Focus on: UBO World Light Heavyweight Champ Arturo “El Hostil” Leyva

Universal Boxing Organization™ (UBO) World Light Heavyweight Champion Arturo “El Hostil” Leyva (10-0, 6 KOs) is based in Miami, Florida, but has had all of his professional fights in his native Colombia.

From a small town in the Cundinamarca department of Colombia, where soccer and boxing were the only popular sports, Leya excelled at both.

But after a few fights, he found out that soccer was a more stable income for him, and he decided to drop boxing, even though he liked it more than soccer.

Around the age of twenty-four he came to the realization that he was not quite a good enough soccer-player to make it to “the big-time”, and decided to retire from that sport to become a coach instead, and did very well in that role.

 In 2018 he decided to give boxing another go, and had what is listed as his first pro fight by BoxRec (Leyva reportedly has several fights not recorded by BoxRec), in Girardot, defeating journeyman Gabriel Bracho from Venezuela.

Already in his third fight he showed his potential when he out-scored former WBC regional titlist Samuel Miller (33-18), and when they had a rematch seven months later he did even better, scoring a second round stoppage.

In December of 2019, Leyva captured his first professional title when he decisioned Evert Bravo (25-11-1) to win the Colombian national Light Heavyweight crown.

His career was about to go to the next level when Covid hit in early 2020, and he only managed to get one fight in that year, a second round demolition of trial-horse compatriot Miguel Angel Suarez (5-39) in October.

Almost a year later, after several delays, he got a long-planned shot at the vacant UBO World Light Heavyweight title, matched another fellow countryman in Deivis Casseres (26-12).

It was a tough and close fight, but after twelve rounds at the Coliseo Luis Patron Rosano in Tolu, Leyva was deservedly declared the winner by unanimous decision (115-113. 115-113 and 116-112).

Boxen247.com needs your support!

If you like what we do and you wish to support us, please consider a one-off donation, however big or small. It helps us to continue our work and sustains our future. All safe and via PayPal…just click the PayPal image below or send manually to PayPal email address boxen247@gmail.com:

Subscribe to our new YouTube Channel with the latest boxing news and results, gossip and information from around the world. Just click the image below or any of the images for all our social media:

For the list of the latest boxing news and boxing results, click the following latest boxing news & results