The Japan Boxing Commission has proposed a rule in which boxers found to be at least 3 percent heavier than the maximum allowable weight for their category during the official weigh-in the day before a match will immediately be disqualified and the relevant match suspended.
The Japan Pro Boxing Association, comprising boxing gym owners around the nation, endorsed the proposed rule Thursday, including punitive measures for overweight boxers.
The JBC's rules will be officially revised following approval from its board.
According to the JBC, these kinds of measures do not exist anywhere else in the world.
Under the current rules, boxers who exceed the maximum allowable weight during weigh-in can be measured again two hours later.
Currently, world title matches tend to be held even if boxers fail to satisfy the weight condition, since it is mainly up to the boxers, their gyms and the match promoters as to whether the relevant bout is held.
In March, then World Boxing Council bantamweight titleholder Luis Nery of Mexico fought Shinsuke Yamanaka. Before the match, Nery weighed 2.3 kilograms, or 4.3 percent, more than the bantamweight limit of 53.5 kilograms when he first stepped on the scales. Even though the bout went ahead and Nery scored a technical knockout over Yamanaka, he was later stripped of the belt. Yamanaka declared his retirement from boxing in late March.
In the face of an increasing number of similar cases, boxers being overweight is a problem.
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