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Conor Benn begins his day at 5am with laborious sprints up a precipitous path in the idyllic yet built-up setting of Palma, Mallorca.
With the sun not set to rise for another two and half hours, the streets are deserted.
“I’m just making things as difficult as I can so come fight night it’s as easy as it can be. This is where the champions are made,” the Briton says through a heavy breath.
The 28-year-old will finally face bitter rival Chris Eubank Jr at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium on Saturday.
They were scheduled to fight in October 2022 – almost 30 years after their fathers’ iconic duels – but the bout was called off on two days’ notice because of Benn’s failed drug test.
Benn has always maintained innocence and after a two-and-a-half-year legal battle, he has been cleared to fight.
“I hit a bit of adversity, came through it, just about, and am ready to go into the biggest fight of my career,” Benn tells BBC Sport.
Yet the reasons why and how the fertility drug Clomifene entered his body remain a mystery.
The ‘nepo kid’ with a father who stands by him
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Nigel Benn lost to fellow British boxing legend Chris Eubank Sr in 1990 before a contentious draw three years later.
More than three decades on, he is by his son’s side as the jovial pair joke with the team. It’s a real family affair, with Benn’s sisters and cousin also joining him in camp.
Having spent 12 years of his childhood in Mallorca, Benn speaks fluent Spanish to the locals in the gym.
When the training session begins, however, the laughter stops. There is noticeable shift in mindset – a sign of just how serious Benn is approaching this fight.
He says he is “leaving no stone unturned” as he fights for the family name – and to prove his own worth – in this bloodline rivalry.
“I’ve got a chip on my shoulder about [people] saying I’m the nepo kid, that I had it easy,” he adds.
But this is no longer about fathers. Benn’s reputation amongst boxing fans has been stained.
Although he has been cleared to fight by an anti-doping panel, they feel he should be more transparent about the reasons behind the failed test.
Benn says he has been “cleared three times” and is reluctant to dwell on the past.
Nigel, meanwhile, speaks more openly about the impact it had on them both, saying £1m was spent on the legal battles.
The former super-middleweight champion says he is not a drinker but would consume “half a bottle of red wine every night” during the period as his mental health issues worsened, while his son turned to therapy to get through the dark times.
“I was watching my son really crying in my arms, heartbroken. I just knew [he was innocent],” Nigel adds.
Training like an elite athlete, but how good is Benn?
Benn taps into modern-day training methods by sporting an oxygen mask during cardio to simulate high-altitude training.
He expertly talks about nutrition, saying in the past he was “eating curries and pop-tarts” after weigh-ins.
There is something quite comical about the way he unintentionally reels his past takeaway order in the style of Smithy from sitcom Gavin and Stacey.
“I’d have prawn puri for starters, lamb rogan josh, Bombay potatoes with some saag aloo, peshwari naan, all the poppadoms, pilau rice, saag paneer,” Benn says.
There is no doubt he is now living the life of an elite athlete.
But so much has happened outside of the ring that we have forgotten, or perhaps never had the opportunity to truly find out, how good a boxer Benn actually is.
Before his ban, he was on a roll with early stoppage victories over past-their-prime Chris Algieri and Chris van Heerden.
His two fights in America since the cancelled Eubank bout – points wins over Rodolfo Orozco and Peter Dobson – have been rather unspectacular.
Benn is a vastly improved fighter from the novice dropped by French journeyman Cedrick Peynaud in 2017.
‘Mind-blowing’ sparring session & Benn predicts ‘one-sided beatdown’
Benn has been sparring the likes of IBF super-middleweight champion William Scull and undefeated middleweight Bruno Surace.
Nigel raves enthusiastically about a particularly “mind-blowing” sparring session against an unnamed top-level fighter which left him too excited to sleep.
“I’m 99% sure he will [beat Eubank] within four rounds,” Nigel predicts.
Is this a case of rose-tinted dad glasses or an unbiased analysis from one of the best British fighters ever?
World-title challenger Eubank has fought at a significantly higher level. Although a stipulation prevents Eubank from gaining more than 10lb on fight night, he is still the more natural at the weight.
“Yes, I am jumping up two weight divisions. Yes, that brings its challenges,” Benn says.
“And yes his CV’s better, but the difference between me and him is he’s lost every time he stepped up. I haven’t.”
Benn believes that “people see this as a 50/50” contest, even though Eubank is the bookmakers’ favourite.
“I must be delusional or people just don’t know what they’re dealing with,” he says.
“Because I see it being a one-sided beatdown. I see it being so ferocious, so dangerous that people are wincing as I’m landing my shots.
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