The tennis ball, with a screwdriver and a gas stove in the kitchen.
This isn’t a weird Cluedo spin-off, just the unusual explanation behind some of the slick skills propelling one of the most highly rated young talents in British boxing.
Hopey Price, a rangy 10-0 southpaw who will box at featherweight for the first time on July 1 when he takes on James Beech Jr (15-4) for the WBA continental title, has impressed fans on social media by posting videos of him throwing combinations at a ball attached to his headband by a piece of elastic.
The routine was popularised by the great Vasiliy Lomachenko. Price is a huge admirer of the Ukrainian lightweight star but told The Sporting News his use of the technique comes back to homespun innovation rather than imitation.
“Lomachenko has done it for a lot of years but it’s something that I’ve done since being a kid,” he said. “I remember my dad coming home once. He literally brought a tennis ball home, warmed the end of a screwdriver up on the gas cooker and punched it through.
I was like, ‘what’s this for’? At first it was hard. I used to tie it to a cap. I learned and just carried on. It’s a bit of fun but it’s also good for your concentration, hand-eye coordination and your reflexes. It’s something that I enjoy doing at the end of training and it looks good.”
Looking good is something that comes naturally to Price, who became Britain’s first-ever boxing gold medalist at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games before turning pro.
“I’m very, very realistic about my fighters but he’s someone that’s not really shown me he’s got a ceiling,” said trainer David Coldwell, who has led the likes of Tony Bellew and Jamie McDonnell to world honours.
“You test him, he passes the test. You chuck him in [sparring] with experienced world champions who are heavier, who are stronger and more of a bullying type and he copes with it. He copes with the problems that they give and then he starts implementing his own game.
“He does everything you want as a prospect. Then, on fight night, he’s so easy to deal with. There’s no nerves.”
Coldwell likens Price’s ice-cool mentality to former super middleweight world champion George Groves, who he worked with as part of Adam Booth’s training team at David Haye’s Haymaker Gym. It’s a lofty comparison and one that has held firm after a start to a professional career like no other.
Price made his debut on Anthony Crolla’s farewell undercard in Manchester in November 2019. A month later, he was on the bill in a purpose-build stadium in Diriyah, Saudi Arabia as Anthony Joshua beat Andy Ruiz Jr. to retain his world heavyweight titles. Three months after that, everything changed.
Boxing as a blue-riband prospect during the pandemic meant two outings in promoter Eddie Hearn’s childhood garden at Matchroom’s Brentwood HQ, either side of a slot at a deserted Wembley Arena.
“The weirdest one was Wembley Arena,” Price recalled. “When we boxed in the pandemic in the garden it was outside, you could still hear things, there was a bit of noise and it didn’t seem too bad.
“When you boxed in the arena it was just like fighting in an empty room. It was like sparring in this gym. There was no atmosphere. You get the win and obviously you’re buzzing, you’ve trained hard and it’s like ‘Where do I look? Where do I celebrate?’.”
There were no questions in that regard when Price stopped Zahid Hussain inside two rounds of a local derby in front of a hometown crowd at Leeds’ Headingley Stadium. Like his Wembley date, that was a fight on a Josh Warrington undercard.
Two-time IBF featherweight king Warrington became Leeds’ first world champion and is a beacon for boxing in a sport-mad city.
As the two share a promoter, Price has become a fixture on the 32-year-old’s undercards — a December 2022 bout against Jonathan Santana took place in mid-afternoon at the First Direct Arena before the big screens showed England’s World Cup defeat to France ahead of Warrington’s loss against Luis Alberto Lopez.
That can be chalked down as another surreal career experience for Price, although it also sharpened his focus on the end goal of being in position for Warrington to pass the torch.
“I believe that’s the way it’s going to go and I’ve always thought that from being a kid who’s gone and watched him when I was probably 11 or 12 in Leeds Arena,” he said. “I thought that then and I still believe. He’s had some tough fights, especially his last couple, and really, when you look at it he’s not got many fights left.
“Even if he goes to America and wins one or two more I believe he’s only got three fights left, maximum. This year is a building year to get everyone behind me and then the boxing carries on in Leeds, the torch passes to me. I’m the one headlining Leeds Arena and being top of the bill on these shows.
“We can win world titles again and keep the city a boxing city. I want to carry it on and then, in years to come, hopefully I inspire the younger generation and then it goes so on and so on.”
Those lofty ambitions are still some way down the line and Coldwell has the task of keeping the breaks on, for now at least.
“If I get my way, by the end of 2023 he’ll end up being 13-0. At 13-0, let him off the leash,” he said. “I’m not in a rush for him to go into big title showdowns. The other kids that are older or have had more fights than him, let them crack on doing what they’re doing. I’m not interested in that. When he gets to 13-0, he can fight anybody, I’m not bothered.
“Some of the most valuable experience Hopey has had is sparring people like [former featherweight world champion] Kid Galahad that have just got so many tricks and do so many things that you don’t see in normal sparring or in the normal fights you’re going to get as a young pro coming through. That’s what it’s about, soaking up that education.
“That’s what this kid does, he’s a phenomenal talent. He’s going to go up to super featherweight, lightweight. He’s just under 6ft, he could go all the way up to light welterweight this kid.”
In the meantime, Price can get on with honing those quicksilver skills. You can order a “reflex ball” on Amazon now, though, so there’s no need to murder any more tennis balls with a hot screwdriver.
Watch the full interview with Price and Coldwell below: