Filipino boxer Jerwin Ancajas is not done. Not even close.
The former IBF super-flyweight world champion has signed with Zuffa Boxing, becoming the second Filipino to join the organization after Mark Magsayo—and arriving with a singular purpose: to become a world champion again, this time at featherweight.
A New Home for Ancajas But a Familiar Ambition
Ancajas held the IBF super-flyweight title for nearly six years, from 2016 to 2022—one of the longest championship reigns in Philippine boxing history. After losing the belt, he moved up to super-bantamweight, then featherweight, navigating the painful process of rebuilding at the highest level. A stoppage loss to Japan’s Takuma Inoue in February 2024 was the turning point that clarified everything.
“I accept that he was the better fighter at that time,” Ancajas said. “I’m making no excuses, whether it was the weight or any other reason. I’m just ready to move on now.”
Moving on meant moving up—and settling at 126 pounds where, by his own account, his body finally feels right.
“I feel really strong and comfortable in this weight class, so this is where we’re going to continue moving forward,” he said. “It means a great deal to be able to move up to this weight class, because it’s very comfortable for me, compared to when I had to make the previous weight limit. Now I’m much more comfortable.”
The Zuffa Boxing signing formalizes what Ancajas sees as his best chance at reaching the summit again. The organization, which operates under the UFC umbrella, has been building a serious boxing roster—and selecting Ancajas for it is a recognition of what the 34-year-old still brings to the table.
“It means a great deal for me to be here at Zuffa Boxing,” Ancajas said during fight week in Las Vegas. “Because I know that it’s a bunch of great fighters that are picked to be a part of it. It’s an honor for me to be chosen.”
What makes the signing significant beyond the personal goes to what it could mean for the Philippines. Magsayo established a Filipino presence in Zuffa Boxing. Ancajas, with his championship pedigree, deepens it. And if he can navigate the featherweight division’s elite—a deeper and more dangerous pool than the super-flyweight ranks he once ruled—there is a genuine path to another world title belt making its way back to Philippine soil.
“I want to hold a championship belt here in Zuffa Boxing for my fans in the Philippines,” Ancajas said. “To bring another world title back to the Philippines would be a very big deal. I know my team and I have worked so hard, so it would mean a lot to be able to win this fight on Sunday and then have another chance at a world title that I can bring back to the Philippines as a Filipino world champion.”
The First Test: Omar Trinidad
The road to Zuffa Boxing gold starts Sunday, June 28, at The Chelsea at The Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas—and it starts against a legitimate test.
Omar Trinidad is undefeated at 20-0-2 with 14 knockouts, a natural featherweight who has competed exclusively at 126 pounds since 2020. He is the current WBC Continental Americas featherweight champion and is rated among the division’s best by three of the four major sanctioning bodies—No. 2 by the IBF, No. 3 by the WBC, and No. 5 by the WBO. His most recent outing was a 10th-round TKO over Max Ornelas in January. He is, in short, not a soft debut opponent.
Ancajas enters the fight as the more experienced man by a wide margin. His record stands at 38-4-2 with 25 knockouts, and he carries the weight of a near-six-year world title reign’s worth of championship experience into every camp and every game plan. This is his third fight at featherweight—he beat Thai journeyman Sukpasried Ponphitak by disqualification in Mandaluyong City in his 126-pound debut, then returned earlier this year to stop Ruben Tostado in four rounds in Mexico. The progression has been deliberate.
He also remains ranked in super-bantamweight despite the weight class move—sitting at No. 3 with the WBO and No. 11 with the IBF—which speaks to the residual respect his name commands across divisions.
A new weight class. A new promotional home. The same goal that has driven Ancajas since he first laced up gloves in the Philippines and dreamed of becoming a world champion.
Sunday is where the new chapter begins.
