By Terence Dooley

Kerry Kayes will leave the sport of boxing with some fond memories, not least the roller coaster ride he shared with Billy Graham, who brought Kayes into Ricky Hatton’s camp, and, over the last year, his role as an integral part of Joe Gallagher’s training set-up.  Kayes, whilst quick to acknowledge the impact Hatton had on his time in boxing, selected a few recent highs when reminiscing about his time within the game.

“John Murray having four British title fights and stopping all four opponents, even though only three were fights in which he could win the British title due to him not making the weight for the Scott Lawton fight,” said Kayes when discussing the good times.

“[Matthew] Macklin winning the British and European titles over the last year.  Jamie Moore and Paul Smith, who I worked with, winning European and British titles.  Matthew Hatton winning the European title was great; I’ve not worked with Matthew directly in recent times but always had a lot of faith in him when others maybe didn’t.  I remember driving him to and from his weigh-ins in the early days and it was brilliant to see him win the title.  Danny Randall, who is undefeated in three fights, has been a buzz as well in recent times.  Danny sells a lot of tickets already and could make an impact in boxing if he keeps winning fights and gathering fans.

“I’ve had great experiences in the sport where I’ve not worked in the corner as a trainer, many fighters have come here for advice, such as Kevin Mitchell and Alex Arthur, so I have to apologise for missing any names.  I still spent an hour-and-half yesterday with a boxer talking about his weight – I’ll never leave the sport completely but will be less hands-on in future.  I’ve got to be bigheaded, maybe because I’ve worked with some great trainers, but I can only think of a few losses that I’ve been involved with.  I’ve been very lucky and had a gifted position in boxing.”

Kayes hopes that his involvement in the sport has been for the greater good, though he fears that boxing’s weight crashing mentality is too deeply ingrained for a complete overhaul.

“Boxing has got a philosophy that all boxers should weigh as light as possible, amateur and pro.  The rational is that you boil down and then carb up to make yourself stronger than your opponent on the night.  In reality, the diet is a starvation diet and it destroys the strength, power and endurance of the athlete, a lot of boxers fight at a weight that they are just not naturally comfortable at,” he opined.

“Boxing people know a lot about boxing but don’t know as much about the human body as they think they do.  People may not like bodybuilding but bodybuilders are experts at weight management.  Someone like [Joan] Guzman is a lovely human man, an innocent guy from a poor background with a wife and kids, so I was prepared to help him out and feel the same way about all my boxers.

“Boxers take a lot out of themselves and then can’t put it all back in.  A lot of people are around the athletes and they are only there to promote themselves.  You and I both know that people could say that I took the Guzman fight in order to promote Kerry Kayes, why would I need to do that?  I work with the British cycling team, Team Sky cycling team, I’ve worked with Blackburn Rovers and other Premiership teams, the England football team has bought our products – I don’t need to cling onto a sport or an athlete, I could retire tomorrow.”

However, the former EFBB bodybuilding champion feels that there are a few green shoots of recovery breaking their way through the dry desert landscape of boxing.  “The BBBoC, in fairness, are moving things forward because they make you fill in an assistant trainer’s license - funnily enough I’ve got just my form to reapply and will keep hold of my license just in case, never say never - and when your licence runs out you have to go on a full-day course where they teach nutrition and first aid, amongst other things,” mused Kayes. 

“If I can be big-headed, in my twelve years or so in this sport I have shown to a lot of other trainers and promoters that you do need a third man in the team.  It was traditionally a boxer and a trainer but you are now finding that there is a conditioner/nutritionalist as well – I’d like to think I contributed to that.  I once read an interview with [Frank Warren Promotion’s matchmaker] Dean Powell in which he was asked about the changes he has seen in the sport, he actually mentioned me as someone who has helped make people aware of the human body and who has helped to make boxers better athletes, and I’m proud of that.”

Still, it has been a Sisyphean struggle, from time immemorial fighters have looked for an advantage over their foes, far too many boxers have maintained a false economy when it comes to their fighting weight.  Strangely, men such as Marvin Hagler, who fought his whole career at middleweight and dominated the 160lb division, are criticised for not jumping up and down in weight in search of paper titles, some boxers still cannot accept that greatness lies in knowing the limitations of your frame and working with, rather than against, you own physiology.

“Maybe Marvin Hagler comfortably stayed at the same weight throughout his career because he didn’t boil himself down falsely at the beginning of his career,” laughed Kayes when discussing the benefits of finding your optimum weight class early in your career. 

“Look at Manny Pacquiao.  There are rumours flying about Manny that are totally untrue in my opinion.  I think it is simply a case that the guy who conditions Manny, Alex Ariza, is very, very good at his job.  It is sad that people don’t just acknowledge this fact and think there must be something sinister to Manny’s recent form.  Alex got hold of Pacquiao after Manny had stopped boiling down in weight and Alex is now working with a fighter that is close to where his body should be, and you can see the results for yourself.

“Some boxers fight at the same weight they fought at when they were sixteen.  How can you do that?  How can you falsely stop your body maturing?  I believe that if an investigative journalist in England looked into the way some amateur boxers boil down at an age where they should be coming into puberty then you’d see how bad things are.  People are looking to coaches to give advice to their children and I’ve heard horrific stories about coaches in the past advising their fighters not to drink water, which is the basic substance of life!  You can do without food for days but try doing without water for just a few days.”

Kayes shook his head.  I’d grown up with the same myths about weight making and we laughed as we went through them.  Once upon a time the main view of weight making was, ‘Don’t drink any water, don’t eat any food, skip in a sauna, take these laxatives, go for a shit and then crawl onto the scales – if you don’t make the weight then you are lazy and you’ll need to train harder next time’.  Kayes hopes that times are changing; he left us with one last thought.

“There is a place for nutritionalists within the sport of boxing, definitely,” he concurred.

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