By Edward Chaykovsky

On Monday night at the DIVS Sports Palace in Ekaterinburg, Russia, undefeated WBO, WBA and IBF light heavyweight world champion Sergey "Krusher" Kovalev (30-0-1, 26 KOs) won a twelve round unanimous decision over top contender Isaac "Golden Boy" Chilemba (24-4-2, 10 KOs). The scores were 117-110, 116-111 and 118-109.

Isaac is only the second fighter to go the full twelve round distance with Kovalev. Bernard Hopkins was the first in November of 2014, when Kovalev won a twelve round unanimous decision in their unification battle.

Chilemba have gave Kovalev some tough moments in the fight and made him miss a lot of punches. The Russian slugger looked winded in the second half of the contest.

Kovalev had his moments, when he dropped Chilemba hard in the seventh round and couldn't close the show as the round was coming to a close.

"If it wasn't the end of the round I would have pursued to actively attack him. But because the bell rang, we rested and he managed to pull himself together and I didn't want to waste my energy. He is very experienced and had as many fights as myself and with boxers of highest level, therefore I was boxing and continue boxing and whatever happens, then it happens. There was no aim to knockout him, but the main aim was to gain experience from this fight for the next fight in November in Las Vegas," Kovalev said.

As far as his stamina, Kovalev admits that he didn't properly pace himself and was throwing had power punches, with knockout intentions, in every round. He says his arms were dead tired by the championship rounds.

"I gained experience; there are things that I have to work with now. I have to work with opponents that sit in the defense and I have to work more with my left arm. And probably I also wanted to make a hard punch and that worked against me. My arms felt heavy and not everything that I wanted happened, and that is again because it's Chilemba," Kovalev said.

"He is actually a very experienced fighter and like many "couch-experts" said: what round? I never think about when knockout is going to be - it's boxing, you need just one punch.  We are all under God and how he judges, that's how it's going to be. I believe my mistake was that I was trying to put power in every punch. I had a heavy feeling in my hands. That's why he was faster than me in some moments."