'It's a battle within yourself': Tim Tszyu's brutal camp paying off ahead of Takeshi Inoue bout

The then-super lightweight champion of the world was weeks out from a title defence, but more pressing was the fate of the nation's brightest young boxers who had followed him to the AIS.

"I am going to make them train so hard they will all be crying by the end of it," the then-super lightweight world champion said.

Kostya's brutal Soviet-inspired training methods are written into boxing folklore. They were designed to break your will, and they go some way to explaining why the Australian sporting spotlight shines on Sydney on Wednesday night.

Because mandatory world title challenger Tim has a chance to force his way into a super welterweight championship bout when he faces the WBO's seventh-ranked Takeshi Inoue.

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Tszyu is writing his own story, but their legacies will be forever entwined. The son of a gun didn't just watch his father break people down. He lived it.

Tasks like not eating for an extended period of time were commonplace. Kostya's ambition was to make his boys say they didn't want to do something, and force them to break through the pain barrier.

Tszyu knows that mentality made his father the undisputed champion, just as he knows it's a big part of the reason why he is here today, one win away from a shot at Brian Castano's WBO crown.

Kostya tried to break training partners. Igor Goloubev was among them, and now he repays the favour as Tszyu's trainer inside the family's Rockdale gym. But those gruelling sessions are all worth it the moment the fighter steps on the scales.

"It's a battle within yourself, it's you versus you everyday," Tszyu said.

"It's a good feeling once you're on the scales and recharged. All I can say in my head is that I'm coming for him, that's all it is. All this stuff is cool and fun, you've got to enjoy fight week and the whole process of the build-up to a fight, but for me, my job is solely on the fight.

"With anything in life, the main thing is consistency. If you stay consistent at what you do, you'll achieve great things.

"This is what I am trying to show to all of the boxers out there, keep being consistent, keep staying in the gym, keep training hard, keep fighting, and great things will come.

"I'm ready to go. I've done over 200 rounds of sparring in this camp. I'm feeling super fit and I'm ready to go. Every camp is a new challenge."

Tszyu is calculatingly cold as he sits down to observe footage of his next challenge: the chiselled former world title challenger from Yokohama with just one loss on his record.

The first thing Tszyu notices are Inoue's shoulders. Then it's the big arms and a series of combinations. But he's off balance, says Tszyu. The 27-year-old quickly finds gaps he vows to exploit.

"I just enjoy the fact of hurting people. I know it sounds brutal, but I enjoy the fact of hurting people. You get into this zone and I turn into a different person," Tszyu said.

"Two days after, I'm a different person back home, I'm nice and relaxed. Right now, I'm in the zone, this is what we do. It's kill or be killed, like back in the gladiator days. This is what fighting and brutality is about."

Inoue vows to knock the Australian star out and tipped the scales at 69.68 kilograms, Tszyu slightly lighter at 69.52 at Tuesday's weigh-in.

"I hope he's had a great holiday here. The holiday ends [on Wednesday]. He can do what he wants, one thing I know is that I'm coming for his head, and his body, everything. I'm coming for him," Tszyu said.

One can't help but feel this is Tszyu's destiny.

His mother Natalia Tszyu says her son was shadow boxing before he could walk. She finds it fitting he was in love with The Lion King as a child, a story about a young lion following in his father's footsteps to rule a kingdom.

With every body punch comes another flashing camera. With every victory, the spotlight shines brighter.

"You know what, before I used to hate it. But now it doesn't bother me, I'm used to it. In all honesty I'm just talking and being myself, I'm not putting on any personas. This is me," Tszyu said.

"It's all part of the process I guess. I'm getting used to this stuff but I've always got to pinch myself. There's so many cameras, you never get used to it. You sort of do but it's always special. I enjoy the brutality of boxing and I understand this is the top level.

"I want my opponents to keep rising, and this is what it is. Takeshi is another rise and that's what I want. The fact I'm doing it here in Australia now with hundreds of cameras in my face non-stop, it's all part of the fun."

Not just for Tszyu, but for his grandfather too, the man he once cracked in the jaw with a well-timed left hook as a child in a clear sign he would pick up where his father left off.

Boris Tszyu keeps a log of both his son and grandson's careers to compare every detail: every rope jumped, every weight, every meal, every result in the ring.

That's why every belt his grandson wins goes to him. That's why Tszyu promised him a world title one day - one that may well come early in the new year.

"If there's a world title next, that's the path I'm going to," Tszyu said.

BOXING

Wednesday, November 17: Tim Tszyu v Takeshi Inoue at Sydney Super Dome. Tickets from Ticketek. Broadcast live on Main Event.

FIGHT CARD

WBO Global and WBO Asia Pacific super welterweight championships: Tim Tszyu [19-0] v Takeshi Inoue [17-1-1]

IBO International super welterweight championship: Wade Ryan [19-9] v Nath Nwachukwu [7-1-2]

Super welterweight: Joel Camilleri [20-6-1] v Koen Mazoudier [8-2]

Super welterweight: Dennis Hogan [28-4-1] v Tommy Browne [42-7-2]

Heavyweight: Jackson Murray [1-0] v Shant Nercessian [1-4-1]

Bantamweight: Viviana Ruiz Corredor [1-0] v Jacinta Austin [debut]

Welterweight: Alex Lual [2-0] v Trent Girdham [2-0]

Super welterweight: Benjamin Hussein [3-1] v Darwin Sagurit [debut]

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