General · EdgepediaOctober 21, 20265 min read

Rakhim Chakhkiyev

Rakhim Chakhkiyev (Рахим Русланович Чахкиев; born 1983 in Tobolsk, Tyumen, Russia) is a retired Russian boxer who won the gold medal in the men's heavyweight (≤91 kg) division at the 2008 Beijing Olympics and later fought as a professional cruiserweight from 2009 to 2016.¹

Key fact	Detail
Born	1983, Tobolsk, Tyumen Oblast, Russia¹
Olympic result	Gold, men's heavyweight (≤91 kg), 2008 Beijing; beat Clemente Russo 4-2 in the final²
Amateur honors	Silver, 2007 World Championships (lost to Russo 6-7); gold, 2001 European Junior Championships at 81 kg; 2007 Russian national champion³^•⁴
Professional titles	WBC Baltic (2012), WBC Silver (2014), EBU European (2014), and IBO (2015) cruiserweight titles³
World title fights	0-1: stopped in round 8 by WBC champion Krzysztof Włodarczyk, 21 June 2013, Moscow⁴
Style and physique	Southpaw, 183 cm tall with a 185 cm reach³
Retirement	Announced September 2017, at age 34⁴

Amateur career

Chakhkiyev took up boxing at age 12 under Ruslan Chapanov, a well-known trainer from Ingushetia, and won a Russian sports-school championship at up to 81 kg four years later. In 2001 he won the European Junior Championships in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, at 81 kg, and in 2003 he completed a law degree at an institute of economics and law while representing CSK VVS Samara.⁴ He boxed as a southpaw and stood 183 cm.³

At the senior national level he placed repeatedly before breaking through: silver at the 2004 Russian Championships, bronze in 2005 and 2006, and gold in 2007 at 91 kg, beating Roman Romanchuk 28-25 in the final.³^•⁴ Other amateur results included gold at the 2006 CISM World Military Championships in Warendorf, Germany, and silver in the 2006 World Cup team competition in Baku, where he beat Cuba's Osmay Acosta 24-15.³

2007 World Championships. At the world championships in Chicago, Chakhkiyev reached the heavyweight final, stopping or outpointing Evan Nedd, John Sweeney, Elchin Alizade, and John M'Bumba along the way. Italy's Clemente Russo won the final by decision, 7-6, leaving Chakhkiyev with the silver medal.³

2008 Olympic gold

The Beijing heavyweight tournament ran from 13 to 23 August 2008 at the Beijing Workers' Gymnasium as a single-elimination event with 16 boxers from 16 countries. Chakhkiyev defeated Ali Mazaheri of Iran 7-3 in round one, John M'Bumba of France 18-9 in the quarter-finals, and Osmay Acosta of Cuba 10-5 in the semi-finals.²^•³

The final paired the two form fighters of the division, Chakhkiyev and Russo, in a rematch of the 2007 world final. This time the result was reversed: in a low-scoring contest, Chakhkiyev won 4-2 to take the gold medal, with Acosta and the American Deontay Wilder receiving bronze medals.² After the victory he was named a Merited Master of Sport of Russia and awarded the Order of Friendship.⁴

Professional career

Chakhkiyev turned professional after Beijing and debuted on 10 October 2009 in Rostock, Germany, knocking out the Bulgarian Tayar Mehmed in the second round. His trainers in that phase were the German coach Michael Timm and the former Uzbek world champion Artur Grigorian, and he spent his first two years winning rating bouts, usually inside the distance.⁴ In January 2012 he won the WBC Baltic cruiserweight title by beating fellow Russian Alexander Kotlobay, and defended it twice.⁴

WBC title challenge. After a win over the American Andrés Taylor in November 2012 put him in line for a world shot, Chakhkiyev faced the WBC cruiserweight champion Krzysztof Włodarczyk of Poland on 21 June 2013 in Moscow. He started well and even scored a knockdown, but faded from the middle of the fight and was stopped in the eighth round, his first professional defeat.⁴

European and IBO titles. In January 2014 he signed with the Russian promoter Andrey Ryabinsky of Mir Boxa and returned to winning ways. A ninth-round stoppage of Finland's Juho Haapoja in March 2014 brought the WBC Silver cruiserweight title, which he defended against Colombia's Santander Silgado in May. On 24 October 2014 he knocked out the former world champion Giacobbe Fragomeni in four rounds at the Luzhniki Stadium in Moscow to win the vacant European (EBU) cruiserweight title.³^•⁴ In 2015 he added three more wins, including a stoppage of fellow Russian Valery Brudov and an eighth-round knockout of Junior Anthony Wright on 22 May 2015 for the vacant IBO cruiserweight title.⁴

Decline and retirement. In September 2017, at 34, he announced his retirement, saying he had given boxing 20 years, 12 of them as an amateur, and that he had not fully realized his potential in the professional ranks.⁴

Assessment

Chakhkiyev's career divides sharply at the 2008 Olympics. As an amateur he reached the top of his division, avenging his only major defeat by beating Russo in the Beijing final. As a professional he was considered one of the most promising cruiserweights in the world when he turned over in 2009, and he collected four regional or minor titles, but after a stoppage loss to Włodarczyk in his 2013 world title challenge he won the vacant IBO cruiserweight title in 2015 by defeating Junior Anthony Wright, losing that belt to Afolabi in his first defense.²^•⁴^•⁵ He described himself as a natural puncher who preferred to attack forward rather than box on points, a style that served him in his early professional years but, by his own account, cost him stamina in the later championship rounds.⁴

References

Initially written Oct 21, 2026 · Edited: Oct 25, 2026