Tim Tszyu has opened up about his complex relationship with his father Kostya as he prepares for another fight with his old man on the other side of the world.
Tszyu (23-0, 17 KOs) faces American Brian Mendoza on the Gold Coast on Sunday and is the heavy favorite to win his third fight of the year in what is expected to be his final fight on home soil.
The 28-year-old is defending his WBO super welterweight belt and is currently just one of four Australian world champion boxers, along with Jai Opetaia, Andrew Moloney and Ebanie Bridges.
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But Tszyu has bigger fish to fish than Mendoza. His hopes of becoming unified world champion were dashed when trash-talking American Jermell Charlo ended their fight.
While Tszyu would love to beat Charlo one day, his camp says Charlo has had his chance and the undefeated Australian is aiming for superfights against boxing megastars Errol Spence, Terrence Crawford and Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez.
If he can beat them, Tszyu will go down in history as one of the greatest Australian boxers of all time, alongside his world champion father Kostya and Jeff Fenech.
Tszyu has a complex relationship with his father, who hasn’t had a ringside seat to one of his son’s fights in several years and now watches Tim’s fights via FaceTime.
His mother Natalia and grandfather Boris remain very present in Tim’s life after Kostya left his wife and children to start a second family in Russia more than a decade ago.
Tszyu previously explained that his father was “never there for us” during his childhood as he prepared to uproot the family and move to Russia.
Tim is clearly proud of his father’s accomplishments and the work ethic he instilled in him, proudly displaying a shrine to Kostya’s boxing career in his childhood home.
“I guess Dad’s success set an example for us: where we wanted to be and what we wanted to do,” Tim told Sporting News.
“It’s all about having Grandpa’s support.” He never missed any of my fights, even among the amateurs.
“I just need people who are true to themselves and to me and I’m true to them.”
But he also intends to make a name for himself in boxing after spending his entire career listening to his opponents claim he was only in the spotlight because of his last name.
Tszyu said after his victory over Jeff Horn: “I want everyone to know my name is Tim, not my son. »
He talks to his father before every fight but takes Kostya’s boxing advice with a pinch of salt.
When asked on the Hello Sport podcast if he ever gets tired of his father telling him how to fight an opponent, Tszyu replied: “A lot of the time actually, especially as you get older.
“Dad forgets sometimes. Of course I respect what he did, but we’re in a different era now. We do things differently.
He says one thing and I’m like, ‘No, I’m not doing that, I’m going to do it my way.’ He’s like, ‘No man, you can’t do it that way,’ and I’m like, ‘Man, I’m doing it my way.
“You haven’t lived here for 20 years dad, it’s okay man, I got it, don’t worry about it.
“Of course I respect his opinion, what he experienced and did. He hasn’t been back for a long time.
Tszyu also took another step toward separating himself from his famous father by removing promotional posters from Kostya’s legendary fights and relegating a handful of them to a section of the family gym.
The modest brick-walled gym in the Sydney suburb of Rockdale is to be renamed the Tszyu Boxing Academy and is now adorned with fight posters of Tim and his brother Nikita.
Tszyu is also aware of not becoming “like my father” and chewing out his younger brother’s ear with boxing advice.
Nikita, 25, fights in the same super welterweight division as Tim and will face Australian champion Dylan Biggs in November in his toughest test yet.
“I try to give him some advice, but I don’t want to be like my dad, basically,” Tim said of giving his brother boxing advice.
“So I always took that into consideration. I always just say, “You should do this man.” I usually say, “This is how I feel better, this is what I do.” See how you feel.
Providing insight into Kostya’s brutally tough approach to fatherhood, “losing wasn’t an option” for him, even as a child.
“I came second in cross country. I came home, told my dad you know, I came second,” Tim recalls.
“He looked at me and said, ‘Man, that’s not good enough.’ He had me running from 3rd to 4th grade, waking up at 5:15 a.m. before school three times a week.
“Of course, sometimes that’s the last thing I want to do!”
“I remember I was emotional when I was racing, I had breathing problems because I was losing. Then years 4, 5 and 6 came first each time.
“That’s how we were. Losing was not an option. Second place is not an achievement. But habits have simply been instilled in us.
“My dad was a rock star back in the day. I could see it. Everyone recognized him. He had the Bentleys, the mansion, he had all that.
“But we lived in a Soviet-style system where training had to be 100 percent assured. It all depends on how you’re raised, I guess.
You get the feeling that Tim won’t be fully satisfied until he’s a unified world champion to completely step out of Kostya’s shadow.
