Former two division world champion Sergio Martinez, 46-years-old, admits that he's one loss away from retirement. 

Martinez returns to the ring on Thursday against British contender Macaulay McGowan in Madrid, Spain.

Since coming out of retirement, Martinez has had three fights between August 2020 and September 2021, having emerged victorious in all of them: by technical knockout in the seventh round against Miguel Fandino, by technical knockout in the ninth against Jussi Koivula and by unanimous decision against Brian Rose.

When Martinez came out retirement in August 2020, it was six years since his knockout loss at the hands of Miguel Cotto,

With a high middleweight ranking under the WBA, Martinez is hoping to secure a world title fight against "regular" champion Ryota Murata.

“Starting the year with a fight, a few weeks after it started, is something that makes me very happy. . It excites me a lot. We try, as a team, to sit down and look for opponents who demand even more of me," Martinez said.

"I'm one loss away from retirement, and that's my motivation. I don't want to lose, I don't want to retire. I don't want to lose. I want to fight for a world title, I want to win the world championship. I want to fight against the best. This fight, number 60 of my career, is one more that I will have on my professional record. I know that everything I'm doing is getting me even closer to the world title. I know that all this work I'm doing is focused on getting to the world title."

McGowan has never been stopped, but he's coming back from back to back decision losses, to Kieron Conway and Tursynbay Kulakhmet.