UFC heavyweight Tom Aspinall has credited Peter Fury for helping him to stop seeing fighting as "life or death".
Aspinall, who fights Curtis Blaydes at UFC London on July 23, trained alongside Peter for two years in the early days of his professional career. At the time, Aspinall was unsure whether he wanted to go into boxing or MMA but one thing was certain, he took his fighting career way too seriously.
The trainer's guidance played an instrumental role in Aspinall's UFC success as he enters his second main event in the promotion. Aspinall praised the coach for making him view fighting as a sport, telling Mirror Fighting : "Peter Fury is a massively underrated person in boxing and combat sports.
"He’s amazing. He changed the way I think about fighting completely. Him, Hughie, Tyson, and John Fury made me start thinking of it as a sport rather than life or death. That's what it used to be for me, I used to take it so seriously."
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Peter, who is the uncle of WBC heavyweight champion Tyson Fury, is one of the most well-respected coaches in boxing. He led Tyson to win the unified titles against Wladimir Klitschko in 2015 when his father John was spending time in prison.
The trainer has recently been praised by undefeated middleweight Savannah Marshall, who defended her WBO title for a third time by knocking out Femke Hermans last month. Much like Marshall, Aspinall said his performances only got better after Peter changed his approach to fighting.
“Peter taught me not to force everything," Aspinall continued. "I used to want it too much and try too hard. He used to say ‘it’s just a sport stop trying so hard, just enjoy yourself’ and since I’ve been doing that I’ve not put a foot wrong in my MMA career. So I massively appreciate what he’s done for me.
Aspinall thinks Peter's reputation as a coach is only appreciated by those who are educated on combat sports, stating: “He’s not got a massive ego, he knows how good he is and he doesn’t need to shout off about that in every interview. The people around him, those who know what they’re talking about know how good he is.
UFC FIGHT NIGHT®: BLAYDES vs. ASPINALL tickets go on sale from 10:00 a.m. BST on Saturday, May 28, via AXS and Ticketmaster.
