Oleksandr VIETUKH: “I am full of the championship spirit”

The Day’s correspondent asked the happy winner to answer a few questions.

“Oleksandr, is it not too early to become a professional prizefighter if you are nineteen? As a rule, this a job for those who have already fully passed the school of amateur boxing?”

“Everything changes very quickly. We were afraid of the word professional until recently and are now trying to catch up with what we lost. It is common knowledge that one should not take such a serious step hastily, so my promoter Michel Barra and I have drawn up a detailed plan of training in order not to force events. As of now, I have fought ten fights.”

“And, on this kind of a jubilee, you have presented yourself and Ukraine a spectacular victory over the American Joshua Smith.”

“Yes, the World Boxing Council (WBC) has decided to hold fights for the title of world champion among the most gifted boxers in the 18 to 21 age category, the winners of which will enter the adult rating list and gain the right to challenge the top title. But I am as far from this as I am from the moon. However, I’ll work, and I hope the time will come. Frankly, I am not so satisfied with myself in the bout: I wanted to finish it ahead of time, as I did in the previous nine. But I have never come across a boxer who can take punches as well as Smith does.”

“Did you train for this fight in London, in the hall where world champion Lennox Lewis also trains?”

“President of the National Professional Boxing League of Ukraine Mykhailo Zavyalov is on good terms with Lennox himself and prominent promoter Frank Meloni. So my compatriots and I always train in the famous school where Lewis does. I must admit you get filled with the championship spirit there.”

“Are you going to relax now?”

“I wish I could. For in two weeks I will be defending the title I’ve just won in the Swiss town of Saint Gallin. Everything is just beginning.”