Aleksandr Usyk and Murat Gassiev entertained a big crowd at Tuesday’s public workout in Moscow,Russia.
Usyk, however, did surprisingly not do any of the usual skipping, shadow boxing or pad work, but instead waved and bowed in front of the hundreds of fans at the Oceania Shopping Mall.
Even though Usyk is fighting in his opponent’s home country there was a lot of noisy support for the Ukrainian.
“I came, entertained the crowd a bit and did some interviews, but I did not show any boxing today,” said Usyk. “You must keep people hungry, not overfeed them. On Saturday people will see everything!”
Murat Gassiev did the classic workout and threw t-shirts into an ecstatic crowd.
“It was a good training in front of a lot of people, but I am looking forward to seeing many more on Saturday!”
More than 200 journalists from all over the world have accreditation for Saturday’s final at the Olympic Sports Complex in Moscow. Over 10.000 tickets have been sold and 20.000 are expected for the historic Cruiserweight final.
The winner of Usyk-Gassiev will be the first boxer ever to win the Muhammad Ali Trophy and unify the cruiserweight titles in the four belt era.
The belts on the line will be the WBO, WBC, IBF and WBA Super and RING Magazine’s vacant cruiserweight championship strap.