By Jake Donovan

Hozumi Hasegawa proved there is still plenty of air left in his tires, outpointing Horacio Garcia in a considerable upset Saturday evening in Kobe, Japan. 

Not only did Hasegawa pull of the shocker, but did so in surprisingly one-sided fashion. Scores were 100-91, 98-93 and 97-93 in favor of the former two-division titlist.

The wide margin on the scorecards was the result of the 34-year old ex-champ managing to avoid the come-forward attack of Garcia. Constant lateral movement was key in outmaneuvering the visiting puncher from Mexico. 

It's a major win for Hasegawa, who was strongly considering retirement following a 7th round knockout loss to then-122 lb. champ Kiko Martinez last April in a failed bid to become a three-division titlist. Saturday's bout was his first ring appearance since that debacle, improving overall to 34-5 (15KOs). 

Garcia suffers his first career loss, falling to 29-1 (21KOs). The bout marked his first fight outside of Mexico. To his credit, the 24-year old took the loss like a gentleman, admitting after the fight that he believed the judging to be fair according to Yahoo! Japan. 

The future isn't immediately clear for Hasegawa, although a part of him would like to make another run at a 122 lb. title. A former long-time champ at bantamweight who also briefly held a featherweight belt, the stretch goal for Hasegawa would be to become just the third fighter ever from Japan to capture belts in three weight classes. Kazuto Ioka picked up a flyweight belt last month to join Koki Kameda on the very short list of Japanese fighters to accomplish the feat. 

Jake Donovan is the Managing Editor of BoxingScene.com. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox