Serrano Defends Featherweight Titles Against Manzur

Amanda Serrano is back in action next month, and the title count keeps growing.

The 37-year-old Puerto Rican will make another featherweight championship defence on August 21 in Temecula, California, facing Argentina's Lucrecia Manzur with her Ring Magazine, WBA, and WBO titles on the line. Ring Magazine announced the bout on Thursday.

Serrano is one of the most decorated fighters in the history of women's boxing, a seven-division world champion who has spent the past several years competing at the highest level while continuing to pile up title defences and championship belts. At 37, she remains the standard by which the rest of the division measures itself.

Manzur enters the fight as the biggest challenge of her career. Her record of 14-4 with seven knockouts has been built largely on the South American circuit, a platform that has given her experience and momentum but limited exposure to elite international opposition. The gap in championship experience and level of competition is significant, and Serrano will enter as a strong favourite.

What Serrano gets from this fight is activity and title defence while she waits for the next marquee opportunity. She has spent recent years testing herself against the sport's biggest names — the two fights with Katie Taylor in particular defined a chapter of women's boxing that the sport will be discussing for decades — and the Manzur defence keeps her sharp and title-active without the kind of risk that those encounters carried. The path to pulling off the upset requires her to be better than she has ever been against the best opponent she has ever faced.