These men had very, very different approaches when preparing for a fight. Ali loved the hustle and bustle of a training camp. He loved the people being around. He'd often do his roadwork in the cities, loving the atmosphere. Ali also wanted to know everything about his opponent. Not only studying fight film, but getting down to knowing his opponent's favourite food, or favourite colour. He really wanted to have a complete picture of his opponent. Rocky by contrast, holed himself do in camp, like it was a prison. No distractions. Someone had Jayne Mansfield visit Rocky one day in camp, and he stonewalled her, ignoring her completely. Rocky also didn't want to know anything beyond the basics about his opponent. Which approach do you think is best? Does it depend on the personality of the fighter? What would happen if each adopted the other's method? Would anything change? Lastly, could Marciano's approach work today? We live in the age of social media and intense media scrutiny. Cameras are everywhere. Could Marciano get away with not having a YouTube channel, or multiple social media accounts? (I think Ali would thrive, by the way.) What do you think? And which approach would suit you best?
Ali’s way is better, but it takes a truly special personality for it to work. The only person who had a similar character (and similar training camp) was Jack Johnson. When you’re larger than life, the pressure of a boxing match is something you can deal with more easily. For the average person, Marciano’s way is much better.
It depends. If I was a coach and I had a boxer who was very outgoing and loved to hang out, I would have to see how he did in isolation as well as with tons of attention. If it seems like his focus slips due to wanting to show off/talking to girls/etc then Rocky's method might be better until he matures as a fighter. If he never does and constantly gets distracted it is simply better to have him go monk mode. On the other hand, some boxers get very uptight and don't learn to relax in the ring. If they are already very nervous and stiff individuals then having them in isolation with little human interaction could be counter productive. Yelling at them all day as if it's boot camp or remaining stone faced and stoic may just make things worse. But it's a case by case thing. Some guys thrive under those conditions and are like well oiled machines. Others become nervous wrecks.
It’s a personal thing. Even with Ali the serious work was done at deer lake. I think Marciano was ruled by Al wiel. No matter what Rocky wanted nothing was really up to him. but Rocky was still allowed a little team of his own neighbourhood sycophants around him in camp. Not to the scale Ali had though. Training was a very serious business to both champions but Muhammad was a showman and he ran his own camp the way that best worked for him. He employed a lot more unqualified people in made up jobs and by the sounds of things, the doors were open to anyone.
Me, I think Rockys are ideal for myself bar his basic knowledge. I would run too the sounds of my opponents fights headphones on as loud as it took too drown out any other thoughts and all working rests would be dedicated to fight film.
