Katie Taylor: I got into the sport as a 9 or 10-year-old. I just fell in love with the sport, and this is what I was born to do. [chuckles]

Amanda Serrano: A good thing is that I get to eat whatever I want. Well, not whatever I want. I get to eat some carbs. I love bread. God, I love bread. [chuckles]

[exciting music playing]

[grunts]

[panting]

[bell dings] 

Serrano: You have to find your passion.

[heavy rock music plays] 

Serrano: Being a Puerto Rican definitely helps me in my fights because we have such a small island, but incredible talent, great champions that came out of that island. And I love to fight. And I think you give Puerto Ricans that, they're — they're happy and they're satisfied. 

Taylor: Some of my heroes growing up would have been the likes of, uh, Sugar Ray Leonard, uh, Marco Antonio Barrera, Roberto Durán. And I want the big fights. I want to challenge myself against the best. I put my body through the trenches every single week. I want to put my country on the map. You have to commit to rigorous training. You're in a training camp, life can be very boring. All you're doing is training and resting. You don't really get much of a social life. It's just like this one athlete said, to become a successful boxer, obviously, when you're training so hard, you have to make sure that you rest as well. You're only as good as your rest at the end of the day. I think stuff like that is the absolute difference between a good boxer and a great boxer.

[panting] 

Serrano: Oh, you have to learn how to take some hits. Well, I definitely have a grade-A chin. [laughs] If you've seen my fights — if you've seen me fight, I go out there and I throw punches, and I get hit, I don't mind. The party don't start until I get a punch in the face. But I've been in there with men, and they've hit me with all they got, and I know I have a grade-A chin. 

Taylor: I do feel like I have a great chin. That's one of the reasons I've been able to spar with the boys throughout my whole, uh, career, is, uh, because I have a good chin. Any time I do get hit hard, all I'm thinking about is, uh, I'm gonna give that back. 

Serrano: You go in there, and — and you're fighting, obviously, you're getting punched in the face, and you need a good chin, especially if you're getting punched by me.

[dramatic drum beat plays] 

Taylor: You always have to get back up. I know that I have what it takes to win a tough fight. Nobody's gonna outwork me, and nobody's gonna show more heart than me. Make sure you enjoy your sport. I think it's really important to, obviously, enjoy what you're doing. I spend so much time in the gym, training, so it's important to enjoy it. 

Serrano: You can never give up. Being a woman boxer wasn't easy. Um, the struggle definitely was real. There was times where, as a team, we wanted to call it quits. We wanted to hang it up and say, "It's too hard. There's no light at the end of the tunnel. It's not worth it." But I don't know, something comes in me, and I'm like, "No, I trained too hard for this. This is my time." Boy, I don't know, we just did it for the love of the sport.

[dramatic music plays, ends]

[bell dings]