This Article has been curated by UDBN
February 19, 2025
Source: Boxing Scene
In 2014, Lee was living in rented accommodation in Purley, Surrey, a two-minute drive from
Sadly, Andy Lee never won another world title after losing to Billy Joe Saunders. Instead, he fought just one more time, beating KeAndrae Leatherwood over eight rounds in 2017, and later turned his attention to training others, including Tyson Fury, whom he guided to wins against Deontay Wilder.
Now, at 40, Lee is a respected trainer whose gym is home to the likes of Joseph Parker and Paddy Donovan and will in the future welcome Ben Whittaker. He is now a watcher rather than a doer and has other people to think about and worry about and to also teach and ultimately protect. This is as true in the gym as it is at home.
“The good thing about it is that the training is intense and periodical,” he tells me in Dublin. “It’s only for the camps. Joe and Paddy having their fights one week apart is even better because I can put them together, train them together, and when the fights are over I’ll have two or three weeks off.
“I’m looking forward to it, but also not looking forward to it at the same time. Because after big fights, win or lose, you fall off a bit of a cliff afterwards. There’s always a comedown. It doesn’t matter whether you win or lose, there’s a massive comedown. So that’s something to look forward to.”
In the old days Lee, the fighter, would typically go back home – that is, to his proper home – after the fight and this would put an end to the days of wandering the streets and sleeping either in other people’s homes or in rented box-rooms happy to accommodate serial killers. Now, though, it is all different. Lee, having made it, now has a permanent home of his own and spends most of his time there when he is not at the gym. He also has boxers who come to him and stay at Dublin hotels or in apartments just so they can be around him every day and learn from him and improve under him. Some, like Joseph Parker, have even travelled from as far as New Zealand.
“He’s been a big fighter since a young age, so early in his career, and he’s done so well, and I think he wants to keep that going,” says Lee. “I think that’s a big part of his motivation. A lot of his motivation comes from the fights and how big they are and the purses and how big they are. He wants to keep that going and keep supporting his family and living this lifestyle he has.
“You get to a certain point where you have to really want it to continue. All the bells and whistles that come with it – the fame, the fortune, and whatever else – it can only take you to a certain level and so far. You need something else to motivate you after a certain point. You get used to the fame and fortune, and then what? What’s next? Where do you find your validation after that? It has to come from within.”
Anyway, enough of the fighting talk. He has small children to pick up and is already late. There is, it seems, no time to waste. “I thought it was a great movie,” he says, now addressing what really matters. “It was weird, almost comedic…”
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