Duke McKenzie has warned Tyson Fury that gaining weight for his rematch with Oleksandr Usyk will play into the Ukrainian’s hands.
Fury suffered the first defeat of his professional career to Usyk in May and they are now set to run it back on December 21 for three of the four major heavyweight world titles.
Fury looks a lot heavier in recent pictures from his camp[/caption]
Throughout the lead-up to their second fight, Fury has spoken about needing to go into ‘destroyer mode’ to beat Usyk while recent pictures suggest he is piling on the timber to achieve this approach.
Britain’s first three-weight world champion McKenzie insists adding weight onto Fury’s already very large frame will be to his detriment and explained why during the most recent episode of talkSPORT’s talkBOXING podcast.
“He [Fury] doesn’t live, eat, walk, talk the sport but you’re supposed to,” said McKenzie.
“In-between fights is where fights are won and lost. We know Fury blows up, puts on a load of weight between fights and then he has got to get rid of all that weight again.
“Now, they’re trying to tell us that Fury is going to be bigger and better.
“Bigger and better isn’t going to beat Usyk. It’s really not.
“If he puts on more weight and thinks to himself ‘I’m going to bully Usyk this time, I’m going to go in and walk him down, I’ll be able to take his shots because I’m that much bigger’, it’s not going to work for him.
“He’s going to be slower, he’s going to be more predictable, he’s going to get hit more and a lot sooner…
“Usyk wins the rematch all day long, I can’t see how Tyson Fury beats him. He’s not going to knock Usyk out.
“This guy is unbeaten, so you have to look for chinks in his armour.
“Has this guy got a bad engine? Does he get cut? Does he go down? Does he have to get up off the floor to win fights? Usyk doesn’t have to do any of them, he’s never shown a vulnerability.”
The former WBC heavyweight champion weighed 18st 7lbs (262lbs) for his inaugural encounter with Usyk after tipping the scales at a career-heaviest 19st 8lbs (277.7lbs) for his crossover clash with Francis Ngannou in his previous outing.
Fury claimed he was in the “best shape of his life” for his last fight but was quick to point out that it wasn’t ‘the real Gypsy King’.
Posting to his Instagram story last month, Fury uploaded a picture of his physique before his loss to Usyk, with the caption: “Was in the shape of my life, but this is not the GK [Gypsy King].”
In a second image, pasted alongside it from his second bout with Deontay Wilder, he wrote: “This is him, 19st 11lbs, bruiser.”
After drawing with Wilder in their first fight back in 2018 boxing off the back foot, Fury packed on 17lbs for their sequel two years later and walked down his adversary.
He blasted Wilder out in the seventh round and came in 4lbs heavier for their trilogy bout to KO Wilder in the eleventh stanza.
If Fury’s pre-fight comments are to be believed then it appears his intentions are to do the same in his rematch with Usyk.
“Last time I went to box him, I was being cautious,” Fury told TNT Sports.
“I boxed the head right off him. Let’s talk facts. Anyone can get caught, as we’ve seen in a lot of these heavyweight fights.
“But this time I’m not going for a points decision. I’m going to knock a m**********r out!”
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