Sporting Heroes Month: Amir Khan
In association with MaxiNutrition
For the month of May, Attitude online will be showing off the best of the best of 2015’s sporting heroes. Today? Pakistani-British professional boxer Amir Khan. Find out all you need to know about 28-year-old sports star below…
Top sporting achievement: Khan is the youngest British Olympic boxing medalist, winning silver at the 2004 Athens Olympics at the age of 17. How’s that for starting your sporting career with a bang!
Better Half: Khan married Pakistani-American student, Faryal Makhdoom, at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City in 2013. Their first child, a daughter named Lamaisah, was born in May last year.
Best Attribute: There’s his philanthropic spirit – he’s soon launching the Amir Khan Foundation for disadvantaged youth. Then there’s that megawatt smile:
Sporting Quote: “Both fighters just wanna get in there and get the fight on, but it’s like we’re on a leash. As soon as they let go of that leash in the ring, that’s when we go at it.” – Sounds like a pretty thorough summation of boxing to us!
Special Weapon: In a boxing world of egos and big personalities, perhaps Khan’s greatest key to success is that he stays grounded and never believes his own hype. “I don’t wanna look too far ahead because you’re only one punch away from getting hurt and if I lose my next fight then all my dreams are gone,” he’s said.
Style: Outside of the ring, Khan frequently looks sharp in a suit – he even posed for a very dapper fashion shoot for Esquire.
Training Tip: “The conditioning exercises I do are all hard. You look at yourself ten weeks before a fight and there’s nothing there, then after five weeks conditioning you look and you’re ripped again,” he says. His training workouts are “not traditional curls and lifts. We might take a disc and hold it over the head, or chuck a medicine ball as far as you can go – it’s about conditioning but it’s also about heart rate as well.”
In The Game: “Mentally I’m very strong and nothing gets to me,” he says, and it’s true – in a sport many wrongly assume is all about brawn, it’s Khan’s focus and mental acuity that sets him apart as a winner.
Wins: Too many to list here! In his professional career, Khan has amassed an incredible 30 wins – and that’s set against just three losses.
Attitude: “I will fight anyone and I think the world of boxing knows that I will step in the ring with any fighter in the world.” Dem’s fighting words!
