Mikaela Mayer: “I want to be in big fights like this. Tasha will bring the best out of me. You will see the best of us both.”

Mikaela Mayer: “I want to be in big fights like this. Tasha will bring the best out of me. You will see the best of us both.”

“The last two fights didn’t inspire me. It wasn’t my best year for me. It was a slow year for me. I need someone like Tasha to bring out the best in me.” Mikaela Mayer

That slow period in her career appears to be over. Mikaela Mayer craves the spotlight. Demands the big fights. After a year or so in the boxing big-time wilderness, Mayer is back where she feels she belongs.

Mayer is back in the UK, her immediate boxing home. Three times the American has fought in the UK, and on January 20th in Liverpool, Mayer will challenge the hometown hero Natasha Jonas for her IBF welterweight title live on Sky Sports. Her latest visit to England is to promote her fight with Jonas. A headline fight in every sense of the word. Mayer is here to sell the fight. In truth, it needs little selling. If you know boxing, Jonas vs. Mayer ticks every box. But Mayer knows her role.

The hotel gym bike is in use as we connect over Zoom. Fighting the jet lag, Mayer tells me how big a fight her showdown with Jonas is.

“Obviously, it’s a huge fight. Coming over here and doing all the media, you realise how big a fight it could be. It’s one of the reasons they have brought me out here. They want to make sure we sell the hell out of this fight, and the reaction so far has been that everyone seems really interested in it. So yeah, it’s going to be another big one.”

It was an easy fight to make. They have joked that they made the fight themselves. A reference that isn’t that far removed from the truth. Jonas and Mayer wanted it. Always a good place to start. Since the summer and the first seeds of the fight being planted, they only had eyes for each other. Even a request from the Jonas camp to fight in Liverpool was met with a favourable response from the former unified world super-featherweight champion, even though she knows the type of reception that will await her.

“When they asked if we would fight in Liverpool, I said whatever,” Mayer told FightPost. “She’s the champion, and it would always be in her country, so what’s the difference in going to her hometown. I’ve been fighting in the UK for over a year now, so hopefully, I have built a fanbase. But I am still preparing myself to get booed and be the underdog in Liverpool.”

Mayer will hope her fourth visit to the UK will end better than her first. A heated rivalry that ended in defeat and a whole load of controversy to her most heated rival Alycia Baumgardner. That setback cost her plenty. Mayer lost momentum and, with it, a possible fight with Katie Taylor. There have been two fights since that bitter loss to her fellow American, and neither of those fights has excited her as much as her upcoming fight with Jonas.

“I’ve hated the fights that I have been in during the last year. They don’t inspire me. I want to be in big fights like this. Tasha will bring the best out of me. You will see the best of us both.” Mayer says, a fighter clearly relishing her return to main event status.

Mayer has moved her entire life from the solitude of the mountains in Colorado to the bright lights of Las Vegas. A move made to enhance her boxing career.

“There is a system I usually follow, and the only thing I change is the strategy,” Mayer told me. “I have moved to Las Vegas, I am there full-time now, so this training camp is different. When I get an idea to do something, I just do it. The training environment in Colorado had just died over the last couple of years. It just wasn’t as motivating for me to go into camp there when Terence Crawford and the other pros were not in camp. It was too chilled, and I wanted to be inspired and have fun. The Vegas environment brings that element back into my training camp. There are so many different sparring partners. I love training at the UFC Performance Institute. I can do so many different physical therapies there, and I can do all my strength training there. It’s better for my health. I have my nutritionist there. Vegas is a one-stop shop. It has everything I need instead of being stuck in the mountains.”

The fight with Jonas is a must-win fight for both. Mayer, at 33, knows she can’t afford another loss for her immediate fighting future. A second career defeat will leave her once again on the outside, looking in. A fighter who would be high risk with no reward. Another member of the ‘Who Needs Her Club.’ Jonas once resided there herself. They share many things in common.

“I think every fight is important to me at this point in my career. But every fight is important in this sport. In every fight, your career is on the line. This sport is so unforgiving. After one setback, there is no room for me to have another because I don’t want that kind of career, Mayer relayed to me. Knowing a win over Jonas could be the gateway to more fights of the same magnitude. “I have to win this fight to get the ball back in my court so I can get the fights that I want in the future. I want to fight the other big names in the sport, and I want to fill my resume the way I want. It not only comes with winning, but it comes with having the belt. If you want the big fights, you have to have the belt. The belt gives me leverage.”

The fight with Jonas represents another phase of her life and career. Another fight. Another obstacle to overcome. But Mayer has been fighting her whole life. The teenage rebel, causing mischief on the streets, drifting along with no real purpose. Even being in a rock band didn’t quite satisfy her. Did boxing save Mayer from herself? Possibly, but Mayer believes she would have eventually found something in her life to give her that purpose.

“I feel like the person that I am, I would have found something. I would have poured everything into something because I am an extremist like that. Luckily, I have found something that is extremely hard because that is the type of person I am. I like challenges. So looking back it doesn’t surprise me that I picked the hardest fucking sport in the world that had the time had no opportunities or direct path. There was nothing. But if it wasn’t boxing there would have been something else. It was always in me to do something.”

But even after a successful amateur career that included a place on the American team that went to the 2016 Olympics, Mayer discovered the boxing road wasn’t initially paved with gold. The golden contracts didn’t come, and she was extremely close to leaving boxing behind to sign with Bellator until Top Rank came calling very late in the day. It is a time of her life that Mayer thinks about a lot.

“I think about that all the time. What if I had done that. My life would be completely different right now. Who is to say if I would have been successful in MMA or not. I would have done everything in my power but there is so much to learn and it’s so much easier to catch a loss. So I think I made the right decision.”

The importance of the fight is obvious for both. Jonas wants to close out her career in style. A win over Mayer adds a little more weight to her own impressive resume. But Mayer is after the same. A fighter who has achieved plenty, but one that wants more. Much more.

“You have to remember that most of my success in my career wasn’t in the spotlight compared to some people. We were still building and developing the sport for women, so I feel a lot of my success went under the radar. But now we have the spotlight on us that no other women have ever had before. I have so much more I want to accomplish, so no, I am not done yet.” Mayer says, eyeing up the biggest names in her sport.

“I want the big fights. It’s not even I want a belt at this weight or that weight, or to go undisputed. I am not thinking about those details anymore. I want to challenge myself against the top opposition. I want Chantelle Cameron on my resume. I am still gutted me and Katie Taylor never got to fight. I want to continue and test myself. That’s where my heart is right now and my legacy will be built on that.”

Mayer seems different. A fighter excited and motivated for her next fight. A big fight with even bigger implications. A win in Liverpool and Mayer will feel she has her redemption from that gutwrenching loss at the O2 Arena just over a year ago. Beating Jonas, and you sense her recovery in her own mind will be complete.