Deontay Wilder training in Europe for Povetkin fight

By Boxing News - 05/03/2016 - Comments

deontay4444444By Scott Gilfoid: WBC heavyweight champion Deontay Wilder (36-0, 35 KOs) flew out last Saturday from Atlanta to Manchester, England to begin training in the UK for his May 21 fight against mandatory challenger Alexander Povetkin (30-1, 22 KOs) at the Khodnyka Ice Palace in Moscow, Russia. Deontay wanted to train in Europe so that he could get acclimated to the time difference and not be in such a shock when flying over to Russia for the fight.

If Wilder had chosen to fly over to Russia days before the fight, he likely would be jet-lagged from having had to sit down for such a long period of time on the plane while flying over.

“I’m ready to get it over with,” Wilder said to Fighthype about his fight against the 36-year-old Povetkin. “I can’t wait until May the 21st. I wish it was May the 21st today and I was already in Russia heading to the Arena. I’m ready to go. I can’t wait. I think America is going to be in for a big treat come May 21st. We coming back and STILL champion,” said Deontay.

Deontay will train in the UK for two weeks before flying out to Moscow for fight week. Wilder’s management lost the purse bid for the fight, so that’s why he has to travel to Russia for the fight instead of having it take place in the United States.

Wilder doesn’t mind traveling to Russia, because he sees a ring being a ring no matter where the fight takes place. He’s not worried about the crowd noise because once he’s in the ring with Povetkin, he’ll be in the zone looking to KO him.

Deontay is bringing his large training team with him and they’ll be taking him through his paces as he sharpens up during training camp for the fight. Wilder’s trainers Jay Deas, Mark Breland, Russ Anber and Cuz Hill will be with him, as well as three capable sparring partners.

Hopefully there won’t be any need for additional sparring partners, but if so, Wilder’s management will likely be able to get one of the local British heavyweights to come over and give it a go to give Wilder some rounds.

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When you get this close to a big fight, sometimes unavoidable injuries occur and cause the fight to be postponed. The good thing for Deontay is he’s young and not shown himself to be injury prone. The 36-year-old Povetkin is a different story. He’s up there in age.

This past week, Wilder got some bad news with IBO/WBA/WBO heavyweight champion Tyson Fury saying he plans on retiring after his July 9 rematch with Wladimir Klitschko. With Fury leaving the sport in the near future, it means there won’t be a big unification fight between Wilder and the 6’9” Fury. It would have been a great fight, especially the marketing of it.

Deontay can still fight IBF champion Anthony Joshua in a unification fight, but it’s not the same thing. Joshua doesn’t show much emotion during his interviews and press conferences. It won’t be nearly as interesting as having Fury fighting Deontay.

With Fury out of the picture, there will only be Joshua, Hughie Fury, Luis Ortiz, Joseph Parker and Carlos Takam to compete with Deontay in the division. All the rest of the guys won’t be worth much against Wilder.