Natasha Jonas: “I don’t fear losing at all. I fear more, not taking the opportunity.”

Natasha Jonas: “I don’t fear losing at all. I fear more, not taking the opportunity.”

Everything was going according to plan. Natasha Jonas had turned professional, hoping for full closure to her boxing life and peace of mind. Injury had cut short her amateur career. A sporting life seemingly had ended without reaching its natural conclusion. Jonas was back for more.

Katie Taylor started a revolution when she turned professional in 2016. Jonas was tempted to follow her and ended her hiatus from the sport. The plan was to put Taylor and Jonas together again. It was just one fight away. All Jonas had to do was beat the lightly-regarded Viviane Obenauf. But after six straight wins, disaster struck. After four shocking rounds, the career of the Liverpool fighter looked dead in the water.

With the long-awaited rematch with Katie Taylor seemingly locked in, Jonas had one eye on what was potentially next.

“I definitely didn’t think about losing when I was at that level. So it did come as a complete shock. But it did teach me never to underestimate anyone ever again.” Jonas said of that heartbreaking night in 2018.

In the blink of an eye, everything changed. Instead of looking forward to a fight with Taylor for the unified world lightweight titles, Jonas was looking at retirement. The defeat and the manner of it left ‘Miss GB’ thinking that there was no way back.

“It was the way that I got beat. I had never been stopped like that before,” Jonas told FightPost. “Normally, I stay overnight and get my breakfast in the hotel the next morning. But I genuinely couldn’t stay in the hotel. I really thought that was the end of my career. Me and Joe went straight home, I started crying, and then Joe started crying, and we were both crying in the car all the way home.”

The tears of despair were the theme of that long drive home from Cardiff. Jonas returned to the sport looking for peace of mind and career fulfilment. It looked as though she had found neither. A shocking upset defeat that had seemingly ended all her dreams.

But Jonas took her time and rebuilt both physically and mentally. Five months later, she started that long road back. With lessons learned, Jonas began her comeback. But her fragile confidence needed a little more time to fully recover.

“If you don’t learn from losing like that, you are insane. On my first fight back against Feriche Mashaury, I was so cautious of getting hit with a shot,” Jonas says of that first fight back. “Sometimes, you get an air of invincibility, thinking that you have a good chin. But then something like that happens, and you realise anyone can be hurt.

“It makes you doubt yourself. But more for me, all roads were leading to Katie Taylor. That was Eddie’s plan, and that was my plan. But all the way along people were saying that she had been too long out of the sport, she isn’t the same boxer and that I was too old now. They were saying all these things about why my performances were not that great. But then that happens, and then I start believing them. I was then thinking, have I lost it, am I not the same fighter.”

After three wins over low-key opposition, Jonas was given a career lifeline. In 2020, and just two years removed from that awful night against Obenauf, the unified world super-featherweight champion Terri Harper was the opponent. Jonas was the perceived no-hoper. The narrative was that the Liverpool fighter was all washed up. A second career defeat would have been the definitive end. The odds said that was exactly how it would play out. Jonas understood perfectly what was on the line.

“If I didn’t beat Terri, then where was there to go. There was a lot of pressure on me in that fight,” Jonas told FightPost. “If I had lost, there was nowhere else to go. But that is where the genius of Joe took over. He started to make it about him and Stefy. By the time the fight came around, nobody was talking about me and Terri. So that took all the pressure off me. Everyone was saying Joe was making it all about him, but it allowed me to focus on the fight and not get sucked into the social media stuff. So there was a big weight taken off my shoulders.”

Jonas did indeed defy all the naysayers. A performance that defied many things. The fight ended in a disputed draw. Jonas was deemed extremely unlucky not to walk away a world champion. But Jonas had proven beyond doubt that she was anything but finished.

The following year, Jonas returned to fight the now undisputed world lightweight champion Katie Taylor in Manchester. A rematch nearly ten years in the making after their unforgettable meeting at the 2012 London Olympics.

After facing a near-certain end to her career, if she had lost to Harper the previous year, Jonas faced the Irish superstar with a point proved and a little comfort of the mind. In many ways, the pressure was off. This was different.

“I had redeemed myself against Terri. So the thoughts of have I still got it, I knew I definitely had. There was no pressure in the Katie fight because everyone thought I would lose. I drew with Terri, but they were saying Katie is different.”

Jonas yet again served up a performance way beyond what was expected. The Liverpool fighter lost to Taylor. But only just. Two judges only had her losing by a single point. But despite another heroic effort, Jonas was denied what she came back to the sport for several years ago.

In the embryonic moments of 2022, Jonas was now with Boxxer and still seeking that elusive world title. At 37, time was running out. Opportunities were not there at her more natural weights. But an avenue opened up at super-welterweight. Jonas took it.

Chris Namus was drafted in to fight Jonas for the vacant WBO title. A move up to 154 that was billed as third-time lucky. But the mindset was a return to what she experienced for the Terri Harper fight. It was very much now or never.

“The Namus fight was the Terri fight on steroids,” Jonas said of her third attempt at winning a world title. “I had tried at featherweight. I had tried at lightweight. So I knew if I didn’t win at 154, there was literally nowhere else to go. I knew my boxing would be done.”

Jonas did make it third-time lucky against Namus. A two-round demolition of Namus had finally given her peace. After that win, Jonas told me everything now would be a bonus. She could now fight with some degree of freedom. Jonas unified her new division further and then moved back down to claim a world title at a second weight. The IBF world welterweight title was now in her possession, and in January, she faced the American Mikaela Mayer in her hometown. A headline fight that was given the big fight treatment by Boxxer and Sky Sports.

Mayer was perhaps in a similar situation to what Jonas had faced in her fights with Harper and Namus. The former unified world super-featherweight champion was without a world title when she faced Jonas in Liverpool. Frozen out since she had controversially lost to Alycia Baumgardner in 2022. Leading up to that fight, Mayer, you knew, had a pivotal fight coming up. She talked about needing to beat Jonas in her hometown for leverage and taking back control of her career.

But Jonas was incredibly relaxed as the fight edged closer. One fight, but with the two fighters approaching it with a completely different mindset.

“When you are in certain places mentally, everything can look different,” Jonas says of that fight with Mayer. “As you go along in your career, you work out what’s best for you at that time. It was a huge fight, and there was a lot of media outside of the ring to do. Everyone was trying to big the fight up. But mentally, I was trying to play it down. I was trying to mask those emotions and be emotionless. I have nothing to stress about anymore. I never want to lose, but I am more relaxed about it now because everything is a bonus. When you are chasing something, there is a stress.”

Jonas is now at peace. That horrific night in Wales in 2018 is now firmly in the past. It looked over when Jonas was saved from further punishment by her trainer Joe Gallagher. An act of mercy that appeared to have closed the door on her entire career. But the Liverpool fighter regrouped and rebounded. A different fighter. A different mindset.

“My perspective of losing is now different. Nobody wants to lose, but carrying that 0 is added pressure. It becomes like a burden. I don’t fear losing at all. I fear more, not taking the opportunity.”

Photo Credit: Matchroom Boxing/Boxxer