Dimitry Bivol resembles a maniac in his final days of training for his four-belt 175-lb contest against knockout artist Artur Beterbiev on October 12th at the Kingdom Arena in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
There’s clearly much worry with Bivol because he knows what he’s up against fighting Beterbiev, and he recognizes what’s at stake. If Bivol gets knocked out, he can say goodbye to the rematch with Canelo Alvarez and a lucrative fight against David Benavidez. He may not want to admit it, but those fights would fill his bank account quite nicely and put a smile on his face.
Bivol (23-0, 12 KOs), WBA light heavyweight champion, looks obsessed and has a desperate appearance to his training in the final 13 days before D-day against IBF, WBC, and WBO champion Beterbiev (20-0, 20 KOs) in their headliner, live on DAZN PPV.
The way the 33-year-old Bivol is training, it seems obvious that he’s going be treating the fight like an amateur contest, looking to score points like a fencer, hitting with the white portions of the gloves, hoping to win a 12-round unanimous decision.
From the looks of Bivol’s recent workout video, he’s not going to be taking any risks against Beterbiev by staying in close. Bivol is using the same three-foot step back style that Shakur Stevenson employs, meaning that it’s going to be a cat & mouse affair. Bivol will play tag and then dart off to prevent getting nailed.
Beterbiev has other ideas. He fights with a more pro style, and will be focusing on wearing Bivol down with powerful shots to the head and midsection to transform him into his 21st consecutive knockout victim.
Fans on social media still overwhelmingly believe that Bivol will outbox Beterbiev as he did against Canelo Alvarez two years ago in 2022. Many of them have never seen Beterbiev fight before, so they’re just going by the one or two fights they’ve seen from Bivol against Canelo and the very slow Gilberto Ramirez. This could be an eye-opener for the pro-Bivol fans, who will see that he’s not what they thought,
It doesn’t look the safety-first approach that Bivol uses will be effective against Beterbiev, because when he does come forward, his head and body will be there to be hit. Bivol is like a poor man’s version of Oleksandr Usyk, but without the power that he possessed when he was in the amateurs.
