Tyson Fury tells Virgin Radio why he came out of retirement

Tyson Fury, AKA the Gypsy King was a guest on the Chris Evans Breakfast Show this morning.

He was there to talk about his third book, Gloves Off, which covers both his mental and physical battles, his family life and highlight moments during his time in the boxing industry.

In the book, Tyson talks candidly about the mental health struggles he has faced, particularly when making the decision to retire temporarily from the sport.

He told the Virgin Radio Breakfast host that last April, he thought that he would retire for good, but admitted he wasn’t ready for it.

“I retired for a few months, and I was very down – I went back to depression,” he said. “I know sooner or later I’m going to have to deal with it and get through it but what I’m going to do next time is have a full-time job to go into rather than just moping around thinking, ‘I used to be a boxer’.”

He added: “I think you learn with experience how to cope more with your mental health struggles. For me, I set short term goals, and I’ve got a really good routine that I stick to. I like to train daily, I like to eat well, just keep myself busy all the time from the moment I wake up in the morning till the moment I close my eyes. That’s the way I like it.”

It was this inability to sit still that got Tyson back into the ring when he retired in 2015. It only took three years before the Gypsy King was back and defending his title as Heavyweight Champion against Deontay Wilder.

Tyson recalls the moment he decided he was going to return to boxing which came after a Halloween party in 2018.

“I remember scrolling down Instagram while I was walking and I saw Deontay Wilder say in a video ‘It’s a pity that we never saw Tyson Fury vs. Wilder, and now he’s in a state, he’s a miss. He’ll never come back to boxing.’ And I thought, ‘I’m going to come back and I’m going to come back for you, son’,” he said.

The pair fought first in December 2018, which ended in a draw. They met again in 2020 and Tyson won, but Wilder took him to court and the pair had another rematch in 2021 where Fury succeeded once again. Tyson admits it was “against all odds” that he succeeded in the ring during those fights.

He also spoke to Chris about his personal life, which wasn’t plain sailing at the time either. He recalled that his daughter Athena, who was only a baby, was seriously ill and in hospital just before his fight with Wilder.

“There were times where we thought we lost her. Now she’s a perfectly healthy beautiful little girl and she’s obviously got a special part of the fighter in me.

“I only had four weeks training for that fight, the biggest fight of my life. I trained for four weeks and the week before that I was in the hospital in Liverpool laying on the hospital floor with a child who I don’t know if she’s coming or going. It was a tough time,” he added.

Of course there have been incredible moments in Tyson’s career, and Chris asked him which one in particular stands out?

“You know, I think the Wembley fight with 94,000 people recently in April after the Dillion White fight, he recalled. “Getting on stage and singing American Pie to everybody- it was just an epic moment. I’ll remember it forever.”

He joked: “It’s quite fitting because they had Ed Sheeran there and I sang to more people than him and I sang to more people than Adele.”

You can listen to The Chris Evans Breakfast Show with Sky, weekdays from 6:30am on Virgin Radio.