It happens nearly every week. On a Saturday night, you sit down on the couch and grab your beverage of choice to watch a fight, be it MMA, kickboxing, or boxing. The routine is more or less the same every fight night.
An entire evening of pugilism boils down to its main event. You can expect a 10-round or a 12-round affair at three minutes per round to end the night’s schedule of action.
Whether or not a championship is at stake in the headlining affair shouldn’t matter, since there’s a good chance that it’ll be entertaining in any event, but far too often, a three-minute round in boxing is exclusive to men’s fights. If you’ve watched a women’s boxing match, you’ll notice a troubling constant on the cards when it comes to the main event:
Quite regularly, the length of a round in women’s boxing is only two minutes. This leads to one salient question:
Why Does This Keep Happening?
Add Three-Minute Rounds to Women’s Boxing!
Come on, now. It’s 2024, so can’t we do any better? The answer is yes, we certainly can. Luckily, this is a problem that’s easy to solve.
Boxing organizations and promoters can make another stride toward equality for women by making all such matches have three-minute rounds. It’s already been done recently.
Back in October, Amanda Serrano (46-2-1, 30 KOs) battled Danila Ramos (12-3, 1 KO) in a winner-take-all affair for the WBA, WBO, IBO, and IBF Women’s Featherweight Championships from Orlando. Serrano took this bout (unanimous decision) after 12 rounds at three minutes per round.
https://twitter.com/DAZNBoxing/status/1718105721982562326
On March 2, Serrano will make her first defense of the belts in another 12-round affair versus Nina Meinke (18-3, 4 KOs) in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Much like the Ramos tilt, Serrano’s title defense will be contested in three-minute rounds.
While Serrano will fight her second contest with equal length to a men’s fight, not everyone believes that three-minute periods are the way to go in women’s boxing.
Katie Taylor Unenthusiastic About Equal Time in the Ring
Katie Taylor (23-1, 6 KOs), who defeated Chantelle Cameron (18-1, 8 KOs) by majority decision in late November to defend her undisputed super-lightweight crown, isn’t sold on the idea of adding an extra 60 seconds to the clock. She weighed in on the issue before her successful appearance in the ring this past fall.
“I don’t know if women’s boxing has the strength and depth to have three-minute rounds really,” Taylor said. “For me, I really don’t care whether it’s a two-minute or a three-minute round. I spar three-minute rounds all the time. There’s pros and cons to both really.”
Faster-Paced Fights Lead to Less Exciting Outcomes
Laila Ali, the daughter of the greatest fighter ever to grace the squared circle, Muhammad Ali, has been among those advocating for equality with male boxers. She mentioned that she wished she had the opportunity to compete in three-minute rounds during her career as a pugilist.
“Two minutes goes by really quickly,” Ali explained. “There have been times where you’re just about to get it done and then the bell rings and you’re like, ‘Dang, if I only had another minute'”.
With only two minutes to fight between rounds, it doesn’t give women adequate time to showcase their full arsenal of punches. You’ll see a woman having to go to the key punches in her gameplan before she’s really ready to execute it.
Having parity with men would allow for a more complete fight and by extension, a more exciting finish. If you go on X during any combat sports card and look at a promotion’s official account, what are you most likely to see?
For those of you who haven’t left the social media network for greener pastures of rival services just yet, going on X entails seeing a highlight-reel knockout or submission right after it happens, along with the likes and reposts (formerly retweets) to drive up the analytics to make it more viral. A two-minute round in women’s boxing may make it less likely for a highlight to be shared online.
MMA Gets it Right
For years, MMA promotions resisted having women as fighters on their rosters, but Ronda Rousey was quick to become a household name among women’s MMA. Along the way, the UFC and its competitors achieved equal time for women by making all fights the standard five minutes in length per period.
If MMA was so quick to do what’s right, why can’t boxing? As it stands now, the Amanda Serrano vs. Nina Meinke fight on March 3 will be just the third-ever 12-round fight at three minutes per round to take place in the history of women’s boxing.
Let’s have more of this in the future.
Final Thoughts
There will hopefully come a day when we won’t have to do articles like this where equality among female boxers is championed because the goal will already be realized. Here’s hoping that day will come soon.
Women have been fighting to prove their worth in this world for a long time and if they get three-minute rounds in boxing, that’ll be another win in the fight for equality. Equal pay will be next.
