When Damien Vazquez opened his training camp in June, his focus was on a rematch against former champion Juan Carlos Payano. Vazquez dropped an 8 round unanimous decision to Payano in 2019.
They were scheduled to fight for the second time on August 14th on Showtime but after a tune up victory in Mexico in July, they were offered the chance to face former champion and three-time Olympian Rau'shee Warren on the same date. Vazquez said they quickly accepted the fight and looked at it as a bigger opportunity.
The Las Vegas based Vazquez is happy that he was able to get the tune up win in Mexico even though Boxrec has taken the result off of their record keeping website. He had been inactive since his September loss to Brandon Figueroa.
“It was a great fight. I went in there and wanted to get rounds in. I didn’t want to stop him and I just wanted the rounds which is what I did. It was important to get the fight in but at the end of the day I didn’t feel like I had ring rust. I looked at it as just a sparring session,” Vazquez told BoxingScene.com.
Payano and Warren have completely different styles but Vazquez had plenty of time to prepare after the change of opponents.
Warren is more of a pure boxer who uses movement and speed to outbox his opponents. Vazquez believes that his experience in the amateur system will help him secure the victory.
“He’s a great fighter. I take nothing away from the dude but it’s going to be one hell of a war and I feel that I am going to come out on top. I fought a lot of styles like that in my amateur days so it isn’t anything I haven’t seen before. It’s nothing new,” explained Vazquez.
Send questions or comments to ringsidewriter@gmail.com. You can follow Ryan on Twitter @ringsidewriter
