Im 15 years old and recently joined this forum to learn some stuff about my grandfather. I was wondering if there is any genetics aspects in boxing? I have been around the sport my whole life due to my my grandfather Dave Zyglewicz. My last name is pretty well known in my part of New york and I get asked how Im related to him a lot. He taught me lots of boxing and now I have just started to train for actual fights. Also any cool stories you may know about him please feel free to share. He recently passed and Im learning a lot about him.
There are plenty of stylistic routes to the top in boxing. You can find examples of just about every body type and body proportion having success at the top level. Just have to play to your strengths.
Yup. You can be fast twitch and have a lot of speed, slow twitch and have a lot of stamina, lanky and have a great jab, compact and have a great chin, fast and be a great boxer, powerful and be a great puncher, have great stamina and be a great swarmer, and on and on.
One thing you need to remember is that you need to Zygle it, just a little bit, you need Zygle it, again, just a little bit, Zyglewicz. Only joking mate. You gotta any footage of your grandad?
being special in boxing is hitting the genetic lottery. you have about as much chance of hitting it with your grandpa as i do with mine. it would take several generations of selective breeding to be able to see consistency in the genetics shown. in other words, dont expect to do what your grandpa could do. but hey, you might have superior genetics for boxing than your grandpa had. like i said, its a lottery.
Yep that one of the things I love about boxing, unlike many sports it's for everyone. Unlike basketball where height is so important, Rugby or NFL where size and strength is so important, you can be a 5'7" Cruiser or a 6'1" Welter it really doesn't matter. Whatever strengths and weaknesses you possess it's about developing a style that plays to your strengths and negates your weaknesses. It's why there are so many great fighters with so many different attributes and styles it's not just one specific body type or specific skill set.
Don't underestimate the cerebral aspect of boxing. You can have someone like AJ, who looks like a Renaissance statue and someone like Tyson Fury, who looks like a 45 year old drunkard soccer fan on his way to the pub. Yet this fight would be a 50/50 and only because AJ has superb work ethic, while Fury could show up overweight after a night of partying. I imagine most people will give more credit to Fury's IQ, rather than his height. High IQ doesn't translate only to achievements in math, literature and natural sciences, but sports as well.
There is a genetic predisposition to every sport. Sometimes it is more prominent, like if we talk about running or swimming, which are a straight measurement of a certain skill, not that they are any easy sports. When it comes to boxing, genetics are here as well, but in boxing, it is also about how tough you are, but also style and intelligence - knowing the game, it isn't straightforward like sprinting 100 m from point A to point B (again, I am far from disrespecting any kind of athletics). As people mention: AJ is called a bodybuilder, but has a heart of a coward and is slower than the fat Fury who also owns him in every aspect of the game. Or look at Marciano - a midsize man, with short arms, but able to generate terrific power, not to mention his determination, conditioning and toughness.
Dave Zyglewicz a fellow that lost by ko1 to Smokin Joe Frazier. Looking at Dave's stance he looks like a swarmer himself, someone who might come straight at you without doing the bobbing and weaving that Frazier did. Easy to understand how such a stylistic matchup would lead to a ko1 loss. In this day and age I wouldn't reccomend it to anyone to invest too heavily in boxing. Instead of having a genetic predisposition to being a great boxer you might have one for easily sustaining brain damage. The organ in you skull is your most valuable one and the one that will make you the most cash during your lifetime, boxing damages this organ without exceptions.