{"id":84847,"date":"2021-06-14T02:06:43","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T02:06:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=84847"},"modified":"2021-06-14T03:58:19","modified_gmt":"2021-06-14T03:58:19","slug":"gallens-startling-weight-loss-for-huni-fight","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=84847","title":{"rendered":"Gallen's startling weight loss for Huni fight"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paul Gallen<\/a> is the lightest he's ever been in his elite sporting career, heading into his Australian heavyweight title fight against Justis Huni.<\/p>\n

NRL great Gallen is now about 98kg, lighter than he was for his entire career in top-flight rugby league, which began at age 19.<\/p>\n

"I'm as fit as I can be, I'm below 100 kilos for the first time since probably 18 years old," Gallen, 39, told Wide World of Sports this morning.<\/p>\n

"I'm really fit, I've just got to get out there and make it happen."<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Gallen (10-0-1, 6 KOs) had his last full-tilt training session last night, with only pad work remaining before he fights rising phenom Huni (4-0, 3 KOs) at Sydney International Convention Centre on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n

He did just four and a half weeks of sparring but crammed in plenty of rounds, many against cruiserweights, to replicate the speed and movement of Huni.<\/p>\n

Gallen's last win, a first round knockout of former world heavyweight champion Lucas Browne<\/a>, was only set for six rounds. He faces 10 rounds against Huni and was intent on being flawlessly conditioned.<\/p>\n

"I always weigh-in with my shoes and whatever shorts I've got on, so it might be around 100kg; but when I wake up in the morning, I'm about 98, 99kg," he said, having weighed-in at 102kg against Browne.<\/p>\n

"I used to play at about 105, 106kg, so certainly a lot lighter than I played footy at.<\/p>\n

"Being a boxer, footy players do a hell of a lot of weights these days. I'm obviously not doing the amount of weights I was doing and just the running, the cardio and the fitness of boxing just strips it off you."<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Gallen intends to use his prime fitness to take his game plan to another level against Huni, the Olympic heavyweight contender who will attempt to keep him at arm's length with superior boxing skills.<\/p>\n

Gallen is eyeing off a late stoppage after wearing down Huni.<\/p>\n

"He's faster, he's a good boxer. I've just got to pressure him constantly, not let him have breaks and push him backwards," Gallen said.<\/p>\n

"Realistically, the first few rounds are going to be hard for me. That's that danger, that's when he's going to be at his best and that's when I need to be wearing him out for later rounds.<\/p>\n

"That's what's going to be the hardest part, probably those first four rounds. I've got to be pushing him backwards constantly, which means I'm going forwards; which mean there's a chance I'm going to be walking into punches.<\/p>\n

"That's the real danger period of the fight but if I get through that, tire him out and back him up against the ropes as we saw Christian Tsoye do at times, I've just got to unload punches.<\/p>\n

"There's no real secret to this one. It's not going to be a boxing match for me, it's going to be a fight. I'll get in there and fight him and do whatever I have to do to win."<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0clicking here!<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paul Gallen is the lightest he's ever been in his elite sporting career, heading into his Australian heavyweight title fight against Justis Huni. NRL great […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=84847"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":84851,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84847\/revisions\/84851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=84847"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=84847"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=84847"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}