By Hans Olson
Fast rising Quebec star Pier Olivier Cote will return to action May 26 in Nottingham, England, putting his IBF Inter-Continental Jr. welterweight title on the line against Wolverhampton’s Mark “Lloydy” Lloyd. The bout will be a featured attraction on the undercard of Lucian Bute vs. Carl Froch.
“We’re pretty excited you know? It’s a very good opportunity to go over there with the crowd against us, just to have that experience,” said Cote’s trainer Francois Duguay to Boxing Insider Monday.
The 15-5 Lloyd will look to bounce back after consecutive defeats.
“I saw a couple of tapes of him,” continued Duguay.
“He’s a pretty good fighter. He likes to work on the inside. He’s very tight with his hands. It could be tough, you know, for a clash of heads…so we have to be careful with him because of that. But, I mean for a return fight, I think it’s a perfect guy to work on the inside fighting of Pier Olivier.”
Cote, who entered the consciousness of North American boxing fans last November with a thrilling knockout of Jorge Luis Teron on Showtime, was originally slated to return in February against Mauricio Herrera. Unfortunately, Cote pulled out of the fight due to an undisclosed illness. Duguay shed some light on just what was affecting Pier Olivier.
“He was kind of overtrained,” said Duguay.
“Not because our program wasn’t good, but because he didn’t know how to recuperate after his training. He’d train in the morning, and then do boxing in the evening. Sometimes when he’d finish his training, he’d go home, have supper…then felt good so he’d decide to run a 10k for nothing! He didn’t know that recuperation was also the part of the training. That recuperation is very important as far as training is. Now everything is okay. He knows the importance to take care of his body rather than just go crazy with training.”
Duguay looks forward to a solid training camp at home in Quebec.
“We were waiting to see which opponent we had, so I [could have] specific fighters to spar with based on the opponent that we’re going to have. Now with Mark Lloyd I know that I have all the tools here in Quebec to stay here and have good preparation for him.”
Boxing Insider’s Hans Olson can be reached at hanswilliamolson@yahoo.com