A boxer’s career is never linear. It goes round and round, and up and down, and one minute they are young and coming up and the next they are old and going down. Around them the faces may change, and the names may change, but the goals and the structure itself remain the same. There will be champions, contenders, and also-rans, and every year the cars on the track will keep doing circuits, each lap a little slower than the last, until eventually they run out of gas, or crash, or everybody watching them, having realized there is no end in sight, gives up on their behalf. 

For as long as they can a boxer will run on fumes and convince themselves each lap is different, quicker. It’s why many of them tend to outstay their welcome and eventually crash and burn or just stop, stranded in no man’s land. It’s why champions will often need to be lapped and derailed in order to see sense and feel as though they now have permission to slow down and cut the engine. 

In the case of Oleksandr Usyk, the current world heavyweight champion, the idea of retirement seems preposterous at this stage – at least to him. He is, after all, not only the best heavyweight in the world, but has yet to lose in 23 professional fights and is coming off arguably his two most impressive performances – both against Tyson Fury. To retire now, with so much momentum and power, would seem like he had shortchanged himself, or not taken advantage of all his good work. A premature stoppage, in other words. 

Yet the reality is that Usyk is 38 years of age, has been fighting most of his life, and has had few easy fights since turning pro in 2013. Added to that, he is a rather small heavyweight, having previously campaigned and dominated at cruiserweight, and has, in beating Fury twice, as well as Anthony Joshua twice, dealt with his closest rivals so emphatically there are, for Usyk, no rivalries left.  

Too good for his own good, perhaps, Usyk has done things swiftly and efficiently at heavyweight and now struggles to find compelling opponents to help further build his legacy. It is for this reason Daniel Dubois, someone Usyk has already stopped in nine rounds, is the frontrunner to face Usyk this summer. It is for this reason, too, that retirement, something no boxer wants to entertain, could end up being a wiser option for Usyk than the alternative: simply going over old ground and doing continuous laps of the same track. 

Usyk Dubois Fight

In fairness to Dubois, the next Brit to get two bites of the Usyk cherry, there are some who believe he deserves another chance and that he will be more effective in fight two. This is primarily because Dubois has, since yielding to Usyk in 2023, won three big fights on the spin – beating Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic and Anthony Joshua all inside the distance – and appears to be getting better fight by fight. At 27, he is now in his athletic prime and, as IBF heavyweight champion, has grown into both his suits and his skin. He has an aura about him these days. He strikes fear in the eyes of the opposition. He hits hard with both hands. More importantly, he no longer panics and becomes vulnerable when things get tough. 

As for Usyk, he sees in Dubois only an old victim and an IBF title he would like to return to his collection. He also hears all the things Dubois says about their first fight, which was tainted somewhat by a low-blow controversy in round five, and would presumably like to silence this noise by beating Dubois in an even more convincing fashion in 2025. 

The question is, does Usyk, given all he has achieved, really have to go to such lengths to prove what we already know? The answer to that is no, of course not. In fact, the first fight between Usyk and Dubois was so one-sided that the prospect of a rematch happening two years down the line would have seemed absurd had it been floated at the time. Indeed, that it is close to becoming a reality for July is a testament to how much Dubois has improved and his hunger to be the best. 

Mostly, though, the prospect of a 2025 rematch between Dubois and Usyk highlights the dearth of viable contenders at heavyweight and suggests that maybe Usyk, 23-0 (14), has outstayed his welcome. That doesn’t mean the Ukrainian is old hat, or no longer interesting, but simply that he has beaten pretty much everybody around him who could be considered a threat. Now, as a result, he is having to look back rather than forward. Now, just to continue, he is being forced to get creative and almost engineer reasons to feel both motivated and threatened. 

His legacy, that is already secured. It won’t be enhanced by beating Daniel Dubois a second time, nor is it likely to be enhanced by wins against Joseph Parker or anybody else a considerable distance behind him. In just 23 fights, Usyk has already fought and conquered the best opponents he will fight and conquer, as both a heavyweight and cruiserweight. Everything from this point on is bound to be second-best, an afterthought, an exercise in futility. 

There are of course still reasons to carry on, what with Riyadh Season the season of giving, yet one cannot help but wonder how long Usyk can do so without feeling either bored or fed up with the familiarity. After all, everywhere he now looks he sees either men he has already beaten or men he would be expected to beat. He sees paydays, perhaps easy ones, but knows that collecting them means a 12-week training camp and additional wear and tear. 

He also knows, as they all do, that a boxer’s career is never linear. It goes round and round, and up and down, and one minute they are young and coming up and the next they are old and going down. Around them the faces may change, and the names may change, but the goals and the structure itself remain the same. There will be champions, contenders, and also-rans, and every year the cars on the track will keep doing circuits, each lap a little slower than the last, until eventually they run out of gas, or crash, or everybody watching them, having realized there is no end in sight, gives up on their behalf.