Wtf are you idiots on about? One re**** says beterbiev is slav, another tartar. He is chechen. Period. And no he isnt on roids, check how big he was when he was still a teenager in the ams, he was like a younger slower but p4p physically more powerful tyson.
Beterbiev is a Russian and he's very Russian looking stop with the semantics Chechens are pretty goddamn close to being Russian therefore close enough to being Slavic, nobody really cares anyway.
Beterbiev is from Dagestan where mostly ethnic Tatars live and his middle name is Asilbekovich which means Royal-Bekovic in Tatar language. He might have chechen roots but he's certainly NOT Russian. By the way chechens and Russians are not close, one is caucasian one is slavic, so they are not closer to russian people than, say, Germans are.
World class boxers quite literally are ALL ON PED's of some kind (which average joes like us probably won't even know what's being used in this decade until scandals/admissions/etc in the next decade).
Beterbiev is really a cruiserweight boiling down to make light-heavyweight, that's why he looks big. If there was a weight class between LHW and Cruiser, Beterbiev and Kovalev would both be in it.
id say at least 50% of boxer make weight the same way as beterbiev nothing unusual for people calling him a cruiserweight he was able to make 178 with same day weigh ins as a grown man, he was at a size disadvantage in almost all his fights at at 200 pounds in the amatuers
I don't think so. To me his body frame is very solid, but is muscles are not bulky. Looks like a dehydrated body actually.
Kovalev not so much - until the Hopkins fight he was actually one of the lighter LHWs out there (fighting at 181 - 185 in his last 3 or 4 fights) and was the lighter and shorter guy in most of his bouts. Even 188lbs (as he was vs Hopkins) ain't that heavy for a LHW in the ring - though I do agree that he does somehow seem to look pretty big. Kovalev (185) - Caparello (185) Kovalev (183) - Agnew (187) Kovalev (181) - Sillakh (185) Beterbiev however does look massive although it's worth remembering that he fought both at LHW and HW as an amateur, trading weights with Mekhontsev (who's also a big looking MFer) on the Russian national team.
They breed them very tough in the Caucasus. A lot of the men from that region are thick-set and beastly strong looking. Wrestling is hugely popular over there too and it's extremely common for young boys to wrestle from an early age. It's also obviously a very rough place to live in and fighting is a cultural norm over there. Here's another huge punching beastly strong looking LHW prospect from that region called Medzhid Bektemirov. [YT]JYK7XZ6aUeA[/YT] Even the national dance (Lezginka) of many people from that region looks very physically demanding too. [YT]iIb762xhVjU[/YT] [YT]IhAUnH1tvyQ[/YT]
The highest recorded ring weight for a LHW that I'm aware of is the 191lbs Chad Dawson weighed for the rematch against Glen Johnson. Up until Kovalev's last fight, he weighed less for all his fights than B-Hop did for the Pascal rematch, which was 186lbs.
Stevenson (189) vs Bellew (190) though Obvs at 6'3" Bellews a more natural CW as are Sillakh and Shumenov who are both over 6'2" who have all now made the move to 200lbs. I believe Dawson rehydrated as high as 193 for one fight but I can't find a reference now and he more usually seems to have come in about 187-8. Pascal seems to come pretty reliably between 185 and 187.