Championship belt
A Championship Belt is used primarily in combat sports such as boxing, mixed martial arts and professional wrestling to signify the champions of the promotion or company, much like the Vince Lombardi Trophy or The Stanley Cup
Boxing
In boxing, the individual organizations such as the World Boxing Council, The World Boxing Associaion, the Internatonal Boxing Federation and the World Boxing Organization each have their own unique championship belt that are awarded to the champions of each weight class. Boxers, especially the World Champions, strive to win the belt of all 4 organizations to unify their weight divisions.
Weight Divisions
There are numerous Boxing weight classes within the sport, with there being minor discrepancies amongst the different governing bodies. The weight classes are.
| Weight | WBA | WBC | IBF | WBO | BoxRec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 201+ lb (91.4+ kg) | Heavyweight | Heavyweight | Heavyweight | Heavyweight | Heavyweight |
| 176 to 200 lb (90.7 kg) | Cruiserweight | Cruiserweight | Cruiserweight | Junior heavyweight | Cruiserweight |
| 169 to 175 lb (79.4 kg) | Light heavyweight | Light heavyweight | Light heavyweight | Light heavyweight | Light heavyweight |
| 161 to 168 lb (76.2 kg) | Super middleweight | Super middleweight | Super middleweight | Super middleweight | Super middleweight |
| 155 to 160 lb (72.6 kg) | Middleweight | Middleweight | Middleweight | Middleweight | Middleweight |
| 148 to 154 lb (69.9 kg) | Super welterweight | Super welterweight | Junior middleweight | Junior middleweight | Light middleweight |
| 141 to 147 lb (66.7 kg) | Welterweight | Welterweight | Welterweight | Welterweight | Welterweight |
| 136 to 140 lb (63.5 kg) | Super lightweight | Super lightweight | Junior welterweight | Junior welterweight | Light welterweight |
| 131 to 135 lb (61.2 kg) | Lightweight | Lightweight | Lightweight | Lightweight | Lightweight |
| 127 to 130 lb (59.0 kg) | Super featherweight | Super featherweight | Junior lightweight | Junior lightweight | Super featherweight |
| 123 to 126 lb (57.2 kg) | Featherweight | Featherweight | Featherweight | Featherweight | Featherweight |
| 119 to 122 lb (55.3 kg) | Super bantamweight | Super bantamweight | Junior featherweight | Junior featherweight | Super bantamweight |
| 116 to 118 lb (53.5 kg) | Bantamweight | Bantamweight | Bantamweight | Bantamweight | Bantamweight |
| 113 to 115 lb (52.2 kg) | Super flyweight | Super flyweight | Junior bantamweight | Junior bantamweight | Super flyweight |
| 109 to 112 lb (50.8 kg) | Flyweight | Flyweight | Flyweight | Flyweight | Flyweight |
| 106 to 108 lb (49.0 kg) | Light flyweight | Light flyweight | Junior flyweight | Junior flyweight | Light flyweight |
| 96 to 105 lb (47.6 kg) | Minimumweight | Strawweight | Mini flyweight | Mini flyweight | Minimumweight |
Professional Wrestling
Unlike Professional Boxing, Professional Wrestling has numerous World Champions and even more regionalized and specialized Championship Belts. The generally universialy recognized World Championship Belts are those of World Wrestling Entertainment, The National Wrestling Alliance, and to a lesser extent Ring Of Honor.The National Wrestling Alliance recognizes numerous regional Championship Belts such as The NWA North American Championship and The NWA British Commonwealth Championship. World Wrestling Entertainment currently has 2 Champions. The WWE Championship is the main championship belt of it's RAW brand and the World Heavyweight Championship is the main championship belt of the Smackdown! brand. Both brands also have their own separate tag team Championship Belts and each has a lesser belt. The RAW brand has the Intercontinental Championship and Smackdown has the United States Championship
Weight classes
Unlike boxing, which has 14 recognized weight classses, professional wrestling generally only has 2. The Heavyweight title and the Cruiserweight/Light Heavyweight title belt. The "weight limit" varies with the Cruiserweight/Light heavyweight divisions depending on the wrestling promotion. The WWE uses 230 lbs as it's purposed Cruiserweight limit. Generally speaking, the Cruiserweight/Light Heavyweight belt is often treated as a secondary belt, despite having "World Title" status.
Specialized Championship Belts
Professional Wrestling also has numerous specialty championship belts. The most well known ones are the now defunct WWE Hardcore Championship, The NWA World Television Championship and the ROH Pure Championship. TNA Wrestling dropped using a cruiserweight Title and went with The TNA X Division Championship , considered an open weight title. These belts would be contested under different rules and stipulations to make that championship more unique.
Designs
Generally, wrestling has many more uniquely designed belts than boxing. The 4 major boxing governing bodies generally use the same belt design for all their champions, whereas wrestling companies use different styles for each Championship. The most notable exception is Japan's Pro Wrestling NOAH, who's belts follow one specific design. Beltmakers such as Reggie Parks and Dave Millican often create belts that not only set the Championships apart from the others, but become huge collector items as well.
Belt Collecting
Collecting of Championship Belts has become a very specialized, if not expensive hobby. Many Championship Belts have become collector items over the years as much for their designs as the history behind that particular belt. Champonship Belts from the 1980's especially are very sought after by collectors.