Vanes Martirosyan, 2004 Olympian, Dies From Cancer At 39

2004 U.S Olympian Vanes Martirosyan reportedly passed away earlier today at age 39 from cancer. Martirosyan (36-4-1, 21 KOs) had been battling Squamous Cell Carcinoma cancer. He’d been getting treatment for the problem.

A Sad Day for Boxing

It was revealed earlier in November 2025 that Martirosyan was battling cancer. He’d had a biopsy after experiencing intense pain. It was later diagnosed that he had cancer.

Vanes started his career in 2005 and went undefeated until suffering his first loss to Demetrius Andrade by a 12-round split decision on November 9, 2013. His career was rocky from that point on, as he lost to Jermell Charlo, Erislandy Lara, and finally Gennadiy Golovkin.

Martirosyan retired after his second-round knockout loss to IBO and WBC middleweight champion Golovkin on May 5, 2018. That was still a prime version of GGG, so it’s understandable why Vanes lost that fight.

If Martirosyan had fought in this era at 154, it would have been interesting to see how he would have done against the top fighters. He had both the power and the size to compete at junior middleweight in this era of the sport.

When he was fighting, moving up to 160 at the end of his career was the wrong move. He had the power to dominate at 154, but came undone when he went up against Andrade and Jermell Charlo.