AT SIX O’CLOCK on Sunday morning, the phone rang. Katie Taylor was, naturally, sound asleep, and only a couple of hours removed from her flight to Manchester from Connecticut. But she had made her bed a couple of months beforehand, and gladly so.
Taylor’s WBO World light-welterweight title showdown with Dominican-born Greek champion Christina Linardatou is the first in the history of the female professional ranks to undergo a full pre-fight random drug-testing program as conducted by the Voluntary Anti-Doping Agency, or VADA. They knock at any time, on any door, and often do so in the wee hours with little to no warning.
Taylor and Linardatou enrolled in VADA’s program as a term in their respective fight contracts. It’s expensive — somewhere in the low-to-mid- tens of thousands for a boxing match, hence why it is unprecedented in the women’s punch-for-pay game: in the majority of cases, the total purse isn’t even worth that much, and for the majority of smaller-scale promoters, it simply isn’t financially feasible.
But Taylor, like her promoter Eddie Hearn, now operates in the bigtime, and ahead of her first major headliner at the Manchester Arena on Saturday night, it was stated that all of her fights henceforth will be subjected to the same rigorous anti-doping procedure.
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And heading toward the end of a year of boxing plagued to a beyond farcical extent by PED scandals, and haunted by several ring tragedies, the Bray woman believes it’s high time the sport began to weed out its cheats.
.@KatieTaylor on boxing’s doping problem, and why her fight vs Christina Linardatou will be the first in women’s pro boxing history to have been subjected to a full @Vada_Testing programme. pic.twitter.com/KWJ25ex7tW
“You don’t like getting those calls at six o’clock in the morning, but it’s definitely going to help the sport,” she told The42. “It has to be done.
“I was tested constantly as an amateur fighter so it’s nice to see the VADA testing coming into the professional ranks as well.
I just think there have been so many dirty drug tests over the last few years — so many dirty boxers, really, over the last few years. Boxing is supposed to be a noble sport. There’s something very noble about getting into the ring and going toe to toe with your opponent. But when there’s so many using performance-enhancing drugs, it’s very, very unfair.
“And also”, she added, “you see the amount of deaths that’s happened this year in the ring as well — it’s been a very, very tough year for boxing, I think.
It’s a tough sport as it is, and if you have drugs inside you, it’s absolutely criminal, really. It’s very important for every single boxer who steps into the ring to be clean.
Taylor shares a joke with her trainer, Ross Enamait, during Wednesday's open workouts. Matchroom Boxing / Mark Robinson/INPHO
Matchroom Boxing / Mark Robinson/INPHO / Mark Robinson/INPHO
Taylor [14-0, 6KOs], still the undisputed lightweight champion, will square off with the 12-1(6KOs) Linardatou on Saturday night in a bid to add a 140-pound world-title to her collection of belts five pounds south.
She is for all intents and purposes fighting at her walk-around weight — she rarely strays above the low-140s. And so while the random testing might be a necessary pain in the backside this time around, she at least doesn’t have to withstand hunger pains during fight week — or at least not to the same extent as to which she has grown accustomed over the last umpteen years.
“It definitely makes fight week a bit easier — I don’t have to starve meself!” she laughed when asked about her temporary climb from lightweight to light-welter. “My focus has been exactly the same, but it nice to be able to eat a little bit more, that’s for sure.
“I’m really, really excited about the fight.
This is something that I’ve dreamt of as a kid — to headline big shows like this. A 20,000-seater [arena], and I’ve a chance to make history — to become a two-weight world champion. It’s huge for me, so I’m just kind of trying to stay focused and stay sharp. You know, I don’t let the mind run away with itself too much!
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'You don't like getting those calls at 6 o'clock in the morning, but it's definitely going to help the sport'
AT SIX O’CLOCK on Sunday morning, the phone rang. Katie Taylor was, naturally, sound asleep, and only a couple of hours removed from her flight to Manchester from Connecticut. But she had made her bed a couple of months beforehand, and gladly so.
Taylor’s WBO World light-welterweight title showdown with Dominican-born Greek champion Christina Linardatou is the first in the history of the female professional ranks to undergo a full pre-fight random drug-testing program as conducted by the Voluntary Anti-Doping Agency, or VADA. They knock at any time, on any door, and often do so in the wee hours with little to no warning.
Taylor and Linardatou enrolled in VADA’s program as a term in their respective fight contracts. It’s expensive — somewhere in the low-to-mid- tens of thousands for a boxing match, hence why it is unprecedented in the women’s punch-for-pay game: in the majority of cases, the total purse isn’t even worth that much, and for the majority of smaller-scale promoters, it simply isn’t financially feasible.
But Taylor, like her promoter Eddie Hearn, now operates in the bigtime, and ahead of her first major headliner at the Manchester Arena on Saturday night, it was stated that all of her fights henceforth will be subjected to the same rigorous anti-doping procedure.
And heading toward the end of a year of boxing plagued to a beyond farcical extent by PED scandals, and haunted by several ring tragedies, the Bray woman believes it’s high time the sport began to weed out its cheats.
“You don’t like getting those calls at six o’clock in the morning, but it’s definitely going to help the sport,” she told The42. “It has to be done.
“I was tested constantly as an amateur fighter so it’s nice to see the VADA testing coming into the professional ranks as well.
“And also”, she added, “you see the amount of deaths that’s happened this year in the ring as well — it’s been a very, very tough year for boxing, I think.
Taylor [14-0, 6KOs], still the undisputed lightweight champion, will square off with the 12-1(6KOs) Linardatou on Saturday night in a bid to add a 140-pound world-title to her collection of belts five pounds south.
She is for all intents and purposes fighting at her walk-around weight — she rarely strays above the low-140s. And so while the random testing might be a necessary pain in the backside this time around, she at least doesn’t have to withstand hunger pains during fight week — or at least not to the same extent as to which she has grown accustomed over the last umpteen years.
“It definitely makes fight week a bit easier — I don’t have to starve meself!” she laughed when asked about her temporary climb from lightweight to light-welter. “My focus has been exactly the same, but it nice to be able to eat a little bit more, that’s for sure.
“I’m really, really excited about the fight.
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Boxing Irish Boxing Katie Taylor Leading The Way vada testing