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Shane Carwin will fight no more, as the former UFC interim heavyweight champion Tuesday announced his retirement.
“Officially retired [today],” Carwin wrote on his Twitter feed. “Thank you to my family, friends and fans! Dream big. God Bless.”
If you want to talk about the legacy of Shane Carwin, the former interim UFC heavyweight champion who retired Tuesday at the age of 38, the most telling aspect of his relatively short, yet explosive, UFC career was that you can never say he was in a boring fight.
A lot of that had to do with the fact that with one swing of his fists, a fight could end suddenly, but it’s also a testament to the fact that for someone with such obvious physical gifts when it came to size, power, and athleticism, he was still just a fighter at heart. Carwin was a fierce competitor who would take one to give one, and sometimes – as in his 2009 fight with Gabriel Gonzaga – it worked, as he rebounded from a broken nose to knock his opponent out seconds later. Other times, as in what would end up to be his final bout against Junior dos Santos in 2011, it didn’t, but even after taking a steady thrashing from the future heavyweight champion, the idea of quitting never entered his mind.
So when Carwin tweeted “Officially retired 2day:-) thank you to my family, friends and fans! #dreambig GOD BLESS!!!” Tuesday evening, you had to assume that it wasn’t from a series of losses or a realization that he couldn’t compete with the best in the world anymore, but that his body finally overruled his heart and mind and made the decision that it was time for him to walk away.
That would come as little surprise to fight game insiders, who saw Carwin battle with serious back and neck injuries for years, some dating back to his college football days, when the two-time Division II All-American linebacker for Western State College saw his back ailments keep him from pursuing a career in the NFL. Of course, the gridiron’s loss was mixed martial arts’ gain, as Carwin – who was also a Division II National wrestling champion – soon turned to fighting, making his debut in October of 2005 with a first round win over Carlton Jones.
Going home early became a habit for Carwin, who didn’t see the second round until his 2010 title fight with Brock Lesnar. That was his 13th pro bout. In the previous 12, Carwin was a force of destruction, tearing through all opposition, and ending five of those bouts in less than a minute.
In 2008, he made his UFC debut with a 44 second knockout of Christian Wellisch, and after similarly impressive finishes of Neil Wain and Gonzaga, he was matched up with Frank Mir on March 27, 2010 for the interim UFC heavyweight title. Three minutes and 48 seconds after the opening bell, Carwin had his 12th victory and a championship belt.