Coach Taylor Ramsdell discusses Dmitry Bivol’s path to victory

Strength and conditioning coach Taylor Ramsdell helped prepare Dmitry Bivol to earn a victory over Canelo Álvarez.

Behind every star-making performance from a fighter, a team is in charge of preparing them for that moment. This past Saturday, WBA light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol (20-0) defeated Saul “Canelo” Alvarez (57-2-2) in a fight that many predicted the Russian would lose.

One man who is part of Bivol’s team and was in charge of strength and conditioning was Taylor Ramsdell from Springfield, MO. Ramsdell attended Arizona State University, which is where he decided to become a trainer. He moved to Los Angeles, CA, in 2009 and that’s when he started to work with athletes as a strength and conditioning coach.

One would call it destiny, while others would say it was “the right place and the right time” for Ramsdell in 2017 when he was contacted by a colleague named Jordan. At the time, Jordan was working with Bivol but was traveling for a year with another client, so he asked Ramsdell to take over those duties. He agreed and has been with Bivol ever since.

With Bivol earning his biggest victory to date, many have wondered about the preparation leading up to his fight in Las Vegas. Was there a difference between this camp and others in the past?

“It really wasn’t any different,” Ramsdell The only thing we changed in the training camp was sparring partners. I’m always trying to make Dmitry (Bivol) a better version of himself. I study the movement patterns of the athlete. I’ll watch a sparring session and then take those movement patterns and train them with varied resistance.”

S&C Coach Taylor Ramsdell discusses Bivol’s preparation leading up to the Canelo Álvarez fight

“You can never forget the basics: push, pull, hinge, twist, rotate and jump. You need to have all of those, but then I put him into the position to be able to perform at a higher level,” he said. “He moves a lot, so I’m working on the muscles in front of his shins, changing the intensity and resistance levels.”

Hearing the thought process of how Bivol prepared for this fight makes you appreciate his performance even more and how he was able to stay fresh throughout the fight against Canelo.

On fight night, Ramsdell was working the corner of Bivol and had a bird’s eye view of what was going on in the ring. What did he see? Ramsdell confidently said, “Greatness. What I saw was his ability to show the world his boxing skills. He was able to recover and put that work in every single round.”

After the fight, Bivol was asked about a comment he made some time ago about dropping to 168 pounds and fighting Canelo at his weight class. Bivol wasn’t as enthused about making that move to 168 but would if he needed to. While discussing the possibility of dropping down in weight classes, Ramsdell told FanSided, “He is a light-light heavyweight. All that means is that he would have to cut down a little bit of weight. He really doesn’t do much of a weight cut during his training camp. He will be fine at 168, but he is really comfortable at 175. I think he would look exactly the same with the exception of rehydrating back to a little less than his last fight where he rehydrated to 183-184.”

After finally making it back home to Springfield, MO, Ramsdell spent some time with his family but went right back to work shortly after. He will be training his other clients virtually as he awaits the phone call to get Bivol ready for his next fight, whether against Canelo or one of the other champions.