Anyone else agree....

[Medved]

eastern europeans produce the top heavy boxers despite having some of the best hockey players, weight lifters , and strong men in the world.at the same time ..

Dont forget, lots of Athletes in Euroleague (basketball), Soccer (biggest sport in world) and other sports like rowing/water polo/handball/gymnastics/swimming.

You cant say that your best Athletes are going into NBA/NFL. Boxing isnt about being physical, its about having the mental game to go along with it. Thats why its a Gentalmens game and lots of Boxers play Chess, because its Chess with fists.

[edgarg]

that american heavy weights would be better( faster, better stamina, more entertaining) if the majority of them wasnt so fat.


??????

It's the nature of present day boxing that if a gym-fit guy normally weighs about 145-7, he automatically is expected by his handlers to boil down to 135 over 6-8 week training camp.

Because a better fighter normally fights only every few months, he goes "off" training, and only gets down to it again, when the next fight is possible and he does his 6-8 week camp stint.

This has an physiological effect on the body and we ALL must have noticed that the large majority of ex-fighters, in later years might weigh much more than their fighting weight. Not just 10-15 lbs. this would be a rarity.(I'm talking '"walk-around" weight)Even more than they would have weighed in a normal life, without ever having boxed and cut down weight.

We've been concentrating on the heavyweights, and in particular the Klitschkos' opponents. because of their size and power, their opponents often are advised to put on MORE weight for fight-time to be able to absorb and not be pushed around etc.

And heavyweight ANYWAY, is the only weight class where the fighters DON'T have to watch the scales. AND, if not in the very top class category, and perhaps with already a loss or two,(losing the present day magic 0) they are not so careful to come in at their optimum fighting weight. The only heavyweights I've noticed doing so areKlitschkos who ALWAYS come in at fight time within 1-2 lbs of their optimum weight.

An easy example was George Foreman whose best fighting weight was under 220 in his heyday. When he returned 10 years later, he graduated into a 250-260 lb monster for the rest of his career. he hadn't grown any TALLER. Larry Hiolmes was another.