Why are fighters more successful at a older age now?

A lot of it's down to better conditioning and diet nowadays.

 

Don't forget that years ago it could have taken you 50-60 fights before you got a title shot and if you won the title, you still stayed very active with title defenses and non-title fights which they felt kept them sharp. Today, you can have a title shot under 20 fights on your record and then they fight twice a year. So fighters today are not nearly as burned out as the fighters of yore and can fight to a much older age.

 

Think of percentiles.

The age of death is a lot higher now, consequently the average age of a person is much higher now.

That means in terms of percentiles the spread is probably the same as it was in terms of percentile success, but it now represents a higher age.

 

Many reasons.
Fighters take better care of themselves no drinking, no smoking, better diet. Stay in shape Year round. Fewer fights, more time to recuperate, advancement in sports science, peds too. Just many reasons.

 

four to five times broader definition of success with 4 to 5 titles available today, plus a shrinking emphasis on conditioning.

also boxing is more of a 2nd chance for those in failed careers, who wouldnt chance it earlier due to risks. young athletes prefer other sports that arent as harmful.

further globalisation has led to more niches for the sport in areas of the world.

 

It certainly isn't because today's fighters are better conditioned. The majority of today's fighters fight a considerably slower pace than fighters did through the 80s. Today's fighters fight less often, fight fewer rounds, and (with a few exceptions) throw less punches per round than previous generations did. Furthermore, an incredibly high number of champions fighting undeserving and unproven title challengers allows this practice to become more common. Bernard Hopkins essentially mastered the art of slowing down the pace to a crawl so that he could outwit younger fighters who had little knowledge of their craft. Wlad is clearly a very fit, hard working fighter. This allowed him to last longer than most. But, his limitations due to age were apparent in the Joshua fight. Had The Wlad of the Joshua fight showed up against the Wlad from five years ago, the younger version would have destroyed him.

 

It's obvious, too many titles ,the 12 round limit , and with a shallow pool of talent an older fighter can hang around for years. Anybody think Bernard Hopkins could have won the lightheavyweight title in the 60's,70's or 80's at 49?.
Could Foreman have won at 46 in those decades ? How about Manny Pacquiao skulking around at 147 pounds at 38? In the 1980's he'd get a concussion at that age. Case closed, boxing simply isn't as good in 2017

 

It's a huge stretch to apply that to athletic competition.

 

Lots of fighters who should never be called a contender to pad records, no need to worry about the championship distance of 15 rounds so less wear and tear during training, easy pathways to win a championship.

 

A couple more: (1) superheavyweights can generally fight at an older age than lighter boxers and (2) orthopedic surgery

 

Of course, because Dempsey and Marciano had no padding on their records.

 

People are living longer.
Which means they are healthier longer.