Jeff Horn’s sloppy diet in lead up to Michael Zerafa diet revealed

Before they fought Michael Zerafa took a shot at Jeff Horn’s physique and it turns out he was right to do so. The former champ’s diet was a shocker.

Jeff Horn said he felt tired and sluggish during his middleweight debut fight where Michael Zerafa knocked him out in sensational fashion — and now we might know why.

His trainer has revealed that ‘The Hornet’ was binging on junk food in the lead up to his first fight at the higher weight level.

Before the fight Zerafa even questioned whether Horn was fit and he might well have been proven right after Horn’s trainer Glenn Rushton spoke.

“We’ve got to sit down and have that long, hard talk and say exactly what does that look like, diet-wise work-wise and really put the effort in,” Rushton said.

“If it’s going to be at middleweight it means we’ve got to change the body structure a little bit and not eat pizzas and drink Coke.

“Middleweight to me doesn’t mean that you eat whatever you want, it means that you’ve obviously got to be very disciplined.

“I think Jeff realises, you’ve got to have that lean muscle mass, at middle and you’ve got to be a ripped middle, which means a lot of hard work if you want to go that route.”

When the fighters were positioned near each other it was obvious that Zerafa was in the much better condition.

Michael Zerafa throws a cross at Jeff Horn.

Horn questioned his food intake in the hours leading up to the fight and said he felt sluggish during the bout.

“I felt like I couldn’t get my shots off, they weren’t landing as good as I wanted, it was frustrating me from pretty much the beginning,” he said.

Rushton said Horn had just an eight-week preparation after taking three weeks off for the birth of his second child and needed everything to go right, but suffered from sniffles and a sore throat last Monday.

Jeff Horn was left battered and bloodied by Michael Zerafa.

“I don’t want to use the excuse: ‘I’ve been sick’, all props to Michael Zerafa for winning the fight,” Horn said.

Horn’s mooted December 23 clash with WBA regular middleweight champion Ryota Murata in Japan looks to be off the table after he was stopped in the ninth round at Bendigo Stadium on Saturday night.

Zerafa knocked the former WBO welterweight champion down twice and was leading on all the judges cards by at least three points at the time of the stoppage.

“I called this weeks ago, I said Jeff will fall and I went out there and proved it,” Zerafa said.

While there was a rematch clause in the contact, Horn isn’t sure if he will exercise it, go down to super welterweight or welterweight, or even retire.

“I definitely don’t want to be doing this game for too long that’s for sure, you don’t want to be battered up and bruised,” Horn said.

Originally published as Jeff Horn’s sloppy diet in lead up to Michael Zerafa diet revealed