150 M AY 2 0 0 7

FLOYD MAYWEATHER’S

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I’m ringside for today’s performance, star-

ring “Pretty Boy Floyd” himself, with guest

appearances by Paris Hilton and Tom Cruise.

As Mayweather explains, “there are stars,

superstars, and supermegastars. Tom Cruise

is a superstar. But I make stars starstruck.

I’m a supermegastar.”

Mayweather would repeat this speech—

questioning Cruise’s acting chops and Hil-

ton’s chops for doing, well, anything—at least

three times during his interview and photo

shoot for Men’s Health. He’s determined to

fl aunt his greatness, and trust me, it’s not

easy to look away.

Across Mayweather’s T-shirt are the words

“philthy rich,” just in case, I suppose, the dia-

mond boxing gloves draped around his neck,

or the cash wedge he pulls from his pocket, or

the Mayweather emblem in place of the May-

bach logo on his Benz aren’t proof enough.

For 2 hours, he’s insisted how rich, famous,

3 . IMPROVE COORDINATION the crisscrossThe trick here is to cross your arms at hip level. Jump rope normally for a bit. When the rope passes overhead, begin to cross hands. They should reach the opposite sides near your hips as the rope touches the floor. Jump, then keep your hands still while the rope rises. Start to uncross as the rope peaks the second time.

2. WORK MORE MUSCLES the backward 180Start just like the jog step. As the rope passes overhead, move your right hand to the left, so the rope swings next to your left side. As it hits the floor, jump and turn left 180 degrees. Move your right hand back to your right side, letting the rope pass over your head and behind you so you’re now jumping backward.

1. BOOST YOUR SPEEDthe jog stepBegin with your right foot planted, your left foot slightly above the floor, and the rope behind you. Swing the rope over your head, jump, and land on your right foot. As the rope comes down, jump off your right foot—allowing the rope to pass under both feet—and land on your left foot, keeping your right foot suspended.

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152 M AY 2 0 0 7

TRAIN LIKE THE CHAMP

Give your workout a jumpstart with thesedrills from ShaunHamilton, head coach of USA Jump Rope. Master them at home, then take your show to the gym—where training in front of a crowd can help you ramp up your intensity.

—DENNY WATKINS

and talented he is, but I’ve come to realize the

only things faster than Mayweather’s mouth

are his feet.

Mayweather, a 150-pound, baby-faced, self-

proclaimed “greatest athlete ever,” moves

panther-fast as he swings his fi sts while tak-

ing verbal shots at musicians Pharrell Wil-

liams and Kanye West. At 30, he exhibits the

antics of an arrogant, 15-year-old rich kid who

needs the piss beat out of him.

Trouble is, no one can do it.

Mayweather is a fi ve-time world-champion

boxer in four weight classes, with an unde-

feated (37-0) record. On May 5, he squares off

against Oscar De La Hoya for the junior mid-

dleweight championship, which will be the

fi fth weight class Mayweather has fought in.

Ten weeks prior to the fi ght, Mayweather

has yet to offi cially begin his physical train-

ing, but you can bet his head is already in the

game. His confi dence, or cockiness—“call it

what you want, but you can call me a winner,”

he says—is key to his success.

An athlete and an entertainer, Mayweather trains for performance and

attention. But he has another objective

that’s even more ambitious: to motivate and

inspire friends and family who watch him

work out. And it’s more important now that

he do this than it’s ever been.

Over the past few years, Mayweather’s

family has struggled with type-2 diabetes—

it’s struck his Uncle Roger, grandmother, and

father. Lately, his mother has been ill, and as

a result, her weight has ballooned, which puts

her at high risk of the disease, too.

Mayweather desperately wants his mom

to lose pounds. But he also wants the rest of

the world to know what makes you healthy

and what doesn’t work. “How come you never

see anyone go on TV and say, ‘I didn’t work

hard, and I didn’t get in shape’?” he asks.

Sick of diet and fi tness gimmicks, he has a

business project in the works called May-

weather Fitness. He envisions it as a hybrid

of an old-school boxing gym and a commer-

cial health club, designed to help members

kick up the intensity of their workouts to

Mayweather level.

And to test-run this project, Mayweather

intends to bring his own mother to his train-

ing camp to exercise until she’s ready for her

glamour shots.

“I want to keep everyone around me

healthy and in shape,” Mayweather says.

“That’s what ‘keeping it real’ is all about.”

That’s why his employees have

24-Hour Fitness gym passes: Every great

star needs a rock-solid supporting cast.

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154 M AY 2 0 0 7

And it’s also why he’s putting on a show

today, at Barry’s Boxing Center, a gritty

gym in Las Vegas where stale sweat and the

fi ring of quick jabs permeate the air.

Barry’s is exactly like the gym in your

basement, or the trendy, high-end health club

down the street, in the sense that no matter

where you train, the only way you’ll stay fi t

and healthy for life is to stay motivated. For

Mayweather, that means entertaining.

Watching him shadowbox, fl ex his abs,

and punish the heavy bag is mesmerizing.

But I’m blown away, almost literally, by his

next act.

Mayweather explodes into a jump-rope

routine, tap-dancing as he whips the leather

so fast the temperature drops. He swings

the rope between his legs, still jumping,

like Iverson unleashing a crossover dribble.

After a few minutes, he pauses for a sip of

hot chocolate—as if to say, This is too easy—

and then launches into his next tirade.

Mayweather can’t decide where Paris Hil-

ton fi ts within his celebrity-ranking system.

“What’s her talent? Being rich? Taking her

clothes off and partying? That doesn’t make

you a star. I’ve got talent, baby.”

Okay, Floyd . . . we get the point.

There’s a science to showboating.Forget Floyd for a moment and imagine

yourself doing a bench press while sexy,

scantily clad women walk by. This situation

stimulates your sympathetic nervous sys-

tem to a much greater degree than if you

were lifting weights alone at home—mean-

ing your nerve transmissions speed up.

As a result, your body increases energy

production and muscle recruitment, says

Matthew Rhea, Ph.D., the director of human

movement at A.T. Still University, in Ari-

zona. “So when someone else is watching,

you push yourself harder than you usu -

ally would.”

In fact, in a study published in the Jour-nal of Strength and Conditioning Research,

Rhea and his colleagues discovered that

men are able to bench-press an average of

41 pounds more in front of spectators than

when they lift alone. “Both audience and

competition improve performance,” he says.

“If the audience in our study would have

been allowed to encourage the lifter, the

effect would have been even greater.”

This, in part, explains why Mayweather

trains at a ferocious intensity with an

audience. And it can work for you, too.

But Rhea warns that many injuries in the

weight room occur when men are trying to

show off and load more plates on a barbell

than they can safely handle, or attempt an

exercise routine that’s too complex for their

ability levels. So the key is to train with atti-

tude, not with abandon.

HARD HIT TING ADVICE

out partner can boost motivation. Challenging

your friends to see who can improve the most

in an exercise over a short period of time can

even help you break out of a stale routine.

But perhaps the greatest benefi t of an enter-

taining workout is the motivation to exercise

when you otherwise might not train. For

instance, say you’re the type of man who wants

to look especially great a few times a year—for

Mayweather’s show captivates himand everyone around him. His 20-year career

has hinged on staying fi t and healthy, and he

knows you can’t train consistently with a

boring routine.

No, Mayweather’s been forced to fi nd new

ways to keep his workout fresh, a hurdle every

health-conscious man must leap over at some

point. Rhea says that training with a work-

1. ON SHARING YOUR WEALTH—AND HEALTHI don’t drink or smoke, but I do buy a lot of champagne for my friends when it’s a special occasion. We’ve gotta keep them healthy, so only when it’s a special occasion.

2. ON CARVING MILLION-DOLLAR ABSI take pride in staying healthy and eating right. I don’t care how much money you have if you wake up every morning and can’t see your [penis]. You need to get that weight off.

3. ON OUTHUSTLING YOUR COMPETITIONI do my homework on every opponent that I fight. I know that if my opponents run 5 miles every day, I have to run 7 miles. And when they up it to 7, I’m going to take it to 9.

4. ON SURROUNDING YOURSELF WITH TALENTOscar [De La Hoya] has a lot more paper than I’ve got, but he’s cheap. I pay my sparring part-ners well. It costs to have a good team, and every time I’ve fought, I’ve gotten good results. You pay for what you get.

5. ON LEARNING FROM LOSSESAs an amateur, I was 84 and 6. I lost six fights by one point. But that was just a learning experience. Once I got to the professional level, I wasn’t going to take an “L.”

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the beach, a wedding, or maybe a reunion.

Most men—and professional fi ghters, for

that matter—will slack off for months and

then hack at the pounds they’ve packed on.

In fact, fi ghters often cut weight for 12 weeks

before a major event. But not Mayweather.

He hovers within 3 or 4 pounds of his fi ght-

ing weight at all times by jumping rope,

playing basketball, and doing body-weight

exercises twice a week. Make no mistake: He

trains as hard as any athlete on the planet for

6 weeks before every fi ght, but the rest of the

time, he simply enjoys staying active, a strat-

egy that’s kept him within a few hard work-

outs of his peak condition year-round.

“I’m always in training, not just to be a bet-

ter boxer, but because I still want to be able

to move around exceptionally well when I’m

70 years old,” says the fi ghter. “I won’t be able

to train like I do now when I’m 60. Actually,

I might. My dad’s 50, and he still moves like

he’s 21. So you never know.”

And that’s just it: You don’t know. So stop

wasting time sitting on the couch. Stop think-

ing you have months before you need to look

and feel great. Stop waiting and start doing.

Let the show begin. �

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