2004 Olympian and #12 ranked IBF junior middleweight contender Vanes “The Destroyer” Martirosyan moved one step closer to his hopes of winning a world title with a six round pummeling of hardcore veteran Andrey Tsurkan.

Martirosyan set the terms of the fight early as he kept the advancing Tsurkan on the outside with constant pinpoint left jabs. Tsurkan continued to plod forward though, taking several combinations, mixed in with uppercuts during rounds two and three. With his face severely reddened and puffed out from the various shots, Tsurkan finally got Vanes to trade in round four. Vanes though was just too quick and after the wild exchange, he stepped back and continued his mastery of getting in and out of punching rage with heavy shots behind the constant jabs.

Late in the round, Vanes wobbled the Russian with over hand right. Tsurkan however had the heart of a warrior and continued to press forward, desperately trying to turn the tide as Martirosyan rained down various combinations. A huge welt had formed under the eye of Tsurkan by round five from the constant attack that he no answer for.

By round six the straight rights from the Martirosyan opened a cut over the right eye of Tsurkan. The game and bleeding Tsurkan continued to press forward with hopes of landing that one big shot that would never come.

As Tsurkan returned to the corner in round six, he looked battered and beaten. With little argument from the corner of Tsurkan, the referee stopped the contest at the advice of the ringside physician.

Vanes Martirosyan averaged 46 jabs thrown per round, landing over 89 jabs in the fight. He was also extremely accurate with his power punches, landing 46% of his power shots (78 of 171) compared to just 31 of 83 landed by Tsurkan.

Martirosyan kept his record perfect at 25-0 with 16 knockouts while Tsurkan drops to 26-5 with 17 knockouts.---Kurt Wolfheimer