It´s official: WBA feather champ Yuriorkis "El Ciclon" Gamboa take on Argentinian Jonathan Victor Barros March 27 in Hamburg. Gamboa vs Barros headlines this Arena promotion along with the heavyweight clash between Steffen Kretschmann and Dennis Bakhtov. On the undercard heavyweight Juan Carlos Gomez, former WBC cruiser king and last seen challenging Vitali Klitschko, squares off against Ukrainian Alex Mazikin. Middleweight Mahir Oral face Juan Camilo Nova in a WBA I/C fight.

When WBO light heavyweight champ Juergen Braehmer defends the title April 24 in Hamburg against Mariano Plotinsky it won´t be televised live by ZDF writes Bild. The reason for this is the 16 month prison sentence that Braehmer have hanging over him. Braehmer insists he´s innocent and the case is appealed but the network still view it as unsuitable to televise Braehmer´s fights. The April 24 show is headlined by Susi Kentikian vs Nadia Raoui with the by now usual late start (23.15).

Bodo Eckmann has decided to resign as President for the German Federation, the BDB, at their annual meeting April 24. Who will take over? Well, it is an election so nothing is settled but it could be renowned boxing man Jean Marcel Nartz, formerly with Sauerland Event and Universum. The BDB have in the last years been under increasing pressure from "pirates" such as the GBA, GBO and the Latvian Federation that all have supervised shows in Germany. Sauerland shows are since years staged under supervision of the Austrian Federation.

The GBA, the German Boxing Association, claims to be the organisation behind the mysterious "Europe Profi Box Assocation title" that Polish cruiser veteran Wojciech Bartnik and Rene Huebner fought for March 6 in Katowice.

American veteran Mia St John takes on Rola El-Halabi March 20 in Ulm, Germany. The fight is for the WIBA and WIBF titles. El-Halabi is trained by Torsten Schmitz, who also handles WBO light heavyweight king Robert Stieglitz.

Swedish welterweight Isam Khalil travels to the US this weekend for final preparations for his showdown against Terrence Cauthen March 26 in Trenton, NJ. Khalil, 36, is 15-1-2, in a career that began in 99. The talent have always been there but there´s been long layoffs due to promotional problems and injuries.


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