Glenn Rushton on what Jeff Horn can learn from Bruce Lee ahead of his clash with Tim Tszyu

Jeff Horn’s fighting guru Glenn Rushton opens up about his love of martial arts legend Bruce Lee, his own tough road to the top of Australian boxing and why ‘The Hornet’ can be world champion again.

Jeff Horn with Glenn Rushton at the announcement of 'Rumble on the Reef'. Picture: Evan Morgan

• Fans could return to QLD stadiums ‘within weeks’
• Young gun a ‘Ponga step’ closer to Reds debut

With the Jeff Horn-Tim Tszyu fight back on track, Grantlee Kieza speaks to Horn’s fighting guru Glenn Rushton

Long before you took Jeff Horn to a world boxing title you were coaching martial arts. Who wins in a street fight between Bruce Lee and Floyd Mayweather?

Bruce Lee. In a boxing match it might be a different story with Floyd’s skills but with no rules, and feet, fists and elbows available I’d back Bruce Lee. He was electrifying and with so many varied weapons at his disposal.

Watch ESPN Ringside Classic Boxing on-demand on KAYO. Louis v Marciano, Ali v Liston, Tyson v Douglas and more. New to Kayo? Get your free trial now & start streaming instantly >

Bruce Lee must have had a huge influence on your life and career?

Enormous. Because of him martial arts boomed around the world at the time I was a teenager. I remember when I was 16 going to the drive-in to see him in a movie called Fists of Fury and I was in awe.

Martial arts expert and actor Bruce Lee.

I’d never seen fighting like that. It had a very big impact on me and it was only within a week or two that I was driving down Adelaide Street in Brisbane and I saw through these plate glass windows a heap of guys training at Bob Jones’s karate school.

When I walked in, there was a little Greek guy punching the living daylights out of a guy in sparring, blood everywhere. I’m going `Gee, this is real, this is what I’m looking for, real fighting.’

I’ve been involved in combat sports now for more than five decades.

Why the fascination with martial arts?

I was 12 years old when an usher rammed my head into a brick wall one night at the Rising Sun picture theatre in Townsville. He’d mistaken him for another kid who had thrown rocks on the roof.

I promised myself that it would be the last time I got beaten up by anyone, and I wanted to learn as much about fighting as I could. I’d seen the Jimmy Sharman tent boxing troupe at the country shows and I went off to learn self- defence.

I learned boxing at the National Fitness Centre on Charters Towers Rd in Townsville.

Another kid there was Neil Pattel, my Year 7 classmate at the Currajong State School. Neil eventually became an Australian boxing champion and is in the Queensland Boxing Hall of Fame.

I then became fascinated with martial arts because of Bruce Lee and his ability to use his whole body as a weapon, not just his fists.

Bob Jones became a mentor to you?

He was a bit of a father figure, yes. He was a martial arts pioneer in Australia and he became a household name thanks to his big mane of fiery red hair and long, droopy moustache.

He was often on the TV, smashing his fists through stacks of bricks and he became a bodyguard for many overseas celebrities visiting Australia, including heavyweight boxer Joe Frazier, the Rolling Stones and Joe Cocker.

I became an instructor for Bob and later I was a bouncer at the Kuraby and Newnham hotels in Brisbane. I became a fourth dan black belt and later on I branched out with my own style of karate called Scorpion Martial Arts.

Jeff Horn with Glenn Rushton at the announcement of 'Rumble on the Reef'. Picture: Evan Morgan

My wife Lillian looked after the administration and at one stage I was running 10 martial arts schools across Brisbane. In the late ’80s I organised a tournament called the National Martial Arts League.

What did you take into boxing training from martial arts?

Martial arts training gave me the ability to zone out so I didn’t feel any pain even when Bob Jones would give demonstrations by smashing big sticks across me.

There is an awful lot in breathing patterns and psychology, which I’ve brought from martial arts to boxing. All along I tempered Jeff Horn’s body and mind with the same philosophy of the samurai warriors. To fight completely devoid of feeling or emotion.

Even though he was under enormous pressure at Suncorp Stadium when Manny Pacquiao came surging back at him in their title fight, Jeff’s composure never wavered. He never lost focus.

Much of that comes from self-belief we worked on together and a lot of that comes from my karate training.

Rushton credits Horn’s ability to weather heat from Manny Pacquiao in part to the martial art techniques they worked on together.

You had a pretty tough start in life but you now live inside what must be one of the biggest houses in Brisbane?

I was born in Bundaberg in 1957. I have 14 brothers and five sisters, though only two are full brothers and two full sisters. My parents both had children with other partners.

My grandfather David Rushton was a 10-pound Pom and he had a cane farm at Tully in the state’s far north and my mother, Charlotte, was born in outback Hughenden to a German mother.

When I was small, if my mother happened to see a smart car or a flash house, she would often say “that’s how the other half live.’’ I remember telling her that I wanted to be in that half and not the crappy half we were in. In reality though, most people in those days were broke.

After my mother split with my father Stanislaus I lived for a while in Brisbane with her and my alcoholic, abusive stepfather. He was a shocker and used to chase me and the other kids around the yard trying to whip us with an ironing cord.

He died after a heart attack on a building site about 40 years ago.

You’ve had all sorts of jobs, cabinet-maker, bricklayer, construction boss, karate instructor, insurance salesman, fight promoter, photographer, property developer, investment adviser. You started out in a pretty humble way, though.

I went to live with my father in Townsville when I was nine. He never really got over the break-up of the marriage so he gave me $20 to get me started and at 14 I hit the road to go fruit picking down in Shepparton, Victoria.

I drove down there with a half-brother, 2500 kilometres. We had just enough petrol to get there and we picked a few bins of fruit on the first day just to get enough money to buy some food. I stayed down there for 18 months working 12 hours a day, seven days a week.

Rushton doesn’t fancy Tim Tszyu’s chances against Horn.

The first season I was a fruit picker and in the second I worked in the SPC cannery and lived at the barracks. I was 15 then but said I was 18 to get the job. Once I worked 83 days straight.

I tell all the boxers I train that the only time money comes before success is in the dictionary, and it’s important to always do your best at whatever you’re doing. Jeff Horn knows the value of that.

Why will Jeff beat Tim Tszyu?

This is like a Group 1 horse going back to Group 2.

Tim is still evolving as a fighter but he’s not on the top shelf yet. Tim is very confident but confidence doesn’t win fights. Tim has a good record and skills but you look at the guys he’s fought and they are not on the same level as Jeff.

Joel Camilleri, who trained with me for a while, gave Tim a tough time in some rounds but he was not fully committed with his punches like Jeff. He doesn’t hit like Jeff. Jeff is a proven performer who will fight fire with fire. He has experience trading punches with the very best in the world, Tim doesn’t.

Jeff has been in there with Manny Pacquiao, Anthony Mundine, Terence Crawford, Michael Zerafa – it’s a higher level. Tim has been able to dictate in a lot of his fights. He sticks that left glove in an opponent’s face and sets them up for a right hand. It’s a typical Eastern Bloc style of fighting but that’s hard to do when someone like Jeff, with that awkward attack, and a lot of power is swarming over you.

I believe the pressure will tell on Tim pretty quickly and I believe Jeff will win inside the distance.

When and where will it happen?

We’re aiming for late August or September at Queensland County Bank Stadium in Townsville, depending on when the crowd restrictions are eased. We hope that will happen soon with the NRL aiming to have some crowds back in July.

With the number of active cases in Queensland these days you’re more likely to win Lotto than get the virus so hopefully things will get back to normal before too long.

There was some talk of fighting with no crowd just for the TV cameras but I know that if we wait for a couple more months we will likely see crowds being allowed back to stadiums and people back into pubs and clubs in big numbers. That make a lot more economic sense for the fight.

The fight is important for Jeff but also for North Queensland?

Even if crowds are allowed back at 50 per cent capacity by then, that is still 10,000 people for a fight in Townsville and that will mean a great atmosphere and lot of tourist dollars for people up there who really need it.

Tourism and Events Queensland have been very good to us over the years and they are very keen for the fight to be in Townsville.

Jeff’s win over Manny Pacquiao in 2017 was one of the greatest sporting events seen in Queensland. His last two fights were tough battles against Michael Zerafa, though. Does he still have it in him to win another world title?

Yes. And after he beats Tim we’re hoping to bring another world title fight to Queensland. I think the break from training during the lockdown has done Jeff the world of good.

Horn’s victory over Pacquiao was one of the greatest sporting moments in Queensland history.

He has had a mini taste of retirement and he realises that he still wants very much to fight on. At 32, he’s not done yet. He wants to fight until he’s 35 and I believe that he can still beat anyone in the world if he knuckles down and does the work in preparation.

He has such an awkward style and a lot of power and toughness.

You’ve come a long way together?

Jeff came to me in 2006 when I was teaching self-defence in my home gym.

He looked like a soft, wimpy sort of a kid, a bit of a mummy’s boy. He told me that he’d been picked on a lot at school and I could understand why. He had one of those choirboy faces that invites trouble.

But he was tough and determined and willing to work hard. He started off learning self-defence for two years and then in 2008 I entered him in an amateur boxing tournament at Acacia Ridge. Four years later he went to the Olympics and he went on to beat Pacquiao at a packed Suncorp Stadium.

When Jeff was still an amateur fighter, I gave him a pair of boxing gloves as a gift for his 21st birthday. The gloves came with an inscription that read: “All it takes to reach the stars is a leap of faith”.

Originally published as Glenn Rushton on what Jeff Horn can learn from Bruce Lee ahead of his clash with Tim Tszyu