Amir Khan has suggested that he could have been an even better boxer if it were not for one career-long habit.
As well as winning a silver medal at the 2004 Olympics, Khan also became one of Britain’s youngest world champions when he won the WBA title at the age of 22.
Despite his success, Khan hinted that he could have been even better.
He revealed: “I think people know or don’t know that I smoked shisha all my life.
“All my boxing career I’ve been smoking shisha.
“Maybe it would have made me a better boxer, but it is just one of those things, I have always been smoking it.
“I wish I didn’t smoke it but it was one of those things that I used to do and maybe stop like a couple of weeks before a fight.”
Nevertheless, Amir Khan managed to retire with a record of 34 wins and six losses.
His losses came at the hands of Breidis Prescott, Lamont Peterson, Danny Garcia, Saul ‘Canelo’ Alvarez, Terence Crawford and Kell Brook.
Khan’s loss to Crawford was a controversial one as he was hit was a low blow. The contest was ultimately ended, giving Crawford the TKO victory.
Critics accused Amir Khan of giving up but the Bolton boxer revealed the effects of the punch.
Speaking to Daily Star Sport, Khan said:
“You know when I met him, he even said to me: ‘you were tough enough to stand back up after that’, because he knew.
“Obviously, we’ve become friends after that.
“But, you know, I felt that in my throat. Honestly, I’m not gonna lie to you like I couldn’t even swallow my spit. I mean, it was that painful, and it was a slow pain and it wouldn’t go.
“You know when you think you’ve been hit with something with the nerves there and it disappears, the pain disappears?
“Well, mate, that pain [didn’t]. I’ve never felt anything like it before. I’ve been knocked out, I’ve been cut, but that pain was something else.
“I felt it through the stomach to literally my mouth and my throat.”
“It was the most painful shot I’ve ever been hit with. I would rather be knocked out. I had to keep my face straight, so I’d rather get knocked out instead of being hit there.
“I was p***ing blood out, I had swellings around there as well, you know what I mean? It was really bad.
“It was hurting me every time I went for a p***. One side of it, where the cut was, it pushed in and it dug right into me.
“I had a small, little swelling and bruise down there, but that went down after about four or five days.
“The main thing was when I was going for a pee. It was very hard to go for a p***.
“So I was not even drinking that much because I did not want to go to the toilet – I was scared to go to the toilet because it hurt that much.”
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