YOU never really know how someone is feeling.
Take Skye Nicolson. She appeared to have it all – the complete package and a world title over her shoulder, the WBC featherweight strap in green and gold. History and significance.
A shot at becoming undisputed wasn’t certain, but it was possible. Her target was Amanda Serrano. Nicolson, 12-1 (1 KO), had beaten her first 12 opponents with something to spare, but we never saw the very best of her. She was convinced she had the beating of Serrano, but the Puerto Rican has always had one eye on avenging her loss to Katie Taylor. July 11 will be Serrano’s third, and possibly final, attempt.
Nicolson held on to the hope, the vision of toppling the Puerto Rican warrior, but that idea vanished after 30 minutes in the ring with Tiara Brown in March.
Skye was back home in Australia, her first fight there in three years. Brown was a problem – up close and personal. She unsettled the champion during fight week, a painful itch Nicolson couldn’t shake. In the ring, Brown executed her game plan. Nicolson didn’t. Ten rounds. Fight over. And the new… Nicolson’s 11-month reign was over.
“It hit me very hard,” she says of her first professional loss, while speaking to Boxing News.
Nicolson is fulfilling media obligations in the build-up to her comeback fight. Pastures new at super-bantamweight, but featherweight remains an option. The Aussie returns tomorrow night in an eight-round bout at 124lbs, two above super-bantam and two below featherweight, against Carla Camila Campos Gonzales.
“I think it hit me harder than any loss or setback I’d ever experienced before in boxing,” she continues.
“I’ve definitely had my fair share of them. It didn’t hit me straight away. I put on a brave face. I was okay. I didn’t shed a tear, I think, for 24 hours. But it did really hurt me.
“I struggled mentally and emotionally for weeks. Not with losing – it’s a sport at the end of the day. Life’s so much bigger than boxing. We both came out healthy, and all of that. But it was different. I was so frustrated with myself because I allowed outside noise to affect how I performed and what I did in the ring. That was very hard to accept because I know I’m so much better than the account I gave of myself. That, for me, was the hardest pill to swallow.”
Nicolson has seen how some fighters respond to defeat, they change trainers or point fingers. For her, it was the opposite.
“I feel like I just took the whole blame for everything that happened, and, honestly, rightfully so,” she admits. “I was physically prepared. My team did their job. It was me and the inner work that I hadn’t done. Maybe partly from not knowing. Even before the March fight, I knew I wasn’t bringing the best out of myself in the ring.
“There have been mental blocks there. It’s been frustrating over the last couple of years, I’ll be doing these amazing performances in sparring and in the gym, and it’s not transferring into the ring. I feel like the warning signs were there.”
If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it – and Nicolson bought into that. She didn’t lose many rounds before Brown. Her opponents posed little threat. Raven Chapman seemed the likeliest test, but even ‘The Omen’ didn’t cause too many problems when they fought in October 2024. Nicolson won wide on the scorecards – business as usual.
But the Brown fight forced her to confront what was missing. Performing great in the gym but not in the ring is a difficult habit to break but one she has to.
At the AO Arena tomorrow night, Nicolson is in her first eight-round fight since June 2022. She’s 1/50 to beat Gonzales. On paper, it’s the ideal setting to bring her gym work to the ring and remind everyone what she can really do.
“We’re early on the card. There’s no pressure. We’re taking away all those outside noise things and literally just trying to put everything into practice that I’ve been working on since that last fight. So I’m really excited for that.”
Ask any fighter and they’ll tell you that mental preparation is just as important as physical. Nicolson’s defeat to Brown made her examine both sides. She wants to be the best version of herself and that means ticking every box. One of those boxes is now checked: she’s started working with a mindset coach.
“One of the first questions he asked me after the fight was, ‘How important do you think mental preparation is for a fight?’ I said, ‘After that last fight, 100%.’ Because I was 100% physically prepared. And then he asked, ‘So how much mental preparation did you do for the fight?’ And I said, ‘None.’”
The penny dropped.
“I sat with that for a bit. Hindsight is a beautiful thing, obviously. But if I could have done that fight week again, I would have done the [mental] work. I hadn’t prepared myself for the unknown. I wasn’t ready for things that could pop up and make me uncomfortable – things I hadn’t experienced before.
“And these are all things I’m working on now. To be a better athlete. To bring the best version of myself, no matter what happens. No matter what kind of mental warfare takes place in fight week, that I can go into the ring and be the best version of myself, and bring together everything I’ve done in my physical preparation.”
