Adrian Diaconu (born 9 June 1978) is a Romanian former

professional boxer Professional boxing, or prizefighting, is regulated, sanctioned boxing. Professional boxing bouts are fought for a purse that is divided between the boxers as determined by contract. Most professional bouts are supervised by a regulatory autho ...

who competed from 2001 to 2011, and held the WBC light-heavyweight title from 2008 to 2009. As an amateur he won a silver medal in the middleweight division at the 1999 World Championships and bronze in the

light-middleweight Light middleweight, also known as junior middleweight or super welterweight,PeBoxRec/ref> is a weight class in combat sports. Boxing The light middleweight division (also known as junior middleweight in the IBF or super welterweight in the WBA a ...

division at the 1997 World Championships. Diaconu was born in Ploieşti, Romania, but fought out of

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

, Canada for almost his entire professional career.

Amateur career

Diaconu represented Romania at the

2000 Olympics The 2000 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXVII Olympiad and also known as Sydney 2000 ( Dharug: ''Gadigal 2000''), the Millennium Olympic Games or the Games of the New Millennium, was an international multi-sport event held from ...

in the middleweight division. Olympic results: *Defeated

Abdelhani Kenzi Abdel Hani Kenzi (born 27 September 1973) is a boxer from Algeria. Career Kenzi participated in the 2004 Summer Olympics for his native North African country. There, he was stopped in the second round of the Light heavyweight (81 kg) di ...

(

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) 19-9 *Defeated Jitender Kumar (India) 12-3 *Lost to Jorge Gutiérrez (

Cuba Cuba ( , ), officially the Republic of Cuba ( es, República de Cuba, links=no ), is an island country comprising the island of Cuba, as well as Isla de la Juventud and several minor archipelagos. Cuba is located where the northern Caribbea ...

) KO 1

Professional career

Following the Olympics, Diaconu made his professional debut in 2001 and competed exclusively as a light-heavyweight. He went on to claim his first regional championship in June 2005, winning the Canadian title with a fifth-round knockout of Conal MacPhee. In December 2005, Diaconu won the WBC International title after knocking out Darrin Humphrey. This was followed up with a knockout against Max Heyman to win the vacant WBA– NABA and TAB titles. Diaconu vacated his Canadian title to face

Rico Hoye Rico Hoye (born November 9, 1974) is an American professional boxer who current competes in the Cruiserweight division. He resides Phoenix, Arizona, and is a former number one ranked light heavyweight contender (IBF) and a former world title ch ...

in an eliminator bout for the WBC world title. He was successful, dominating Hoye until a stoppage in the third round. With the win, Diaconu became the mandatory challenger for then-WBC world champion

Chad Dawson Chad Dawson (born July 13, 1982) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 2001 to 2019. He has held multiple light heavyweight world championships, and was one of the most highly regarded boxers in that division between 2006 and ...

. In October 2007, world cruiserweight champion

David Haye David Deron Haye (born 13 October 1980) is a British former professional boxer who competed between 2002 and 2018. He held multiple world championships in two weight classes, and was the first British boxer to reach the final of the World Ama ...

described Diaconu as "the future of the light-heavyweight division." On 19 April 2008, Diaconu won the vacant WBC

interim An interim is a period of temporary pause or change in a sequence of events, or a temporary state, and is often applied to transitional political entities. Interim may also refer to: Temporary organizational arrangements (general concept) *Provis ...

title with a twelve-round

unanimous decision A unanimous decision (UD) is a winning criterion in several full-contact combat sports, such as boxing, kickboxing, Muay Thai, mixed martial arts and other sports involving striking and submission in which all three judges agree on which fighte ...

over Chris Henry in Romania; the interim title being at stake to allow full titleholder Chad Dawson to make an optional defense after a previous injury-produced delay to the mandated bout. In July 2008, Diaconu was elevated to full champion status after Dawson vacated the title to avoid having to make the mandatory defense. Diaconu suffered his first career defeat and lost the WBC world title to

Jean Pascal Jean-Thenistor Pascal (born 28 October 1982) is a Haitian-born Canadian professional boxer. He held the WBA (Regular) light-heavyweight title from 2019 to 2021, and previously the WBC, IBO, '' Ring'' magazine and lineal light-heavyweight tit ...

on 19 June 2009, and would go on to lose a rematch on 11 December 2009. Diaconu's final professional fight took place on 21 May 2011 against former champion Chad Dawson, who defeated Diaconu by a unanimous decision after twelve rounds. A year later, Diaconu announced his retirement from boxing, stating that he felt a lack of support from his promoters, Interbox, to organize significant fights for him.

Professional boxing record

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Diaconu, Adrian World boxing champions World light-heavyweight boxing champions World Boxing Council champions Light-heavyweight boxers Romanian expatriates in Canada Sportspeople from Ploiești 1978 births Boxers at the 2000 Summer Olympics Olympic boxers for Romania Living people Romanian male boxers AIBA World Boxing Championships medalists Light-middleweight boxers Middleweight boxers