Hiroki Ioka

Hiroki Ioka, born on January 8, 1969 in Sakai, Osaka, Japan; he was a former WBC Minimumweight and WBA Lightweight champion. But before all this, he was better known for being the first ever WBC Minimumweight champion winning the title immediately after the minimumweight division was created.

He first became interested in it when he entered the Miwa Tsuda Gym during the time he was still in middle school. He then finally made his professional debut on 1986 at the young age of 17. His eight professional fights was a landmark for him, because this was when he first won the Japanese Minimumweight title. And eventually went on to fight for which was just newly created and that was the “WBC Minimumweight” title.

After some time, Ioka moved up to the light flyweight division and challenged the undefeated champion Myung-Woo-Yuh for the WBA Light Flyweight title which was dated December of the year 1991. He was then able to win a close split-decision victory and was fortunate enough to have been able to defend his title twice in the following year. And on 1993, he lost the hold of his title after competing with Yuh for his third defense.

Though Hiroki Ioka made highlights in becoming the youngest Japanese boxer to win a world title at the age of 18 years and 9 months. Till date, this record has not been broken which keeps Ioka on the Hall of fame.

He is currently sharing his knowledge and skills to new boxers as he train at his own gym which he name “Ioka Boxing Gym”.