders folded 20 seconds into the second round.

A blot on the Dubois CV came at the end of 2020 when he went up against fellow Brit Joe Joyce, with five titles at stake including the European championship belt. Dubois came off second best following a horrific eye injury that forced him to take a knee, while ahead on the cards in the 10th round.

Upon returning to the ring, Dubois flattened Bogdan Dinu in the second round to win the WBA Interim world title and then introduced himself to an American audience with a first round demolition of Joe Cusumano last time out in August 2021.

His world title success in Miami – that took just four rounds - perfectly positioned the young London to propel himself into the world elite mix of heavyweight operators, where he now proudly sits having one of the four major world title belts under his ownership.