Former Olympian Tony Yoka has opened up about what it was like sharing the ring with fellow heavyweight Daniel Dubois.
Dubois has had an up-and-down few years inside the boxing ring. After plenty of early success, he had a setback loss against Joe Joyce but rebuilt and worked towards his first world title shot against Oleksandr Usyk.
That ended in a stoppage loss, but he rebuilt again with great KO victories over Jarrell Miller, Filip Hrgovic and then Anthony Joshua. Last time out in August 2025, he was stopped for a second time by Usyk and will be hoping no ring rust has built up in the meantime ahead of his WBO world title fight with Fabio Wardley in April.
Speaking to Playbook Boxing, Yoka – who trains under Don Charles with the British heavyweight – went into detail about his gym sessions with ‘DDD’.
“I sparred with Daniel before his fight with Hrgovic, before his fight with Joshua, and we will spar again in the next few weeks. It’s top-level sparring for him and for me. The first day we went in the ring, the whole gym shut down, and afterwards, Daniel said, ‘Put him in the ring more, it’s good sparring for us.’
“He’s at least in my top three [hardest punchers]. The first time I sparred with him was in 2015, back in Sheffield. I was sparring Joshua, Frazer Clarke, then a little 15-year-old kid and he was punching hard, and it was Daniel.”
Dubois will be hoping to find his best form for the fight with Wardley, who has knocked out Justi Huni and Joseph Parker in his last two fights and is known to carry power late in a fight despite often being behind on the cards.
As for Yoka, he is gearing up for a shot at the WBC interim belt against Lawrence Okolie.
