British super middleweight and light heavyweight Sven “The Hammer” Hamer from England was a fighter through and through. He boxed at a good level as an amateur, reaching the ABA semi finals, and he boxed when serving as a soldier in the British army. He turned professional, and after his “real” boxing career he continued to fight regularly on the unlicensed circuit. Born in Margate, a coastal town in the southeast of England, on June 6, 1973, he enlisted in the British army at seventeen and served four years in the Queens regiment, partly in Canada and Germany. When he left the army in 1994, he decided to turn professional and made his debut at middleweight against Eddie Haley (1-0) on October 25 in London, winning by fourth-round stoppage.

 

Too much of a fighting man to demand a soft introduction to the paid code, Hamer was never going to have a padded record. From the start he was willing to take on all comers, which resulted in some early losses. Two years and nine fights in, he was a very mediocre 5-4 and looking at that statistic it would be easy to conclude that Hamer didn't have what it took in the pros. But the defeats came against good opponents in up-and-comers Delroy Matthews (4-1), Jason Matthews (7-0), Mark Baker (15-1) and Howard Eastman (12-0) in Southern Area title fights. To put things in context, Jason Matthews went on to become a WBO champion, Baker went on to become a WBF champion, and Eastman captured British, Commonwealth and European titles.

 

While it appeared to be in the cards that Hamer would spend his professional boxing careers as a journeyman, he learned from the set-backs and had other plans in mind. After losing to Eastman in December of 1996, Hamer moved up to super middleweight and went on a bit of a tear, winning four straight inside the distance, three in the first round. Among those victories were upsets over Scottish prospect John Wilson (10-0), and Willie Quinn (22-2), whom Hamer demolished in the first round of a British title eliminator.

 

At this point, in the fall of 1997, Hamer was on his way to resurrecting his career, but he refused to play things safe. Consequently, he went up to light heavyweight, lost four of his next eight and was only 13-8 after beating Terry Morrill (15-6-2) in September of 1999. But he always gave it his best and was almost always in entertaining scraps, so a month after the Morrill fight he found himself in the televised co-feature of a show at David Lloyd Tennis Centre in London, fighting Ukrainian champion Vitaly Kopytko (12-2). Kopytko had been an accomplished amateur, and many felt the tricky southpaw should have been awarded the decision against Eastman the previous year, so he was easily have the favorite against Hamer.

 

But the Englishman boxed very disciplined that night, controlling most of the fight and often found a home for his right hand, and came through a tough fight with flying colors to win his first non-domestic title fight 97-94 on scoring referee Larry O´Connell´s card.

 

Unfortunately this would be the high-point of Hamer´s career. He didn't box for another year-and-a-half, and when he returned it was in a low-profile decision victory over four rounds against journeyman Paul Bonson (10-36-5).

 

Three weeks after that, on June 16, 2001, he was halted with a cut eye against Elvis Mihailenko (6-0), and this bout turned out to be the last of his official professional boxing career. But, as mentioned earlier, Hamer was not able to just shake off his urge to fight, and since he was only twenty eight when he left life as a “real” professional boxer, he had plenty of time to continue in the unlicensed code, which didn't require the same commitment. He did that for a long time, boxing at heavyweight against opponents who rarely came close to his skill level and pedigree, defeating most of them with ease.

 

A genuine hard-man in the ring, Hamer´s official professional record stands at 15-9 with 10 KOs.