The circumstances surrounding the unavailability of the WBO title belonging to Kazakhstani champion Janibek Alimkhanuly have finally been cleared up. While Alimkhanuly, who currently holds both the WBO and IBF titles in the middleweight division, is poised to fight Andrei Mikhailovich today [October 4] but was planning to enter the ring without his WBO title, leading to suggestions he lost his belt. This has been debunked as the WBO reveals that Mikhailovich’s promoter and the organizer of the upcoming October 4 card, “No Limit”, actually prevented the WBO title from being on the line due to the IBF’s recent second-day weigh-in rule,

To truly put things into perspective, it is important to understand the intent by Australian promotion No Limit. WBO and IBF middleweight (160 lbs) champion Janibek Alimkhanuly (15-0, 10 KO’s) and Australian challenger Andrei Mikhailovich (21-0, 13 KO’s) were poised to fight earlier this year July, but their match was cancelled due to Alimkhanuly suffering from dehydration issues.

Though No Limit did not specifically state their concerns―or only did so in vague terms, a letter retrieved from the WBO that was sent towards both parties confirms the promotion desired for the WBO title to be excluded due to the IBF’s second-day weigh-in rule. This rule requires fighters participating in a IBF-sanctioned title bout to weigh in a second time the morning after the first weigh-in―to prevent a contestant from rehydrating up 10 lbs past the weight limit.

As the WBO title would also be on the line, No Limit prevented the title from being included in the title bout between Alimkhanuly and Mikhailovich in order to ensure the IBF’s second-day weigh-in rule would remain, presuming that the title’s availability would result in the WBO cancelling or interfering with the IBF’s rule. As such, there were concerns by No Limit of Janibek Alimkhanuly rehydrating past the 10 lbs limit set by the IBF, leading to them contractually attempting to exclude the WBO title.

However, this decision has now been rectified by the WBO itself―after Alimkhanuly’s representatives protested No Limit’s exclusion of the WBO belt―who stated in their letter that they would sanction the WBO title without interfering in the IBF’s second-day weigh-in rule, confirming the upcoming Alimkhanuly-Mikhailovich contest to be for both the WBO and IBF titles.

Additionally, Alimkhanuly’s fight with Mikhailovich has been sanctioned as a voluntary title defense, while the IBF [according to the letter] has sanctioned their bout as a mandatory title fight.

The two are set to fight later today at The Star venue in Sydney, Prymont, which will occur in Mikhailovich’s home country of Australia. The second-day weigh-in as stipulated by the IBF is set to occur as normal between 8:00 A.M. and 10:00 A.M [Australian time] according to the IBF’s rules. According to IBF rule 1.B, if Alimkhanuly were to rehydrate past 10 lbs, the IBF title would be vacated in the case of Alimkhanuly missing weight and give Mikhailovich the oportunity to win vacant title.

In the case of Mikhailovich―the challenger―missing weight, he would no longer fight be eligible to fight for the IBF title.