Head to Head nightmare at his best HUGE 160, freakishly strong. Enormous puncher with both hands, vicious body puncher, great left jab, very fast hands, unorthodox great defense, very good footwork, extremely talented, just a very difficult style to fight with his unorthodox movement, strength and punching ability. At his best he had a pretty good chin to
An early adopter of weight training as well, IIRC. Which might be some indication of what boxers might have accomplished earlier with those methods in their arsenals.
Good point Turpin had serious fast twitch muscle. A lot of those euro fighters from that era were grossly overrated especially the heavyweights but Turpin was the real deal
Makes you wonder whether any other Euro guys (or other contenders) could have pulled something impressive off if they'd also been early adopters of weight training methods.
quite possibly I can’t tell you how impressed I am with Turpin. Honestly, I don’t know how many 160s I would pick over him at his peak, he was that good. He looks incredible on film.
You mean huge for his time? Because for many decades now guys can come in significantly heavier due to day before weigh ins. Would you pick him against most all of the elite guys who were what would have been LHWs then?
In his autobiography Ray mentions how he cant understand how Turpin’s body fits his frame. “He looks like a 190 lb guy in a 160 lb body” to quote Ray.
I don't think anyone is rating him on the level of LaMotta or Tiger and such - which would be overrating him IMO, but most probably consider him on the level below with guys like Fullmer, or Kalambay. IMO, he's rated about right by those who remember him but he's become largely forgotten in an era of giants.
Take a look on YouTube at Turpin’s clean, crisp demolition of Don C’ll compared to the sloppy, foul filled brutalisation perpetrated by Marciano, to show what a class act looks like.
Marciano didn’t take cockell seriously (admitted this in training) and it was an ugly styles clash. Who cares, it was his worst fight. It happens to great fighters
Problem was, it was an ugly side of Marciano against an opponent with no hope of winning. He resorted to blatantly fouling at every opportunity. Again, just watch how Turpin dealt with Don, whilst Jimmy Slade did the job quicker than either man. Although, no film appears to exist of the latter.
To be fair Don was really struggling at the weight for the Turpin fight it was his last fight at Light Heavyweight he moved up to heavy after that. Still an impressive performance from Randy though. It’s just frustrating that Turpin’s prime was so short.
I believe at his peak he was an outstanding middleweight. Awkwardness, handspeed, power and nasty jab. His physical strength would be another problem. People will overlook Turpin because his time was short. He made it to the top but other issues were his real downfall.
very relevant factor, and for Turpin it was his Best Ever Performance. He came along at the right time, as ALL of the UK Big men were coming to the end of their Ring days and the Colour Bar HAD to be once & for all obliterated. the 'new' crop of UK Big Boys weren't quite as probable hopes as were McAvoy, MILLS and Woodcock. 'IF' there would have been a few Very Definite English Whiteboys around, that 'Colour Bar' would have lingered on another good few years. Randolph, a Very Good fighter, benefitted from that fact.
