Zhilei Zhang will face Agit Kabayel on February 22nd for the interim heavyweight title. This marks one of Zhang’s toughest tests but pales in comparison to the time he fought death and won.
Zhilei Zhang holds a record of 27-2-1, with two brutal stoppage wins over ‘The Juggernaut’ Joe Joyce and a devastating knockout of Deontay Wilder on his resume.
His only losses have come at the hands of Joseph Parker, who recently opened up about depression, who he put down twice but was outpointed to a majority decision loss, and Filip Hrgovic, who beat Zhang on a controversial unanimous decision.
Zhang is now 41 years old and likely has only a few fights left in his career, with Agit Kabayel being up next.
Though many are aware of ‘Big Bang’ Zhang’s power and recent run of form, there is one area of his career that many don’t know – Who did Zhang draw with?
Zhilei Zhang was diagnosed with kidney failure after draw with Jerry Forrest
Speaking with Daily Mail Sport, Zhang told the story of how he almost died after facing Jerry Forrest in 2021:
“The fight happened during COVID so we were put in the bubble. There were three to four days where I was put in the hotel room without access to the outside world, so I didn’t train[…] or drink any water.”
Zhang goes on to explain the tragic consequences of this: “Something was not right. In the last couple rounds I didn’t know what happened, I lost my memory. […] My heart wasn’t right and nothing was right.”
“In the hospital, I was diagnosed with acute kidney failure and liver function escalate. That was a very dangerous moment.”
Zhang summarises the moment in one sentence: “I thought I was dying, and I didn’t know if my life would stop at that moment in time.”
The fight ended in a majority draw.
The reason Zhilei Zhang thought about giving up
In the same interview, Zhang spoke on his will to succeed and stated: “When you’re talking about training hard, when you’re talking about sparring gets hard, when you’re talking about losing a fight, those are not the reasons that I even thought about giving up.”
Instead, Zhang’s doubt in his career early on came from one thing – visa issues.
“The only time I thought about giving up was when I was in China waiting for my American visa I was put on hold for about half a year, and I thought because of logistic issues like this, it’d make my career really difficult.”
Zhang, who has been training with LL Cool J, spoke on how every time he has to leave the country for a media event he must first apply weeks in advance for a visa to allow him to return to the United States.
Zhang faces Kabayel on February 22nd. Kabayel comes off the back of two career-best wins over Frank Sanchez and Arslanbek Makhmudov.
Also on the Dmitry Bivol vs Artur Beterbiev card is Hamzah Sheeraz, who won’t pray to beat Adames as he fights for his first world title, as he doesn’t want an ‘unfair advantage’.
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