NABF Website will be featuring under NEWS:: SPECIAL INTEREST A different NABF Fighter to have everyone get to know these athletics.

Most current update on Travis Walker

- supplied by Steve Munisteri and Goossen Tutor Website

Additional significant info- Beat Jason Estrada , NABF ranked 8 at time

3 time National Amateur Champion and Gold medal winner Pan American games who had beaten Walker 3 times in Amateurs and Olympian whose only loss as pro is to Walker on Shobox fall of 2006. Beat George Garcia number 2 rated Amateur and undefeated prospect who had beaten Walker as amateur in April 2007 on Shobox. Lost very controversial fight to TJ Wilson when ref stopped in 15 seconds despite Walker being clear headed and on feet in Nov 2007 on Shobox. Won rematch in dramatic fashion for NABF interim title by knocking out Wilson in second round on Shobox on Feb 29th 2008. Became permanent NABF Heavy Champ on MAY 31st 2008 when Rahman refused to fight him. Hopes to defend title this summer.

TRAVIS WALKER

Travis has been a professional boxer since July, 2004 following a brief, but distinguished amateur career which he didn’t start until age 21. In posting an amateur mark of 24-8, Travis won the 2003 National Golden Gloves title as a super heavyweight. Three of those eight losses were to Jason Estrada – the latter of which cost him a shot to make the U.S. Olympic Boxing Team for the 2004 Games in Athens, Greece.

Managed by Steve Munisteri and trained by the duo of Dwight Pratchett and Dick Wood, Travis has been making up for his late start in boxing to fight 22 times in less than 2 ½ years.

He knocked out five of his first six opponents in the latter half of 2004, winning the other by majority decision.

In 2005, Travis was busy fighting nine times, winning eight of those and battling Goossen Tutor stablemate Jason Gavern to an eight-round draw in September. To date, that draw is the only blemish on Walker’s record.

A month prior to stopping Agustin Corpus in December of last year, Walker and another stablemate, Raphael Butler, were brought in to spar with then-WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko to prepare him for his title defense against Hasim Rahman.

That fight never came to be, as the sparring partners reportedly gave Klitschko all he could handle and more, and the sessions came to an end when Walker dropped the Russian giant with a body shot. Several days later, Klitschko announced his retirement.

Walker has been on a roll in 2006, with a pair of hard-fought decision wins over Andrew Greeley and a September second-round TKO of John Clark on the James Toney-Samuel Peter undercard at Staples Center in Los Angeles.

FAMILY:

Travis, age 27, was born and raised in Tallahassee, Florida by a single parent – his mother, Diann Walker – who worked as a law clerk.

He has an older brother, Gregory (28), who works at an automobile dealership, as well as a younger sister, Khadijah (16), who is a high school student.

For several years, Travis has served as a “Big Brother” to a young boy who moved from Tallahassee to Orlando. The boy is now age 9 and Travis continues in that role making the three hour drive whenever possible.

EDUCATION:

Travis successfully went through the Tallahassee school system. He attended the Bond Elementary School, the Nims Middle School and Rickards High School, from which he graduated in 1998.

In high school, Travis played football as a defensive end and offensive guard and received several college scholarship offers. He also excelled in track and field, running the 4 x 400 and 4 x 800 relays and throwing the shot put and the discus. He also set state records in weightlifting in both the bench press and clean and jerk.

WHY BOXING:

Travis was pursued by Rickards High boxing coach Alonzo Johnson to take up boxing, but he declined because Johnson was also the dean of his high school and as he put it, “Nobody likes the dean.”

However, after graduation he saw then-heavyweight champ Lennox Lewis score a quick, first-round knockout over an opponent who made more that $300,000 for less than two minutes in the ring, and the thought of that type of income gave Travis a change of heart about boxing.

Travis admits he took up the sport for the money, as he was not interested in going back to school.