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Gareth A. Davies says Tyson Fury’s nutritionist said he was in “excellent condition” for his rematch with unified heavyweight champion Oleksandr Usyk on December 21 in Riyadh. Davies says Fury’s conditioning was “brilliant”.
Wasted Camp
He 281 pounds Fury (34-2-1, 24 KOs) didn’t look in “excellent condition” and he certainly didn’t look “brilliant” unless we’ve dramatically lowered the bar for a fighter to meet those criteria. He looked like an out-of-shape, retired former athlete who was taking it easy.
Tyson looked like someone sitting on the couch, eating cakes and pies for the past three months. He appeared to be carrying about 30 pounds of excess fat that should not have been around his waist. That is a discipline problem.
That the ‘Gypsy King’ makes it through a three-month training camp and looks like this suggests these things:
- I didn’t work hard
- cut corners
- eating too much
- Not enough cardio
For this important fight, Fury should not have weighed more than 247 poundsthe weight he acquired for his historic victory over Wladimir Klitschko on November 28, 2015. Fury has never weighed in at 240 since that clash, and hasn’t performed this well in any of his fights in the last nine years.
Lack of discipline
That tells you that Fury lacks discipline because he should have been able to cut to the mid-240s if he worked hard and controlled his diet. Call it laziness, but you haven’t put in the effort to lose weight. That’s why Usyk defeated him twice and will likely lose to Anthony Joshua if that fight happens next.
“The fury improved, but so did Usyk. His conditioning for a 20-stone man was brilliant,” Gareth A. Davies told King of Boxing Media on Tyson Fury’s physical condition for his rematch against Oleksandr Usyk on December 21.
“I spoke to his nutritionist (Fury) and they told me he was in excellent condition and had had a great camp. He showed it in the fight. Usyk was a little smarter. There were times when Fury, the giant, was trying to crush this smaller guy, and he would go in and out and land right before coming out on those clinches in the last third of the fight.
“It was a close fight, it was definitely a close fight. It was a very physical, intriguing competition. It wasn’t an exciting fight by the minute, but it was very intriguing. It was a grueling fight for both men. They have been through 24 grueling rounds together,” Gareth said of Fury and Usyk.
The last two fights between Fury and Usyk were not grueling encounters. Usyk worked Tyson in the ninth round of their first fight on May 18, but that was the only action-packed round of the 24 rounds they fought where many punches landed. Their two fights were chess matches, not grueling fights.
Fury has NOT improved. I don’t know what Gareth is talking about. He has steadily gotten worse and seems unable to overcome the top heavyweights. Usyk is a good fighter, but some guys in the top 15 would have beaten him in his last two fights. He beat Fury and Anthony Joshua because neither of them are elite or A-level. In their best years they were overrated, but now they are even worse.
“There is an obvious fight for Fury (Anthony Joshua) next, but not for Usyk. The obvious fight for Fury is Joshua, but for Usyk, will he fight Daniel Dubois again if he defeats Parker? Will he fight Parker if he defeats Dubois on February 22 and regains the undisputed title? That seems like the obvious route, but other than that, what else is there for him (Usyk)?” Gareth said.
Usyk will likely fight the winner of the Daniel Dubois-Joseph Parker fight next. Eddie Hearn is pushing for Usyk to fight cruiserweight Jai Opetaia, but that’s not likely to happen. Opetaia is not a name for casual boxing fans, and it is not a fight that works well. If Turki Al-Shiekh wants to finance a battle between those two, that would be great, but other than that, Usyk is better off fighting the winner of Dubois-Parker to regain his undisputed championship.
