Former heavyweight champ Deontay Wilder blamed his elaborate walk-up costume for his decisive loss last month to Tyson Fury.
“He didn’t hurt me at all, but the simple fact is ... that my uniform was way too heavy for me,” Wilder told Yahoo Sports. “I didn’t have no legs from the beginning of the fight ... I was only able to put it on (for the first time) the night before but I didn’t think it was going to be that heavy. It weighed 40, 45-some pounds with the helmet and all the batteries. I wanted my tribute to be great for Black History Month. I wanted it to be good and I guess I put that before anything."
Fury finally responded to Wilder's excuse in an interview with ITV.
"He said he trains in a 45lbs weighted vest every day,” Fury said on ITV’s This Morning. “I can understand where he’s coming from because in every fighter’s mind there’s always got to be a reason why they’ve lost. It can never be the simple fact of 'I wasn’t good enough on the night, I lost to the better guy.'
“It's always gotta be 'the camp was wrong, it was the trainer's fault, it was my suit, it was my toe’. It’s always something was a problem. With me if I’m injured or whatever the problem is, it’s like ‘ok the performance wasn’t great, I’m going to move on and crack on’.”
Wilder and Fury will make it a trilogy on July 18 in Las Vegas.