Canelo vs Kovalev – Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez vs Sergey Kovalev at light heavyweight is a really interesting fight. In this video we do a technical preview of Canelo vs Kovalev, looking at the physical, tactical and stylistic considerations of the battle.
Some of the key areas that we work through in the video:
- The Kovalev stance – balance and body weight distribution
- The Kovalev strength of long range jabbing and back hand work
- The Kovalev upper body turn
- The Canelo jab – in my opinion the best in World boxing
- The high guard of Canelo, meaning he needs minimal movement to make his defence amongst the best out there
- The active counter punching of Canelo and of course the devastating hooking and body punching.
Following on from the technical preview I provide answers to 3 questions:
- Can someone who has never fought be a boxing coach?
- Could I give any diet and nutrition tips in terms of how to stay disciplined and on track with good food?
- How hard does one go in sparring. Is the aim to knock the sparring partner out?
This is the video that I mention in my answer to question 3:
Sparring – Be Constructive NOT Destructive:
https://www.myboxingcoach.com/sparring-boxing-training/
Cheers
Fran
PS – leave your observations or questions below!
by 
Fran, can you share your 4 week meal plan please? Be super useful as I’m now going through the adjustment phase for boxing I.e. HIIT
David
Leave it with me. The plan I talked about was to feed my family as opposed to boxers. I have your email address and will get something sorted over the next few weeks.
Great vid, Fran,
On the subject of non-boxers becoming coaches: I agree, a person with no experience of participation can learn the mechanics and skills of the sport, understand how those are executed proficiently, teach them to a novice boxer and correct problems. However, I think the coach needs to be able to adequately demonstrate the skills to give the boxer something to imitate. So the coach either has some innate ability, or needs to have spent hours, days and weeks in practice. Now, a formerly competitive boxer, while not imbued with a coaching ability by default, will have that experience.
I also think that, when it comes to competition, the experience of having competed carries all manner of kudos, understanding and gives the coach an ‘eye’ for what’s going on that only another boxer can understand.
Dave
Hello mate
Hope all is well. Yes, for sure the ability to demonstrate with a level of quality makes a difference, and the kudos piece as well carries some significant weight. I guess it’s difficult for me to be in the place of a non-boxer…for obvious reasons. My assumption though is that if you spend enough time watching your boxers in different situations against different opponent types that you begin to get that understanding. But, and it’s a big but, quite how many of those situations you need to experience before you begin to get that intuitive understanding of what’s going on and more importantly what might be coming, that I couldn’t say. Great comment mate…as always👍