The WBA super-lightweight champion says the disaster ‘took away everything’ but forced him to grow up, and explains why he will treat himself to a new bookshelf if he beats Josh Taylor
“If I didn’t read as much as I did, and study the history, I’d probably be intimidated by this fight and by Josh Taylor,” Regis Prograis says as he faces the dangerous ordeal that awaits him and his opponent on Saturday night. Prograis and Taylor are both unbeaten world champions in the super-lightweight division and their unification contest at the O2 Arena should be riveting.
I interviewed both men last week and they offer an intriguing study in contrast. Taylor, a 28-year-old Scot who lives just outside Edinburgh, is likable yet concentrated in his searing focus on Prograis, while also revealing a passion for motorbike racing. The 30-year-old Prograis, meanwhile, is erudite and laconic. He discusses books and history, poverty and morality. In London he has visited the Churchill War Rooms and plans were made for him to meet the historian Andrew Roberts. An unlikely encounter between a heavily tattooed American boxer and Churchill’s biographer didn’t happen this time but it’s an example of Prograis’s difference to most fighters.
Written by Donald McRae
This news first appeared on https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2019/oct/26/regis-prograis-hurricane-katrina-books-josh-taylor-boxing under the title “Regis Prograis: ‘Hurricane Katrina changed my life for the better’”. Bolchha Nepal is not responsible or affiliated towards the opinion expressed in this news article.
