Heeding to Nature or Relying on the Magic of Modern Science in Boxing - Part 3
By Teodoro Medina Reynoso
PhilBoxing.com
Thu, 03 Mar 2022
Navarrete (L) and Vargas (R) benefit the magic of modern sports weight reduction technique.
The popular saying in boxing or sports in general for that matter is that one cannot struggle for long against Father Time.
There is a long list of boxers or athletes who faced inglorious or ignominious end to their otherwise highly distinguished careers because they can no longer defy old or well advanced age.
There's Sugar Ray Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan, Roy Jones, Jr and our own Flash Elorde and Manny Pacquiao to remind us, "We cannot beat Father Time."
But there's an even more telling and encompassing old Chinese saying that also applies to sports, boxing in particular: "Man cannot fight nature."
Another One Fails The Weight Scales
After Jerwin Ancajas, super featherweight Joe Noynay become in second Filipino boxer in a matter of few days to lose his fight and title virtually at the weight scale.
Noynay was stripped of his minor WBA Asia Pacific super featherweight title when he came in six pounds overweight or two divisions heavier in the weigh in of his scheduled defense versus Australian Liam Wilson.
There is no reason for Noynay to put on such weight as a physical advantage for last August he dispatched the same Aussie inside five rounds in a ten round super featherweight match.
But that's beside the point.
What is alarming is that Pinoy fighters are vainly copying the practice especially in the West or the developed world where fighters generally fight under their optimum fighting weight and rely on the magic of modern sports science and medicine to help them make the required weight limits at the official pre- fight weigh in which is the day before the actual fight.
Our natural physique and constitution not suited to such demanding regime and the cost of resort modern sports science very expensive, the result of this experimentation has been more of the negative than positive in the long run.
Hence the spectacle of fighters from a Third World country as ours which is generally considered as poor and impoverished, losing their fight or belt or both because of being overweight is absurd.
But it has been happening since the 80s. Mostly due to the influence of so called modern boxing trainers and quasi doctors, some of whom could be called quack doctors who claim to have the ability to manage and mitigate natural physical growth which in many times, is the result of affluence due to the boxers ring successes (read: improved earnings).
For we have seen Filipino fighters who previously subsisted on local diet blowing up in weight as soon as after their major international big money fights. Dati nagdidildil lang sa tuyo, noong kumita na e pa steak steak na.
But diet and good life are not the main culprits. The lack of discipline coupled with so much trust and faith on modern sports science to defy natural physical growth usually are. As well as handlers who are starstruck with foreign boxing trainers and so called conditioning gurus.
Fighting Under Vs Fighting Over One's Effective Weight
Almost coinciding with the successful move to change the original weigh in schedule system was the multiplication of the boxing weight divisions from the original nine to what is now 17, 18 if we add the so called Bridgerweight in between the cruiserweight and the heavyweight.
These have widened the options of boxers and their so called tacticians on how to plot successful professional boxing campaigns and careers starting in the 80s.
But in most cases especially in the West, what prevailed as the practice has been the development of boxers by making them fight under or below their natural effective fighting opposing weight such that if successful in making the weight limit in the official weigh in, they would have the advantage at least in weight and power over their adversaries at fight time 24 hours the minimum later.
The original weight classes have been a travesty as it has been common to see opponents who weighed in within the limits of a specified division actually coming at most two divisions heavier at actual fight time.
Marco Antonio Barrera complained of Erik Morales coming as virtual super featherweight in their fights. This was the reason Manny Pacquiao and Freddie Roach were adamant Morales must not come in the weigh in of their succeeding two fights even an ounce over 130 lbs.
Vasily Lomachenko complained of Salido being a virtual welterweight in their fight for the WBO featherweight crown when he himself was as heavy as super lightweight during the match.
The list could go on but authorities are only after the opposing fighters make the limits during the official weigh ins. Nobody seems to check and bother with their actual weight at fight time.
The higher the weight it seems the bigger the chance of cheating or playing around the so called official weigh ins.
Pinoys usually excel at super featherweights up to the super lightweights which produced at least half a dozen world champions up to the 80s and 90s. Now no more except for Pacquiao two decades later. And Pacquiao is a once in a generation special fighter!
Wonder no more. As the opposition has become bigger, taller and stronger. Thanks largely to the magic of modern sports medicine. Boxing needs not wait for natural phenomenon and freaks as Panama Al Brown, Henry Armstrong, Roberto Duran, Alexis Arguello and yes, Manny Pacquiao to enthrall us with super feats and performances at the so called lower and middle weights.
I doubt it if the likes of Rey Vargas and Emanuel Navarette are really junior featherweights and featherweights now much as I doubt Russian bruiser Artur Beterbiev who won an Olympic gold as a heavyweight as a true natural light heavyweight in the pros.
To be continued
The author Teodoro Medina Reynoso is a veteran boxing radio talk show host living in the Philippines. He can be reached at teddyreynoso@yahoo.com and by phone 09215309477.
Click here to view a list of other articles written by Teodoro Medina Reynoso.
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