Living Legend Opens Camp Exclusively To Boxingtalk.com
My first day with the legendary Bernard Hopkins was surreal. Hopkins has that “IT??� about him that all superstars do. I met Hopkins many years ago at the James Shuler Memorial Gym when he was training for his first Robert Allen fight. We used to talk back then. We were never bussom buddies who called each other on the phone but in Philly we call it busting it up. Bernard was a cool dude back then and he still is now.
More recently my partner Greg Leon and I had Bernard on a conference call. He introduced us and I reminded the champ of our previous introduction. He told me to walk up to him and introduce myself again when I see him in person. Then a great opportunity presented itself and Jean Pascal upset Chad Dawson. Pascal called out Hopkins and a light bulb went off in my head. I first reached out to one of Hopkins’s assistant trainers Danny Davis and I told him about my “In Camp With The Champ??� idea. He liked it. So did G. Leon and he we are. Once Bernard realized who I was , he called me in the locker room as he got dressed for his workout. He immediately tried to make me feel comfortable. Bernard told me at this point in his training he just wanted to keep his bio rhythms up. He informed that this phase of training is not intense. There would be no need to over do it this early for a fight December 18th.
WORKOUT
The champ’s workout on this particular day started off with a good stretch. I noticed Davis concentrated on Bernard’s hamstrings and his back. After that Bernard shadowboxed for 5 rounds. When Bernard shadow boxes if you did not know any better, you would assume that Bernard was fighting an invisible man. He really hones in and imagines that he is boxing a real person
