LONDON — Anthony Yarde has warned David Benavidez he is punching harder than ever after employing a strength and conditioning coach for the first time in his career.

Yarde (27-3, 24 KOs) challenges the Mexican Monster for his WBC light-heavyweight title in the main event of The Ring IV card at ANB Arena, Riyadh on November 22.

Undefeated Benavidez is a huge favourite to retain his title against his challenger from east London, who has tried and failed in world title attempts against both Sergey Kovalev and Artur Beterbiev.

But in a bid to cause an upset this time around, 34-year-old Yarde has finally decided to properly integrate strength and conditioning training into his camp - and he is already feeling the benefits.

“I’ve never done it before in my career,” Yarde tells The Ring.

“We did around four weeks before the Lyndon Arthur fight in April but this is the first time I’ve ever had a proper camp.

“If you look at my career, I started boxing late so it has always been trial and error or playing catch-up. But now we thought the time was right to adopt it.”

Yarde and head trainer Tunde Ajayi decided to turn to renowned sports performance expert Ruben Tabares, who has worked alongside the likes of former world champions David Haye and George Groves among many others.

The pair train together during the mornings in south London before Yarde heads east for his boxing sessions with Ajayi.

He said: “I’m already feeling the benefits in my boxing training. I feel like I’m punching harder than ever and I feel physically stronger for sure.

“My sparring has been excellent and even on the days where I feel physically fatigued I’m dealing with it better than I used to.

“Now my body feels more conditioned. It has been physically demanding and it’s only going to get harder now. I’m always up for challenges.

“Me and Ruben have had our back and forths too. If we disagree with each other we talk it out. I just love growth and that’s what I feel I’m doing.”

The pair tested the waters together ahead of Yarde’s last fight, when he beat Lyndon Arthur on points as part of The Ring’s Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves event headlined by Chris Eubank Jr’s victory over Conor Benn on April 26.

Now they are midway through an exhaustive 12-week programme ahead of the Benavidez fight and Yarde believes, despite his age and experience levels as a professional athlete, he has been enjoying some ‘newbie gains’.

“Oh definitely,” he says. “I know it’s not usual for someone to start this late but then again my career isn’t usual. Why not try and do things that make me great? That’s what this is all about.

“There was only so much we could get done in those few weeks before the Arthur fight but now we are fully into it and this is the first real programme.

“We have a chance to understand each other more and I’m enjoying it but the only time we get to really see the results is on fight night.

“For me I’ve always thought S&C is not boxing. But now when I do my research I see that even people like Sugar Ray Robinson were doing strength and conditioning. Maybe he wasn’t doing it how we see it now but it was a form of S&C.

“Mike Tyson did strength and conditioning with Cus D’Amato too. He was doing weights or doing his neck stuff. It’s all part of it.

"It worked for them so now it's time to make it work for me."