Combat Sports Law

Male boxers suffer KO/TKO stoppages 1.6 times more than their female counterparts. However, when adjusting the bouts for minutes boxed, their KO and TKO rates are almost identical.

These findings were revealed in a study published this week in the journal Neurology.

In the study, titled Gender Differences of Concussions in Professional Boxing, the authors combed through 10 years of data from the boxing database BoxRec. They reviewed the results of 237,238 professional matches between January 1^st 2014 and January 1^st 2024.

5% of the women’s bouts ended in KO. 24% with a TKO.

For men 15% of bouts ended in KO and 32% with a TKO. A significantly higher rate. However men box longer rounds and have more rounds in their championship fights. The authors adjusted the data for KO/TKO rates based on minutes boxed. They found that there was only a 1% difference in stoppage rates with this factored in.

The full abstract is below.

Abstract

Objective:

In this study, we aim to determine whether the rates of knockouts (KO) and technical knockouts (TKO) differ between male and female boxers.

Background:

Due to concerns around safety, female boxers have shorter rounds (2min vs 3min) and less championship rounds (10 vs 12) than male boxers. This may affect the earning potential for female boxers. There is however a concern about increasing female risk of head injury with longer matches. At this point, it is unclear whether the current rules and regulations are equitable, or whether females and males have the same rates of KO/TKOs.

Design/Methods:

We collaborated with Boxrec.com, a well-maintained and comprehensive public online database, to extract match results from 237,238 professional matches between January 1^st 2014 and January 1^st 2024. We compared the rates of KO/TKO in female and male professional boxers.

Results:

Of 14,555 matches in females, 5% ended in KO and 24% in TKO (total 29% KO/TKO). Of 222,683 matches in males, 15% ended in KO and 32% in TKO (total 47% KO/TKO). Males incurred significantly more KO/TKOs (18% difference with 95% CI of 17.22–18.76, p<0.0001), but this difference fell to 1% when considering rates of KO/TKO per minute fought. On average KO/TKOs occurred in 2.68 rounds (5min 24sec, 5% per min) for females and 2.59 rounds (7min 48sec, 6% per min) for males.

Conclusions:

Male boxers are 1.6 times more likely to have a KO/TKO than female boxers in the same number of rounds, but when taking into account the difference round duration, the rates are about equal across sex. This suggests that if rounds were longer for females, rates KO/TKO would supersede males. These data should be considered when making rule and regulation changes for boxers.