SAN JUAN ZITLALTEPEC.- Among the sacrifices that Emmanuel “Cowboy” Navarrete has had to do to be three-time world boxing championthere is a very peculiar one that comes to mind in the most difficult moments of preparation for fights: the tortilla.
Think about her before and after workouts, while she buffs her core, strengthens legs, arms and fists at the gyms away from home where she moves to focus and adhere to rigorous no-carbohydrate diets and thus face the best athletes in the world.
He confesses it without hesitation, in an interview with this newspaper at his home in San Juan Zitlaltlepeca town in the State of Mexico with less than 20,000 inhabitants, where the boxer was born, where he is one more, the root that always carries in mindin the head, in the heart and, of course, in the stomach.
He was recently in a rigorous training to fight at Glendale’s Desert Diamond ArenaArizona, for the vacant world super featherweight title of the World Boxing Organization, left by the American Shakur Stevenson.
Every day got up at 6:00 in the morning, ran between 25 and 55 minutes and then I did two hours in the gym on a rigorous diet, without fat, without much water. In that context, reduced the number of tortillasfrom six per meal to zero.
“For me the most difficult part of being a world champion is not the physical exhaustion, but leave the family and spend two or three months in other places (usually in Tijuana) to prepare in other cities where the food is not the same”, he details in the room of his house, a spacious and bright space that he builds little by little, achievement after achievement.
“Here, in the village, the gastronomy is very good: gorditas, tortillas, tlacoyos, everything is very natural. Here the corn is plantedit is harvested, we have the culture of corn, which is like the rice of the Chinese”.
After his victory against Australian Liam Wilson, at the beginning of February, things are going better for “Vaquero”. He is not in intense preparation and can go out in his truck with four by four tires throwing dust towards the municipal market and bathe in Mesoamerica with the variety of dishes.
Barbecue and “basket” tacos with stews in green or red sauce; toast with tinga with mole, with beef brisket; gorditas of pork rinds and broad beans, of beans that rise about the cooked corn millon the griddle, on the surroundings, on Mexico.
“This is from here.”
Emmanuel Navarrete He brings his Mexican style to the ring. Sports analysts say that he is like most boxing champions in the country he “goes to the front, receives punishment, overcomesgive shrapnel and win ”.
He did so in his most recent fight that put him in the Select club of three-time world champions from Mexicotogether with Julio César Chávez, Érik Morales, Marco Antonio Barrera, Juan Manuel Márquez, Jorge Arce, Fernando Montiel, Leo Santacruz, Abner Mares and Canelo Alvarez.
“I am the tenth to enter as a three-time champion”says Navarrete, 28, after getting up from the canvas, receiving shrapnel, overcoming and beat Liam Wilson by knockout in the ninth round and thus crowned world champion in three different divisions.
-He 10 is a big numberof luck…
I don’t know what to think about it, but I’m the one. tenth Mexican to achieve a title of this type.
The boxer won his first world crown at super bantamweight when he beat Isaac Dogboe via unanimous decision in December 2018, giving him the World Boxing Organization title (OMB), a belt that he successfully defended five times.
Two years later, he surpassed Rubén Villa for win vacant featherweight medal of the WBO that he defended undefeated on three occasions.
The The only time the Mexican has lost was in 2012 when he fell before Daniel Argueta in four rounds. At that time, Navarrete had only six professional contests and despite the defeat, he obtained the 18th Gold Belt because his rival had not appeared at the weigh-in.
In total, he boasts a record of 37 bouts.
The Vaquero’s family wanted their children to be athletes. The mother suffered from the blows that this implied, but she accepted that the father encouraged them so that they the three brothers went to the gym in San Juan Zitlatepecwhere they still train after working construction, like they always have.
The eldest of them married and no longer pursued the career; the second recently returned to the professional ring and recently won a fight; Emmanuel wanted to do everything at the same time: fight hard, work in constructionhave a girlfriend, have three children and be the best in the world, why not?
“I finished high school in the town and I no longer wanted to go to high school, he boxed better and workedI boxed and worked and life gave me the opportunity to grow.”
Despite the glories that boxing gives, Cowboy doesn’t want his kids to box. They are still small (they are eight and two years old and an eight-month-old baby), but he think about avoiding suffering “better that they study or do something else”. He does not say it because of the blows, he notes: “the easiest thing is to throw and receive blows”, but because of what it takes to be a world champion.
“You can run out of friends because you are training, you have no personal life”.
Fortunately, he can go out of town and walk without problemsthe residents meet him by chance and greet him as when he was a little boy and he went to run to the lagoon to train. “He is a very simple person”says Faustino Delgado, one of the town’s residents who has known him since he was a child.
Emmanuel Navarrete he thinks about his retirement, although he is only 28 years old. “I am going to retire young and I want a more sedentary, more familiar life, I want have cattlecattle, sheep, chickens, turkeys, pigs and I take care of them”, he says.
For now He already bought some of those animals that roam in the distancebehind the corral that can be seen behind the glass during the interview in the living room of his house. Cowboy took the nickname from his trainerbut it has a lot of cattleman.
of course has a fight at the dooris dedicated to this: to be with the family, to walk, to do a little exercise and, of course, to eat everything omelettes to start.
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