Did Wilfredo Benitez really only train for SIX days for SRL?

leonard was the biggest fight of wilfreds career. why would he take him so lightly

 

Wilfred was messing around with Sugar Ray's sister pre-fight.

That may have been the "Trojan" horse.

Takes away the legs.

 

The word across the board in those days was Wilfredo was seldom in the gym for any fight like most boxers. Still, though I saw him as slower then usual in this fight, the number of punches landed was very even. Ray put out way more offence but many of them caught air round after round. Going into the l5th round I had it scored dead even, and that round was tooth and nail, chest to chest until Ray landed that left uppercut. Without the bad cut and in great shape he sure wouldn't have done any worse.

 

But if you only train for six days before the fight, do you have stamina for 15 rounds? I think it´s something said just to excuse the loss.
All the best
The Predator

 

I've heard conflicting accounts; ranging from 6 days - 14 days. I honestly don't believe however he trained hard for the SRL fight. Most of his training took place dancing with the women at the discos as someone mentioned on here previously.

 

As mentioned before, Benitez probably only did close to a week's worth of good training.Not enough for the likes of Ray Leonard.

 

Most likely BS, like most similar excuses. For some reason they always botch their training before their biggest fighest.:huh We're supposed to believe this about top professionals? These excuses are bought WAY to easily on this forum.

He looked to be in just fine shape to me. It wasn't that much between them, but Leonard managed to edge most of the rounds and make it wide points wise even though it was competitive.

 

No, you're thinking of Duran v Leonard 2. And it was minus six days. With only six months notice!

 

Didn't Benitez give Leonard an awesome staredown in this fight?

 

It was Benitez's father who claimed it before the fight. I don't know if Wilfred himself ever made such a claim. He was never a believer in hard training, but he worked in the gym to keep his skills sharp. A relaxed fighter such as him who had boxed for all his life did not need to condition himself that much, atleast so he believed.

 

He looked to good in that fight for six days training total BS, no way he was that good to fight Leonard as he did with 6 days of training.

 

aye tell the young people of today and they wouldn't believe ya

 

It worked the other way too.

 

Take all this with a pinch of salt, fellas. In truth it was probabily only the Bruce Curry and Harold Weston fights were he was super lax in training. Even those were MUCH more then days. Benitez was a party animal, so how the heck did he get into shape if he was only training for days and compete with ATG's. It's nonsense for me.

Was he a dedicated trainer? no. He was definitely lazy in the gym, but it's overblown.