George Groves speaks to Clide Delaney at Crowns Gym Beckenham about Usyk VS Daniel Dubois, recovery, ice baths and more.
Q: If you were a young fighter now or for any of your young fighters, do you think that that type of therapy (cold plunge, red light therapy, etc) would work for them for recovery, for helping them become better fighters moving forward in their careers?
A: Absolutely. I mean, it’s recovery, but also there’s an element of toughness involved in it as well. If you can do a cold plunge or a sauna, they seem like luxury until you get in them – you get in that cold plunge like “oh, ouch”.
I’m getting to that age where the body don’t recover quite as quick as it did when I was 21, 22 so if I do a couple of hard sessions throughout the week you’re like “oh, I should’ve jumped in the cold plunge – should’ve braved up and done it”. So, yeah, if you’ve got those facilities, then, it’s incredible because they are neglected.
It’s giving people the the information that it’s there, but use it and when to use it and how to use it – rather than “My gym’s got a cold plunge”, “How many times have you used it?”, “Never”.
Q: So for you with the cold plunge, do you like to push yourself and test yourself with it?
A: I’ve used them sporadically throughout my career when I was when I was boxing. I wouldn’t get in there for a long duration of time.
What I was told was get in to shock your system. It might be thirty seconds to a minute, then you jump out and just get in that rush of blood pumped around the body is what’s gonna clear up the inflammation and all the lactic acid and everything else.
But there was times I remember boxing for England the first time we was introduced to them and you wanna show no weakness, so we’d jump in the ice bath and just be like “this is fine. It’s not even cold” and just try and last three or four minutes.
Q: You’ve worked with a lot of people, trained with a lot of people, and you fought some of the greatest people in in history, in your division…but also the mental games that you played with people with the the the Rubik’s cube and stuff like that. Maybe the next level is doing a Rubik’s cube in the cold plunge.
A: Trying to remember your algorithm and trying to even focus on the on the Rubik’s cube, making sure you get the colours the right way around might be a challenge. W
Q: When was the last time that you played around with the Rubik’s cube?
A: Oh boy, I don’t know. I need to get back on it. It might have been a good few years.
Q: Your career has changed and now you’re training young fighters. When you’re looking for a facility to train at, does it matter to you what the facility has, or do you train them in a specific facility at the moment yourself?
A: It certainly has to have the right equipment for you to get whatever you need to get done. But as well as that, you need a lot of the right vibe. Sometimes it’s hard to tell what you want. Sometimes you do want something that’s polished, nice & crisp and makes you fit.
Everyone always leans into the spit and sawdust gyms, but they’re good for building a bit of toughness, a bit of resilience…but also if I’m a fighter, I wanna feel a million dollars. So make sure that there are elements to your gym that are a bit a bit bougie, a bit classy, a bit a bit special.
If you can manage to figure out something that no one else has got because they haven’t quite caught up yet, that makes you feel good too. It’s a hard nut to crack when it comes to a gym because you wanna get the best out of individuals, but individuals are different –
you have to get to know people to know what what they want. The same with fighters, some fighters are wired different to others…some fighters want to put themselves in the hurt locker they want to be battered and bruised. Whereas actually, your recovery and your rest is just as important as as the work.
And then the the the opposite end of the scale where they don’t want to break a sweat, they’re Divas, they don’t want to break a nail.
Clide; No place for Jake Pauls in the fight game
Q: With Daniel Dubois fighting Usyk at the weekend, maybe he could’ve been better at getting off the canvas if he had it recovered in here at Crowns Gym Beckenham.
A: I mean, he got hit with some incredible shots, he didn’t seem like he was fully switched on. You only can surmise and maybe even Daniel doesn’t know, but the difference between the look on his face for the ring walk for Anthony Joshua to the ring walk for Oleksandr Usyk ( obviously, different fights, different style of fighting about to happen) but Daniel in a different place within his life might have played a part. He wasn’t quite there, was he? He wasn’t switched on. He wasn’t at the races and Usyk was certainly was.
Maybe that was always gonna be the the challenge for Usyk after beating Tyson Fury twice…he’s completed boxing, completed the heavyweight division, he’s beaten all the top guys. Now he’s come in again, fighting someone he’s already beat, but he’s gonna have to be switched on, show up, and perform. You can’t take nothing for granted in boxing. Otherwise, you pay the ultimate price, but he did, and he was on it.
It wouldn’t surprise me if Daniel Dubois needed an ice bath after that weekend.