Abel Sanchez: The trainer behind Gennady Golovkin’s rise to greatness
- Craig Watson
- 28 March 2023
Abel Sanchez is undoubtedly one of the most well-known trainers in the sport of boxing, and he has enjoyed a great deal of success over the years. He does have very humble beginnings though.
Sanchez was born in Tijuana, Mexico, and moved over to the US with his mother and siblings when he was just five years of age.
Although he never really competed at a high level within fighting, he did have six amateur bouts, winning three, and had an amateur kickboxing record of 15-0.
Sanchez got his first break from the owner of his local gym, Ben Lira, who let Sanchez help out in training some of his fighters at the time. That same Ben Lira is now Sanchez's assistant in the corner.
Sanchez originally made a life for himself in America as a building contractor, something which he says taught him the skills that he would later rely on as a boxing trainer.
The skills he was referring to were being able to manage personalities and characters and knowing how to manipulate someone's psyche in a positive and reactionary way.
Big Bear Lake
Sanchez is of course famous for his affectionately named 'Big Bear Lake' gym in California, but it almost never existed.
The self-confessed workaholic suffered a stress-related heart attack in 2001, and for the second time, walked away from boxing altogether.
However in 2007, in part due to the impact of the financial crash upon the construction industry, Sanchez decided to complete the project he started and open the now famous training camp.
The completion of the high-altitude gym would prove the catalyst for a great upturn in Sanchez's career.
Whilst he had already enjoyed relative success as a trainer, by helping Lupe Aquino become the super-welterweight champion in 1987, a request by Oscar De La Hoya's team to use his California gym took Sanchez's career to the next level.
A number of other high-profile fighters subsequently followed suit, including a certain Gennady Golovkin.
Before pairing with Sanchez, Golovkin was more of a strategic counter-punching fighter, though he was ridiculously good at it.
However, Sanchez encouraged the Kazakh fighter to adopt a traditional Mexican fighting style, which roughly translates as boxing your opponent's head off!
It worked too, as Golovkin became one of the greatest knockout artists of all time.
GGG's record at one point under Sanchez was 36 - 0, with 34 wins by KO and 23 consecutive knockouts.
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Under Sanchez's tutelage, Golovkin destroyed the likes of Daniel Geale and Matthew Macklin inside three rounds and forced a white-towel stoppage from Kell Brook's team in 2017.
Sanchez made Golovkin into an absolute fighting machine, with virtually no equal in the sport.
Sanchez the coach
Sanchez's style as a trainer has been much discussed, and there have been as many insults as compliments thrown his way about his understanding of the sport - but his record speaks for itself.
Sanchez believed that "boxing is a cerebral game", alluding to fighters like Mayweather, who make the fight play out the way they want by subtly manipulating movement and manufacturing opportunities to strike.
When asked what his favourite thing about being a trainer was, Sanchez replied "watching them get their hand raised, to see them succeed, that's really my highlight".
Sanchez has been victorious himself too, winning the Futch-Condon best trainer award in 2015, awarded by the boxing writers association of America.
The split with Golovkin
"I think that a lot of coaches today, unfortunately, are not protected contractually. We are probably the most significant part of a fighter's team; yet at any time, on a whim, they [the fighters] can decide that they don't need us no more".
How pertinent the above quote from Sanchez seems now, after Golovkin's decision in 2019 to split from his long-time coach, with whom he'd enjoyed so much success.
The split came just six weeks after Golovkin had signed a new $100million deal with DAZN - no prizes for connecting those dots.
Sanchez said the former deal between the two saw him receive a 10% cut, which seems to be standard for a trainer in boxing.
He clarified that after the new deal was made, he would have been receiving less than a fifth of what he previously enjoyed, an "insulting figure which my pride simply would not allow me to consider".
After the split, Golovkin went on record to say the following: "This was not an easy decision for me, and it is not a reflection on Abel's professional abilities. He is a great trainer, a loyal trainer, and a Hall of Fame trainer."
That quote seems like the right tone on which to end this story - and whatever your thoughts on Sanchez's style, he is undoubtedly one of the most successful coaches of the modern era.
