JD NXTGEN: Jordan Gill reveals how scientific approach to boxing has boosted his rising career
Written by News on 16/02/2019
Jordan Gill is among a growing trend of fighters who have adopted a scientific approach to boxing, so we asked him to outline his revolutionary training regime.
The unbeaten featherweight is one of Britain’s hottest prospects and has been undergoing stringent preparations for his bill-topping bout against Emmanuel Dominguez on the JD NXTGEN show on March 2, live on Sky Sports.
Since joining Dave Coldwell’s gym, Gill has enlisted the support of Danny Wilson from ‘Boxing Science’, and offers insight into his ground-breaking sessions.
How has your training developed?
Yeah, massive change. I never really did much strength work before, whereas now I do a lot. I train with Danny four times a week, and then the weekend is when he’ll set me another conditioning session to do.
It’s paid off big time so far, it’s been a big help. I’ve been training with him for about three years now.
What kind of methods do you employ?
We do a lot of mobility work. A lot of injury prevention in boxing, which is important, make sure my body is supple. Learn the techniques and the lifts before you load up the weights.
Deadlifts, trap bar deadlifts, squats, cleans, overhead presses, lunges, those sort of things. It’s all beneficial. A lot of band work as well, kettlebells. They are the mad scientists and I just follow instructions.
How far will you run?
I don’t run distances. I run in intervals. They design the programme and I just follow that. Sometimes we’re running in altitude tents, sometimes we’re running on the curve treadmills, which are absolutely brutal. But all the conditioning, it all comes to hand on fight night.
Which session is the hardest?
What I dread the most is running on the curve, because they are self-powered and they call them ‘The Devil’s hamster wheel’. It’s called that for a reason.
How has your mindset changed?
I look at boxing in a different way than I did before. That’s just from being educated on the dynamics of the sport, and how boxing actually works. Dave is a true teacher of that, and I’m lucky to have him as a coach.
Are you feeling the benefits in the ring?
The sport science verdict
Danny Wilson from Boxing Science: Most boxers join our programmes with short-term goals, looking to get fit quick and wanting instant results. But Jordan understood the long-term process of athletic development and his aim for his sport science support was to have world level strength, speed and fitness in four years time.
A lot of the conditioning we do involve maximal sprints, exposing Jordan to high lactate levels and pushing him near to physical exhaustion. The best example of where this helped Jordan was during round four of the Ryan Doyle fight. He unloaded about 80 punches in under one minute, and was able to recover and go again. Many boxers wouldn’t have been able to maintain that intensity or might have “punched themselves out”.
The best way to describe the benefits of Jordan’s physical training on boxing performance, is that we develop the physical capabilities to support the quality work he does with Dave Coldwell.
(c) Sky News 2019: JD NXTGEN: Jordan Gill reveals how scientific approach to boxing has boosted his rising career
