Five reasons why Tyson Fury is world heavyweight champion
- Lewis Oldham
- 17 March 2022
Planet Sport looks at Tyson Fury's journey to the top, including overcoming mental health and becoming world champion once again.
Tyson Fury is undisputedly ranked as the best heavyweight in the world following a second successive win over Deontay Wilder in October 2021.
The Gypsy King retained his WBC crown and is now set for a second defence against mandatory challenger and fellow Brit Dillian Whyte.
They will fight at Wembley Stadium with a minimum of 80,000 fans set to attend the spectacle on April 23. And below, we take a look at five moments which made Fury the champion he is today.
1. His superior in-ring IQ
Whatever you think of Tyson Fury as a person or as a fighter, you cannot dispute that he has proved his worth over the years. Over the course of his career, he has proved himself to be a true student of the game - hence his intelligence inside the ring.
His ability to adapt to different situations in fights is truly remarkable. If you compare his performances in fights with Deontay Wilder alone, you see a completely unrecognisable boxer.
A lot of credit for this should no doubt go to his trainers, who have masterminded some great tactics in his various fights. However, it takes a top-level fighter to not just take these messages on board, but to implement them.
The way Fury has done this through his career goes to show how good he is.
2. Shock win over Wladimir Klitschko
Prior to the 2015 fight between Klitschko and Fury, the latter was seen as a joke in the eyes of most fight fans, who were not aware of his natural boxing skill set.
In the build-up, Fury hyped this up even further with some extravagant press conference antics.
This may have seemed to Klitschko and everyone else that Tyson was not taking the fight seriously and that he was in it just for the fame and money that a world title fight brings.
In reality, it all was a ploy on Fury's part to get in the head of Klitschko and his camp. It worked a treat. During the entire build-up to the fight, Wladimir never looked comfortable or anything like his usual composed self.
Klitschko was rattled, and on fight night Fury made the most of this. In a now trademark Fury performance, he controlled the fight from the opening bell. Klitschko simply could not get going and was always at the end of a brilliant Fury jab.
Fury won the 12-round contest in a landslide via unanimous decision. This is all the more impressive when you consider that the fight was taking place in Klitschko territory, in Dusseldorf, Germany.
For any normal fighter, this would have been the pinnacle of their career. But for the storied life of Tyson Fury, this was just the beginning…
3. Battle with mental health
After winning the unified world heavyweight titles, it's fair to say Fury went on a downward spiral. He was due a rematch with Klitschko in 2016, but Fury admitted that he was not motivated enough to fight again.
In October 2016, Fury was forced to vacate his IBO, WBA and WBO world titles after battling an anti-doping case in relation to his use of cocaine and eventually he was deemed medically unfit to fight.
Fury only got worse from here, as his health spiralled out of control. He was gaining more and more weight while drinking an excessive amount of alcohol as well as taking drugs.
At his heaviest, Fury admits that he weighed up to 378lbs. Fury announced that he was going to reapply for his boxing licence in early 2018.
He named Deontay Wilder as the main motivation for his return. This came after Wilder said Fury was done and would definitely not come back.
When you saw Fury at his worst, it should not surprise readers that he had a lot of people doubting his return to the ring.
But as we have seen throughout Fury's life, whenever his back is against the wall, he comes out firing to prove everyone wrong.
Fury kept true to his word and returned in May in a fight with Sefer Seferi. The lineal world champion weighed in at 276 pounds (125kg). In the run-up to the fight, it is believed Fury lost a remarkable 112lbs (51kg).
For his November world title fight with Wilder, Fury hit the scales at 256.5lbs, and he looked significantly leaner than his last couple fights.
Fury's comeback is definitely up there with the best ever in the sport. You cannot credit Fury enough for his mental fortitude to return from the lowest of lows and go right back to the very top.
4. Charity work
Since returning to boxing, it is not just his body image that has changed massively. It seems like he has become a better person outside of the ring as well.
He has received a lot of criticism throughout the years for his exploits inside and outside of the ring. But in recent times, he appears more humble and has gone from public enemy number one to one of the most well-liked and respected fighters in boxing.
This was typified in the aftermath of the first Wilder fight. Fury reportedly donated his entire fight purse, which came to around £7million, to charity. He insisted that other people less fortunate than him needed the money more than himself.
On top of this, Fury has joined the Frank Bruno Foundation as a Foundation Ambassador. The foundation offers support to people with mental health issues with wellbeing programmes and structured non-contact boxing sessions.
5. Career-defining win over Deontay Wilder
It was widely accepted that Fury should have got the win from the first fight between the pair in 2018 after controlling large portions of the contest despite two knockdowns.
In the end, the decision was a split draw, so a rematch was always inevitable. Even though Fury controlled the first fight, using that same style, he was always going to perceive a big punch from Wilder.
We have seen throughout Wilder's career that his one-punch power is phenomenal, and it will only take one good shot to down any opponent.
In a bid to change his tactics for the second bout, Fury replaced Ben Davison with SugarHill Steward as his trainer and returned to Kronk Gym. Promising to destroy the "Bronze Bomber", Fury met Wilder in the middle of the ring once the first bell rang and attacked him from the get-go.
Fury's strength and conditioning was much better for this fight, so his consistent jab and power punches were really taking its toll on Wilder as the rounds wore on.
This was a Fury we have never seen before, and many doubted whether he had it in his locker. But he executed his plan masterfully and made Wilder become a shadow of his normal self.
Credit to Wilder for staying in there as long as he did, because it was clear after the opening rounds that his legs were gone.
This was a superb and career-defining performance from Fury. Anyone who had doubted him and thought he was not as good as he used to be got proved wrong emphatically.
This performance asserted Fury as the man right at the top of the division, and the sport as a whole, which is right where he belongs.
