By Johnny Walker
As WBC heavyweight champion Vitali Klitschko attends to an ongoing political crisis in Ukraine, a crisis which caused him to uproot his Austrian training camp for a September 10 clash in Poland with top challenger Tomasz Adamek, much attention has been paid in the boxing press as to how this disruption will affect the champion come fight night. Scant attention however, has been given to the reaction of his opponent.
While some of the online boxing forum crowd has been buzzing with the notion of a distracted Klitschko, now training back in Ukraine, not taking the upcoming fight seriously and thus heading for a sure fall in Poland, Adamek, always a stoic type not prone to emotional outbursts, is having none of it. Adamek tells Fightnews today (August 11) from his training camp in Pennsylvania that he has “zero interest” in what is going on in the Klitschko camp.
“It has nothing to do with our work here, “Adamek (44-1, 28 KO) says. Vitali knows what to do to be the best and I’m not paying attention to so-called ‘distractions’ in his camp. I’m assuming that Vitali will be the best he can be when we will meet in the middle of the ring on September 10. I’m expecting nothing less than Vitali being 100-percent ready, ready for him having fight of his life.”
Adamek, like recent Wladimir Klitschko victim David Haye a former cruiserweight champion, also shrugs off the notion of some critics who feel he is overmatched against the 6’7” Ukrainian with the highest knockout percentage in heavyweight boxing history. Adamek hopes to draw the 40-year-old Klitschko into a technical type of fight where he feels he has the edge.
“I would like Vitali’s fight to be a technical one, because this is one of my strengths,” says the Pole. “I will not even try to convince people that I will do all what I can to win, because if somebody does not know this about me, it means he never saw me in the ring.”
While Haye made a huge fuss about rematch clauses in the Klitschko brothers’ contracts, Adamek, who is contracted to fight The Ring recognized world heavyweight champion Wladimir should he wrest the WBC title away from Wlad’s older brother, sees it very differently.
“As long as Wladimir will not join his brother Vitali on September 10 in the ring, I’m fine.” Adamek quips.
“Wladimir [is] next in line, my next fight after [me] beating his older brother.”
