Present V Past

[TonnnnUK]

I'm not sure I agree there mate. Take your example then, but go even further back to (say) Larry Holmes in the late 70's and early 80's.

Are you saying that techniques, strategies and game plans would have suddenly and quickly evolved in the 20 years between Holmes and Klitschko ..... when humans had already been boxing for thousands of years?

The modern boxer and how he trains, prepares is an interesting one to me. Obviously people now are far more savvy about what they eat, what they supplement that with, what physical activity to do. What's the end product? Are boxers now all super fit machines that can go full tilt for 36 minutes every fight with a perfectly evolved technique? I think the answer to that one lies somewhere in the middle. Both past and present would benefit from what the other does, or rather had to do. Modern day fighters would benefit from being in the ring more. To a point, past fighters probably from being in the ring a bit less.

A jab, right cross, left hook have remained unchanged for a long time. OK there might be minor nuances to it from certain individuals. But the mechanics have remained largely untouched, some might say technical coaching has gone backwards. So the benefits of modern science are possibly bottlenecked to a degree in comparison to something like tennis, where the thing they use has come on leaps and bounds over years. Bigger, stronger faster tennis players can impart all that science into and through a (what are they made of now?) modern racket and play shots with greater force and accuracy that the older players of not a million years ago simply couldn't with the wooden racket. A glove is a glove. Yes they've changed, but not as an extension of the fighter in the way that a racket or bat has. To that end I'd probably lean towards the older fighters in terms of how they did things. The technical elements have remained the same, they just did it more. The modern boxer isn't being taught anything alien to the boxer of the past when it comes to how to box.

You fellas are probably about right. Boxing is something of a primitive art, whereas other sports such as the example of tennis could look to the advancement of equipment as a major factor for modern athletes being superior.

Alghough take modern football, which is hard to gauge since its a team sport but it also a pretty primative sport. The debate on who is the greatest footballer is GENERALLY between two current/active players (Ronaldo and Messi). Players of today are generally considered better than their counterparts of yesteryear as the game is now played at a faster pace etc etc.
Records in athletics for the most part don't hold for more than a couple of decades. Some of the longer ones going back around 30 years. But they are reflective that athletes perform better over time.

It's a very hard debate!