Vasiliy Lomachenko — a Boxing Legend’s Retirement in Words & Numbers

Vasiliy Lomachenko announced an emotional retirement from boxing on the 5th of June.

The video confirmation brings to an end an extraordinary career as Lomachenko won gold medals for boxing in back-to-back Olympic Games, in 2008 and 2012, as well as gold medals in two separate World Amateur Championships. His experience in the amateur ranks was so extensive, and of such quality, that he was fast-tracked as soon as he entered the pro ranks. And, though he lost the second fight of his career, he rebounded with a world championship win at featherweight over Garry Russell Jr in just his third fight.

Lomachenko became a two-weight world champion in his seventh fight, stopped Guillermo Rigondeaux in his 11th bout, and finished his career with a pro record of 18-3-0 (12 KOs) after beating the lightweight fighter George Kambosos in the final fight of his career, at lightweight, last year.

GIVEMESPORT talked to Kambosos, and received data from prominent statistician Compubox, to explain how significant an impact Lomachenko made on the sport.

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Compubox data also shows Lomachenko was a statistical marvel

Kambosos told GIVEMESPORT, ahead of his own return to the ring on the 14th of June atop a Matchroom on DAZN event against Richardson Hitchins, that it “was an honor” to box Lomachenko in what was the final fight of his career.

“Vasiliy Lomachenko is a legend and a great human being.”

Lomachenko fought Kambosos on the 12th of May, 2024, at the RAC Arena in Perth, Australia, for the IBO and vacant IBF lightweight title. Lomachenko dropped Kambosos with a body shot, turned up the pressure, and, after a sustained attack, the referee brought the bout to a close in the 11th round, ensuring Lomachenko won by finish. In beating Kambosos, Lomachenko limited his opponent to an 11% success rate when it came to punches landed, while the Ukrainian himself landed 37% of his total shots.

“I’m honored to have been his last opponent,” Kambosos told us, “bringing him to Australia for his last fight — a championship fight.”

“It gives me goosebumps remembering how big that fight was, the fans, the crowd — we sold out the arena together.”

“It was an honor to be the last guy to have fought him,” Kambosos said. “No matter how great his career was, you always remember the last one. So I’m sure they’ll be great memories for him.”

Kambosos then vowed to meet Lomachenko atop Mount Athos, like they had spoken to backstage just one day before punching lumps out of one another. Mount Athos is an important center for Eastern Orthodox monasticism, a pillar of Christianity important to both Kambosos and Lomachenko — something they realized they had in common on the fight week in which they fought.

“There was a nice moment [we shared] when we were doing the gloves behind-the-scenes, after the weigh-in,” Kambosos told us. “We’ve come in, looked at each other, and we were staring off again.”

Their competitive spirit saw them stare each other down again and again, until Kambosos broke the ice.

“I like your logo,” he said, pointing to an IC XC — a Christogram representing the first and last letters of the words for Jesus Christ in Greek.

Kambosos wore the same logo.

“I like yours,” Lomachenko said back. “We’re both representing our faith,” he added.

They then talked about meeting one another in Europe, long after they were done fighting in the ring.

“Have you been to Mount Athos?” Lomachenko asked Kambosos. It’s a monastary in Greece, and one of the highest peaks in the country.

With three children, and a fighting career, Kambosos said it was difficult for him to find the time.

“You should come,” Lomachenko told him.

Now that Lomachenko is retired, Kambosos is looking to the future. “I have a couple of good years left in me,” he said, “but we can tear it up atop Mount Athos. Obviously, we went to battle the next day but that was a nice moment. Hopefully I’ll catch him there like we spoke about.”

Lomachenko finished his career with statistics comparable to Hall-of-Famer Floyd Mayweather and current lightweight champion Shakur Stevenson, as he is one of only three fighters to have ever posted a plus/minus data point that exceeded 20. Plus/minus in boxing is where you take your percentage for punches taken from your percentage of punches landed. The greater the number is, the greater the difference is between the amount of punches you land, and the amount of punches you get hit by.

Through his 21-fight career as a whole, Lomachenko threw an average of 53.7 punches per round, landed 35.6% of his shots, and limited his opponents to landing just 18.4% of their punches.